From HousingWire:
77% of refinancing homeowners reduce or maintain mortgage amount
Freddie Mac says 77% of homeowners who refinanced first-lien mortgages in the second quarter either reduced principal loan amounts or maintained the same loan value while benefiting from historically low interest rates.
Of those who refinanced, 51% ended up with the same loan amount, while 26% lowered their principal balance in 2Q, according to second-quarter refinance analysis from Freddie Mac.
Meanwhile, the median interest rate reduction for a 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage was about one percentage point, or an interest rate savings of 18%. Those same borrowers will save about $1,550 in interest payments on a $200,000 loan during the first year of the refinanced loan’s life, Freddie said.
“Savvy homeowners are taking advantage of some of the lowest fixed-rates in more than 50 years to lock in interest savings,” said Frank Nothaft, Freddie’s vice president and chief economist.
“Over the first half of 2011, fixed-rate mortgage rates hit a low during June, with the 30-year product averaging 4.50 percent and 15-year averaging 3.68 percent over the last four weeks of June,” Freddie said in its Primary Mortgage Market Survey.
Good Morning New Jersey
From CNBC:
Home Sales Contracts Rise, But Cancellations Run High
Last month, the National Association of Realtors reported a huge jump in cancellations of pending home sale contracts. 16 percent of contracts didn’t make it to closing, up from a norm of about 4 percent.
The chief economist at the NAR said he was baffled by it, but ask any agent working the nation’s neighborhoods, and they’ll tell you it is all about confidence and financing—specifically, a lack of both.
“It seems like everybody’s got home purchase ‘cancel-itis,'” says David Fogg, a real estate agent in Burbank, Calif.
“Currently, we are seeing about 75 percent, when we close escrow, had been in escrow 2 or 3 times prior.”
Good to see that the Housing ATM use has slowed down.
Have heard commentary on Bloomberg and other places regarding smart and dumb ways for the gov’t to raise additional revenue. One of the comments from an “expert” was that it would be better to eliminate some of the tax deductions available to more affluent folks rather than raising tax rates on them.
Question: If the Doe family has a household income of $400k, hypothetically, what would the difference be in increasing their taxes so they pay an extra $XX per year vs taking away some deductions which yield the same $XX? Does the money they would pay in taxes go into a different gov’t budget vs the extra money they would pay if some of their deductions were taken away?
Thanks to anyone who can shed additional light on this.
My question is this. Why bring cash to the refinancing table if unnecessary for closing the deal? A better option is locking in as much as you comfortably can then use the cash you were going to bring to the table to either advance the amortization schedule or buy inflation hedges.
Once that money is in your house consider it lost.
Toast, no difference. Money is money. Perhaps Nom can shed some light on which way makes the taxes easier to evade with slick accountants.
A house is not an investment. It is simply a gurantee you have a roof over your head. I don’t even understand point of a mortgage for most. You are risking the only purpose a house has, a guarantee of a roof over your head. My crappy home’s monthly cost is around a weeks interest income. I could re-mortgage and cash out and invest but that is betting the farm.
AG says:
August 2, 2011 at 6:42 am
My question is this. Why bring cash to the refinancing table if unnecessary for closing the deal? A better option is locking in as much as you comfortably can then use the cash you were going to bring to the table to either advance the amortization schedule or buy inflation hedges.
Once that money is in your house consider it lost.
Does anyone know anything about converting a forced air system to baseboard? I have forced air oil heat, no gas line coming into the house at all, electric water heater, and the hot/cold, hot/cold, makes us nuts. It’s bad enough that the company I’ve been with for 15 years is now quoting me a per-gallon price that’s a dollar more than anyone else is charging and everything is spot market, but the inconsistency of forced air is horrible. Short of linking my house into a deteriorating gas infrastructure and digging up my whole yard, or spending $30K on geothermal, what other options do I have?
Stench of death.
7. A small loan is your problem. A big loan is the banks problem. I didn’t create the moral hazard but the player must play the game.
10
Don’t you think this philosophy will change in the coming years? Considering the loss by banks, govt, and investors in the mortgage markets i can see the rules changing
7. A small loan is your problem. A big loan is the banks problem. I didn’t create the moral hazard but the player must play the game.
Jc get the nat gas and go radiant
LAKE SELIGER, Russia (Reuters) – Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin accused the United States Monday of living beyond its means “like a parasite” on the global economy and said dollar dominance was a threat to the financial markets.
“They are living beyond their means and shifting a part of the weight of their problems to the world economy,” Putin told the pro-Kremlin youth group Nashi while touring its lakeside summer camp some five hours drive north of Moscow.
“They are living like parasites off the global economy and their monopoly of the dollar,” Putin said at the open-air meeting with admiring young Russians in what looked like early campaigning before parliamentary and presidential polls.
8.JC says:
August 2, 2011 at 7:27 am
Does anyone know anything about converting a forced air system to baseboard? I have forced air oil heat, no gas line coming into the house at all, electric water heater, and the hot/cold, hot/cold, makes us nuts. It’s bad enough that the company I’ve been with for 15 years is now quoting me a per-gallon price that’s a dollar more than anyone else is charging and everything is spot market, but the inconsistency of forced air is horrible. Short of linking my house into a deteriorating gas infrastructure and digging up my whole yard, or spending $30K on geothermal, what other options do I have?
We use to have an oil fired steam heat system which we later replaced with a gas fired steam heat system. It used cast iron steam baseboard radiators & some recessed radiators. You can certainly replace an oil fired forced air system with an oil fired hot water or steam baseboard system, but it’s a completly new system with boiler, pipes & radiator. You could then use existing forced air ductwork for an AC only system. Not cheap but doable. I prefered the old steam system to hot water because you never used electric for a recirculating pump. It had a pilot so even in a power failure you stiull had heat.
#5
c’mon? seriously? have we not learned what got us into this mess? people leveraging as much as they can with very little to nothing down. the way to go is to bring AS MUCH cash as you can to the table, be less indebted and pay less over the course of the loan. if you want a home you will live in long-term to be an investment, bringing as little cash to the table as you can is the exact opposite of what smart money does; after 30 years of interest, maintenance, repairs, etc. you may sell that house for a few hundred grand more (at this rate maybe in 15-20 yrs if this ever turns around) but in real terms you will still come out a loser on that investment.
Not RE related but related to the economy
Seeking Arrangement: College Students Using “Sugar Daddies” to Pay Off Loan Debt
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/07/29/seeking-arrangement-college-students_n_913373.html?page=1
A person making $400k with deductions of $150k will have a taxable income of $250k with a lower tax bracket of 33% instead of 35%.
Eliminating tax deductions might keep same person at the 35% bracket,instead of 33%
If you increase their taxes say 37% and allow same deductions and have a 35% bracket,person is paying 2% more.
Not an expert just my take
8
Can you get a gas line run to your house? It’s fairly simple, they use plastic piping in a shallow trench typically to connect the house and the main line. The gas company may do it for free if it is a simple intall.
To go to a hot water heating system would most likely be a PITA and expensive. What type of house? Basement?
You would have lots of pipes to run, lots of holes to poke in the floors and walls, etc. Pex piping makes it a little more doable these days as opposed to old fashioned copper, but not something I would undertake unless say it was a ranch with a basement.
They do make oil fired water heaters that are a lot more efficient and heat up the water much quicker than electric. They are pricey compared to gas or electric heaters, typically roughly 4X the cost of an electric and twice that of gas.
Another option is to go all electric and use a heat pump. Jersey climate works fairly well for a heat pump, the only issue is the brutally cold days in mid-winter. You could even twin it with your existing oil or gas furnace to get the extra boost you need on the very cold days as opposed to using electric strip heat in the air handler.
confused DX geothermal if you can’t get gas. Look it up. Can keep your forced air, geothermal makes it downright enjoyable, cost would be about the same as converting to baseboard and a winters worth of dino juice.
