A dollar has value if you can buy shit for a dollar.

Gold likewise has no exchange value if you cant exchange it for goods and services. Its rare and chemically stable and good for memorial coins, has many technical uses and looks cute, but otherwise it hardly matters what symbol for money you choose. There is 200 years of experience with fiat money and gold and silver standards and fiat money has been better, not just usually better or better in some scenario, universally better.

Symbolic money is practical and facilitates quicker turn around prevents deflation makes speculative runs on currency harder and smoothes the economic bumps in the road in general.

GDP is just a metric. Not a bad one but not the actual goal.

USofA is teh most developed. Should have used growing. Deflation in an economy that is growing kills growth.

Restarting countries not only get to ignore their debts, they immediatelly start borrowing again.

The only countries that dont borrow are countries no-one will lend to and countries so rich in some silly resource they can float high in the international currency system without borrowing. Borrowing is good for bussiness.

What is outrageous idiotic bullshit? Believing pegging the value of your paper note to some hoarded luxury makes it a better representation of the mean value of goods and services bought and sold? I could do without gold except for the jacks on my audio cables (just kidding). It does not matter what I exchange for food and gas, if it gets me food and gas, its good money.

Money is what you can pay taxes with. Do they take gold?

If you insist your dollar has the value of some weight of gold how does that influence the willingness of someone else to sell you shit? Unless they specifically intend to buy gold at a fixed price they dont care. They are going to use your dolar to buy some other shit from someone else. So if you take the actual currency out of the equation, when you decide on buying and selling shit you are intuitively comparing that decision with all the other decisions about buying and sellin that you know of. The currency is just a good way to count the measure of usefullness of a product or service and compare among many. Pebbles, bottletops, dollars, gold, pearls, all just a number.

A dollar could be backed by gold or it could not, this has zero impact on the transactions made. What matters is how many transactions are made, at what value, and how much money is available to the entire marketplace in a given period of time. Transactions quickly pass the ability of a gold standard to keep up. If you want a gold standard you have to slow transactions down because you dont have the money for them.

This is why markets need some regulation, otherwise someone might sell the universe twice and then default on one. But a gold standard, at least the type of gold standard I believe was talked about in this thread as a miracle cure, would be too limiting.

If the dollar has no actual value…you’re sunk from the start.

Improving gdp is the only way to add value today….much easier said than done, and possible to go backwards at light speed.

Are you calling the US a developing country? Deflation isn’t a concern for most. It’s pretty rare.

If you improve the economy artificially, the bill will come due someday inconvenient and likely cause depression, not just recession.

Restarting countries didn’t all borrow, some tried to take over the world and ignore all their debts. Just saying.

If you have gold backing your dollar, even if your dollar somehow collapsed you’ve still got all the gold. That’s just one reason it’s smart. If you don’t issue dollars for every ounce of gold in reserve, you can add dollars without the risk of inflation, then remove them when possible.

You keep saying it has no advantages, I’ve listed many.

Outrageous idiotic bullshit. Gold is a commodity universally valued. Bitcoin is worse than nothing, it costs money just by existing and has absolutely no value besides what idiots will pay, that’s like basing your economy on beanie babies and saying it’s the same as physical gold. WTF man?

If youre a normal country you are always living on credit, if for no other reason, then because it is super easy and cheap to borrow. Also you have to, to make it to the next pay check (tax collection). First your subjects have to produce and sell, then you can collect taxes.

You dont base the value of the dollar on anything. You offer it as a commodity to the market. If your economy sucks or you print too much money the dollar goes down, which can help the economy. Printing money doesnt automatically help the economy though, it just creates space and time to make it possible for the economy to improve.

Improving the economy means creating more or better products and services that are in demand at a competitive cost. Governments in non-dictatorial countries cant really do that directly, they can only create the conditions for this to happen.

Moderate inflation hardly plays a part, except as a moderator (is that a pun?) of shocks. Deflation (and a strong gold standard in a developing economy IS deflation) is deadly, it makes the economy less flexible, less able to adjust.

If you never improve your ecomomy, all you will have left will be to bitch about inflation.

What is too much debt, too much inflation, too much intervention? I wish economics was a science.

Theoretically the economy can get to be so bad that the structure collapses, there are countries which have notoriously bad historical records, and yet every time they restart they have to borrow money to get things going again. Reserves in general are useless. Production, services and a functioning market, recursive production of valuable goods and services which freely and easily find customers is the only thing you can consider a reliable pillar of civilization. Currency is one of those goods and services.

