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A sign of the times?
I deal with contractors for various types of building maintenance, and always above board to avoid problems. Three days ago a contractor I have dealt with for over 15 years ( they do work, they bill me, I mail them a check ) asked me a question. Would I be willing to pay by cash for a 20% discount? hmmmm like Greece, etc.? Not good.

gerald wrote:A sign of the times?
I deal with contractors for various types of building maintenance, and always above board to avoid problems. Three days ago a contractor I have dealt with for over 15 years ( they do work, they bill me, I mail them a check ) asked me a question. Would I be willing to pay by cash for a 20% discount? hmmmm like Greece, etc.? Not good.

What did you tell him?

John

Comparing the Great Depression era to today, I don't have the statistics in front of me but it seems like peak unemployment was 25% in 1933 and rapidly fell from there. It may have been 17% in 1936 (edit). Just rough numbers to set the tone. Today we have unemployment of 8% officially and using the same measurement methods as in the 1930s it may be 12%.

Now let's move on to another concept - what relative percentages of the population were actually doing something productive then versus now. If a man was repairing appliances for a buck or two during the Great Depression, he may have been officially on the unemployment rolls but he was doing something worthwhile. He may have worked for a bank and lost his job when the bank went under, whereas today a bank facing the same insolvency situation may still be open and the employee may still be paid with printed bailout money and is officially on the employment rolls.

Which man is more productive - the man of the Great Depression who is unemployed and repairing appliances or the man of today who is employed in an insolvent bank and being paid with printed bailout money?

Just off the top of my head, I would guess that 90% of the labor force in the 1930s was doing something at least vaguely productive whereas that number might be about 75% today - in other words, a reversal of the official statistics. If you're unemployed and tending a garden and fixing holes in clothing and eating out of a soup kitchen that's more productive than sitting on your ass collecting a government issued check and using food stamps. Certainly 10,000 lobbyists descended upon Washington to collect more money to keep failed corporate bureaucracies afloat can't be considered real employment either.

John wrote:

gerald wrote:A sign of the times?
I deal with contractors for various types of building maintenance, and always above board to avoid problems. Three days ago a contractor I have dealt with for over 15 years ( they do work, they bill me, I mail them a check ) asked me a question. Would I be willing to pay by cash for a 20% discount? hmmmm like Greece, etc.? Not good.

What did you tell him?

John

John--
I told him to bill me as usual, The potently negative consequences are something I prefer to avoid, not worth the risk. I do things above board, and still I have had bad experiences with the IRS ,workers comp claims, insurance fraud committed by tenants for insurance awards, etc. Being above board is a first line of defense, and you don't have to try to remember what lie you told who. It helps make life simpler and less stressful.

I'm not seeing this reported anywhere except in India's newspapers. There was a flash crash in the Indian stock market on Friday.

Nifty futures drop 6.7% in seconds
Dealers say algo trade from large foreign institutional investors triggered freak crash
BS Reporter / Mumbai Apr 21, 2012, 00:33 IST

Flash crash — was the catch phrase among market players on Friday after a huge sell order dragged Nifty futures down by nearly seven per cent within a few seconds.

http://www.business-standard.com/india/ ... ds/472132/

I'd also point out that at the time of the Depression, far fewer women worked than is now the case. Considering the increase in labor, I could see unemployment going even higher than in 1933. When my grandmother was alive, she always said that if a depression happened again, it would be worse because we're a lot more urbanized than we were 80 years ago.

http://generationaldynamics.com/forum/v ... 530#p13250
http://money.cnn.com/2012/04/20/markets ... ?iid=HP_LN
http://generationaldynamics.com/forum/v ... 390#p12913

Brune stated he became aware of the $26 million in donations from individuals and subsidiaries of Chesapeake Energy, one of the largest natural gas companies in the U.S., shortly after he became executive director in 2010. The funding began in 2007
In February, EIG announced that China Investment Corp.(CIC), China’s sovereign wealth fund, had acquired a minority
stake for an undisclosed amount. CIC declined comment.

http://generationaldynamics.com/forum/v ... tion#p8966

gerald wrote:Would I be willing to pay by cash for a 20% discount? hmmmm like Greece, etc.? Not good.

Record numbers of US citizens are renouncing their citizenship to avoid taxes:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/ ... UF20120416

The more you tighten your grip, the more tax payers will slip through your fingers.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076759/quotes

“Unlike the current system,” Gale told Congress, “workers’ and firms’ contributions to employer-based 401(k) accounts would no longer be excluded from income and would be subject to taxation, contributions to IRAs would no longer be tax-deductible and any contributions to a 401(k) plan would be treated as taxable income.” In other words, the employee and employer would no longer get a deduction under the Gale plan, they would qualify for a credit. And the credit would “increase [government] revenues by about $458 billion,” Gale says.
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/business/p ... z1soPpwQry
http://www.brookings.edu/opinions/2012/ ... _gale.aspx

H the algo's will destroy all and will destroy anything or anybody in there way. If you are not in the club
it will be like Indonesia soon. Ask for a public service and organize they will simply murder you.