If same person has $250k in deductions now he is in 28% bracket instead of 35%.Eliminating deductions will make same person pay more
FKA 18 After the student loan debt is paid maybe the daddies will help with their mortgage next
Sorry FKA 16
Take heed of the following and bear in mind that Romer is a Democrat who served The Empty Suit In Chief, and is not someone who can be described as a reactionary from the far right:
http://news.yahoo.com/debt-deal-set-pass-were-costs-045917154.html
snip
In the marginalization of the political center and dismal prospect for expedient reform, experts saw a threat to America’s geopolitical strength.
“It’s hard to maintain your influence globally when you can’t manage your own country,” said Barry Bosworth, a veteran fiscal and monetary policy expert at the Brookings Institution.
The former chair of President Barack Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers tacitly agreed. “There is no way we can have persistent deficits of the size the Congressional Budget Office is predicting over the next 25 years and hope to remain the world’s preeminent economic superpower,” said Christina Romer, who left the CEA in September 2010. “If we don’t deal with these deficits there is no way we won’t eventually default and become a much weaker country.”
snip
#16 Hunter college is cheap, and she has a job, she should be able to pay her loans. In fact she should not even have loans for the cost of Hunter’s tuition.
Eliminating personal deductions is a fing joke. What Fing deductions? Does anyone here besides me pay AMT?
Geothermal heat pump would be wildly more expensive than gas, and it on top of all the interior work which would be the same.
“Does anyone here besides me pay AMT?”
The Shores and the DePlumes are AMTed, I am sure AWest is, as well as others here. Eliminate every deduction and make the rate what it needs to be to balance the budget. THEN we will see the average Joe or Jane demand cuts in government spending.
I think that’s why its so important to choose the right career. Your baby girl wants a Liberal Arts degree from Harvard and wants to come back to NY……that’s a lay up for situations like this……
“Let’s say you’re a recent graduate, with $80,000 in debt and a job that pays $35,000 a year. It’s tough to pay that amount of debt down, live in a decent city and still be able to socialize and do fun things. At some point, you’ll have to start making major sacrifices,” he says. “But what if all of a sudden, the only sacrifice is the age or success level of your boyfriend or some guy you occasionally hang out with? That becomes a real game-changer in how you get to live your life.”
Grim, Price direct exchange it is comparable when you look at all the work involved with baseboard and the cost of a winters full of oil tanks. DX is more compact than traditional sytems and easier to install. a unit 1.5 times our need for the house would have ran about 25K, but when you factor in energy savings, and tax rebates it came out cheaper than a hyundai. If wife was working we would already be converted
re #27 – The deal Bohner, Reid and Obama made for the Debt Ceiling was to let the Bush Tax cuts expire this time at the end of the extension in 2012. I fully expect to pay allot more next year and I am fine with that however we need to cut spending period. We did it when Regan was President he cut 9.7% nondefense outlays in his first term.
The whole recession will start again if we cut government spending is baloney. We are not growing by any real measure and are already in a recession. We need to make the needed changes and retool our economy for growth even if it means creating a new bubble in something like energy. If we do not act now we will not reach escape velocity since each and ever year the output gap is growing larger and larger.
Yo’me
The largest deductions for someone with a salary of 400k is taxes. (at least in this part of the country) That’s both income and real estate. There are exceptions to this like people with outsized mortgages, huge charitable deductions, or crazy medical.
Much worse than the guy with a 400k salary are the people with 400k of income that do not work. Investment partnerships, MLPs, tax free bonds, etc… not to mention the 15% cap gain rate on long term gains and qualified dividends. All help those with sizable investment assets to pay far less than the people earning a decent wage at a job.
re #31 – long term gains is another joke. Since when is one year long term?
Nompound?
http://lifeinc.today.com/_news/2011/07/31/7208640-for-175-million-you-can-own-americas-most-expensive-home
I don’t have any deductions really. I am in big time AMT. You could eliminate mortgage deductions, RE tax deduction, charitable deduction, dependent deductions and I could care less.
Juice Box says:
August 2, 2011 at 9:01 am
Eliminating personal deductions is a fing joke. What Fing deductions? Does anyone here besides me pay AMT?
WASHINGTON (AP) — Americans cut back on their spending in June for the first time in nearly two years and their incomes grew by the smallest amount in nine months, a troubling sign for an economy that is barely growing.
Don’t worry, the Great Negotiator will save us!!
#27, Shore you’ve probably seen this before, but anyway:
Suppose that every day, ten men go out for beer and the bill for all ten comes to $100. If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something like this:
* The first four men (the poorest) would pay nothing.
* The fifth would pay $1.
* The sixth would pay $3.
* The seventh would pay $7.
* The eighth would pay $12.
* The ninth would pay $18.
* The tenth man (the richest) would pay $59.
So, that’s what they decided to do. The ten men drank in the bar every day and seemed quite happy with the arrangement, until one day, the owner threw them a curve. “Since you are all such good customers”, he said, “I’m going to reduce the cost of your daily beer by $20″. Drinks for the ten now cost just $80.
The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes so the first four men were unaffected. They would still drink for free. But what about the other six men – the paying customers? How could they divide the $20 windfall so that everyone would get his “fair share?”
They realized that $20 divided by six is $3.33. But if they subtracted that from everybody’s share, then the fifth man and the sixth man would each end up being paid to drink his beer. So, the bar owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man’s bill by roughly the same amount, and he proceeded to work out the amounts each should pay.
And so:
* The fifth man, like the first four, now paid nothing (100% savings).
* The sixth now paid $2 instead of $3 (33%savings).
* The seventh now pay $5 instead of $7 (28%savings).
* The eighth now paid $9 instead of $12 (25% savings).
* The ninth now paid $14 instead of $18 (22% savings).
* The tenth now paid $49 instead of $59 (16% savings).
Each of the six was better off than before. And the first four continued to drink for free. But once outside the restaurant, the men began to compare their savings. “I only got a dollar out of the $20,” declared the sixth man. He pointed to the tenth man, “but he got $10!” “Yeah, that’s right,” exclaimed the fifth man. “I only saved a dollar, too. It’s unfair that he got ten times more than I!” “That’s true!!” shouted the seventh man. “Why should he get $10 back when I got only two? The wealthy get all the breaks!” “Wait a minute,” yelled the first four men in unison. “We didn’t get anything at all. The system exploits the poor!” The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up.
The next night the tenth man didn’t show up for drinks, so the nine sat down and had beers without him. But when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered something important. They didn’t have enough money between all of them for even half of the bill!
And that, boys and girls, journalists and college professors, is how our tax system works. The people who pay the highest taxes get the most benefit from a tax reduction. Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy, and they just may not show up anymore. In fact, they might start drinking overseas where the atmosphere is somewhat friendlier.
re: college educated prostitutes. Seems they went about it the wrong way. Earning $500 to screw and old farts is hard degrading work. You will have to screw hundreds of old farts to pay down your debt and you could end up with a disease or dead.
I knew a woman who paid her way though college stripping at various places around NY Metro. At the time she was making at least $500 a night dancing and she was able to keep some dignity. She danced maybe 2 nights a week and saved every nickle. She ended up graduating and becoming a teacher for a few years and is now a frumpy housewife, but at least she did not have to earn it on her back.
Gary [35],
Say it aint so. Consumers cut back on spending? Nobody could see this coming. One must wonder how an economy, which relies on consumer spending, can get out of reverse. Cylical? It’s the great correction, deleveraging will go on for years and years. Our only hope is to print till infinity. Spend dollars today, they’ll be worth much less tomorrow.
re # 38 – “get out of reverse” Much worse than most think . We are in for more revisions of GDP as consumer spending starts to cliff dive.