If for any reason yor currency cant freely circulate (see China or the USSR errr... Russia) you can hardly be a superpower, at least not in the economic sense.

Adopting a gold standard so strong that it would destroy the international dollar standard has no advantage for the USofA or for any developed first world country. Even just having the Euro wreaks havoc in weaker European countries economies, but that is another can of worms.

A lot of what is wrong about the gold standard would apply if a country decided to adopt bitcoin as its sole currency btw.

I certainly hope so, 0-.25% doesn’t cover administrative costs for basically free loans.
If they go slow, it shouldn’t stall….cool off a bit, sure. That’s acceptable.

Personally, I think it all became funny money when Nixon dropped the gold standard, and I would support returning to it, painful as it would be. At least the dollar would have some permanent fairly predictable value. (And the fed would be forced to stop printing more money to pay government debts, which causes inflation).

Bob, please read this carefully. I know we fuck around a lot here, but I 100% honestly don't want to see you get hurt financially.

Obviously, if you believe in TSLA, I understand you putting your money where your mouth is (full disclosure: I'm holding POTX and CURLF, so I'm on the same page with what I'm saying on this) but PLEASE don't bet money you don't have on TSLA.

“At 10-times revenues, to give you a 10-year payback (P/E 10, my note), I must pay you 100% of revenues for 10-straight years in dividends. That assumes I can get that by my shareholders. It also assumes I have zero cost of goods sold, which is very hard for a computer company.

That assumes zero expenses, which is hard with 39,000 employees. That assumes I pay no taxes, which is very hard. And that expects you pay no taxes on your dividends, which is kind of illegal. And that assumes with zero R&D for the next 10-years, I can maintain the current revenue run rate.

Now, having done that, would any of you like to buy my stock at $64? Do you realize how ridiculous those underlying assumptions are? You don’t need any transparency. You don’t need any footnotes.

What were you thinking?”

-- Scott McNealy was the CEO of Sun Microsystems
2002

At the peak of the Dot-Com, roughly 30 stocks in the NASDAQ 100 traded above 10 P/E. Today ALL stocks in the DAQ do: the average P/E is ~25.5.

TSLA is at a P/E of 175.

There is no American economy. There hasn't been since since October 3 of 2008. Things got catastrophically worse on September 17th of 2019 when the repo market came within hours of completely locking up in a catastrophe that would have made AIG look like a rounding error. The Fed was forced to firehose astronomical amounts of money into the system to keep this from happening and this was before Covid.

In Jan of 2021, there was $2.6 TRILLION in Zombie Debt out there. That's $2.6 TRILLION on the verge of default at 2021 interest rates. The Fed is now in a horrific position: raise rates and watch massive defaults explode like financial nukes, or keep rates steady and watch inflation implode the economy.

People don't understand how bad this is and how much worse it can get. If the Fed has to raise rates by 500 BP -- and Christ fucking help us if they do -- the first order defaults will be the worst in Capitalist history and the second and third order effects could very well be the nightmare scenario we came within 36 hours of in 2008.

Save your money, Bob. Cash is king. And fuck BTC.

Totally agree….profitable companies shouldn’t get welfare/tax breaks. Non profitable companies shouldn’t be artificially propped up forever (unless they’re essential).

I would go farther…tax leeway at first to help them become established companies, but if they accept the tax breaks and still fail, the company assets should be forfeit to repay the taxes unpaid like any other debt. If you accept a break and succeed, pay it back over your first profitable decade with slightly higher taxes. Help up, not handouts. That’s my druthers.

Massive corporate welfare for extremely profitable companies is abhorrent to me….just like tax breaks for the ultra rich.

I do….and I can list reasons why I think what I think, unlike yourself who is embarrassed to admit you never actually think yourself and all your arguments come from disgraced and debunked liars who’s jobs are to lie, almost exclusively when it comes to any political topic.

The ship only turns so fast. It needed SO much correction on SO many issues because the last demander in chief refused to steer the nation anywhere but into a reef for the last entire year of his term….the last 3 months totally intentionally while he drilled holes in the keel and cut holes in the sails.

