observational economic dialogue...

[cbartlett419]

in other words, nobody gives a shit how you feel about past current or future administrations. I've watched as similar threads go locked in a matter of hours, I'd like to think we're capable of objective thought.

My wife teaches high school math in a town called Farmerville, Louisiana. No shit, Farmerville, the high school mascot is a farmer. It's a town of about 4000 people supported economically by a Pilgrim's Pride chicken processing plant and a large recreational lake. The plant folded last week and with it went around 1000 jobs. This doesn't include the 100 or so chicken hatcheries and chicken farms that rely solely on that processing plant for income. There are no other major industries. Brooke noticed an immediate reflection of this in terms of students' classroom behavior. She has come home more taxed than usual, explaining that overnight they have developed an angst or depression or animosity or or or or or. I have been keeping up with the economic downturn and desperately trying to understand it all, but this helps clarify. Short of hearing people getting laid off and all the babble that NPR offers, this is my closest encounter. There are going to be alot of people thoroughly make the beast with two backsed by this event.

So if you think of people who are suffering because of the economic situation, please think of Farmerville, Louisiana.

[Grampa]

Have no fear....roads/bridges/and high speed internet access cable are headed your way.

Its all part of the new new deal mind reassignment trickle up economic shuffle.

But.... there is good news out there..... Manny  signed a 2 year 45 mil contract with the Dodgers.

I hear Manny loves  chicken.


Best of luck to you and your family....... this.... is not the bottom.

[ZLTFUL]

BP is right. We have a little farther to go to the bottom. But we are all Americans and I have every confidence that we will get there as long as we all work together. 


Frankly, the industry I work in is a pretty good indicator of economic troubles. Alot less premium and import beer is being sold but alot more stuff like Natty Light and the like is going out the door.

[superjohn]

Have no fear....roads/bridges/and high speed internet access cable are headed your way.

We need roads, bridges, high speed Internet, and upgraded power grids for future economic growth, so we may as well buy them now when there are available workers looking for work and the cost is cheaper than waiting until all those resources are tied up on something else. So in a way it makes sense. Buy it when it's cheap.

As for the people of Farmersville, this probably doesn't directly help much and that's unfortunate. It's unfortunate that as our industrial and agricultural economy has evolved, millions of small towns and cities across the country have evolved to only support a single plant or business or industry. Economic specialization and efficiency has become geographical specialization fueled by cheap fuel and transportation costs. The lack of market diversity within a geographic area has made most communities especially vulnerable to downturns since the closure of that one plant effectively tears the heart right out of the town.

I don't have any real answers, but I do sympathize with people in this situation whether they worked at the local pork plant, chicken plant, car plant, or whatever. The good thing is that there is still a lot of good in the country and the economy will rebound. I just hope it rebounds in a better way than before and we learn the lessons of past failures.

[Grampa]

I had no idea getting from point A to point B in America was a huge problem.

America needs to concern itself with selling outside it's borders, not shuffeling freshly printed cash inside itself.

[superjohn]

I had no idea getting from point A to point B in America was a huge problem.

America needs to concern itself with selling outside it's borders, not shuffeling freshly printed cash inside itself.

There are a bunch of people in Minnesota who thought the same thing until the old bridge they were on broke. Couple that with engineering reports citing major deficiencies in a good number of our bridges and there's a problem that needs fixed. Couple that with a growing population taxing road systems that were designed for half the capacity and yes, getting from point A to point B in America can be difficult at times.

I do agree though that we need to export more and actually produce quality stuff that the world wants again.

[Grampa]

fixing the infrastructure is and should be secondary. yes...it pumps money into whatever location the work is being done in.... but all that is, is a shuffle.   zero growth.

its all about pie. building the infrastructure first is just taking one piece of the pie from one person and handing it to another.

one benefits...one suffers, in an endless shuffle.

and with every imbalance in trade outside the border.... the pie get smaller.

the pie needs to be baked bigger first.  and from what I've seen... none of the chefs  are talking about make'n a bigger one, just the promise of a bigger slice in the same old pie tin.




I have lil faith in smart people figuring that out.    I'm dumb. 