Economic growth slowed during Q2 as acknowledged by the Fed and indicated by regional Fed surveys, ISM, durable goods, etc so how the heck could Q2 GDP be higher than Q1 GDP?
Revisions, Revisions Anyone?
#8 JC: i see there are still more listings coming on in WT, we like the area nd all, but I am not thrilled about having to drive to Hillsdale/Westwood every day to catch the train, and will not do the park and ride bus thing. Ultimately I may have to bite the bullet and do it, but also looking at other options Emerson possibly, and Park Ridge. The problem with Park Ridge is there is l almost no inventory available right now. I will keep you posted. Thanks for your help.
“Much worse than most think”
Juice,
Bingo. Now that the side show is over in DC, investors can concentrate on a decelerating US economy, a property bubble in Aussie, accelerating inflation in China and a bull market in CDS rates in Europe.
I hear the horn, the QE3 ship is entering the harbor.
AMT does not matter for people that are on the 35% bracket.35% is the highest bracket. A person making $1M with a $300K deduction will still have a taxable of $700K and AMT of 35%
The Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT) is an income tax imposed by the United States federal government on individuals, corporations, estates, and trusts. AMT is imposed at a nearly flat rate on an adjusted amount of taxable income above a certain threshold (exemption). This exemption is substantially higher than the exemption from regular income tax. Regular taxable income is adjusted for certain items computed differently for AMT, such as depreciation and medical expenses. No deduction is allowed for state income taxes or miscellaneous itemized deductions in computing AMT income. Taxpayers with incomes above the exemption whose regular Federal income tax is below the amount of AMT must pay the higher AMT amount.
no. 16 Quelle surprise! Sugar daddies have been a way of life for Latina college students in South America for decades. As JJ might say, short term relationships are like repos, wives are like perpetual bonds.
a little something something with your coffee?
A Dunkin Donuts employee in Rockaway, N.J. was charged by police with “providing sexual services in exchange for money” while working her shifts. “She was a night time employee (working 9 p.m. to 5 a.m.), supposedly a very good one,” Detective Sgt. Kyle Schwarzmann tells the Asbury Park Press, possibly making a joke. A sting operation finally took down her horrible single-person prostitution ring:
http://www.app.com/article/20110801/NJNEWS14/308010062/Dunkin-Donuts-worker-charged-prostitution-selling-things-not-listed-menu
I worked with an ex LA girl smoking crazy hot, a body your only worries would be how to I stop myself from giving her all my money, anyhow arrived in NY at age 18 for school was in dorms a few months met a rich older law partner, he put her up in a very nice apartment, paid the rent, leased her a mercedes and gave her a credit card. Basically, he put her through college, then this arrangement lasted until she was like 34 when she finally decided to call it off as she wanted to go husband hunting, by then her sugar daddy was nearing 60 so she did not want to marry him even though by then he was already divorced. Within 12 months of breaking up some cheesy secretary who was like 29 moved in and married him. Girl makes like 200K a year income, not too bad, but still she used to buy $1,000 dollar pairs of jeans, $500 shoes, $3,000 purses, drive brand new benz’s sit in front rows at games or shows and jet off to the islands, now she is living on $200K and in Manhattan that gets you a small one bedroom in a doorman building, gym membership and Century 21 clothes. Oh the sad life of a girl. She only has a year or two before the looks goes. She is working on a 50 guy divorced guy who makes likes ten million a year, but so far the fish is sniffing the worm but has not bitten.
So what the article is saying as a father not only is your job to keep your daughter off the pole, but out of prostitution if they want a useless psychology degree? I’m pretty positive a girl a used to drink with in college did the same thing, the internet just made it a business opportunity for someone to act as the middle man. just because you don’t wear flashy clothes and drive a ghetto’d cadillac doesn’t mean your not a pimp. It comes down to this if it doesn’t bother your moral compass as a person to get it on for money then it doesn’t bother me. I’m not paying for the service.
America runs on Dunkin, funny reminds me of Hotdog truck on LI years ago where a hotdog cost $40 bucks. Of course you got to go into truck to get full service, best part is lady insisted on making you the two hotdog and a soda special afterwards and then you paid her $40 for the hot dogs.
(47) JJ
So how were the hot dogs?
48
Think he got onions on them? And stay away from the slaw.
ten year $2.70
In other news. We signed a new lease for our now vacant unit in our multi. Would you believe that there are bidding wars going on over rent. I was shooting for 2K, Gator doubted it, listing agent suggested $2250. Lease signed 6 days after listing. Turned down a $2300 offer due to fact that candidates never even saw the place in person.
Multi is cash-positive (somehow) to the tune of about $600 per month not counting deductions and this even includes mowing and shoveling. Needless to say, we are both happy and surprised. Best of all, tenants are moving in on the 15th and going to Amsterdam for 3 months!!!
#46 The question today is what is not a useless degree? Accounting, Finance, Engineering, Math, IT? Is every kid going to go into these fields? I saw an article in the WSJ a few month back, where apparently during the civil war in Sri-Lanka many young people went to college for accounting degrees, now companies in the U.S. are outsourcing higher level accounting jobs to Sri Lanka.
Lib congrats, best tenants are the ones who are never there but pay. nice to own a multi in a desirable town. Maybe now Gator can get out of the X-terra
Anyone going to the (Emirates Cup winning) Red Bulls match on the 13th and want to get together? Might do Brazilian BBQ prior.
Also, Sastry…Still on for our investment club meeting on Thursday?
“Maybe now Gator can get out of the X-terra”
Not until Old Reliable dies (which may be never). She passed inspection last Friday.
I live in a home that was originally a single heating/cooling system. Several owners back a oil system was installed with a 7 zone baseboard heating system. Later oil coverted to gas. I am no expert, but I can at least answer questions about how such a system works once it is in place. Two comments #1 retro-fitted baseboards are ugly as sin. I guess there could be a aesthetic solution, but you are effectively eliminating furniture in front of all windows/perimeter walls impacted. The system can be noisy as the fluid ciruclates through the pipes. I know this system was well thought out and installed; if you system is installed poorly, the banging in the pipes can be significant.
Confused In NJ says:
August 2, 2011 at 8:04 am
8.JC says:
August 2, 2011 at 7:27 am
Does anyone know anything about converting a forced air system to baseboard? I have forced air oil heat, no gas line coming into the house at all, electric water heater, and the hot/cold, hot/cold, makes us nuts. It’s bad enough that the company I’ve been with for 15 years is now quoting me a per-gallon price that’s a dollar more than anyone else is charging and everything is spot market, but the inconsistency of forced air is horrible. Short of linking my house into a deteriorating gas infrastructure and digging up my whole yard, or spending $30K on geothermal, what other options do I have?
We use to have an oil fired steam heat system which we later replaced with a gas fired steam heat system. It used cast iron steam baseboard radiators & some recessed radiators. You can certainly replace an oil fired forced air system with an oil fired hot water or steam baseboard system, but it’s a completly new system with boiler, pipes & radiator. You could then use existing forced air ductwork for an AC only system. Not cheap but doable. I prefered the old steam system to hot water because you never used electric for a recirculating pump. It had a pilot so even in a power failure you stiull had heat.
Chifi
Here you go high cost but makes baseboard look nice
http://www.radiantwraps.com/
Lib – And you forgot to mention that we are also settling our tax appeal. Assuming we settle at the number the attorney and I discussed, our taxes will now be $5,100/year less than had we never filed.
And damn close to what we paid back in October of 2004 in tax increase-centric Montclair. That’s the real impressive feat.