The nation certainly needed serious and immediate correction. Glad to hear you admit it, even accidentally.
You’re complaining about more spending!? You must be joking! Compared to spendthrift Trump, he’s a fucking miser. Every major project he’s put forward has been paid for in the bill, not so with the last administration that thought they couldn’t overspend because they can print more money….the biggest deficit and fastest debt rise (both by dollar and percentage) EVER by a mile. And put us in a recession with high inflation, negative GDP, outrageous unemployment, and near a million dead for the privilege. Joe invested in American infrastructure. Complaining about spending will not be tolerated from you after supporting Trump. Not for a second, you unbelievable hypocrite.

He did many things, leading to a healthy economy and amazing jobs numbers and rising wages among other improvements. All work against inflation.

But you like to say he’s done nothing, so how’s 4 examples on the Afghanistan disaster alone work for you?
He negotiated 6 more months to be gone.
He evacuated any and all Americans that wanted out, including those that waited until the last day.
He set up and staffed new systems (granted too little and late) to assist Afghans that worked for us in getting at least refugee status if not visas. This should have been step 1 in February 2020….likely a big surprise to find nothing started or planned when Joe took office.
He pulled out billions worth of functioning, still owned by America weaponry (what you love to whine about is the weapons in Afghani’s hands, and decommissioned often scuttled vehicles we abandoned….yes, a waste) that before he took office were being left in country.
Simply put, he made a plan and implemented it, can’t say the same for his predecessor. It wasn’t perfect, but it was something….which is a massive improvement.

He’s a mile above the low bar set by your idol, who spent nearly a full 1/3 of his presidency off playing golf (after promising not to play at all), and >1/2 of every day on personal executive time eating junk food and watching TV (but only ever taking softball questions from far right outlets, refusing any non right wing reporters a question much less interview). The remaining 1/6 was largely filled with rage tweeting and executive toilet time (pooping or shredding, you choose).

Your position is old, dementia ridden, no leadership, no question taking, slow, incapable of speaking or thinking, doesn’t know who or where he is Joe kicked fat lazy dumb Don’s ass without even holding rallies, did it in his pjs without breaking a sweat or raising his voice. Odd you love to constantly degrade the guy who’s by every measure head and shoulders above your messiah and proved it by a historic landslide. Seems you wouldn’t want to keep putting Trump down as a massive total loser to such a sad, weak, incompetent opponent, but you gotta be you.

Downvote at dishonest “bidenflation”. This is Trumpflation if we must be infants.

Economists will tell you how inflation happens. Creating 1/3 of every dollar in existence to pay for things we can’t afford (2020) is the simplest way. Lowering GDP is also a factor (-2.2% 2020)
At least under Biden, wages are increasing too. Didn’t happen under the last president, not so much. Inflation from a glut of new money (but no added value) takes time. It will continue no matter what steps are taken until the spending we did on fake “credit” gets paid.

Another debt Trump left, not Biden policies driving inflation.
I defy you, @bobknight33, name 3 Biden policies that are driving inflation. Name one. I’ve named the Trump policy economists say caused it….printing new money to pay for programs without funding. Look it up.

As for meat prices, remember that little thing called Covid? Remember how the last administration insisted Covid was a mild flu, and meat processing plants closed because of massive outbreaks? That, and subsequent labor shortages have increased prices, not Biden adding taxes.
Comparing mid pandemic unnaturally low (shutdown means cheap fuel, even free oil) fuel prices to artificially inflated (refineries refused calls to ramp production back up) prices of today is a red herring, a paper tiger. Two factors there caused the increase, neither caused by Biden.

Total false narrative, or in bob speak, FAKENEWS!

So easy to make baseless, fact free opinion only statements, isn’t it?

You might try adult conversation wherein you are expected to back up opinion with facts. Try something new.

It’s true, the withdrawal plan is on Biden, because Trump did not have one at all.


The withdrawal, and the issues with the Taliban taking the billions in weapons we had given the Afghans are 100% on Trump, however. He negotiated the withdrawal with the Taliban after releasing them from prison. They instantly started attacking Afghan targets and Trump gave the Afghans, our allies, zero assistance….then blamed Biden for his mess and losses.
Can you explain why Trump apparently gave up and surrendered unconditionally to the Taliban in 2020? Can you explain not involving the Afghans or our military in his negotiations? Can you even explain setting the enemy free from prison, no strings attached?

