Oct 2, 2023 10:25:23 GMT iNCY said:

Oct 2, 2023 5:47:52 GMT c said:

How people can struggle on six figures is beyond me. People always bitch about poor people having unreasonable expectations of being able to eat and have housing with only on job, but what is the excuse here? US is the same people making under 250k are living paycheck to paycheck. Get fucking bent. They claim the disabled can live on 10k a year, but they struggle live on 250k, 25 times more than we get? Then people wonder why I went fucking socialist.

Think I owe 250k for college now in loans.  I knew from the get go I was not going to every pay them back entirely though so I took the max I could and signed away 10% of my income over the poverty rate for 30 years.  So far, I paid 0, and next disability review, the loan is nullified finally.

My main issue with socialists is that they believe they deserve a share of other people's money without having worked for it.
That very notion is offensive for me, you don't see people providing for their family and doing overtime to make their life better pushing for socialism...
Not a dig at you c but invariably those advocating for themselves getting a bigger share of the pie are the ones contributing sweet nothing to it.

I am all about guard rails and protecting the poor, but not subisidising peoples poor decisions.

We're at a point now, where 4.4 million people in Australia have a disability. That's 17% of Australia's population. 5 million Australians, or 24% of the population receive some sort of income support payment. 3.5% of this country is unemployed.. nearly 900,000 that we know of. That's a massive part of the Australian population collectively - and we wonder why this country is eating itself alive, as that shared view as you've mentioned iNCY is everywhere today. 

Life's tough, I get it. But at no point should we be punishing those contributing, and more importantly the one's standing on their own two feet. 

PLEASE WATCH THIS!

I have been saying this for a while, the problem is that the Fed has no choice to raise rates until something breaks.
If the treasury bonds go to 13% + the economy is going to break in ways we can't even fathom.

The secondary point he makes, which is true is about the Bank of Japan.
For the longest time the Japanese economy has been in a deflation/stagflation era with interest rates at zero.
This has had Japanese institutions buying US treasury bonds at Japanese interest rates.

What is starting to happen now is inflation is working it's way through the Japanese economy.



As Japan starts to deal with inflation it's interest rates will go up, which will turn off the tap for purchasing US Bonds, this would be a catalyst to push the bond price much higher.
This is going to keep happening until the US starts to get it's debt under control.
Not because on Bidenomics or whatever, but because the more bonds you print, the higher the price for them is going to be in a competitive market.

Now as I keep saying the Government could manipulate and keep the bubble rolling as they did through the GFC and COVID, but what this shows is that you cannot escape the laws of gravity and the more you push higher the further you have to fall.

Oct 2, 2023 11:09:14 GMT NATH45 said:

Oct 2, 2023 10:25:23 GMT iNCY said:

My main issue with socialists is that they believe they deserve a share of other people's money without having worked for it.
That very notion is offensive for me, you don't see people providing for their family and doing overtime to make their life better pushing for socialism...
Not a dig at you c but invariably those advocating for themselves getting a bigger share of the pie are the ones contributing sweet nothing to it.

I am all about guard rails and protecting the poor, but not subisidising peoples poor decisions.

We're at a point now, where 4.4 million people in Australia have a disability. That's 17% of Australia's population. 5 million Australians, or 24% of the population receive some sort of income support payment. 3.5% of this country is unemployed.. nearly 900,000 that we know of. That's a massive part of the Australian population collectively - and we wonder why this country is eating itself alive, as that shared view as you've mentioned iNCY is everywhere today. 

Life's tough, I get it. But at no point should we be punishing those contributing, and more importantly the one's standing on their own two feet. 

This is where the discussion gets hard.
When we brought in the NDIS there was a lady on the radio talking about the human dignity of being a full time disabled person, how she should be able to afford a new wheelchair.
I don't disagree that everyone has a right to be treated with dignity...

What I am unclear on is declaring that people can join the ranks of the full time disabled on the government dime.
Especially in a WFH era, surely we can do a better job of matching people's limited abilities to available roles.
We are not the USA, we have socialised medicine, if people need treatment or counselling to join the workforce in some capacity, let's do that.

The basic definition and what qualifies for the Disability Support Pension in Australia is as follows - a physical, intellectual or psychiatric condition that is likely to persist for more than 2 years and stops you from working.