Lib to make you proud, 2000 Crew Cab Frontier basically some truck as Gator’s X-terra. 250K, have some minor work to do on the old girl but expect her to pass inspection this december when she turns 12. Sorry Gator, I know Captain cheapo will keep you and Lil Gator in it forever with that bit of info.
#70 Local elected officials in Montclair must really not likeyou guys.
So which dies first? The 2004 Nissan Xterra with 90K or the 1995 Honda Civic with 140K? Both cars have all major routine maintenance performed every 30K and we change the oil every 5K.
Lib since we got rid of our 2000 civic with 180K but the only reason was the bad Honda auto. I would say both would rot away from the road salt befor either power train goes, especially since your Honda is a manual
JJ,
Great call. I listened to you on Friday and sold gold. Now, I’m scrambling and forced to buy back at new highs. Do yourself a favor, stick to hot dogs and onions.
36 (60) – True that. Jerry Fried is on the record as stating that only bad people appeal their taxes.
BC Bob – I was on a ski lift in Jan 2010 with a guy from Venezuela right before Chavez devalued the Bolivar by 40%. We talked for a good while about his country since the lift had broken down, he went on about politics there and boasted about the strength of their economy and said that there is nothing wrong with his country. I saw him a few days later after they devalued and he had the look of death on his face as he was checking out of the Hotel knowing he was going home to massive inflation.
There is no way you sold your Gold.
#64 Amazing. But what it is also nice, is that you have left the town, but you have not, since you still own the multi. So you guys can still cause them what they would call grief!!
“I am in big time AMT. You could eliminate mortgage deductions, RE tax deduction, charitable deduction, dependent deductions and I could care less. ”
Yup. The deductions just complicate things. We spend a couple grand a year on tax prep. It sucks. Just come up with a rate that pays the bills, everyone pays it. If one does not earn much, the bill will be small. If one earns bundles, the bill will be large. It is really pretty simple. Frankly, if the rates went up for the Shores, but everybody was paying that same rate, okay, it is the cost of running the country. This “progressive” system is for the birds and has not done the economy any favors.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/01/opinion/the-diminished-president.html
By rights, Barack Obama should be emerging as the big political winner in the debt ceiling debate. For months, he’s positioned himself near the center of public opinion, leaving Republicans to occupy the rightward flank. Poll after poll suggests that Americans prefer the president’s call for a mix of spending cuts and tax increases to the Republican Party’s anti-tax approach. Poll after poll shows that House Republicans, not Obama, would take most of the blame if the debt ceiling weren’t raised.
Yet the president’s approval ratings have been sinking steadily for weeks, hitting a George W. Bush-esque low of 40 percent in a recent Gallup survey. The voters incline toward Obama on the issues, still like him personally and consider the Republican opposition too extreme. But they are increasingly judging his presidency a failure anyway.
The administration would no doubt blame this judgment on the steady stream of miserable economic news. But it should save some of the blame for its own political approach. Ever since the midterms, the White House’s tactics have consistently maximized President Obama’s short-term advantage while diminishing his overall authority. Call it the “too clever by half” presidency: the administration’s maneuvering keeps working out as planned, but Obama’s position keeps eroding.
snip
Well we still own in town, but the tenants will be paying any tax increases. So now we can bitch w/ the rest of them, but not allow it to impact us financially, except eventually putting us in a higher tax bracket, not that this really matters.
Oh, and ten year is at $2.68.
I might have to call my buddy Carl Nielson to see what he can do for me on that 20-year we have for the multi.
“deteriorating gas infrastructure”
Huh? Forced hot air + natural gas is ideal. Ducts pipe warm humidified heat in the winder, and cool central AC in the summer.
Barack Obama the Pessimist
His lack of faith in American exceptionalism has dashed any hope of a ‘transformational’ presidency.
By FOUAD AJAMI
In one of the illuminating, unscripted moments of the 2008 presidential campaign, Barack Obama said—much to the dismay of his core constituency—that the Reagan presidency had been “transformational” in a way that Bill Clinton’s hadn’t. Needless to say, Mr. Obama aspired to a transformational presidency of his own.
He had risen against the background of a deep economic recession, amid unpopular wars in Afghanistan and Iraq; he could be forgiven the conviction that the country was ready for an economic and political overhaul. He gave it a mighty try. But the transformational dream was not to be. The country had limits. Mr. Obama couldn’t convince enough Americans that the twin pillars of his political program—redistribution at home, retrenchment abroad—are worthy of this country’s ambitions and vocation.
Temperament mattered. Ronald Reagan was the quintessential optimist, his faith in America boundless. He had been given his mandate amid economic distress—the great inflation of the 1970s, high unemployment and taxation—and a collapse of American authority abroad. Through two terms and a time of great challenges, he had pulled off one of the great deeds of political-economic restoration. He made tax cuts and economic growth the cornerstone of that recovery. Economic freedom at home had a corollary in foreign affairs—the pursuit of liberty, a course that secured a victorious end to the Cold War. The “captive nations” were never in doubt, American power was on the side of liberty.
By that Reagan standard, Mr. Obama has been a singular failure. The crippling truth of the Obama presidency is the pessimism of the man, the low expectations he has for this republic. He had not come forth to awaken this country to its stirring first principles, but to manage its decline at home and abroad. So odd an outcome, a man with an inspiring biography who provides no inspiration, a personal story of “The Audacity of Hope” yielding a leader who deep down believes that America’s best days are behind it.
snip
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111903999904576466411161774824.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
re: # 68 & 72 – Shore it is the Krugman effect. The biggest and boldest supporters he had now openly badmouth him at every turn. I know someone who raised allot of money for him and was personally offended when I called O an empty suit back in 2008 over dinner in NYC. He now knows I was right and won’t talk politics with me anymore. Tail between legs as they say.
Juice [65],
Yeah, I listened to him like I listened to Bergabe in 2007; no contagion. I’d rather listen to the 3 Stooges.
Dealbreaker:
Layoffs Watch ’11: Barclays
http://dealbreaker.com/2011/08/layoffs-watch-11-barclays-2/
Lib 70 – Oh Lil Gator would be so happy to see another Devils game out of that.
Bob at least the 3 stooges are funny. I remarked to my then girlfriend now wife in 2004 that il Duce will be the next president because he speaks well in front of crowd. Perceived intellectualism after Bush as well as a yearning for something new and outside of the beltway would sweep him in. She shrugged said most Americans can’t possibly be that stupid. She ended up paying me ten bucks after McCain got nominated realising all hope was lost and the neophyte narcissist would be crowned.
BC,[63]
Come join the poor shmuck whom people call a dolphin and and insect. I don’t know how to play the paper shiny with leverage game but I do know how to sit on shiny. Was a bench warmer in HS so I’m experienced.
BC btw every day is a day to sell gold, it is worthless. I know it is up today but the old saying is if you sold at the top you sold too late.
Gold rallies 1% to new high
For a group of people who are going to fly first class on a commercial flight, some of these prices are pretty good:
http://www2.bluestarjets.com/domesticdev/quickquote.asp?c=26&keyword=business%20jet
(72) It’s impossible to be a ‘transformational’ president when all you do is continue the policies of your predecessor.
Sure! BO transformed into W — only with a larger vocabulary.
Isn’t Blue Star the airline from the movie Wall Street?
…
Gordon Gekko: Fox, where the hell are you? I am losing MILLIONS! You got me into this airline and you sure as hell better get me out or the only job you’ll ever have on the Street is SWEEPING IT! You hear me, Fox?
Bud Fox: You once told me, don’t get emotional about stock. Don’t! The bid is 16 1/2 and going down. As your broker, I advise you to take it.