The last 4 + months of his presidency, Trump forgot about policies because every waking moment was spent fomenting and perpetrating the big lie, knowing he would lose the election and a coup was his only shot at retaining the power to hide his crimes and debts.

Biden won. Trump isn’t president. No one expected him to be able to put out every dumpster fire Trump left him, he only had to get Trump out. Success. Winner.

Such a sad little man, bob. Defending a failed anti American wannabe dictator for a plan he never had for the withdrawal he negotiated. Why? Dictator Don failed….over and over and over and over and over…….thank goodness. Failure. Loser.

Competition? Seriously what competition is there?

2 things are clear
Clearly your anti Tesla.
Clearly you truly dont know much about the EV market.

Tesla is dominating the EV space.
Tesla has 8 quarters of growth.
Growing roughly 20% per quarter and about 70% YoY
2021 seen 84% growth in car sales.
Demand is a 6 month wait.
Tesla has sold 930K vehicles in 2021.
2022 Fremont and shanghai will make 1.2Mvehicles alone.
Giga TX and Berlin coming on line soon should add 500K vehicles.

Ford / GM do not have the capitol to make EV and ICE.
Layers of management and union demands will keep from a rapid necessary to EV.
Ford / GM have each have over 100 Billion in debt
Factory closing and chip shortages causing more Ford /GM losses
Ford / GM probably go under unless bailed out.
Ford/ Gm lost sales and Tesla grew sales.

Toyota also dragging their feet.
VW is the only company seems to be moving to EV in a substantial manor.


As you say high demand / low supply is some how bad. This is good place to be. Its a supply issue . Tesla is addressing that.

Saying Tesla doesn't pay taxes. false argument. Every company pays their taxes. If you don't like the amount then that's a government tax policy issue.

FSD is still in beta form. It is not a final product. It is pretty fuckign good as is.


Elon being pro corporate anti tax is what you would expect.
Im sure Apple, Facebook, Google are all in this same camp.
Far right? I dont know about that.

Did they offer that in the program, or was it only random individuals….or are you extrapolating, assuming the program became universal? I thought this plan was just for the indigent.

$500 each for 4 works out to more than my wife brought home for 40 hours a week after 15 years at her last job…..barely livable for 4 anywhere in California, a nice income in some states. Not a huge amount to provide for 6 months. How much does temporary housing, services, extra law enforcement, etc cost over that time for 4 people? I assume they’re close.

Yes, universal income is costly, but most on the right won’t consider giving the destitute money if they don’t get a handout too, that likely multiplies the amount by over 10 times. With a means test, it would be billions, maybe under $100 billion. We spent nearly $6 trillion on bad Covid response in 2020, including trillions to corporate welfare handouts with no strings attached and they still fired millions of workers. I think if that’s ok we can afford to invest in making people productive again instead of drains on society (of course, not everyone will benefit, but 75% success must be a win overall). If not, socialize any corporation that took a bailout, we bought em, we should own them.

…Or taking on more debt like every government project, but the increase in gdp from turning costs into profits likely pays for the program without a dime in new taxes, just a reduction in costs of handling the homeless and new taxes from their incomes….especially if you have a means test and not universal income.

Yes, they convoluted by calling it universal income but focusing on homeless. It should be UMI. Universal Minimum Income….under employed get less than unemployed up to a certain minimum livable combined income, fully employed (with living wages) get nothing….IMO. Sadly, a large portion of people can’t see what’s in that plan for them (no homeless, less crime dumbshits) so won’t consider it unless they also get $500 even though that’s not even a noticeable amount to them….one more ivory backscratcher.

Holy fuck!
Remember Hillary?
Remember how she should be locked up for using a private server for digital copies of official government documents?

Uh oh….Trump not only also did exactly that, but he actually stole original (uncopied, with no digital copy) documents from the whitehouse, including but not limited to presidential records, personal notes, correspondence with foreign leaders, government records…. The national archive had to raid Maralago to retrieve what was left unincinerated (yes, he burned records that he stole from the whitehouse).
He allegedly actually ate some records in the Oval Office so they couldn’t be retrieved and put back together like so many were.
Another instance of Trump being ridiculously guilty of far more of the exact criminal activity that he asserted his opponent might commit and should definitely be executed for.

P.S. How about those jobs numbers!? Not the 300000 jobs lost Fox and co have been gleefully telegraphing for weeks, but nearly 500000 gained, and more people reentering the workforce thanks to a healthy economy! Thanks Biden!

