[ExI] Economy: "The Big Takeover".

[BillK]

On 3/31/09, John K Clark wrote:
>  But NOT during the last 3 of the Clinton years.
>
> http://archives.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/stories/09/27/clinton.surplus/
>
>  Anyway, at a time like now the last thing on earth you'd want to do is
> balance the budget. Hoover did it and turned a garden variety recession into
> a decade long worldwide depression.
>


That's what I said.  Clinton held the national debt just about level.
And if you take it as a percentage of GDP then Clinton actually
reduced the national debt for a few years.

You'll have to come back in ten years and see if we've had a ten-year
depression (or worse).
At present the powers that be seem to be making policy up as they go
along with not much idea about what the effects will be. (Apart from
the immediate effect of looking after their millionaire banker
friends).

Note that GM CEO's can be sacked, because any idiot can run a car
company into the ground. But international bank CEO's cannot be sacked
because it takes the best brains in the country to run a bank into the
ground.

If you ask 100 economists, you'll get 100 different opinions.
But I suspect that for the next few years, there will be a lot of
people exclaiming, 'Well, I never thought that would happen!'


BillK