Gordon Gekko: Yeah. Well you TAKE IT!
[shouts]
Gordon Gekko: *Right in the ass you f*cking scumbag c*cksucker!
Bud Fox: It’s two minutes to closing, Gordon. What do you want to do? Decide.
Gordon Gekko: [calms down] Dump it.
Shore (81) – How old are the pilots? :)
RE#13
LAKE SELIGER, Russia (Reuters) – Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin accused the United States Monday of living beyond its means “like a parasite” on the global economy and said dollar dominance was a threat to the financial markets.
“They are living beyond their means and shifting a part of the weight of their problems to the world economy,” Putin told the pro-Kremlin youth group Nashi while touring its lakeside summer camp some five hours drive north of Moscow.
“They are living like parasites off the global economy and their monopoly of the dollar,” Putin said at the open-air meeting with admiring young Russians in what looked like early campaigning before parliamentary and presidential polls.
While I share other’s frustrations about or Country’s in- ability to manage its finances, I find it laughable that Putin can make a statement like that as Russia
defaulted not long ago.
Breaking News
Investors Made a Fortune Betting on U.S. Treasuries in July
was bill gross selling them?
Toast (4),
Removing tax deductions is different than hiking marginal rates because of the incentive to earn more. Cutting deductions while keeping marginal rates lower provides no disencentive to working harder and making more money. Maintaining deductions while hiking marginal taxes generates a relative disencentive to working harder and making more money. In simple english, at the extremes: low deductions, high marginal tax rate = wife stays at home; high deductions low marginal tax rate= wife goes to work.
2.65
Speaking of college girls working the pole, Rupert Murdoch’s wife Wendi Deng rode a lot of old poles to before she found one big enough to settle on. One to get her out of China, one to get her through school, someone to help get a job, and finally someone to get her a billion dollars.
http://howardout.blogspot.com/2007/05/hot-rumour.html
Debt Jubilee?
http://thehill.com/blogs/floor-action/house/174953-rep-paul-introduces-bill-to-cancel-public-debt-held-by-the-fed
JJ,
Empty suit said today that we’re still in a recession. I thought it ended 2year ago??
http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/ObamaStatem/start/281/stop/324
Juice,
Not much different than the contained fire that I have suggested for some time.
[72] shore
Never thought there would be a president that would make me miss Carter.
[72] shore
You are old enough to remember. BO on the economy reminds me of Ford with a tan.
“Empty suit said today that we’re still in a recession.”
Make,
C’mon, man. Think. Think! If we are “still” in a recession, then it never ended; thus, it is still Bush’s recession, not one that Obama owns.
2.62
With apologies to Meat:
I am choking on the stench of death in the air today.
[96] shore
we did come out (briefly) but that wasn’t going to hold, and it didn’t.
I think George Will is closer to the mark: Capitalists have gone on strike. And the Suit in Chief’s response is to jawbone them to spend more.
Nom,
At least Ford had the b@lls to pardon Nixon. He actually took stands and fulfilled his historical role as a bridge from Watergate to post-Watergate. The Empty Suit In Chief is starting to give Bush a run for his money in terms of worst president since the end of Reconstruction.
“You are old enough to remember”
Rub it in. Thanks.
“Capitalists have gone on strike”
Why would one deploy massive amounts of capital if one believes that the nation’s leader is a socialist who just wants what one has in order to redistribute it to others?
Gold $1,644.90 $1,645.90 $25.20
Silver $40.27 $40.32 $0.96
Any questions?
Plants and equipment are harder to move than cash.
re: # 92 – His big 50 Birthday Party is still on for tomorrow in Chicago. He has some stones attending when we are in a recession. There will be protests too for jobs.
Fodder for Fabius and Sas3:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/international-news/us/tax-revenue-as-a-percentage-of-gdp-in-the-developed-world/article2114914/
63,
Bob,
I listened to JJ on Friday and sold my gold. I ran out and invested in Fairfield RI muncipal bonds. Hope he’s right.
I find it funny that the world is “up in arms” over the debate we had leading up to the debt limit increase. Had we just approved the increase as a matter of course six months ago, everyone would be happy, even if we kept spending like drunken sailors on liberty. Instead, we make cuts, incremental at best, but at least some cuts, and people call us out on our process.
70,
Best 30 year fixed conforming Im seeing now is 4.25 no fees.
[104]
“Plants and equipment are harder to move than cash.”
And the administration can’t understand why banks aren’t lending. If I were a capitalist, I would leverage to the hilt and encumber everything that can’t be moved overnight. In fact, I would borrow against receivables in order to get money out of the country.
Nom,
If congress implemented a flat tax to bring us in line with Canada, you and I would make out like bandets and most people would fume. If they implemented a flat tax of 45%, we would be incrementally hurt and the vast majority of people would be up in arms.
Clearly, given that adjusting rates to bring us in line with the rest of the world would either benefit us or hurt to a smaller percentage increase than most others, the people who are in the lower tax brackets (including cap gains folks) are getting an unfair advantage out of the current tax structure and should stwart paying their fair share.
#09 This keeps up, we coudl be under 4 in a few more weeks.
Bob,
A couple junior minors you may be interested in taking a look at.
HLLXF.PK 0.5967 +0.0467 +8.49% HELLIX VENTURES
PXZRF.PK 10.92 +0.24 +2.21% Pretium Resources
Bob Quartermain is running the show at Pretium now. They have property that bleeds gold up in Canada.
I am putting all my money into CDs.
I started with Black Sabbath and Robert Johnson. Today I am loading up on Howl’n Wolf, Springsteen, and Glenn Miller.
[68] shore
The Times op points out what is, to me, the height of hypocrisy on the part of BO. The approach he is taking, as highlighted in the piece, is a purely political strategy of trying to avoid the rocks and shoals, and avoid any spatter from policymaking, in order to position himself for 2012.
Yet BO was the president that said so famously that he would accept being a one-term president if it meant that he advanced his agenda. The message there was “I will lead even if it costs me the election.”
Two completely contradictory messages. So, were I cross-examining The One, I would ask him “Are you lying now or were you lying then?”
I think chairman O has Shrub beat. That takes alot for me to say that as I can’t stand the whole neocon lot of them and consider shrub their greatest acheivement. O while still a reminder of everything that is right with the country considering his bio, has proven to be a vascillating boob who gives a great speach but has no conviction. Say what you want about Bush’s intelligence, hubrus and smugness, but right or wrong the man made a decision and owned it. O looks like someone who is always looking for another boogeyman to blame some problem on but that is endemic of inner city liberals.
[114] Shore
I am going liquid, same as I have been doing for awhile: Wine, Scotch, Vodka, . . .
Also, I am going back into metals again: Brass, lead, gun . . .
[117] redux
Say what you want about Nompounding. With what I am stockpiling, when TSHTF, we will be able to PARTY!!!!!!
Al 3.78 on the 20 year!
119,
I cant get too excited. I was offered a 4.0, 30 year, no fee, refi last year around this time and didnt go for it. I really need to see sub 4%. Last year I think we saw 3.875 for a day and then it was gone.
Nom where is that nompund again?
“every day is a day to sell gold, it is worthless”
JJ
“Gold is not money”
Bernanke
F-Ing Classic.
#22 BC
The best was Bernanke’s comment that banks hold gold because of tradition.
I haven’t gone in years. Can anyone here offer any opinions on the best churrascaria in the Ironbound?
Bob Quartermain is running the show at Pretium now. They have property that bleeds gold up in Canada.
Related to the adventurer Allan Quartermain who found King Solomon’s gold mines?
% wise $25 bucks is nothing. The intraday dip in exchange traded mortgage fund would have netted you $162 bucks for $1,644 invested. Gold I still stay is worthless.
