I realized as soon as I heard the phrase, create or save when it comes to jobs I knew something was up. I was surprised that it took several months before the press began to question this. I soon came to understand that the saved jobs would be state employees and this would be done by giving federal dollars to states so they would not have to lay off anyone, thus saving jobs. The fact that most of these people are members of the public employees union was part of the plan. Another part of the stimulus was spent on extending unemployment benefits. Another part was tax credits in the form of $400 to each worker and another $400 to the spouse of a worker. This is the tax break to 95% of all Americans that Obama speaks of. The problem with all of this spending is that it is a very inefficient way to create jobs. Here is just one example.
The results of a 1.5 billion dollar grant to the state of Florida Education Dept.
Jobs Summary: The number of jobs reported represents the calculation of full-time equivalent positions (FTE) as required by federal instructions. The number of jobs (FTEs) saved during this quarter was 12393.41 and the number of jobs (FTEs) created was 803.13. The number of actual jobs (full- and part-time) saved for this period was 18042 and the number of actual jobs (full- and part-time) created was 2934. The majority of the jobs saved and created related to instruction or instructional support. Types of jobs included but were not limited to adjunct faculty, faculty, classroom teachers, school-based administrators, clerical personnel, instructional aides, librarians/media specialists, career specialists, supervisors, and paraprofessionals. (Total jobs reported: 13,197)
Note the saved jobs were 18,042 and created jobs 2934 and of course some of these created jobs are part time.
Now the president is talking about tax credits to small businesses for hiring new employees. This shows how little he understands business. No business person is going to hire a new employee to get a $5,000 tax credit. They will begin to hire when the demand for their product increases and they have some assurance that the government will not pass laws that hurt their business, laws like cap and trade and health care.
While the federal government can effectively save jobs it can only create jobs in a most inefficient manner.
Thursday, December 23, 2010
robots
Our economy will eventually turn around in spite of the government interference but then what. The US has always been a leader in innovation and will continue to be, but there is a foreboding change on the horizon. In today’s world when a new idea is put forth it is patented and then production is moved to some cheap labor market outside the country. We cannot lower our wages here to compete with China and it will be many years until they catch up to our wage scale. So what is the answer? I suggest we concentrate on robotics to produce our new innovations. It requires a high tech, highly education work force to product robots and robots work for even less than Chinese. Lesser trained individuals are still needed to build the robot factories and then the additional facilities to produce the new products. The Chinese can continue to make our TV’s and Gym shoes but we will be making the advanced products of the next generation.
And that is all I have to say about that.
And that is all I have to say about that.
Jobs
Friday, February 05, 2010
Hi All,
While the federal government does not have to balance its budget the states do. For fiscal 2010 the states are facing a 35 billion dollar deficit, with California and Illinois leading the way with 6 and 5 billion respectively. One of the major expenses that the states face is the benefits for public employees.
Here is a quote from a Time Magazine article from 2005.
All pensions and health-care plans are not created equal. At the same time millions of workers in private industry have lost the benefits they once thought they had for life, another group is doing quite nicely, secure in the knowledge that their benefits are protected forever--not by some government agency, but directly by you, the taxpayer.
To understand how this happened consider that you own a company and your employees belong to a union. When you sit down to negotiate you are working with your money. Even if you manage a public company you are working with stockholder monies and you know that your job is on the line if your dividend is reduced. On the other hand if you are a county commissioner negotiating with the public employees you are using tax payer money not yours or the stockholders. The net result of this over time has been better benefits for public employees.
Much of the stimulus money that the government has spent in this past year has gone to states so that they can keep from laying off state employees. As the situation deteriorates the states will need more money and it is my guess that the president will pay off the above mentioned 35 billion using money from the stimulus.
The states will learn from this that they can overspend and fall back on the federal government to bail them out just as the too big to fail banks figured out the same idea.
The long term results of this will be more and more public sector jobs and fewer private sector jobs. Even today the public job salaries average $70,000 per year while private jobs average $40,000. The future will bring more government jobs and fewer private sector jobs. This is not sustainable since government jobs do not produce products and under our economic system all long term growth comes from private employers
John aka Jack
Hi All,
While the federal government does not have to balance its budget the states do. For fiscal 2010 the states are facing a 35 billion dollar deficit, with California and Illinois leading the way with 6 and 5 billion respectively. One of the major expenses that the states face is the benefits for public employees.
