Politics

[sgt_zim]

@Alistair , I don’t give Trump a pass on Covid, shutting down an economy was new to everyone and some spending measures probably needed to be taken but when Biden took over we were already coming out of the shut down and on the road to recovery and Biden just kept his foot on the spending peddle and never took it off.

Trump didn't shut us down during covid, democrat governors did. I don't believe RDS ever shut down FLA, and Abbott re-opened Texas by some time in 2021 as I recall.

 

[LivingTheDream]

Yeah, I did that at age 33. Paid cash for a house on the sand in Newport Beach, CA, new Porsche 911, 45’ sailboat at the marina, season tickets to Lakers behind the bench, became an LA opera patron, and a revolving door of college co-Eds. Partying, playing tennis daily, sailing and occasional hunting plus international travel with the girlfriend of the month. Living the dream, I thought. Lasted about 5 years before I was bored out of my mind. Next chapter, made a deal with myself to take a month off each quarter. That has been working for me for the last 35 years.

Yeah I wish my friends did stuff like that. The issue they have is they retired in their 30s but made so many sacrifices along the way they struggle to do anything different. For example, one was going on vacation and instead of flying direct they could save 80 dollars by having 2 layovers. So they took the 2 layovers, going out to eat is going to Burger King, they got too caught up live below your means lifestyle.

 

[Hunt anything]

Certainly an argument can be made for that interpretation, I'll give you that.

Personally, I don't think it was particularly well handled by Trump OR Biden, but hindsight is a wonderful thing, and playing it safe with levels of risk tolerance at the time was certainly justifiable considering the information at hand, even if it wasn't the route I wanted to see taken.

In all honesty, I'd probably agree that Biden was a little worse than Trump there, but it's hard to say with certainty what Trump might had done in an alternate universe, so who knows really!

That’s fair, no one is fully off the hook for our response to Covid.

 

[Hunt anything]

Trump didn't shut us down during covid, democrat governors did. I don't believe RDS ever shut down FLA, and Abbott re-opened Texas by some time in 2021 as I recall.

Yep, I was fishing in the Keys in June of 2020 during the height of most shutdowns?

My biggest problem with Trump during Covid was actually he seemed to go against his instincts by putting too much faith in Fauchi among others. But everyone knows how accurate hindsight is.

 

[BSO Dave]

COVID was certainly an important metric, and it was certainly out of Trump's hands. Which is why I tend to judge him more on 2016-2019, than I do on 2020. Although I could point out that a lot of the inflation and growth in national debt during Biden's term comes from COVID measures, so if Trump gets a pass on COVID impacts, so too should Biden. Only fair, after all.

Absolutely NOT the same thing... Trump was forced to do a total shutdown, that lasted nearly 4 months, then very smartly encouraging states to decide individually on how to reopen... The worst outcomes and economic damage from the shutdowns occurred exclusively in democrat-controlled states who refused to reopen... Too bad you didn't post any graphs indicating that dynamic...

Brandon electively decided to keep federal shutdown recommendations in place long after they were proven to be both ineffective and devastating to the economy... Furthermore, not only did Brandon refuse the opportunity to recall the unspent Covid money from the first bailout, he doubled down and spent another unnecessary 2 trillion increasing the deficit, and igniting the fuse to all-time record inflation... Elective and deliberate self-destruction does not get a "pass" under any circumstances...

Understanding the reality of what we experienced during Covid and the impacts it had on the economy does not require studying the data... It requires living in the reality of it, and being honest with yourself...

 

[Certus]

Yeah I wish my friends did stuff like that. The issue they have is they retired in their 30s but made so many sacrifices along the way they struggle to do anything different. For example, one was going on vacation and instead of flying direct they could save 80 dollars by having 2 layovers. So they took the 2 layovers, going out to eat is going to Burger King, they got too caught up live below your means lifestyle.

Geez! I thought retiring early meant in 50’s!

 

[BSO Dave]

Trump didn't shut us down during covid, democrat governors did. I don't believe RDS ever shut down FLA, and Abbott re-opened Texas by some time in 2021 as I recall.

Initially, all states complied with the federal shutdown recommendations... Remember it was 2 weeks to "stop the spread" which turned into nearly 4 months before Trump encouraged each state make their own determinations based off individual data and need...

DeSantis shut down Florida completely for about 30 days... Then he allowed partial reopening's of most businesses for the next 2 months... Even then, the "partial" reopening's were no longer being enforced. It was pretty much business as usual.. By 4 months, almost all businesses were not only allowed, but encouraged to reopen under DeSantis... If it was not for DeSantis, my wife's business would have been completely lost..

Schools that had been closed for in-person instruction were ordered to be reopened by August 30, 2020... The only sector not happy about DeSantis' order was the Teacher's Union who fought and lost the order in court...