It is today’s beanie babies.
Al Mossberg says:
August 2, 2011 at 2:15 pm
Gold $1,644.90 $1,645.90 $25.20
Silver $40.27 $40.32 $0.96
Any questions?
They definitily should have a flat tax, I mean who wants to look at a girl with no boobs,
Kettle1 – How are they going to clean this up? A few seconds exposure and you are toast literally.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-11386_3-20086824-76/peak-radiation-spots-found-at-fukushima-plant/
JJ,[127],
good boy. Stick to what you know.
By that Reagan standard, Mr. Obama has been a singular failure. The crippling truth of the Obama presidency is the pessimism of the man, the low expectations he has for this republic. He had not come forth to awaken this country to its stirring first principles, but to manage its decline at home and abroad. So odd an outcome, a man with an inspiring biography who provides no inspiration, a personal story of “The Audacity of Hope” yielding a leader who deep down believes that America’s best days are behind it.
This statement should be engraved in stone.
Ket its not a radiation burn its’ mearly a flesh wound
[121] Pain
“Where is that Nompound again?”
You find out after your check clears.
Who remembers this jingle that I bastardized?
“Oh, I’m a prepper, you’re a prepper, he’s a prepper, she’s a prepper, wouldn’t you like to be a prepper too?”
And on that humorous note, guess who just joined the prepper bandwagon?
http://www.examiner.com/finance-examiner-in-national/rich-dad-warns-of-economic-collapse-and-the-need-to-prepare-for-crisis
I have just under 8 years left to go on a 15 year @ 4.75. Is it worth my while to try and find a 10-year no-fee refi at a lower rate and make extra payments up to my current mortgage payment?
Gold busts through $1650.
135,
A toast to Mr. Jim Sinclair.
Probably not JC. You could run the calculator though to see for yourself.
http://www.bankrate.com/calculators/mortgages/mortgage-calculator.aspx
Head for the hills Rich Dad speaks.
Seems that the doomer talk may develop into it’s own mania, perhaps we can have a show on HDTV called “Defend this House” where a family builds a hard perimeter rigged trip wires and also shows them digging a root cellar.
JC…He’s right. At this point, you are paying such little interest due to the risk-averse amortization schedule that I doubt it would make much sense.
“Gold I still stay is worthless”
JJ,
When you run a positive current account balance, real interest rates are positive and rising, you are the world’s largest creditor nation, debt/gdp is under 25%, world capital is flowing into your currency and the treasury supports a strong currency, then I would agree. Wake me up in 5-10 years.
JC,
Refi and take out max money they’ll give you, use the cash to buy physical.
Wait 4 years and then sell half of your shiny and pay back the entire loan.
Keep the other half stashed in a foreign country or nompound.
Assume BC sold his home for 600K in 2005 and bought 1000 ounces. His ex home is now 450K while his shiny is worth 1.65M. I don’t think bankrate has a mortgage calculator for this.
Trust me, watching your net worth double in the midst of “the great recession” by doing absolutely nothing is happening to someone I know.
141.
“Refi and take out max money they’ll give you, use the cash to buy physical.
Wait 4 years and then sell half of your shiny and pay back the entire loan.
Keep the other half stashed in a foreign country or nompound.”
This. Todays moral hazard world that we live in allows you to walk away from an over taxed crap shack in NJ. The greatest bull market in the history of bull markets is about to enter into new territory.
nom do you accept american Gold Eagles?
Juice these great looking garden gnomes double as claymores, while the fence is electrified. automated turrets are decorated in Robin’s egg blue and the windows are bulletproof glass with shooting ports.
Make,
BC Bob is going to be the wealthiest guy I know.
nobody could have predicted this /sarcasm off/
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/exclusive/debt-ceiling-deal-sets-off-lobbying-frenzy-160406928.html
#46 Why don’t they just use the recommendations from the Simpson committe; did we not go through this already. Just saying.
Dow down 265 points.
Yes… We… Can…
Kettle1 – job ad taped to a pole in Japan.
http://photozou.jp/photo/show/218335/91570230
Urgently Wanted
50,000 yen [US$648] per day
4 hours a day work
(and in handwriting)
Only for one month (20 working days)
2 days of training given
Work to assist recovery in the disaster affected area in Tohoku
No age limit
Healthy males
stocks/gold moved 4% today. Central Banks keep buying billions worth all because
of some silly tradition.
#124 Lib
Iberia Penninsula
Its the small one across the street from the huge mission building that houses Iberia.
Al [144],
Nah. I don’t have a Jim Rogers sized position.
What did the monkey say as he was peeing over a cliff? Wow, a little bit travels a long distance.
100 Ford had the balls to pardon Nixon? Please! That was quid pro quo for becoming President. The Republicans demanded it and it was a main reason I voted for Carter.I never thought I’d see a more incompetent chief operative than Carter…the current void-in-charge makes me wistful.
From CNN e-mail (it is about time politicians stopped trying to blow smoke up our shorts and just level with the public):
The Dow closed down about 266 points, or 2.19%, as investors worried about the weak economy.
The selloff pushed the S&P 500 into negative territory for the year.
“Now that we have solved the debt ceiling issue, the market has moved on to the other data, which has taken a significant turn for the worse,” said Ryan Detrick, senior technical strategist with Schaeffer’s Investment Research.
The Dow suffered an eighth straight day of declines for the first time since October 2008, when the financial system was in the depths of a crisis. The Dow also finished below the psychologically important 12,000-point mark.
Juice
We don’t know what the real reading was only that is was above 10 sieverts/hr, as their meter pegged out at the max.
At least we know they still have intermittent criticalities going on
“That was quid pro quo for becoming President. ”
Nope. Just as when party leaders knew that Roosevelt was going to die during his last term, and moved to have him drop his current Veep with Truman for his last electoral run, Ford was seen as someone who would not be powerful. He was a decent guy who did an okay job. Agree or disagree with the pardon but, the pardon put Watergate in the rearview mirror and allowed him to focus on other matters, like the Soviet Union, energy shortages, and a faltering economy.
115
Nom,
I said here and offline for a year before the last presidential election that the winner in ’08 would likely rue the day they won.
Shiny/dow ratio is now 7.14.
Wake me up when its 2:1
until then everything is a slow moving train on a 24 hour news channel. Whole bunch of commentary, analyst, specialist, political figures and morons(special contributors), etc and they all have their distinct and unique paid for opinions to share.
I need to go potty….
Shore Guy says:
August 2, 2011 at 4:32 pm
From CNN e-mail (it is about time politicians stopped trying to blow smoke up our shorts and just level with the public):
The Dow closed down about 266 points, or 2.19%, as investors worried about the weak economy.
The selloff pushed the S&P 500 into negative territory for the year.
“Refi and take out max money they’ll give you, use the cash to buy physical.
Wait 4 years and then sell half of your shiny and pay back the entire loan.”
And if the price of gold goes down?
Juice
and they are still pumping water into the reactors and it is still draining onto the ground water and the ocean.
The only reasonable longterm solution is to deconstruct the site. And entomb the debris inland
Fabius (150) – Does it have a kick a*s salad bar with good vegetarian options? He’s dragging me there too. Who said chivalry was dead?
Double down
and what if pigs fly?
2012 is the Great Equalizer.
re: And if the price of gold goes down?
It will when we get our house in order. Can you give us a timeline as to when we get our house in order? Will it happen in 4 years?
inflation adjusted gold has not had a pretty 25 year run. sadly I do know about commodities, did consulting work at a CFM and I am familar with CFTC rules. Commodities, Factoring and the Diamond trading businesses are shadier than a back street drug dealer. Usually traders go all in. They go long 100%, little heding, wait for blow up stick firm with loss and move on, all the way yelling cotango. Gold is at least more honest than aluminum which Aloca manipulates, or coca futures.
