It's the economy, stupid!

[Taters]

People always seem to fall into the most heated arguments when they're each coming from a different presupposed foundation, and neither will accept said foundation as opinion.

[Arterion]

Admission is the first step to healing, Arterion.

Post above reported, again...you sir seem to have only this argument on your lips.

I would gladly invest money into "military needs" if the soldiers would actually fight. We need the oil, the natural resources and political levy. I say finance the military and declare war. It worked well in the past, why not now?

[ClottedCream]

Your views on Homosexuals offend me, by the way.

[House of the Wolf]

For a supposed law-student, Arterion, reading isn't really your strong-suit. It's definitely not the only argument I've put forth in this exchange, but it seems to be the only one you understand. What that implies is something altogether obvious.


And as far as "declaring war", Italy might want to have a word with Ethiopia first...find out what they did wrong there.
Waging war at this day in age is definitely a very bad idea for everyone. Just throwing that out there...

[Arterion]

Your views on Homosexuals offend me, by the way.

Than I do appologize if so but those are my views and apart from that there is little I can do. God ordained an order and said people have no place in that order. I have always been adamant on my views and my religion and I do not intend to change them.

Despite the risks, war is a good investment. Wheter you win or loose, money flows.

[Avron the S'wit]

I'm going to respectfully ask you two step away from the thread and go take deep breaths. I think both sides have talked enough for today.

[ClottedCream]

Your views on Homosexuals offend me, by the way.

Than I do appologize if so but those are my views and apart from that there is little I can do. God ordained an order and said people have no place in that order. I have always been adamant on my views and my religion and I do not intend to change them.

Despite the risks, war is a good investment. Wheter you win or loose, money flows.

I respect your religious views, it's doesn't stop them from offending me, but I respect your right to have them.

[Derp53]

ummm wow i feel kinda stupid reading this thread the only problem with war is that both sides tend have nuclear arsenals and though it maybe good in the short term it is more harmful in the long runplease don't kill me guys

[Dark Lord Cam]

Money flows into the pockets of the people who make the weapons, not into the pockets of the people.


Your logic: Blown.

[Br3admax]

Yeah, or the tons of lives lost, much of that is civilian.
Your logic then implodes, are you dead yet?

[Derp53]

*eyes roll backward into skull then faints*

[Br3admax]

Finally no more derp, stormcloaks are safer, by a small margin.

[Dark Lord Cam]

In fact, the longer a war goes on, the poorer the middle class gets. The government is paying for war materiel using tax money as the military is entirely funded by taxes. So the more taxes spent on war materiel, the less taxes are spent on public works like schools, libraries, parks, and etc. The rich get richer as all of the government's yearly earnings go to fund their projects.

So saying that a war would make the average person's life better is foolish and shortsighted. You also can't really argue that the war profiteers make jobs either, as every modern factory is partially automated. Sure, a small percentage of highly skilled individuals get to make ammunition, but a lot of the work is also done by machines which take the jobs of 30 men.

That's how I see it, at least.

[Frost Mage]

It sounds cheesy, but war is never the answer. Ever. Nothing will get solved with petty fighting, as each party will eventually forget their purpose, forgoing the public on their mission. It's pointless, and I'm sad to see the US still in the Middle East.

[Dark Lord Cam]

That's not entirely true. Sometimes war is necessary, and sometimes, war gets more done than peace talks.

Case in point: The appeasement of Germany before WW2.

[Br3admax]

No, thats just ES vs Real World parallel , hence the name Great War (Forshadowing the Elder Scrolls VI).

[Wolf]

HotW: Paul Krugman = win.

Arterion, you're so very... hateful. That's quite honestly the only word I can come up with. Selfish, maybe? Pardon me, I'm not trying to poison the well or ad hominem; it just seems as though you're so very unwilling to help others. I see this in a lot of people, and it fascinates me. From an evolutionary perspective, it's a fluke: the pack-species loner is the one that dies. I don't think there's been a semi-intelligent species yet that hasn't been propelled through evolution through the use of communal survival tactics.

But this thread is about the economy, so pardon my derailment.