Outside of the people on disability with an actual physical issue and/or health concerns and those with an intellectual disability, there are some people that are just 100% unemployable - people that have no potential skill, no prospects or lack any real ambition, common-sense, grasp of reality or any sort of real intelligence. Some of these people are absolute nuffys and can't, don't, and won't ever work.  

Others are drug and alcohol dependents, or have behavioural issues, and are likely often violent or aggressive offenders. There's also those will a very low IQs, despite no actual intellectual disability and of course the petty crims who will never be employed based on their history. Lifestyle is also a big component as is generational poverty as a result of many of the things noted above. 


I'm sure at some point, after years of different services trying to improve their client's prospects they just write them off to save themselves the workload and seek a disability diagnosis. 


So, do you stand your ground and turn some of these people away because you think they could do better if they cut the shit out, or do you sign the form, tick a box and put a few bucks in their pockets so they won't starve to death and end up living on the streets? And then focus on the rehab or recovery? 

Australia has gone with the latter. Which makes it easy to exploit. 

Who gave Aunty Janet the keys to the money printer?
Totally not inflationary!~

She cannot increase the debt or direct any spending. Those are congressional powers. House has no speaker, so no money is going to Israel in our near future. Inflation still falling here as well. Almost like higher federal rates can drop it or something.

Financial experts just discovered the concept of model bias, and say a crash in the market due to AI is inevitable in the next few years as people are willing to use progressively more biased models if they increase average returns. Eventually one of the core models will fail, creating a massive crash across Wall Street. We been warning about this in machine learning groups for the last decade as more and more these models are being misused and the risk of them failing slowly increasing. Currently people rock ensembles thinking they offer innate protection, but they are only as strong as the models they average. If one model in them is not good, it weaken the entire ensemble. Which is what people are warning about right now.

So that crash that was coming when rates went up? US not only did not enter recession, but accelerated growth instead breaking 5% GDP increase. US only broke 5% once since 2010.  Almost like democrat policy works or something.

Waiting for people to say that rising GDP is clearing a sign of a failing economy.

www.marketwatch.com/amp/story/gdp-bonanza-u-s-economy-may-have-grown-5-in-the-third-quarter-5a5cf194

I think we are in a recession and the only thing keeping people afloat is credit cards. Get rid of them and watch the shit hit the fan.

Oct 25, 2023 1:47:20 GMT c said:

So that crash that was coming when rates went up? US not only did not enter recession, but accelerated growth instead breaking 5% GDP increase. US only broke 5% once since 2010.  Almost like democrat policy works or something.

Waiting for people to say that rising GDP is clearing a sign of a failing economy.

www.marketwatch.com/amp/story/gdp-bonanza-u-s-economy-may-have-grown-5-in-the-third-quarter-5a5cf194

It is inflation, it is persistent and the longer it goes on the harder the landing

GDP is up more than inflation. Next quarter we should be down GDP though as student loans are finally in repayment and is money that will be ripped out of the GDP.

Oct 25, 2023 17:37:39 GMT c said:

GDP is up more than inflation. Next quarter we should be down GDP though as student loans are finally in repayment and is money that will be ripped out of the GDP.

There are absolutely hardships out there, but it’s a fucking joke more people didn’t take advantage of zero interest loans for three damn years.

Those were for corporations not people. And you needed connections to get them. Everyone I know that applied was denied. Meanwhile every member of congress with a podcast god one despite not qualifying. That cash was never meant for ordinary people, even if they qualified.

Also almost no loan company would give you a zero interest loan for student loan debt. Student loans are not dischargeable in bankruptcy, but can be if someone buys the debt. So only reason to swap from income based payments with a host of protections, to a private loan at a higher rate would be to discharge it.

Seems like every time I go to the grocery store it takes more money and I leave with less bags.

Oct 25, 2023 22:31:38 GMT c said:

Those were for corporations not people. And you needed connections to get them. Everyone I know that applied was denied. Meanwhile every member of congress with a podcast god one despite not qualifying. That cash was never meant for ordinary people, even if they qualified.

Also almost no loan company would give you a zero interest loan for student loan debt. Student loans are not dischargeable in bankruptcy, but can be if someone buys the debt. So only reason to swap from income based payments with a host of protections, to a private loan at a higher rate would be to discharge it.

The original student loans are the loans I’m referring to:

And people had no payments or interest for three years. People should’ve taken advantage of that vs. just spending the dollars in the market. 36 months of payments solely against the principle. And they didn’t do it.