Go to the HSBC building over by Bryant Park and take freight elevator to lower level and the amount of gold is amazing. But before you decide to take any the bars are so heavy you need a forklift, basement is in solid rock, only way up is through lobby during working hours, and by the way, I got a peak at the guards manual and saw the works STK HSO. I go what does that mean, well if someone makes it to lobby with the gold it means they killed the guards below already and most likely are wearing a bullet proof vest, STK HSO means Shoot To Kill Head Shot Only.
Most people have never even seen the gold, it is cool. Even cooler is the other vault I cant name location with one trillion in assets stored in it. Buying pieces of paper that you think is gold is fun.
JJ [165],
“Usually traders go all in. They go long 100%, little heding, wait for blow up stick firm with loss and move on”
You mean taxpayers are stuck with the loss? Bear, Lehman and GS via AIG.
Who gives a rat’s ass what the inflation adjusted gold return has been over the last 25 years? At that time, I was buried in RE.
[138] Juice
Watch “Doomsday Preppers” on Nat Geo Channel, if it repeats.
They followed 4 preppers, 4 different styles, and 4 different concerns, ranging from tinfoil hat to what Bernanke is really thinking. They went into a decent analysis of what each person is doing, and had an expert rate their prepper performance.
Notably, most declined to take additional measures based on the expert’s advice.
BTW, if you watch it, the third story is the Nompound (not mine, but someone else’s) and their progress to date has me deeply envious.
[156] shore
Wasn’t that a lot like the last NJ election? The loser gets to be governor.
As for BO, I had said to some that I hoped he did make a lot of moves that had to be made, even if he got kicked out later.
shore: is your name Jason Clemens?
OPINION
AUGUST 2, 2011, 10:10 A.M. ET
Why Canada Is Beating America
It shrank government, and now unemployment and debt are declining..
By JASON CLEMENS
While the U.S. remains mired in debt and slogs through a subpar economic recovery, Canada is moving ahead steadily. Its unemployment rate peaked at a little over 8.5% and is now 7.4%, and there were no bank bailouts. Real GDP growth is expected to be roughly 3% this year.
Now with the first majority government since 2004, and the first Conservative majority since 1993, the country has an opportunity to vault forward. The Conservatives led by Prime Minister Stephen Harper have a chance to build on the reforms begun under previous Liberal governments that Americans can only look at with envy.
Canada’s government, for example, has grown smaller over the last 15 years. Total government spending as a share of the economy peaked at a little over 53% in 1993. Through a combination of spending cuts in the 1990s and spending restraint during the 2000s, it declined to a little under 40% of GDP by 2008. (It’s currently about 44% due to the recession.)
Reductions in government spending allowed for balanced budgets and the retiring of debt. Federal debt as a share of the Canadian economy was almost halved from nearly 80% to a little over 40% over the same period.
On the federal level, capital gains taxes in Canada were reduced twice and currently stand at 14.5%. A series of cuts to the corporate income tax beginning in 2001 have seen the rate slashed to 15% from 28%. Many provinces followed suit by reducing both corporate and personal income tax rates.
But the Conservative government faces two challenges: health reform and taxes.
The unavoidable challenge is the country’s health-care system. Negotiations to renew federal transfers to the provinces in support of health care begin later this fall.
Canada devotes a relatively high share of its economy to health care without enjoying commensurate outcomes. Of the 28 countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) that have universal access, Canada has the sixth-highest rate of health spending as a share of its economy.
Canadian health care is unique among the OECD countries with universal access in that Canadians alone depend almost exclusively on government for medically-necessary health care. Simply put, health care is dominated by the government in one form or another. Canada prohibits both copayments and private funding for publicly-insured services. Hospitals are for practical purposes owned and operated by government, and over 98% of physician income is from government.
But Canadians’ access to care is poor, despite high spending. The country ranks 20th of 22 OECD countries for access to physicians. Canada’s national statistical agency recently reported that 6.6% of Canadians (aged 12 or older) indicated being without a doctor and unable to find one. Canada also ranks poorly on access to technology: 17th for CT scanners and MRIs.
Waiting times for treatment continue to worsen. A longstanding survey by the free-market Fraser Institute recently found that the median wait time between general practitioner and treatment had increased to 18.2 weeks (2010) from 9.3 weeks in 1993 when the survey started.
While the United States moves towards greater centralization of health-care regulation, Canada’s Conservatives have an opportunity to give the provincial governments more leeway in delivering and financing health care. Allowing the provinces to become laboratories for different methods of health-care delivery and financing while protecting universal access holds the greatest chance for improving health care and controlling costs.
Uncompetitive tax rates, particularly compared to the U.S., are the country’s other major challenge. Canada’s Conservative Finance Minister Jim Flaherty has consistently indicated that lowering personal taxes is a priority. In a recent interview he stated that Canada “should be moving toward a flatter personal income tax system.”
Canada’s personal income tax rates are relatively high and kick in at comparatively low levels of income. For example, Canada’s top federal marginal personal income tax rate (29%) applies to income over $128,800 (in Canadian dollars, or U.S. $135,038 as of July 29). Provincial taxes, which are generally higher than in U.S. states, are added on top of the federal rates. The top federal tax rate in the U.S. is 35%—but it applies to income over U.S. $379,150.
The Conservatives have committed to tax relief once the budget is balanced, which is expected toward the end of their current term. To implement meaningful income tax cuts, the Conservative government will also need to be more proactive with spending reductions. As demonstrated in the 1990s by their Liberal Party predecessors, spending reductions now will result in a balanced budget sooner and an opportunity for large-scale tax relief.
Winning a Conservative majority in Canada was no small feat. The question remains what the Conservatives will do with that majority.
By DARREN EVERSON
Formula One, the world’s richest and most glamorous racing circuit, may be headed to New Jersey for an event in the shadow of the Manhattan skyline.
The mayors of Weehawken and West New York, N.J., said Tuesday that they are in early stages of talks with a group of investors led by Leo Hindery Jr., a former chief executive of the YES Network, to bring an F1 event to the area as soon as 2013. The race would run on existing streets in these cities, with New York as the backdrop.
The event would put the region in the company of Monaco, Montreal, Singapore and Shanghai, all of which host annual F1 events. Bernie Ecclestone, the head of F1, could not be reached for comment.
If approved, the proposed race would be a second U.S. event for F1, which has announced an annual race in Austin, Texas, starting next year.
Weehawken Mayor Richard Turner and West New York Mayor Felix Roque suggested in a joint statement that the race could prove to be a lucrative annual source of income for the area. They said no tax dollars would be involved in staging the race.
“In these uncertain economic times when every direct and indirect revenue source is vital, our own Formula One race could be a very positive boost to our citizens,” the mayors said. “This said, we need to ensure that the financial benefits from the privilege of having these races in our towns are equitably shared and that no tax dollars are used. The investor group has already told us that our towns would be substantially compensated annually.”
There were discussions last year about bringing an F1 race to Jersey City, N.J. So far, the difference between that failed initiative and the new one is that public officials appear to be on board.
Last year, Destination Jersey City, an organization operated by the city’s economic-development department, created a proposal to hold an F1 race at Liberty State Park, near the Statue of Liberty. Government officials quickly objected to the idea amid public protest, with Jersey City Mayor Jerramiah Healy saying the event wasn’t suited for the park.
Representatives of Weehawken and West New York have had preliminary talks with Gov. Chris Christie’s administration about the new proposal, according to Kevin Roberts, a Christie spokesman. “The prospect of having Formula One come to New Jersey is exciting,” he said.
