Do the debates matter?

[Gob]

I love American politics, it's so ...mature....

[RayThom]

So was that his hankie that he was shuffling at the end of the show? Regardless, although Romney looked pretty good it's a shame that very few of his "facts" checked out. Those undecided voters are going to be even more confused.

[Rick]

I love American politics, it's so ...mature....

Big Bird!

Big Bird!

Big Bird!

[Gob]

[Guinevere]

Now *that* is painful (and almost true).

[rubato]

With respect to the "5 trillion dollar tax cut", Robert Samuelson's column this morning notes this has always been a contrived number by Obama?

"... Obama says he favors tax reform but would also raise the top income tax rate to 39.6 percent from 35 percent. That's the opposite of what most economists consider reform: cutting rates and broadening the tax base. ... "

Samuelson* has redefined "reform" to only mean "cutting taxes and broadening the base" and lied about how this is "most economists" definition.

But that is typical for him.

Tax Reform always means cutting taxes only to a small group of fringe ideologues. Tax Reform, to any honest person, can equally mean cutting, raising and/or altering the distribution of taxes .

Obama's policies are tax reform to any honest writer.

yrs,
rubato

* This is ROBERT Samuelson the ignorant RW hack generally ignored by most economists not PAUL Samuelson the Nobel-winning real economist.


http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/bea ... nion-pages

[Econoline]

* This is ROBERT Samuelson the ignorant RW hack generally ignored by most economists not PAUL Samuelson the Nobel-winning real economist.

Exactly. Robert Samuelson, is a journalist, with no formal education in economics, and his pronouncements on economic issues should carry no more weight than any other journalist (and less weight than, say, a Nobel Prize-winning economist...but I digress. )

[rubato]

I love American politics, it's so ...mature....

Well it's very strange.

Most of the largest and most important European countries have leaders who all went through a very thorough training in economics, public policy &c no matter which side of the aisle they are on. So that Hollande and Sarkozy, for one example, both are very well educated in government in general and as technocrats will not make wildly different decisions. As a result they don't have grossly unfit stupid people like Bush II, McCain, and Romney in line for succession. But in the current crisis Obama has done better than nearly all of the Eu leaders in pulling the US out of a recession/depression, based on the data.

And the UK is mired in what looks like the beginnings of a Japan-style lost generation, economically speaking.

Rather surprising.

Although a Romney win will set us back even further.

yrs,
rubato

[Gob]

But in the current crisis Obama has done better than nearly all of the Eu leaders in pulling the US out of a recession/depression, based on the data.

And the UK is mired in what looks like the beginnings of a Japan-style lost generation, economically speaking.

The number of people out of work in the UK has continued to decline.

Unemployment fell by 50,000 to 2.53m in the three months to August, taking the jobless rate down to 7.9% from 8.1%.

The number of people in employment rose to a record of almost 30 million, the Office for National Statistics said.

The ONS figures show that some 1.57 million people claimed Jobseeker's Allowance in September, a fall of 4,000 on the previous month.

A combination of more jobs being created and more people entering the workforce pushed the absolute number of people in employment to 29.6 million, the highest since these records began in 1971.

The percentage of people in work rose to 71.3%, the best rate since April 2009.

"It's a real landmark to see more people in work than ever before," Employment Minister Mark Hoban said.

"Despite the tough economic times, the private sector continues to create jobs and our welfare reforms are encouraging people to return to work."

The government also noted that there were more job opportunities available, with the number of unfilled vacancies at 476,000, up 3,000 on the quarter and 17,000 from the same period last year.

[dales]

Do the debates matter?

No.