Dumb.

Roughly 9 million people, or 40%, paid down debt during the pandemic.

And it was not always stupid to not pay down debt, as post pandemic a lot of stuff was changed that saw many of the people not making payments get their loans forgiven entirely. Public service and disability forgiveness programs were completely changed seeing a million more (about 10%) get their loans voided.

Oct 26, 2023 19:32:40 GMT KJ said:

Oct 25, 2023 22:31:38 GMT c said:

Those were for corporations not people. And you needed connections to get them. Everyone I know that applied was denied. Meanwhile every member of congress with a podcast god one despite not qualifying. That cash was never meant for ordinary people, even if they qualified.

Also almost no loan company would give you a zero interest loan for student loan debt. Student loans are not dischargeable in bankruptcy, but can be if someone buys the debt. So only reason to swap from income based payments with a host of protections, to a private loan at a higher rate would be to discharge it.

The original student loans are the loans I’m referring to:

And people had no payments or interest for three years. People should’ve taken advantage of that vs. just spending the dollars in the market. 36 months of payments solely against the principle. And they didn’t do it.

Dumb.

You are spot on 100% correct.

Here in Australia nearly all mortgages are variable so a lot of people are hurting with the rising rates, but for years they've lived it up on disposable income where if during that time people would have put more into their mortgages, they'd be in much better shape now.

This isn't a class thing, I know people across the financial spectrum and people tend to always have a lifestyle 105-110% of their income.

I tend to ignore my income and always keep my living to a constant level, I'm not super frugal or anything, but I know good times come and go...

The good news is I just got almost 5% on a term deposit, it's hard to justify taking any risks for income when those rates exist and the market may or may not be overvalued

I see people saying how badly they are struggling here every day. All walks of life.

My soon to be son in laws' mortgage went up $1000 a month because he had a variable mortgage. The other issue is people bought houses when the market was low (1-3%) and now they are having to remortgage at 2-4% higher which doesn't sound like much but on a $300-500K purchase that's massive monthly increase. We locked in at 2.35%, but prime right now is around 5-6%. That means if it stays that high we are looking at anywhere between $1000-1500 more a month. Brutal.

Food prices are up on some items 400%. That's insane!

I work indirectly for Imperial Oil aka Uncle Exxon who have already reached their budget for the year because of inflation, so things are slow. Layoffs are happening every week. The Food Bank said it hasn't seen numbers like this since 1989.

Oct 26, 2023 22:22:41 GMT iNCY said:

This isn't a class thing, I know people across the financial spectrum and people tend to always have a lifestyle 105-110% of their income.

I tend to ignore my income and always keep my living to a constant level, I'm not super frugal or anything, but I know good times come and go...

As they say, you can go broke trying to look rich. 

I'm not an investment guy, nor do I have any real interest in playing that game. I'm just an old-school ' cash is king ' type of guy, whether that's right or wrong.. I don't care. It's worked for me.

I benefited a few times over from some property sales that has largely put me into the position I am today. 

I moved approx. 90% of my savings into a high interest account, that other 10% is 'everyday' money. So, in short, I base my spending habits off that 10%. 

Oct 26, 2023 23:06:37 GMT iron maiden said:

I see people saying how badly they are struggling here every day. All walks of life.

My soon to be son in laws' mortgage went up $1000 a month because he had a variable mortgage. The other issue is people bought houses when the market was low (1-3%) and now they are having to remortgage at 2-4% higher which doesn't sound like much but on a $300-500K purchase that's massive monthly increase. We locked in at 2.35%, but prime right now is around 5-6%. That means if it stays that high we are looking at anywhere between $1000-1500 more a month. Brutal.

Food prices are up on some items 400%. That's insane!

I work indirectly for Imperial Oil aka Uncle Exxon who have already reached their budget for the year because of inflation, so things are slow. Layoffs are happening every week. The Food Bank said it hasn't seen numbers like this since 1989.

Someone I know saw his repayments each month go up $1,600. But who in their right mind, on $60,000 a year and two kids under 5 walks into a bank and borrows $650,000? And then picks up two new cars on finance...

A lot of people...  

For context, $600,000+ is at the top end of our market. 

But he could argue that this is just a moment in time. It's tough now, it could be easier in a few years time.. then it might get tough again, then eventually easier. They've just got to ride that wave. 

