southsider2k5

Upchucking for the better part of two days isn't any fun. Kids make great germ carriers.

Congrats Jeff, I hope for all of the best for the both of you!

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Oct 9, 2010 -> 08:11 AM) I have a bit more time this morning, so let me spell out why inflation can't be a concern at all until we're nearly out of the output gap. Inflation is at the most basic level caused by demand for products outpacing supply. You can't make enough to keep up with demand, prices have to rise to slow down demand. Normally, when we start seeing general inflation in the economy, that is a sign that the economy is overheating; that is, people want to buy more things than can be produced. Expanding capacity is not cheap in a working economy; the supplies it takes to expand by building new factories or opening new shops are more expensive because everyone wants them, workers are hard to get because low unemployment means that most people who want jobs actually have jobs. Thus, if you want to expand capacity, you have to pay more for workers, for labor, for facilities, everything. In that case, typically what we see is the federal reserve bank raising interest rates...so that it becomes more expensive for people to buy things on credit, and demand is suppressed. Now, let's look at the case we have now. We have a gigantic output gap; we have huge amounts of idled capacity. Factories, raw materials, and workers are all sitting there idle, with the workers especially wanting to work. If I produce a product that suddenly becomes in high demand...how hard is it for me to expand? Compared with the supply-constrained case, it's easy. I can increase capacity easily; workers are easy to find, even highly skilled workers, and they're cheap because they have no other job offers. I can get raw materials somewhat easily as long as I don't need gold, and I can get facilities easily by taking over someone else's idled factory. We are in a demand-side crisis right now. None of the forces that could drive inflation exist, because we have the capacity to produce over a trillion dollars more stuff than we actually are producing. Businesses that have funds they would invest in expansion have zero reason to do so; even if they have good products, they already have more capacity to produce stuff than they need. Bringing extra production capacity online would be easy. This problem is why doing things like business tax breaks right now will have zero impact; businesses are already sitting on the cash and the capacity they need to hire people, but they have no customers to buy stuff. Until we're close enough to out of the output gap that labor starts to become constrained and the idled capacity is working again...there just is no reason for inflation to happen. We're still, in reality, stuck in the area where limited deflation is possible, despite all the money we've shoveled out, and the thing preventing that right now is price-stickiness; the fact that people don't like to lower the prices of their product even if they can't sell the stuff they're currently producing. The only thing that really could push inflation right now is a spike in raw materials prices, such as oil or precious metals. I'll grant...that's at least slightly possible, since we're in a world where energy and raw materials supplies are genuinely constrained...but right now, even energy prices aren't acting as a constriction. All of that sounds great, if this were actually true in anything but a theoretical sense then why is the President on TV complaining about a lack of lending? I know you have latched on to the idled output as some soft of mecca of problems, but at the end of the day, you need to have banks lending. That is the start of economic activity in this country, because there is no such thing as savings.

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ Oct 8, 2010 -> 05:59 PM) Then perhaps you should avoid the forum in which the White Sox are always discussed? I see no reason why a post regarding mismanagement of a team that isn't the White Sox should be mentioned in the White Sox forum unless it were only meant to bait certain posters. I'm not a mod, though, so what do I know. So people are allowed to compare them to other teams, but when the other teams comparisons are used back, that doesn't belong... Sure that makes sense.