Here is a quote from a Time Magazine article from 2005.
All pensions and health-care plans are not created equal. At the same time millions of workers in private industry have lost the benefits they once thought they had for life, another group is doing quite nicely, secure in the knowledge that their benefits are protected forever--not by some government agency, but directly by you, the taxpayer.
To understand how this happened consider that you own a company and your employees belong to a union. When you sit down to negotiate you are working with your money. Even if you manage a public company you are working with stockholder monies and you know that your job is on the line if your dividend is reduced. On the other hand if you are a county commissioner negotiating with the public employees you are using tax payer money not yours or the stockholders. The net result of this over time has been better benefits for public employees.
Much of the stimulus money that the government has spent in this past year has gone to states so that they can keep from laying off state employees. As the situation deteriorates the states will need more money and it is my guess that the president will pay off the above mentioned 35 billion using money from the stimulus.
The states will learn from this that they can overspend and fall back on the federal government to bail them out just as the too big to fail banks figured out the same idea.
The long term results of this will be more and more public sector jobs and fewer private sector jobs. Even today the public job salaries average $70,000 per year while private jobs average $40,000. The future will bring more government jobs and fewer private sector jobs. This is not sustainable since government jobs do not produce products and under our economic system all long term growth comes from private employers
John aka Jack
Don't ask
Wednesday, February 03, 2010
Hi All,
Since 9/11 I have been going to a Middle East chat room, ostensibly to learn more about the culture there and I learned a lot of unexpected stuff. For one thing I had to change my nick name since I was using jenemn which is my and my wife’s initials and many thought that was a female name. Now in chat rooms there are lots of young guys looking for girls so they were always hitting on me so I changed my nick to jack and that stopped but then gay guys would contact me. For those of you who do not frequent chat rooms, the way you know this is that a person comes into the room and sends you a message of asl. By this they are asking age, sex and location. When you see that, many times it is some guy on the prowl, gay or otherwise. On a number of occasions when the issue of gays in the military was in the news, I would ask these guys if they were gay and if they were I would ask them if showering with other men would be sexually exciting for them and most answered that it would be. That gave me some concern about changing the don’t ask don’t tell rule but I wanted to investigate further and discovered the following. While I think that the love between two men is a wonderful thing and the world would be a better place if we had more of that, when it comes to the intimacy of this type of relationship I get a little uncomfortable. I am not alone in this matter and I can prove it. Everyday on the soaps and most nights in prime time TV you can see a man and women in bed and most of us don’t think much of it. Now let us see such a scene with two men scantily clothed, in bed, rubbing each other and open mouth kissing and you can bet that most people would find that not only uncomfortable but bordering on disgusting. It is my contention that we have come along way in understanding homosexuality but we still have a way to go before the general public is completely at ease.
There is a good argument for dispensing with the don’t ask rule as many militaries around the world including England and Australia have no such rule and they seem to have adjusted. There is no reason why we cannot also adjust but I believe they should move gradually in this direction. The current situation of just sticking our heads in the sand is not a viable long term solution but changing should be accomplished with sensitivity to the problem that many in the military would face. Many of the talking heads on TV would not care much for taking a group shower knowing that there were gay people in the room but they are strongly oppose the don’t ask policy. It is always easy to take the high road when the consequences only affect others.
I believe we will get rid of don’t ask but it will not be for several years and when that time comes the old policy will fade into the past and we will all move on.
Jack or John whatever
Hi All,
Since 9/11 I have been going to a Middle East chat room, ostensibly to learn more about the culture there and I learned a lot of unexpected stuff. For one thing I had to change my nick name since I was using jenemn which is my and my wife’s initials and many thought that was a female name. Now in chat rooms there are lots of young guys looking for girls so they were always hitting on me so I changed my nick to jack and that stopped but then gay guys would contact me. For those of you who do not frequent chat rooms, the way you know this is that a person comes into the room and sends you a message of asl. By this they are asking age, sex and location. When you see that, many times it is some guy on the prowl, gay or otherwise. On a number of occasions when the issue of gays in the military was in the news, I would ask these guys if they were gay and if they were I would ask them if showering with other men would be sexually exciting for them and most answered that it would be. That gave me some concern about changing the don’t ask don’t tell rule but I wanted to investigate further and discovered the following. While I think that the love between two men is a wonderful thing and the world would be a better place if we had more of that, when it comes to the intimacy of this type of relationship I get a little uncomfortable. I am not alone in this matter and I can prove it. Everyday on the soaps and most nights in prime time TV you can see a man and women in bed and most of us don’t think much of it. Now let us see such a scene with two men scantily clothed, in bed, rubbing each other and open mouth kissing and you can bet that most people would find that not only uncomfortable but bordering on disgusting. It is my contention that we have come along way in understanding homosexuality but we still have a way to go before the general public is completely at ease.