[Br3admax]

AMERICA SHOULD OWN THE WORLD, FIRST CHINA THEN YOU ALL. BOW TO OUR SUPERIOR FORM OF GOVERNMENT.

[Frost Mage]

AMERICA SHOULD OWN THE WORLD, FIRST CHINA THEN YOU ALL. BOW TO OUR SUPERIOR FORM OF GOVERNMENT.

Honestly, this is what most politicians seem to think. Like there's no alternative to capitalism, to how our democracy has become more of a subtle movement to decrease our rights, to the point where you can hardly call it a democracy, in my opinion. For instance, very few laws that are passed aren't put up against the constitution to see if they hold any weight. Now, the republicans, every time Obama wants to pass something, waste time and compare it the constitution. It's a vicious cycle.

[Wolf]

It's politics. And capitalism is a type of economy, not a form of government.

[Frost Mage]

It's politics. And capitalism is a type of economy, not a form of government.

Yeah, typo on my part.

[Kestral]

{Insert Arterion's arguments here}

>Implies that government spending caused Italy's, and the Eurozone's, collapse

Meet my smooth-talking friend here. FDR, one of the best presidents of the US. Only one to have gotten more than 3 terms, and even got a fourth. I'm sure you have heard of a little thing called the "Great Depression" (An event not limited within the bounds of the US, but was a pretty severe global depression) and "World War II" (Also not only limited to the US, but was a pretty severe global war.)

He made something called the "New Deal," which was basically a try-anything-except-what-we're-doing approach to fix the Great Depression, atleast stateside. It had the lucrative idea of borrowing money to make government programs in order to deal with social problems* caused by the depression and even create programs to employ people.** He lowered unemployment (When it was over 25%) by more than 10% in his first two terms alone. (Something no other president, and most likely, no other world leader in modern history, had ever done) All of these projects (listed below) operated on the idea of: "[&@%!] it, we're going to spend some money on the economy." (It's what this cool, British cat initially thought.)

And it worked! He even started social security, even then a costly program, to help out the disadvantaged. (My good buddy, LBJ, expanded that.) And even under the Great Depression and that war I mentioned on its way, the economy still improved. But what caused the depression?

Well, during the 1920s, we had lots of "hands off" government policies when it came to regulating business (It has a funny name, it's called "laissez-faire" capitalism. Lie-zy fare.) This was pretty cool stuff, because the banks made programs where I could buy $1000 worth of shares for only 10 bucks! Stellar deal! Well, I don't really have that much money, but not one really cared, because people kept on buying. And then the stock brokers called in their loans and lots of people cared when they were $990 in debt! Woops! Then you have something where some market crashes and people lost jobs and stuff generally hits the fan all over.

Fast forward to now, and you have this whole government spending idea still around. It's pretty cool for people who need it, like my old granny or maybe your disadvantaged uncle. (Lots of countries do it. I think those fellas up north of you do.) This whole "hands off" business was also around not too long ago, too. There were things going around called "sub-prime mortgages." Basically, I can buy a big house on the cheap regardless if I can pay for it or not. Sound familiar? Well, it was making lots of money in real estate everywhere, so everyone jumped onboard, even Italy (Under "So what really caused the crisis?")!

Then the inevitable happened, which was everyone's money disappearing and banks closing. There's a lot of other stuff that happened too, but I don't think you'd be able to understand it. But what's the lesson?

Government Spending !=> financial crisis
Deregulated business => financial crisis

Con excepción a los grecos, quien son una historia diferente totalmente.

* These include but are not limited to:

• AAA
• DRS
• DSH
• FCC
• FDIC
• FERA
• FHA
• FLSA
• FSA
• Social Security Administration
• TVA
• REA

** Includes:

• CCC
• FLSA
• WPA
• FWA
• FTP
• FWP
• NLRA
• TVA

[&@%!] off you goddamn nazi.
PS: You sound a lot like some dude named, Adolf. He wasn't all that cool.

[Veck]

Kessie, someone's going to get all excited when he reads this but it must be said; I actually love you.

[House of the Wolf]

Kestral - (kay-strol) trans: awesome person.

[Rose of Sithis]

Kes, I know I say it all the time, but you should really post more often.