If I recall correctly, South Dakota pretty much mirrored Florida and also reopened withing about a month of the initial shutdowns. I was in Wyoming, SD, and Montana during the late summer of 2020, and it was pretty wide open in those states...

 

[Saul]

Trump didn't shut us down during covid, democrat governors did. I don't believe RDS ever shut down FLA, and Abbott re-opened Texas by some time in 2021 as I recall.

I moved to Florida prior to most of my colleagues, but the speed with which they relocated here during covid was staggering.

 

[Flipper Dude]

Yeah, I did that at age 33. Paid cash for a house on the sand in Newport Beach, CA, new Porsche 911, 45’ sailboat at the marina, season tickets to Lakers behind the bench, became an LA opera patron, and a revolving door of college co-Eds. Partying, playing tennis daily, sailing and occasional hunting plus international travel with the girlfriend of the month. Living the dream, I thought. Lasted about 5 years before I was bored out of my mind. Next chapter, made a deal with myself to take a month off each quarter. That has been working for me for the last 35 years.

The college co-eds ………………just tango dancing , of course?

 

[Louis Toadvine]

Whose pay increases kept up? The missus and I both earn nice 6-figure salaries. Without having made adjustments to our spending, our saving/investment would be suffering relative to where we were 4 years ago. The one thing keeping us within spitting distance of where we were 4 years ago is that we both work remotely. If not, I'd probably have a new truck note (my 2013 F150 has 140K miles on it, with only putting about 6K miles/year on it in the last 4 years) + $400/month in additional fuel + $15/day in tolls to get to my office.

By any standard, we are well off, and we're feeling the pinch. I can't imagine having to slog through this shit where I was 15 years ago.

100% this. When I account for the increases I've seen across all classes of expenses--household goods, of course, but notably the big ones like health insurance premiums & deductibles, property taxes, vehicle replacement cost, floating interest rates on lines of credit, etc.--I am way behind where I was five years ago. And it has impacted the decisions I make and how I live.

Inflation is "down" this year relative to recent trends but taxes on my properties went up between 12% and 20% without any changes/improvements to the properties. And this was after they increased by 20%+ in the prior year (a crazy revaluation of all properties by the assessors). And there are no large municipal projects being funded--that's just an increase to the tax rate to cover the growing costs of running the towns. Even if my pay raises over the last three years were twice what they were, I'd still be behind. A COL adjustment of 4% doesn't mean squat if many larger real expenses increase 7-10%+.

The market has been on fire and my portfolios have done well, but the churn in my week-to-week and month-to-month is brutal. I certainly feel it.

 

[Tanks]

Yeah I wish my friends did stuff like that. The issue they have is they retired in their 30s but made so many sacrifices along the way they struggle to do anything different. For example, one was going on vacation and instead of flying direct they could save 80 dollars by having 2 layovers. So they took the 2 layovers, going out to eat is going to Burger King, they got too caught up live below your means lifestyle.

I think it depends where one's mindset is. I life a comfortable life, but my future retirement budget is more than double my current budget as I will have more free time for interests, hobbies etc..

 

[Tanks]

... And there are no large municipal projects being funded--that's just an increase to the tax rate to cover the growing costs of running the towns.

I think it depends on area. My engineering company's municipal projects have more than tripled in the last couple of years and we have more in the pipeline for the next year or so. I also know of a few others we will get involved in that are in design stage. I really do not want to hire more people.

 

[Louis Toadvine]

I think it depends on area. My engineering company's municipal projects have more than tripled in the last couple of years and we have more in the pipeline for the next year or so. I also know of a few others we will get involved in that are in design stage. I really do not want to hire more people.

Yes, definitely. But in my specific case there are no large projects that contributed to the increase (these are mostly very small towns governed by town meetings, so anything big can't fly under the radar). This is just typical municipal maintenance. And the cost of that maintenance has increased significantly. If the tax rates increase 12% or 15% YoY for 2-3 years and these towns are not ending the year with surpluses, it's safe to assume the marginal tax revenue is just being absorbed by higher wages for municipal employees, more expensive subcontracts, increase in base materials like sand & gravel, rock salt, etc.

For the average taxpaying Joe getting his 0-4% COL adjustment, it's a bitter pill to swallow. Now add in the 10%+ YoY increases he's seeing in other areas of his life, and it's downright brutal.

 

[PHOENIX PHIL]

On the subject of the national debt, this graph shows a similar shape but what is different is that it shows the debt over time vs our GDP. Currently we're running a debt of about 120% of our GDP. So if I understand this correctly, if we were able to take the entire output of the USA for one full year (which we most certainly can't) and applied it to the debt, we'd still be running in the red.