There is a good argument for dispensing with the don’t ask rule as many militaries around the world including England and Australia have no such rule and they seem to have adjusted. There is no reason why we cannot also adjust but I believe they should move gradually in this direction. The current situation of just sticking our heads in the sand is not a viable long term solution but changing should be accomplished with sensitivity to the problem that many in the military would face. Many of the talking heads on TV would not care much for taking a group shower knowing that there were gay people in the room but they are strongly oppose the don’t ask policy. It is always easy to take the high road when the consequences only affect others.
I believe we will get rid of don’t ask but it will not be for several years and when that time comes the old policy will fade into the past and we will all move on.
Jack or John whatever
China
Tuesday, February 02, 2010
Hi All,
On a regular basis we hear that the Chinese government now owns much of the US foreign debt and there is the underlying threat that they could somehow bring down the US. I am not sure how they would do this but I am well aware that much of the Chinese economy depends on US consumers. In the current recession our imports from China are down 20% from 2006 and 2007. If our economy goes in the tank then consumers will no longer be going to Walmart and China will be hurt. When we have a recession here people suffer but in China the people would riot. I believe China has a vested interest in our economic success and these arguments about China bringing us down are highly exaggerated.
Jack , John Novick
Hi All,
On a regular basis we hear that the Chinese government now owns much of the US foreign debt and there is the underlying threat that they could somehow bring down the US. I am not sure how they would do this but I am well aware that much of the Chinese economy depends on US consumers. In the current recession our imports from China are down 20% from 2006 and 2007. If our economy goes in the tank then consumers will no longer be going to Walmart and China will be hurt. When we have a recession here people suffer but in China the people would riot. I believe China has a vested interest in our economic success and these arguments about China bringing us down are highly exaggerated.
Jack , John Novick
Fed
Monday, February 01, 2010
Hi All,
I want to use my experience with Equitable Life of New York to explain what transpired in the recent profits made by the Federal Reserve. A big insurance company like Equitable has its assets in two major areas. The first called Separate Accounts is where the investors have their money in things like pension plans. This money is separate from the company and any gains or losses are passed on to the investors. The company makes money by managing these accounts. The second is called the General Fund and this is where the assets that protect the life insurance policies are kept. These monies are invested in conservative things like bonds and mortgages. Back in the 80’s when Equitable received a billion dollars from a French company called AXA they had to place a value on the General Fund to determine how much of the company the billion dollars would buy. The first step was to appraise all the real estate and this was a major undertaking. AXA invested $20 million to have these properties appraised and this leads me to a concept called Mark to Market. At that time it was a common practice for companies like Equitable to hold the value of mortgages on the books at the original price. This meant that if the value of the property increased the value on the books was understated and the reverse. Many large insurance companies took advantage of this by making selected adjustments to the book value of various properties. At that time Equitable had about 60 billion in mortgages on the books and they owed about 58 billion on these which meant they had about 2 billion available to back up their insurance claims. Now they had over 100 billion in outstanding life insurance policies but 2 billion was considered adequate to back these up. The trouble began when some companies would re-appraise properties that they knew had increased in value and up date the book values accordingly. This would increase the amount available to protect the life policies. All of this information was forwarded to insurance rating companies like AM Best and S&P and they used this information to determine the relative strength of the insurance companies. The rating companies could hardly spend 20 million to appraise the Equitable properties and so they had to accept the values given to them. Some companies were not as honest as Equitable and so the ratings given by the rating companies did not have much value. One of the companies that fudged the books on this appraisal process was Mutual of New York and they were rated as triple A, the highest rating available, the week before they went bankrupt.
