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The right to life, liberty and an equal share of luck is what differentiates us Americans from the rest of the riffraff that squats on this planet of ours.
– From the desk of the Secretary of the Luck re-distributing office.

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[quote=walterwhite]I feel more testisteroney when I make money.[/quote]
It’s not you, it is the forces of evolution, my friend!
You feel that way because making more money ends up making you more valuable to your mate. And you might get a lil’ something in return that evening.
20,000 years ago you would have felt that way when you brought in an extra chunk of meat from hunting…the meat just got replaced by money.

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Maybe what I am going to say might sound rude and insensitive; I am trying to put words carefully, so bear with me.

What kind of a person/family would make a decision to have or not have children based on economy? We all know economy gets better or worse in cycles, if things are good today, they will get relatively worse tomorrow….if things are bad today, they will get relatively better tomorrow.
Making a decision to have a child simply based on current economy makes no sense. Is this a correlation observed by the demographers or do you guys think that it is a causation i.e. where women/couples are deciding not to have children based on S&P 500?

It is not like civilization is going to end….and animals are going to come in and eat your kids. There will still be schools, parks and fun things to do. Maybe you have to get a little colder in winter and warmer in summer to save money. Maybe you have to cut vacations to save on gas bill, but deciding not to have children?

On the other hand, say, once you have a child and the economy gets worse what would you do? Return the child back to where he/she came from? Or do all couples who make children are doing it under assumption that the economy only keeps getting better from that point of time?

I hope the demographers are using this correlation to derive causation and are wrong with the reasoning. If not, it reflects worse on thinking process of American couples/women of child bearing age.

pri_dk, thanks for posting this. Interesting chart. By the way, I could also interpret the chart as migration from farmlands to cities. The green bubbles are essentially where the large metro areas are today irrespective of coasts or inland.

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Indians are not caucasians either.

[quote=ocrenter][quote=Tickles][quote=dumbrenter]Indians are not Asians.

[/quote]

Really? What are we then?[/quote]

apparently you guys are suppose to be caucasians because of the influx of Aryans from the middle east a few thousand years ago. :)[/quote]

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Indians are not Asians.

[quote=AN][quote=ocrenter][quote=walterwhite]Did people used to say this stuff about the Jews?[/quote]

The scary thing about that is there are over a billion Asians…[/quote]
Try about 3 billions :-). ~1.4B Chinese, ~1.4B Indians, and all the other Asian countries will push it over 3B.[/quote]

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I pay IT consultants for their services and always thought their rates are too high for what they do. The worst are the IT service companies.
Agree about rates plummeting since ’07 but I am not complaining.
I know it is not a politically correct thing to say these days, but I wish the government does nothing about it. Actually, I am betting on MSFT, GOOG, QCOM and AAPL lobbying to make sure government does nothing about it.

[quote=kev374]I haven’t got a raise since 2007, I work in IT as a Sr. Software Consultant.

Actually the contracts rates have plummeted around 10% since ’07 but somehow I have managed to hold on to what I was making BUT that means in REAL terms my pay has actually fallen 10-20% in the last 4 years.

THANK off shoring and L1 visa abuse for that. The problem is getting worse with IT wages falling and the HUGE influx of cheap L1 labor, the government does nothing about this.

The lucky ones are the full time employees of companies that have managed to avoid layoffs, they have gotten cost of living raises over the years and it’s become so out of wack that at the company I work the total compensation package of full timers now exceeds what consultants make![/quote]

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[quote=briansd1][quote=dumbrenter][quote=SD Realtor]Is there any other endgame?

Yes, it is basically a lower standard of living for those that cannot keep up as well as more time spent keeping up by those who are in the middle.

It is simply a slow process. In terms you like to use, you work then you die. Now you just work harder, have less, then you die.[/quote]

This is one thing that economists / analysts never tell even though I am sure they knew it all along. One of the effects of globalization will be that in longer term, there will have to be some sort of equalization of standard of living. This means that those living in one country whose people have a way higher standard of living compared to the rest will have to give up some.[/quote]

That’s not how it works.

Globalization will result in more parity, but we can get richer still, at a lower growth rate, while developing countries catch up to us, at a faster rate, That’s actually very good for the world.

I think the psychological discomfort is that we, Americans, are no longer wildly richer than that rest of the world.

One example. In the past, Americans were use to new immigrants being the tired, poor, huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse. Now many immigrants come to the best universties and drive luxury cars to class. They get H1B visas and buy houses in Carmel Valley and 4S Ranch. Some Americans think that’s “wrong.”

There’s globaliztion of knowledge and capital. That’s just how it it works.[/quote]

If you are an economist or an analyst, you just made my point.
If other countries have to match America’s lifestyle, their growth rates have to be in mid-teens to even have a realistic chance of catching up. How soon do you think that is going to happen? How is it even mathematically possible? And who is growing in mid-teens now?
The fact is that the Americans quality of life is going down for a few years, the parity is going to happen alright, but while other countries grow faster, we have to give up some.

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[quote=walterwhite]Sounds unamerican.[/quote]
Which one is it that is unamerican? Working or Dying?
I’ll have to stop working till I figure this out. Hate to be unamerican.

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[quote=SD Realtor]Is there any other endgame?

Yes, it is basically a lower standard of living for those that cannot keep up as well as more time spent keeping up by those who are in the middle.

It is simply a slow process. In terms you like to use, you work then you die. Now you just work harder, have less, then you die.[/quote]

This is one thing that economists / analysts never tell even though I am sure they knew it all along. One of the effects of globalization will be that in longer term, there will have to be some sort of equalization of standard of living. This means that those living in one country whose people have a way higher standard of living compared to the rest will have to give up some.

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How different is American steel from other steel? Does it have any special juice or carbon concoction? Just curious.
I thought practically all new ore is going to China while most steel here is recycled and reused.

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[quote=DomoArigato]

By ‘retire’ the debt, I meant that the Fed would just print whatever money they need to buy the debt. The Fed wouldn’t incur any losses because they would be buying the debt with money that they had printed.[/quote]

The printing of money is done by Treasury, not the Fed. I could be wrong though, I keep getting them mixed up.

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[quote=Veritas]We should have let Patton kick their ass in 1945, then we would not have this problem.[/quote]

Yeah right…for all his bull*&^%, Patton would have most probably got his ass handed to him by Zukhov.

Time makes people look greater by glossing over their weaknesses, but do not forget Patton was not liked by anybody, even Americans. This guy was one failure away from being fired….very brilliant but demonstrated a good reason why generals should never be trusted with long-term strategy issues.

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[quote=Veritas]We should have let Patton kick their ass in 1945, then we would not have this problem.[/quote]

Yeah right…for all his bull*&^%, Patton would have most probably got his ass handed to him by Zukhov.

Time makes people look greater by glossing over their weaknesses, but do not forget Patton was not liked by anybody, even Americans. This guy was one failure away from being fired….very brilliant but demonstrated a good reason why generals should never be trusted with long-term strategy issues.

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[quote=Veritas]We should have let Patton kick their ass in 1945, then we would not have this problem.[/quote]

Yeah right…for all his bull*&^%, Patton would have most probably got his ass handed to him by Zukhov.

Time makes people look greater by glossing over their weaknesses, but do not forget Patton was not liked by anybody, even Americans. This guy was one failure away from being fired….very brilliant but demonstrated a good reason why generals should never be trusted with long-term strategy issues.

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