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm beer.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Oct 8, 2010 -> 09:30 PM) They're not being forced to keep bad debt on their books right now...they've figured out how to make so much money off of that bad debt that they couldn't care less about getting it off the books. They get a family that misses a couple payments, they start the foreclosure process but don't tell the family so that the family keeps paying on the mortgage, they foreclose on the family anyway, and show up 1 day and evict them with no warning. They sell the house at near full value because it never sat empty, and they get the additional funds the first family paid on the mortgage. That's the new game. They do things as rapidly as possible between eviction and sale because they make the most money that way from both sides. The problem is they keep going overboard with the eviction process, to the point that they've literally broken into some people's homes. That got the government's attention, so now they "halt" all foreclosures and just let the people they're foreclosing on pay longer. If people aren't paying, they aren't making anything. They also aren't able to lend on those fund again, because they are tied up.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Oct 8, 2010 -> 02:21 PM) Well, let's divide that up. There is a difference between softening the extremes, and just postponing the inevitable. Putting false stops on foreclosures is the latter - its not helping anyone, those people aren't going to suddenly find big money, so all you are doing is making things worse. The banks have f***ed a lot of things up, but the speed of foreclosures was actually being handled pretty well. Messing with it is stupid. Stimulus type actions, on the other hand, aren't really forestalling anything. They are softening the dip, but also blunting the rate of recovery a bit. So its changing the curve, but can still have an overall positive effect, all the way out to the next run up. My problem has never been with the idea of the stimulus in general - and its plain to see that it has indeed helped avoid a depression. Problem is, they spent the money in the wrong places, so the long term (and I mean past the recession entirely) hasn't been helped. Forcing banks to keep bad debt on their books only means there is less money to lend, especially when all of the focus is on tightening rules, increasing capital requirements, and the like. All it is doing is forcing banks to look at a Japan type scenario.

I'd be curious to hear which of the top free agents that we bid on, should we have outbid the top bidder for? Should we have went higher for Torii Hunter?

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Oct 8, 2010 -> 01:24 PM) B of A now halting foreclosure proceedings in all 50 states, until they feel they have a better handle on procedures and documentation. This is an interesting set of developments, starting with what Balta posted earlier. One of the positives of the foreclosure situation seemed to be that the banks were processing, but also sort bottlenecking them to an even pace, which was doing a decent job of putting them on the market at a fast enough pace to work down the pile but slow enough not to cause a massive downturn and following spike in prices. Now, we have this stalling - which if it goes on for any significant lenght of time, will cause a backlog, and further push out the healing process for the housing market. Hopefully this turns out to be a blip. But I have a feeling you will see Congress grab onto this as a way to look good, going after the banks, but ultimately the stalling would end up making things worse. That is the story of this recession. We are trying to forestall all of the bad things from happening that need to happen so that we can start to recover.

Andy Pettite, Hall of Famer, or not...

QUOTE (fathom @ Oct 8, 2010 -> 01:36 PM) The same Paul Konerko that was the best fastball hitter in the majors? Eh, I thought you were talking about Thome in there.

QUOTE (fathom @ Oct 8, 2010 -> 11:27 AM) I'm sure Bobby Jenks or whoever is pitching would continue to give him fastball after fastball. If they can keep it up over his hands, they will be fine.

QUOTE (Rex Hudler @ Oct 8, 2010 -> 12:52 AM) I don't follow basketball recruiting as much as I used to. Anyone have any insight into IU's chances with Cody Zeller? I know he is choosiing between Butler, IU and N. Carolina but haven't seen much beyond that. Palehose, anyone? It is amazing to see Butler in the same sentence as IU and UNC.

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ Oct 8, 2010 -> 10:06 AM) Why do people do this? Do you actually think the Sox show accountability? Just baiting? Honestly I don't see it as being any different as when the same people repeat that over and over and over about whoever they hate in the Sox organization.

Every so often you get someone who isn't paying attention to this thread.

Blech.

Bulls start slow, finish hard, win about 55 games. Miami blows away the field wins 70 and the title.

QUOTE (Chet Kincaid @ Oct 8, 2010 -> 09:54 AM) HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I could just read Soxtalk and replace a couple of names.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Oct 8, 2010 -> 09:48 AM) Is there really a need for a [insert crappy remake here] remake?

Outstanding, except they don't offer mayo.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Oct 7, 2010 -> 09:28 PM) I don't buy that for a second. You also don't buy into markets having instant reactions to politicians talking, so that doesn't surprise me.

So who had Bickell for the first goal?

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Oct 7, 2010 -> 09:26 PM) You really think that actual investors buy that CNBC "republicans are great" crap to the point that it drives 20% swings in the DJIA? Short answer: enough people do that you do get a significant move out of stocks.

Lock him in a cell