On Wed, Dec 10, 2008 at 8:31 PM, Judah McAuley <[email protected]> wrote:
> > > > Blame oil producers like Russia, Iran, and Venezuela for trash talking in > a > > clear attempt to unnerve analysts and push the price of oil ever higher. > > As opposed to OPEC? :) I don't blame OPEC generally. Saudi Arabia has no interest in instability or uncertainty, as they have recently signaled. Russia, Iran, and Venezuela in particular have huge national budgets that are predicated on selling oil at a very high price. > Oil is a commodity but is not traded on anything resembling an open > market using market economics. One of the best reasons for the US to > get out of the oil game as a consumer and, ideally, as a producer. We're going to be living with oil for another fifty years at least, imho. Maybe not in as central a role as it is today, but in a significant role. At a bare minimum, trains, planes and ships will continue to run on oil for the foreseeable future. Broadening home ownership amongst the poor is not a bad thing. > Programs that encourage people to get into financial contracts that > they don't understand and can't afford are. > The "can't afford" part is what concerns me. Giving someone access to a loan that they most likely will never be able to repay is bad business for everyone. > Blame Americans (and others) for a negative savings rate. Spot on there. That's actually one thing that I've been curious about > but haven't seen a good write up on. How did we go from a positive > savings culture just post WWII to the negative savings culture now? Culture of consumption. Marketing as an industry unto itself. The Me Generation. Cheap goods from China flooding our markets. Take your pick for why it happened. Reversing it? Good luck. California is on the verge of BK and can't even agree on budgets cuts. Can we expect consumers to do a better job than their elected representatives? > And blame investors/analysts who demand that certain numbers be hit > and profit and revenue targets be nailed and improved every quarter > come hell or high water. And the notion that cheating to get there is OK. > Blame China for keeping its currency depressed to allow its companies to > sell huge amounts of goods to the rest of the world. Hard to blame them for doing the smart thing. I disagree that it is the smart thing to do. Sure, they are able to sell lots and lots of goods, but what happens when the US goes BK or has to massively inflate our currency in order to repay our debts? All that money they made (and are holding onto) becomes massively devalued, so the end result is the same. > Blame the EU for not responding effectively to the devaluation of the dollar > over the last few years. Just like we blamed the US when the Euro was at 2 to a dollar? A > strong Euro isn't necessarily a bad thing for them and they don't > necessarily have our best interests in mind. They were very concerned over the summer that the Euro was overvalued and it was causing them to lose out on exports. Based on pricing of goods, I think an exchange rate around 1.10-1.20:1 dollar to euro is about optimal, but as you say, floating currencies will float- up and down. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Adobe® ColdFusion® 8 software 8 is the most important and dramatic release to date Get the Free Trial http://ad.doubleclick.net/clk;207172674;29440083;f Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:282537 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=11502.10531.5