In an attempt to correct this, the government changed the law and companies had to follow what is called Mark to Market accounting. This meant that all assets had to be held on the books at current market value. This remained the law until the spring of 2009 when the Mark to Market idea was suspended. Recall at that time the banks had lots of bad mortgages on the books and they had to lower the value of those mortgages. Once Mark to Market was suspended the banks could allow the value of those assets to remain on the books at the original value and this helped the bank balance sheet to look better.
The question remains as to how the Fed made $50 billion last year and since no one is allowed to see their books we can only guess what happened and I offer my guess. In a nutshell I think it is all paper profit. The Fed can use money credits from the Treasury and purchase mortgage bundles from the banks and just put a credit on the banks balance sheet and then re-assess the value of these assets higher and put that on their books as profits and then return the money to the Treasury and all this without using any real money.
At this time no one has revealed just how the Fed made all of these profits and I am waiting for their explanation which may not ever come unless the congress demands that they open the books. Don’t hold your breath.
Jack (John) Novick
Hi All,
I want to use my experience with Equitable Life of New York to explain what transpired in the recent profits made by the Federal Reserve. A big insurance company like Equitable has its assets in two major areas. The first called Separate Accounts is where the investors have their money in things like pension plans. This money is separate from the company and any gains or losses are passed on to the investors. The company makes money by managing these accounts. The second is called the General Fund and this is where the assets that protect the life insurance policies are kept. These monies are invested in conservative things like bonds and mortgages. Back in the 80’s when Equitable received a billion dollars from a French company called AXA they had to place a value on the General Fund to determine how much of the company the billion dollars would buy. The first step was to appraise all the real estate and this was a major undertaking. AXA invested $20 million to have these properties appraised and this leads me to a concept called Mark to Market. At that time it was a common practice for companies like Equitable to hold the value of mortgages on the books at the original price. This meant that if the value of the property increased the value on the books was understated and the reverse. Many large insurance companies took advantage of this by making selected adjustments to the book value of various properties. At that time Equitable had about 60 billion in mortgages on the books and they owed about 58 billion on these which meant they had about 2 billion available to back up their insurance claims. Now they had over 100 billion in outstanding life insurance policies but 2 billion was considered adequate to back these up. The trouble began when some companies would re-appraise properties that they knew had increased in value and up date the book values accordingly. This would increase the amount available to protect the life policies. All of this information was forwarded to insurance rating companies like AM Best and S&P and they used this information to determine the relative strength of the insurance companies. The rating companies could hardly spend 20 million to appraise the Equitable properties and so they had to accept the values given to them. Some companies were not as honest as Equitable and so the ratings given by the rating companies did not have much value. One of the companies that fudged the books on this appraisal process was Mutual of New York and they were rated as triple A, the highest rating available, the week before they went bankrupt.
In an attempt to correct this, the government changed the law and companies had to follow what is called Mark to Market accounting. This meant that all assets had to be held on the books at current market value. This remained the law until the spring of 2009 when the Mark to Market idea was suspended. Recall at that time the banks had lots of bad mortgages on the books and they had to lower the value of those mortgages. Once Mark to Market was suspended the banks could allow the value of those assets to remain on the books at the original value and this helped the bank balance sheet to look better.
The question remains as to how the Fed made $50 billion last year and since no one is allowed to see their books we can only guess what happened and I offer my guess. In a nutshell I think it is all paper profit. The Fed can use money credits from the Treasury and purchase mortgage bundles from the banks and just put a credit on the banks balance sheet and then re-assess the value of these assets higher and put that on their books as profits and then return the money to the Treasury and all this without using any real money.
At this time no one has revealed just how the Fed made all of these profits and I am waiting for their explanation which may not ever come unless the congress demands that they open the books. Don’t hold your breath.