On a personal note, Biden debt relief programs just erased $59k of student debt my mother in law has been paying off for nearly 50 years (she became severely ill and was out of work for years….twice, and all progress she had made paying it off was erased with penalties and interest). Thanks again Biden!

Oh no!
Good….Trump (likely) only has $93 million in liquid assets….1% of the 10 billion he’s claimed. None of his properties have shown a profit in at least two years, and they all are essentially owned by the banks that loaned him the money to buy them.
Better….he has $750 million in loan debts due in the next few years.
Best…. he also has between $100-$300 million in back taxes to pay or go to prison.

Sounds like Daddy Trump is going to be sleeping on your couch soon, he already spent all your political donations on defending his own criminal cases, and they’re all still moving forward. His lawyers are making arguments first year law students would laugh at, not actual defenses….and have bled both his and the RNCs coffers dry.
D’oh! Bad year to be a Trumpster.

Lol. Triggered much bob!?

Impossible to enlighten you, you live in the dark by choice.

No matter how often or how clearly I explain my feelings on Biden, 20 minutes later you will post “newt, you good think time Biden you boy good!? Explain why you love him. This is you choice?”

There’s no point explaining for a fifteenth time to a moron that can’t read my reply and can’t remember an answer for 3 minutes.

🤦‍♂️

On the other hand, Trump IS 100% you(r) choice, despite all the lies, despite the massive failures on every front, despite adding 50%+ to the debt, despite the worst economy in history, despite being responsible for 750000 American deaths, despite the racist race baiting and scapegoating politics, dispite the most nepotistic administration ever, despite the dissolution of the union, despite letting Russia invade Crimea and murder their political enemies internationally without a word, despite dozens of failed attempts to subvert democracy, defraud an election, outright steal the presidency, use the military to seize voting machines and install fake electors to “elect” him, sell pardons, and despite his being best friends and a long time party partner with Epstein, filmed lecherously leering and gawking at children at multiple events including Maralago parties with just him, Jeff, and dozens of under age girls in attendance and no one else.

Yes, Bob. Biden is incredibly better than Trump, no comparison, it’s a mid level AAA ball player vs a cheater and loser at T-ball. It’s an old fashioned grandpa vs Charles Manson. He doesn’t have to be Hank Arron to be a massive improvement over a cheater who bats 000 and has 4217 errors in 4 seasons and no plays (but claims to be the best player ever).

Could you explain what positive traits you see in Trump? What success he had (without ignoring 2020)? In what way specifically was the nation better off Jan 19 2021 than it was in late 2016?

How are you going to answer with OAN going away? No more canned insane fact free answers for you to cut and paste.

Let me remind you….you are still one of the 30% that think Trump did a good job (by what metric I can’t tell….not economic, not infrastructure, not public health, not jobs, not the state of the union, not trust in government, not international standing, not trade, not lower crime, not cooperation (government or civil), not by simplifying the tax code, not by lowering spending….so how, how did he succeed, by bankrupting the treasury to give welfare to billionaires? The only thing he actually won are titles for most corrupt administration in history hands down, first to be impeached twice, only president ever to deny certified election results, first to attempt to falsify election results, first to attempt to overthrow a valid election by force, and biggest debt by 1/3 and biggest deficit by far more than double.).

You are also one of the 30% that, after months of denying Republican involvement at all now thinks violently attacking the government with bombs, fire, guns, knives, tear gas, projectiles, and heavy clubs, killing police and trying to murder representatives is a great job, patriotic. 🤦‍♂️

You are also one of the 30% who denied Covid was ever an issue that needed to be addressed until Jan 20, 2021 when it suddenly was horrific and all the president’s responsibility….but no fucking way in hell you’re going to listen to his advice.

Bob, I couldn’t say the last time you were correct on any topic. I may be incorrect up to 5% of the time, and gladly accept true correction (but not simple obstinate contradiction without fact) and willingly admit mistakes. I actually research. You are totally wrong on every detail closer to over 95% of the time, you’ve never once even looked into the ridiculous claims you cut and paste from right wing propaganda sites…I doubt you would know how, and never once have you admitted a single of your uncountable and verified mistakes that you make in every single argument you attempt….and I’m talking about factual mistakes, not grammar.

Let me also remind you, Biden has a 42% approval rating, not 30%. Trump had 39% at this point. 🤦‍♂️