I’m one of those rabid pro-life types, and actually, the argument presented in Stoid’s OP is what finally led me to decide a few months back to vote for Kerry, although in my case, it was purely hypothetical, since, being search-engine impaired, I was unable to find the statistics I needed to back me up. It just seemed to make sense. A woman finds herself unexpectedly pregnant. Is she more likely to carry the child and give it birth if she is in a stable economic situation, with a decent-paying job with decent benefits that is likely not to be offshored, or if she is making a wage that is such that she frequently has to decide between paying the electric bill or buying groceries for the week, and has no insurance benefits, and the company is claiming quite vociferously that they are not planning to lay people off in the near future, which is, of course, a sign that they are planning to lay people off in the near future?
I belive that Kerry’s economic policies will create more, and better paying jobs than Bush’s will (and have, or shall I say, have not.)
On another note, I don’t think abortion should be made illegal. I know that sounds contradictory, but I do know for an incontrovertible fact that women will have abortions whether it’s legal or not. I would rather that if a woman does come to that horrible decision, that she have the operation in a clean, hygenic clinic than on somebody’s kitchen table.
Although my great-grandmother did keep her kitchen table, along with the rest of her house, immaculately clean…
That’s exactly where I am. If you want to stop abortion, you have to swallow your bile and do what will help the pregnant woman, even though it’s not your problem.
But at the time Stoid says the numbers started turning, we didn’t have a Republican administration, but a Democratic one. In fact we had 8 years of 'em. And there was at least even odds of another Democrat winning the 2000 election and being in charge for another 4 years. That wouldn’t have stopped the tech-bubble from bursting, the resulting market correction, and the following recession.
At best, President Gore still would have had 9/11 to contend with as well as a sluggish economy, before things got better (which they are now, just not the way some people would want them to be).
Trends don’t happen in a vacuum.
So if Kerry/Edwards win tomorrow, when can I start blaming them for the mess in Iraq? After all, Iraq is a mess, and they are now in charge, since they won the election. Is the inauguration soon enough?
Just stop playing the blame game; the recession wasn’t either Clinton’s fault or Bush’s. At best, you can blame Bush for prolonging it, but you can’t blame him for causing it by somehow manipulating the space-time continuum to somehow affect the economy before he was elected President.
I expect this kind of partisan nonsesne out of Stoid, but I thought you were smarter than that.
Call it partisan if you like, but I was attempting to take out some of the short term variances due to “unforseen” circumstances, and look at the economic performance under various administrations over a longer period of time.
I certainly agree that Gore would have had his hands full with the tech bubble bursting and the economic impact of 9/11. I don’t hold Bush responsible for either of those. However, I do hold Bush responsible for increasing the size of the federal government, and the significant increase in the deficit (and the corresponding increase in the national debt). I believe his tax cuts were poorly targeted, and did not provide the impetus the economy needed.
Likewise, I doubt Gore would have been proposing more dramatic cuts in spending or taxes. But I also suspect the Republican Congress would have been less likely to approve any new spending under Gore. Bush seemed to get a free pass. In that sense, from an economic perspective, I might lean toward a Republican presidential candidate, if I thought it likely that Congress would go to the Democrats.
Bottom line, at least within the last 30 years, our economy has performed better under Democratic Presidents than Republican Presidents. While I acknowledge that such trends do not confer proof to the assertion, it certainly seems reasonable to hold the position that the economy would fare better under Kerry than Bush (even if it is attributable to the Presidency being controlled by the party opposite the one controlling Congress).
I agree to some extent, which is why I’ve spent years of my life supporting crisis pregnancy centers–both financially and through manpower. I even worked at one for six months on an unpaid basis.
However, I certainly hope you’re not implying that only people who actively help the pregnant women are in any position to condemn abortion. That would be like saying that people have no business condemning child abuse unless they are personally willing to care for the children in question.
My bona fides shouldn’t be questioned, and I regret now that I turned her question around. We shouldn’t be arguing over which of us has done more for “the children”.
With all due respect ExTank, there are risks in venturing outside of your core competencies.
Here’s the Dec 1996 Greenspan quote: “Clearly, sustained low inflation implies less uncertainty about the future, and lower risk premiums imply higher prices of stocks and other earning assets. We can see that in the inverse relationship exhibited by price/earnings ratios and the rate of inflation in the past. But how do we know when irrational exuberance has unduly escalated asset values, which then become subject to unexpected and prolonged contractions as they have in Japan over the past decade? And how do we factor that assessment into monetary policy? We as central bankers need not be concerned if a collapsing financial asset bubble does not threaten to impair the real economy, its production, jobs, and price stability.”
Sorry for the length. The Chairman was not forecasting a recession in 4 years time. In fact, he wasn’t forecasting at all. Rather, he suggesting the possibility that Central Bankers should set monetary policy with an eye to asset values, in addition to unemployment and inflation.
--------- Just stop playing the blame game; the recession wasn’t either Clinton’s fault or Bush’s. At best, you can blame Bush for prolonging it, but you can’t blame him for causing it by somehow manipulating the space-time continuum to somehow affect the economy before he was elected President.