Jack (John) Novick
Obama
Friday, January 29, 2010
Hi All,
I was watching Hilary Clinton and she said she was an old time progressive. I know that since the Reagan era that the word liberal has come under attack and many democrats have started calling themselves progressives. I decided to do some research to find out more about these names and discovered some interesting things. First off, the word liberal as used by the founders meant someone who would follow the constitution and champion the rights of the individual. The constitution is filled with limitations on government so as to protect the individual from an oppressive government which is what the revolution was all about. This worked fine until a Republican president Theodore Roosevelt and a Democratic president Woodrow Wilson felt the constitution needed some improvement. They felt that individuals needed help from the government in determining how they lived their lives. These two presidents set the stage for the Progressive movement that became popular in the early part of the century. Over a 20 plus year period they made some changes that they thought would improve the lives of individuals at the expense of individual freedoms and in time the people objected and the Progressives went underground and they became the new liberals but their brand of liberalism was much different. Some of the changes they brought about were the income tax, the League of Nations and prohibition.
The progressive ideas remained hidden until FDR came along and he was the next to bring these ideas to life. He too did not like all of the restrictions that the constitution placed on government so he decided he wanted a second Bill of Rights where the government would replace individual responsibility. He wanted the government to guarantee the right to have a job, the right to have a home, the right to have health care, the right to an education and the right to recreation. He ran into some problems with the courts and tried to stack the court with judges who thought more like he did but he was not able to pull this off. He wanted congress to pass a law stating that all judges over age 71 had to retire and he wanted six new judges added to the court but the congress would not go along with him.
After FDR passed the progressive movement once again went under cover only to come alive again when President Clinton tried to bring about universal health care but it died on the vine.
Today there is some interest in President Obama’s ideas on the constitution as he has said he is not comfortable with the restrictions it places on the federal government. He feels somewhat like FDR in that the constitution should allow the federal government to confer more rights to individuals. He is a kind of modern version of the progressive.
Thomas Jefferson said, "The two enemies of the people are criminals and government, so let us tie the second down with the chains of the Constitution so the second will not become the legalized version of the first." Is progressivism breaking the chains?
This is the concern of those who are trying to figure out what President Obama is all about. Finding out what makes him tick should have been done before the election but the press was so enamored with his oratory they left that little detail to be investigated after the election. Now many are asking themselves the question, what is this guy all about?
Jack Novick
Hi All,
I was watching Hilary Clinton and she said she was an old time progressive. I know that since the Reagan era that the word liberal has come under attack and many democrats have started calling themselves progressives. I decided to do some research to find out more about these names and discovered some interesting things. First off, the word liberal as used by the founders meant someone who would follow the constitution and champion the rights of the individual. The constitution is filled with limitations on government so as to protect the individual from an oppressive government which is what the revolution was all about. This worked fine until a Republican president Theodore Roosevelt and a Democratic president Woodrow Wilson felt the constitution needed some improvement. They felt that individuals needed help from the government in determining how they lived their lives. These two presidents set the stage for the Progressive movement that became popular in the early part of the century. Over a 20 plus year period they made some changes that they thought would improve the lives of individuals at the expense of individual freedoms and in time the people objected and the Progressives went underground and they became the new liberals but their brand of liberalism was much different. Some of the changes they brought about were the income tax, the League of Nations and prohibition.
The progressive ideas remained hidden until FDR came along and he was the next to bring these ideas to life. He too did not like all of the restrictions that the constitution placed on government so he decided he wanted a second Bill of Rights where the government would replace individual responsibility. He wanted the government to guarantee the right to have a job, the right to have a home, the right to have health care, the right to an education and the right to recreation. He ran into some problems with the courts and tried to stack the court with judges who thought more like he did but he was not able to pull this off. He wanted congress to pass a law stating that all judges over age 71 had to retire and he wanted six new judges added to the court but the congress would not go along with him.
After FDR passed the progressive movement once again went under cover only to come alive again when President Clinton tried to bring about universal health care but it died on the vine.
Today there is some interest in President Obama’s ideas on the constitution as he has said he is not comfortable with the restrictions it places on the federal government. He feels somewhat like FDR in that the constitution should allow the federal government to confer more rights to individuals. He is a kind of modern version of the progressive.
Thomas Jefferson said, "The two enemies of the people are criminals and government, so let us tie the second down with the chains of the Constitution so the second will not become the legalized version of the first." Is progressivism breaking the chains?
This is the concern of those who are trying to figure out what President Obama is all about. Finding out what makes him tick should have been done before the election but the press was so enamored with his oratory they left that little detail to be investigated after the election. Now many are asking themselves the question, what is this guy all about?
Jack Novick
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