I don't think you need to have any degree in finance, accounting or economics to understand that is a bad situation. I don't know where the threshold of pain is in regards to the number, but I don't think this is sustainable. As much as I did not care for Bill Clinton, he was pragmatic and wiling to compromise with Newt Gingrich to balance the budget and put us on a path of reducing the debt. Albeit it was a modest downward trend, it was moving in the right direction.

Whatever happens tomorrow and who takes office in January, this problem is being ignored. I don't think we can afford to do that anymore. Many have stated in this thread they're absolutely against negotiating with the Dems. I would say if you're a Republican and think we can attack this problem without any compromise on taxes or if you're a Dem and cannot compromise on spending, you are a part of the problem and not the solution.

Federal Debt: Total Public Debt as Percent of Gross Domestic Product

View the ratio of federal debt to the economic output of the U.S., which can indicate economic health and the sustainability of government borrowing.

fred.stlouisfed.org

 

[Tanks]

Yes, definitely. But in my specific case there are no large projects that contributed to the increase (these are mostly very small towns governed by town meetings, so anything big can't fly under the radar). This is just typical municipal maintenance. And the cost of that maintenance has increased significantly. If the tax rates increase 12% or 15% YoY for 2-3 years and these towns are not ending the year with surpluses, it's safe to assume the marginal tax revenue is just being absorbed by higher wages for municipal employees, more expensive subcontracts, increase in base materials like sand & gravel, rock salt, etc.

...

A lot of new municipal projects are being funded by the infrastructure bill that Biden signed into law. You are right about normal costs going up though. We have increased our maintenance contract costs by about 30% cumulatively in the last 4 years for municipal clients. That is just labor, material costs are on a cost plus basis and some have stayed pretty much the same and some has gone up.

 

[Doubleplay]

6% here on variable. We’re 12 months out from having it fully paid off so I’m going to keep pouring funds into it. I guess that’s my investing for now.
Then it’s shares or property?

Shares.. because you already will have the property.
Also if you retire less than 2.5-3 million worth of liquid assets with todays money, get out of US or spend 5-6 months somewhere else.
You'll live a much better life and you'll get much more for your money.

 

[Doubleplay]

On the subject of the national debt, this graph shows a similar shape but what is different is that it shows the debt over time vs our GDP. Currently we're running a debt of about 120% of our GDP. So if I understand this correctly, if we were able to take the entire output of the USA for one full year (which we most certainly can't) and applied it to the debt, we'd still be running in the red.

I don't think you need to have any degree in finance, accounting or economics to understand that is a bad situation. I don't know where the threshold of pain is in regards to the number, but I don't think this is sustainable. As much as I did not care for Bill Clinton, he was pragmatic and wiling to compromise with Newt Gingrich to balance the budget and put us on a path of reducing the debt. Albeit it was a modest downward trend, it was moving in the right direction.

Whatever happens tomorrow and who takes office in January, this problem is being ignored. I don't think we can afford to do that anymore. Many have stated in this thread they're absolutely against negotiating with the Dems. I would say if you're a Republican and think we can attack this problem without any compromise on taxes or if you're a Dem and cannot compromise on spending, you are a part of the problem and not the solution.

Federal Debt: Total Public Debt as Percent of Gross Domestic Product

View the ratio of federal debt to the economic output of the U.S., which can indicate economic health and the sustainability of government borrowing.

fred.stlouisfed.org

Yes, it is ignored.
As long as US dollar is the World's reserve currency and we have the printing press it really does not matter.
The reason we are the World's reserve currency is our economic and military strength.
The moment we lose that position, our debt comes into play.
That's why we should stand in the way our biggest adversaries be it in Ukraine or Taiwan or anywhere else in World for that matter.

 

[Tanks]

One thing people lose sight of is that we are the masters of our own destiny, and one has to make himself/herself great first. Election and election results mean nothing if after November 5th people go back to living a life of mediocrity with the expectation of the government and government policies making their life great.

 

[HookMeUpII]

Well, appears to be more of the same old in this thread.

Regardless of that, after listening to JD Vance on Rogan, I can see why Trump picked him. He is incredibly sharp, well spoken, and super reasonable on the sensitive issues.

I guess we will see what happens tomorrow night.

 

[PHOENIX PHIL]

Yes, it is ignored.
As long as US dollar is the World's reserve currency and we have the printing press it really does not matter.
The reason we are the World's reserve currency is our economic and military strength.
The moment we lose that position, our debt comes into play.
That's why we should stand in the way our biggest adversaries be it in Ukraine or Taiwan or anywhere else in World for that matter.

Yah I guess we could print our way out of debit if you don't mind the inflation that comes with that. Sure hope we don't lose that reserve currency status, perhaps the possibility is reason enough to get the fiscal house in order.