Emphasis added. You can blame a policy maker for increasing the duration or intensity of a given economic downturn. (One which happened to start immediately after W took office. The stock market is not “the economy”).
More specifically, you can blame George Bush for refusing to use orthodox economic tools to fight the recession. Block grants to the states would have been a credible method of temporarily stimulating government spending, which is a stronger stimulant than a tax cut of a similar magnitude (see balanced budget multiplier). Tax cuts directed at those with a low marginal propensity to consume (e.g. those making over $200,000 per year) also tend to stimulate the economy less.
Permanent corporate tax cuts tend not to be stimulative at all. (Temporary corporate tax cuts -some of which were passed- can provide incentives to speed up investment spending).
These issues were debated on the Board, as they occurred. I argued for orthodox economic policy because -hey whadya know- it is believed to reduce the intensity and duration of economic downturns, as well as lay a foundation for long term economic growth.
No, I’m just saying if you really prefer stopping abortion to judging it, you can do it, and be more effective at it. But nobody has a particular responsibility to solve someone else’s problem.
More generally, a weaker economy is associated with a range of societal ills. Administrations that succeed in attenuating fluctations and promoting long term growth do a world of good.
Those wishing to reduce the incidence of abortion might want to study policies in the Netherlands. Admittedly, I was surprised that the rate in Sweden was not lower.
Abortion Rates in Western Industrialized Countries
Country Rate per 1,000
United States 21.3
Australia 22.2
Sweden 18.7
Denmark 16.5
Canada 16.4
England & Wales 15.6
Germany 7.6
Holland 6.5
Leading indicators have declined for the past 4 months. The consensus view is that they signal weakness, if not immanent recession.
If for some reason a recession occurs, I would hope that the next administration pursues orthodox economic policies, reversing existing ones if necessary.
The Netherlands completely banned abortion, except when the life of the mother is at stake, until 1981. This indicates to me a society very squeamish about the wanton destruction of life.
Some carryover of these attitudes may well continue today, despite the (vastly overblown) reputation the Netherlands has as a den of libertine vice.
I’m wondering whether the Netherlands data nets out people of foreign birth. Given the relative size of Germany’s population, I would think that the cross-border traffic would boost the Netherlands’ abortion rate more.
Are German women traveling to France? Or maybe RU486 is more widespread than is commonly believed.
So my closing sentence was a tad hyperbolic (deliberate stupidity has that tendency); this is the best you can do?
In the core of my post, I never said Mr. Greenspan was forecasting the recession in his “irrational exuberance” speech; he was warning of an overinflated stock market. The correction of which I identified as one of the contributing factors of the recession. And you should have quoted the rest of the paragraph:
Few negative consequences doesn’t mean any negative consequences, short- or long-term. Some people took a bath, and it wasn’t just evil, money-grubbing Republicans.
You deny that the stock market is a bellwether?
I believe I already have. What I have not blamed him for is an upward trend in abortions that began in 2000, linked to a poor ecomnomy that began in 2000, as the OP asserts.
So, are you blaming George Bush for an upward trend in abortions linked to a bad economy that began in 2000 as the OP asserts, even as you claim that the economy didn’t start turning bad until George Bush was installed into office in January of 2001?
Hate the man for what he actually does; don’t make shit up out of thin air.
Just to be clear, I believe a collapse in investment (beginning, yes in 2000 and ending very roughly in Q4 2001*) triggered the 2001 recession.
The stock market is generally thought to be a rather mediocre leading indicator for the economy: for example, it generates an excess of false positives.
I don’t blame GWBush for the recession that began in Feb-March 2001. I do blame him for using the recession to push for a policy constructed during times of plenty. I blame him for his inflexibility and refusal to consider policies that might reduce the fixed costs of hiring an additional worker.
In short, I blame GWBush for not being an empiricist. Half-assed policy driven by feel-good ideology has sorry consequences.
Speaking of empirics, I haven’t been able to link to the article in the OP, and Googlenews isn’t helping. So I can’t really evaluate the recent abortion data c. 2000, 2001 or whatever. Sorry.
We’re really not on separate sheets of music, here. The OP’s article stated that abortions began trending upwards in 2000, linked the trend to economic conditions, and Stoid pretty much said that it’s all George Bush’s fault because he screwed up the economy.
So, in my mind we have sevral facts, as pieces of a puzzle, which just aren’t adding up.[ol]
[li] Abortions began trending upwards in 2000.[/li][li] George Bush was elected (appointed, if you prefer) in November 2000.[/li][li] He assumed office in January 2001.[/li][li] His tax cuts, as bad as they were, didn’t take effect until 2002 (for the 2001 tax year).[/ol][/li]
At best, he just contributed to an effect that was already there, but for all intents and purposes, the economy was still pretty much riding high in 2000. I just lucked into a paranoid IMR and managed to keep my little (emphasis: little) nest egg safe from the economic downturn. And I know enough to know when to admit that I don’t know shit, so when my IMR said “move,” I did.
And since trends don’t “just happen,” arguably the root causes of the upward trend in abortions beginning in 2000 are to be found prior to 2000.
Or maybe RU486 is more widespread than is commonly believed.