F1, considered the world’s premier racing circuit, holds races on a combination of permanent courses and city streets across the globe. Its open-wheel cars reach speeds of more than 200 miles per hour and achieve high-speed cornering through advanced aerodynamics. This season’s 19-race F1 calendar includes events in Australia, Asia, Europe and South and North America.
The one place that F1 has not had a steady foothold historically is in the U.S. Numerous localities across the country have held F1 races over the past half century, including Watkins Glen, N.Y., Detroit, Dallas and Phoenix. Most faced attendance problems or track difficulties. The last U.S. F1 race took place in Indianapolis in 2007.
Nom
I saw the preppers show and am curious what you game plan would be for managing the social dynamics involved with multiple families such as the SC preppers?
Clot,
This sounds like a band you would like (the name, anyway):
11/18 – THE AIRBORNE TOXIC EVENT – Terminal 5
Chifi,
Just add it to my list of names.
“and they are still pumping water into the reactors and it is still draining onto the ground water and the ocean.”
Everyone needs a hobby.
“As for BO, I had said to some that I hoped he did make a lot of moves that had to be made, even if he got kicked out later.”
The only way for a politician who is in charge of a place with serious problems — think CC in NJ, Cuomo in NY, Obama in Neverland — to be considered a great leader (at least in retrospect) is to take serious actions that tick off so many people that it becomes all but impossible to win a second term. Over time, I came to despise the way Bush was running things and I made no secret about saying so here, off-line, and to people I knew in the WH. Bush was bad news and did serious harm to the nation. Although I did not vote for him, and could not believe that so many people were snookered by him, I very much hoped that Obama would be a great president. It has not turned out that way. As it currently stands, BO is in the same league as Bush the Younger. Carter was a far better president than the Empty Suit in Chief — and Carter was not very good.
Martin Armstrong on the bond rally.
“The vast pool of cash out there has to park some place. This means the bonds are the only spot to hide for now. You can’t cash out and put it in a bank. You can’t buy all the debt of everyone else. Only the US$ is the reserve currency and that means the central banks around the world need it. As I said, two-thirds of world reserves by central banks are held in US treasuries. So yes, the game will change. This debt crisis put a lot of people on notice US politicians are clueless. They kicked the can down the road but after the next election, look for this debt crisis to start to come apart at the seams. Then capital will start to shift as we get closer to 2016. That will be the biggest reservoir of capital to propel the stock market and gold to the outer stratosphere when it begins to pour out of the bond markets into assets.”
http://www.martinarmstrong.org/files/Why%20Bonds%20Always%20Rally%2008-01-2011.pdf
Chairman Ben S. Bernanke said in congressional testimony in July that the Fed may take new action if the economy stalls, including beginning a third round of bond purchases. The central bank could also cut the interest rate it pays banks on excess reserves and pledge to hold its assets at a record high and interest rates at record lows for a longer period, he said.
What part of we are bankrupt doesn’t Ben understand. Got No Money Ben!
#161 Gator,
If you eat fish or shellfish you are all set, otherwise its sides with your salad bowl.
176 – Al, why would we believe that crackpot armstrong and his conveniently predictable charts of recurring crashes, when his last call for a 20% crash in stocks, which was supposed to occur two months ago to the day, never ever even came close to happening. Now he’s doing a complete 180 by saying his mickey mouse charts were wrong (two months after the fact mind you) and instead stocks are poised to skyrocket into the ‘stratousphere’. His hocus pocus bs reports are laughable. I put him up there with cramer and whitney, both people who make money by making rediculously spectacular predictions which subsequently turn out to be dead wrong.
Oh Hillary. Hillary. Hillary? Are you out there?
Maybe BO will pull a Lyndon Johnson ’68 and decide to retire to a ranch in Chicago and grow his hair long.
http://www.latimes.com/health/healthcare/la-na-obama-debt-20110803,0,4338056.story
Debt drama takes political toll on Obama
The president is the most visible symbol of what voters see as a badly dysfunctional government. Some Democrats say he could have negotiated better.
Reporting from Washington—
Though he succeeded in staving off a historic default, President Obama emerges from the debt talks in a weakened political position with limited influence over a divided Congress.
snip
Kettle,
You may enjoy this. This is the Mission Controller’s loop from Mission Control right after the accident.
http://www.umiacs.umd.edu/~oard/apollo/apollo13eecom.mp3
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/03/us/politics/03spend.html
Spending Cuts Seen as Step, Not as Cure
By BINYAMIN APPELBAUM
WASHINGTON — There is something you should know about the deal to cut federal spending that President Obama signed into law on Tuesday: It does not actually reduce federal spending.
By the end of the 10-year deal, the federal debt would be much larger than it is today.
Indeed, both the government and its debts will continue to grow faster than the American economy, primarily because the new law does not address federal spending on health care.
snip
It is also the reason that many conservative Republicans refused to vote for the agreement, calling it a grossly inadequate answer to a pressing problem.
“The current deal to raise the debt ceiling doesn’t stop us from going over the fiscal cliff,” Senator Rand Paul, Republican of Kentucky, wrote Monday in an open letter explaining his opposition. “At best, it slows us from going over it at 80 m.p.h. to going over it at 60 m.p.h..”
snip
Nicely played, NBC Phila….
http://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/NJ-Lawmaker-Pulls-a-Weiner–126589978.html
BC (41)-
2011 is 2010 redux. Shank equities in early August, start the deflation scare, announce the next round of QE at Jackson Hole.
Rinse and repeat until such time as the doomsday machine explodes into smithereens.
“I hear the horn, the QE3 ship is entering the harbor.”
Although the idea of rate-capping at the short end of the UST curve both gives our creditors a red-flagged exit point at the top and throws a head fake to our lobotomized financial media. They won’t get that the whole ruse is a disguised, smoking wet version of QE until the rats are nibbling on their toenails.
#180 Shore,
While that may be one of your dreams, in reality there is no chance. No primary opposition this year and no real credible opposition next year. “A cruise to victory!”
Jon Stewert had a nice piece this week.
Fast forward to 4mins
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-august-1-2011/dealageddon—-a-compromise-without-revenues
While O will take a few lumps over this, yes, but should recover.
One question for you would be “Can you pull the handle on Mitt!”
Anyone got some cheap long term parking advice for EWR, they seemed to have jacked the Lot 6 rates to $18/day!
How to make Devo cool….
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YbxGjAHu_Fk&feature=related
Fabius Maximus says:
August 3, 2011 at 12:07 am
Anyone got some cheap long term parking advice for EWR, they seemed to have jacked the Lot 6 rates to $18/day!
http://www.airportparkingreservations.com/
#181 Shore
ATC are still the coolest heads in the room.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/02/05/1549.voice.recorder.tape/index.html
#189 Chi
Thanks, that’s a lot more reasonable.
“Anyone got some cheap long term parking advice for EWR”
A taxi.
Nice review! This is exactly the type of information that should be shared around the internet. Shame on the Bing for not ranking this article higher!
My husband and i felt so delighted Ervin managed to round up his basic research through the entire precious recommendations he acquired in your web page. It’s not at all simplistic just to be making a gift of helpful hints which often some people may have been making money from. And we all discover we have got the website owner to be grateful to for that. The explanations you have made, the straightforward site menu, the friendships you make it easier to foster – it’s most great, and it is aiding our son and the family reason why this topic is entertaining, and that’s exceedingly vital. Many thanks for the whole lot!
Great review! This is truly the type of blog post that should be shared around the internet. Sad on the Yahoo for not positioning this post higher!
Woh I your articles , saved to bookmarks ! .
there is noticeably a bundle to know about this. i assume you made certain nice points in features also.