Oct 26, 2023 23:06:37 GMT iron maiden said:

I see people saying how badly they are struggling here every day. All walks of life.

My soon to be son in laws' mortgage went up $1000 a month because he had a variable mortgage. The other issue is people bought houses when the market was low (1-3%) and now they are having to remortgage at 2-4% higher which doesn't sound like much but on a $300-500K purchase that's massive monthly increase. We locked in at 2.35%, but prime right now is around 5-6%. That means if it stays that high we are looking at anywhere between $1000-1500 more a month. Brutal.

Food prices are up on some items 400%. That's insane!

I work indirectly for Imperial Oil aka Uncle Exxon who have already reached their budget for the year because of inflation, so things are slow. Layoffs are happening every week. The Food Bank said it hasn't seen numbers like this since 1989.

I am sympathetic to the whole interest rate thing... But only to a point.
Interest rates were depressed below their historical average for decades, it was impossible that this could continue forever.

It's a manifestation of the hot hand fallacy where because something in the past has happened frequently it will be the same in the future, that is statistically unlikely.

Whenever I borrow money I look at the rates today and what would happen if the rates went up...
I get that there are people who make money convincing people that there is only calm seas in their future...
But this only works because it's what people want to believe.

If someone who made a living juggling chainsaws lost a limb, we might have a bit of... Well what did you expect.

I know it's heartless but so much of life reminds me of the story of the grasshopper and the ant. Except today it seems it's the job of the ants to bailout the grasshopper.

Hope them corporations also used their near free loans to fortify their businesses and not focus solely on buying stock or increasing dividends because multiple industry demand collapse is brewing. When they come screaming for bailouts hope the American people treat them like they treated us. Because the current demand collapse is solely from the student loan repayments redirecting economic activity. Overall there is growth, but not not evenly. All those things that people screamed people should give up, they mostly gave up to pay for increasing core costs, and now those companies are nearing collapse.

Funny that people thinking they should be able to afford rent, food and healthcare was considered unsustainable, but year after year of 30% increases in growth is the norm for business. And once they fail to hit these numbers, the collapse starts extremely fast.

Oct 27, 2023 2:21:34 GMT c said:

Hope them corporations also used their near free loans to fortify their businesses and not focus solely on buying stock or increasing dividends because multiple industry demand collapse is brewing. When they come screaming for bailouts hope the American people treat them like they treated us. Because the current demand collapse is solely from the student loan repayments redirecting economic activity. Overall there is growth, but not not evenly. All those things that people screamed people should give up, they mostly gave up to pay for increasing core costs, and now those companies are nearing collapse.

Funny that people thinking they should be able to afford rent, food and healthcare was considered unsustainable, but year after year of 30% increases in growth is the norm for business. And once they fail to hit these numbers, the collapse starts extremely fast.

Interesting to post that right after you were doing victory laps about US GDP.

You can let all the companies go to the wall like you're asking, I'm no fan of corporate welfare.
Just understand that every company that go's under further establishes the monopoly of those that remain, I don't think you're advocating for half of the USA to end up working for Amazon.

Wealth concentration in the US is not news. And is the future. This is what capitalism in the late stage looks like due to economy of scale. You either led the industry or will get bought out out or bankrupted. Or killed via policy change since you money is speech and you can talk all you want at congress and the supreme court.

And it is Amazon's goal to make money. Why should they not run every other single business out of the market using all means necessary from aggressive prices to bribing supreme court justices to kill antitrust cases? This is the capitalism you all support. The sole goal of a business is to make as much money as possible right?

Oct 27, 2023 4:53:16 GMT c said:

Wealth concentration in the US is not news. And is the future. This is what capitalism in the late stage looks like due to economy of scale. You either led the industry or will get bought out out or bankrupted. Or killed via policy change since you money is speech and you can talk all you want at congress and the supreme court.

And it is Amazon's goal to make money. Why should they not run every other single business out of the market using all means necessary from aggressive prices to bribing supreme court justices to kill antitrust cases? This is the capitalism you all support. The sole goal of a business is to make as much money as possible right?

Like I said I don't care, but I'm not a hypocrite because when everyone ends up working for 5 corporations at minimum wage I won't whine about capitalism...
I'm also not a hypocrite whose going to shop at Walmart and Amazon while whining about falling wages.

I'm not saying we all get what we deserve, but we do get what we cause to happen.