Doctors are smart folk...... they tackled the small breast issue before the cancer issue.  way to go smart people

[mitt]

Adversity makes us better in the end.

We have gone far too long on the fat, dumb, lazy boy chair.  I just hope that everyone can understand why we are where we are (spending), and who got us there (us), and rely on themselves to get through it, no big brother, and do it all civil.

mitt

[Grampa]

Adversity makes us better in the end.

We have gone far too long on the fat, dumb, lazy boy chair.  I just hope that everyone can understand why we are where we are (spending), and who got us there (us), and rely on themselves to get through it, no big brother, and do it all civil.

mitt

[ZLTFUL]

I say just take another route...one less traveled.  [moto]

To be honest, corporate farming is doing alot of damage. The small family farmers can't compete with the mass production value of the corporate farms, the family hog producers can't keep up with large scale hog lots/slaughtering operations, the small ranchers can't compete with the huge commercial feedlots...

Pretty bad when your ranch land in South Dakota has more value as pheasant hunting land than it does as ranch land due to the 5000+ head feedlots...

[mitt]

I say just take another route...one less traveled.  [moto]

To be honest, corporate farming is doing alot of damage. The small family farmers can't compete with the mass production value of the corporate farms, the family hog producers can't keep up with large scale hog lots/slaughtering operations, the small ranchers can't compete with the huge commercial feedlots...

Pretty bad when your ranch land in South Dakota has more value as pheasant hunting land than it does as ranch land due to the 5000+ head feedlots...

+1.  It is a whole 'nother topic dear to me.  Subsidies are killing ma and pa, thus killing little towns, and really the midwest way of life.  Is this political yet? 

[ZLTFUL]

That's just it, Mitt...too many people DON'T realize what got us where we are. They want to play the blame game instead of cinching their belts, hunkering down, and getting to work. I see it in my sister and her husband when they blame everyone else instead of themselves when they KNEW they couldn't afford a $700,000 house on the salary of a teacher and an IBM salesman with 4 kids. But they felt they were OWED that kind of house.

I don't own much. But what I have is paid for. What I go to the store and say I would really like that, I pay for. And if I can't pay for it, then I save, work harder, and buy it when I can. I don't feel like I am OWED the 55 inch LCD I picked up last week. My sister and her family on the other hand think they deserve the Tommy Hilfiger and Dolce and Gabanna. And I think they deserve the shit storm of repossession and bankruptcy that is rapidly bearing down on them. I love them to death and I will be here when they need me but I absolutely refuse to validate their sense of entitlement by even remotely feeling sorry for them.

[ZLTFUL]

+1.  It is a whole 'nother topic dear to me.  Subsidies are killing ma and pa, thus killing little towns, and really the midwest way of life.  Is this political yet? 

I don't think so as government period is responsible for this...on both sides of the aisle...but I could (and have been known to be) wrong...

[Ddan]

I agree having a single income source for a region spells economic disaster, but are you/we willing to pay for the increased cost of, say, bacon, raised locally on a small farm, butchered and processed at a local smokehouse and sold at a small store without the endless variety of everything you need.  The efficiencies of those industrial food operations equate to far lower prices.  How much do you suppose lettuce would cost if we had to pay a living wage to someone to pick it.  It's way to easy to point out what's wrong but I don't see anyone coming up with how to fix it.

[mitt]

I agree having a single income source for a region spells economic disaster, but are you/we willing to pay for the increased cost of, say, bacon, raised locally on a small farm, butchered and processed at a local smokehouse and sold at a small store without the endless variety of everything you need.  The efficiencies of those industrial food operations equate to far lower prices.  How much do you suppose lettuce would cost if we had to pay a living wage to someone to pick it.  It's way to easy to point out what's wrong but I don't see anyone coming up with how to fix it.

The industrial farming model is flawed though.  What is on paper cheaper, in the end is not.  Some of the ways they kill any efficiency of scale -
another tier or 2 of middle man to get to market
paying ceo's outrageous salary
lack of care from food handling

Then, they try to make up profit it by hiring ineligible workers and taking short-cuts on the environmental conditions.

mitt