Which I why I now welcome the progression. Nothing changes for me really one way or another like most on the bottom. And I cannot wait for more to join me who believe they will spared from it because they are special.

///

Seems food prices are about to skyrocket in the US and other countries. Congress considering adding Ozempic to medicaid, and is even consider funding it for all obese Americans since it will rapidly drop medical costs. It also already has caused a notable impact on sales of general food sales, and fast food sales, with junk food sales taking the largest hits. The move is coming from the right as well, likely because they were paid well to push for it.

For those who do not know Ozempic is a diabete 2 drug that inhibits hunger, offered now in weekly injections.

As more and more are put on the drug internationally, food prices will rise to maintain profit margins as prices adjust to based on consumption levels of those taking the drug.  Also as the America loses profits, to keep international profit levels, prices will rise globally.

Oct 27, 2023 8:18:46 GMT c said:

Which I why I now welcome the progression. Nothing changes for me really one way or another like most on the bottom. And I cannot wait for more to join me who believe they will spared from it because they are special.

///

Seems food prices are about to skyrocket in the US and other countries. Congress considering adding Ozempic to medicaid, and is even consider funding it for all obese Americans since it will rapidly drop medical costs. It also already has caused a notable impact on sales of general food sales, and fast food sales, with junk food sales taking the largest hits. The move is coming from the right as well, likely because they were paid well to push for it.

For those who do not know Ozempic is a diabete 2 drug that inhibits hunger, offered now in weekly injections.

As more and more are put on the drug internationally, food prices will rise to maintain profit margins as prices adjust to based on consumption levels of those taking the drug.  Also as the America loses profits, to keep international profit levels, prices will rise globally.

I don't accept that being on the bottom is necessary for most people. The only way the betterment of everyone's situation is improved is when people innovate and create to make the pie bigger.

The problem with socialists is that they don't care how big the pie is so long as everyone has the same size when it comes to slices. Even though it's better to have a small slice of something than a larger piece of nothing. The only people who object are those who have no interest in contributing or those whose goals are short term betterment for long term pain

talked to a cousin in the cattle business. He expects the price of beef to go up as much as 40% in the next couple of months.

Oct 27, 2023 8:28:54 GMT iNCY said:

Oct 27, 2023 8:18:46 GMT c said:

Which I why I now welcome the progression. Nothing changes for me really one way or another like most on the bottom. And I cannot wait for more to join me who believe they will spared from it because they are special.

///

Seems food prices are about to skyrocket in the US and other countries. Congress considering adding Ozempic to medicaid, and is even consider funding it for all obese Americans since it will rapidly drop medical costs. It also already has caused a notable impact on sales of general food sales, and fast food sales, with junk food sales taking the largest hits. The move is coming from the right as well, likely because they were paid well to push for it.

For those who do not know Ozempic is a diabete 2 drug that inhibits hunger, offered now in weekly injections.

As more and more are put on the drug internationally, food prices will rise to maintain profit margins as prices adjust to based on consumption levels of those taking the drug.  Also as the America loses profits, to keep international profit levels, prices will rise globally.

I don't accept that being on the bottom is necessary for most people. The only way the betterment of everyone's situation is improved is when people innovate and create to make the pie bigger.

The problem with socialists is that they don't care how big the pie is so long as everyone has the same size when it comes to slices. Even though it's better to have a small slice of something than a larger piece of nothing. The only people who object are those who have no interest in contributing or those whose goals are short term betterment for long term pain

It does not matter how big the pie is in a capitalist system as the ultra rich will continue to want their piece to continue to grow in size in proportion to the rest.  And as their proportion grows, that is less left for the rest.  Once people are crunched below a certain point they are no longer worth trying to squeeze more from, so you move your target up the chain.  Which is where we are at now with the upper middle class being the main target to transfer wealth from, with seeds to move to the lower upper class.  And with targeting these groups, small businesses are also targeted, as if they go under, it just means less competition for the ultra rich's corporate investments.  

The sole way this stops is if the ultra rich magically decide they no longer wish to increase their wealth, or socialist policy.  There is no magical point where the ultra rich decide they have enough and stop hoarding wealth.  Individuals may, but as a group they will not.  

Latest earning statement Bank of America suggests targeting the retirement market as an undercosted market that is ripe for expansion. Because boomers have more savings than other generations they are now being targeted heavily, with a 20% increase in costs just last year alone, and far more to come as long there is savings left to be had.