Political Roundtable Part XXVII

[dobrojim]

BSilver's take was interesting and probably substantially in agreement with popular opinion.

That said, as of recent polls, roughly or slightly more than half of the country already
thinks Trump should be removed from office. It's understood he doesn't need a majority
to win reelection. I didn't see how he could win the last time but I'm ready to double
down on that belief. I really don't see how he can win a year from now. But a year is
a long time. One wonders if his tax returns will be public by then not that the vast
majority of his supporters will care what they show. They've proven to be completely
unaccountable to anything but tribalistic partisanship.

[Zonkerbl]

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[Zonkerbl]

lol we had this new hire back in 2001 or so who proudly informed me that economists no longer support free trade, I nearly ripped her jugular out with my teeth I was so mad.

Not such a strong consensus about globalization of capital markets though. This paper indicates that the main accomplishment of financial market globalization is to shovel money from the poor to the rich.

https://voxeu.org/article/aggregate-and-distributional-effects-financial-globalisation

[Pointgod]

I think the average person still doesn't get - or even come close to getting - how horrible a President and a person the pog that lives in the WH is. It boggles my mind that there's still about half of Independents that are not in favor of impeachment. He really could shoot someone in cold blood in front of millions of people, and significant percentage of the public would not want him impeached. That's a problem, and it's a problem that people don't seem to understand the simple fact that it's a problem. And if anyone thinks I might be talking about them, you're probably right.

It’s scary just how ignorant the average American is. This is truly the last stop for Democracy. In Poland you saw the President basically invalidate the judiciary. Hungary, China and Russia have had leaders set themselves up as Presidents for life. It will happen in the US because who’s going to stop Trump? The Justice department will do nothing, Republicans will never impeach him so Trump could take a **** all over the constitution and there’s no recourse until things work their way up the Supreme Court stacked in Trumps favor. He should have been impeached once the Mueller report came out, if he gets a second term you guys are totally ****. There’s literally nothing to stop him from doing whatever he wants. It’s amazing that there’s even a discussion that doesn’t end in Trump being thrown in jail.

[Pointgod]

BSilver's take was interesting and probably substantially in agreement with popular opinion.

That said, as of recent polls, roughly or slightly more than half of the country already
thinks Trump should be removed from office. It's understood he doesn't need a majority
to win reelection. I didn't see how he could win the last time but I'm ready to double
down on that belief. I really don't see how he can win a year from now. But a year is
a long time. One wonders if his tax returns will be public by then not that the vast
majority of his supporters will care what they show. They've proven to be completely
unaccountable to anything but tribalistic partisanship.

One thing that’s not talked about enough is that Trump has been campaigning since inauguration. You cannot underestimate the amount of investment that his team has put into digital advertising through different platforms. You’re right he doesn’t need a majority to win, but his team is absolutely finding new voters to turn out in key swing states. Add on top of that he’s pretty much able to send unfiltered lies because Facebook refuses to regulate political ads, he definitely has a path to reelection. That’s why all this handwringing about the Democratic candidate is idiotic. You have to assume Trump will turn out new voters, so Democrats need to get their head out of their ass and show up in record numbers. Trump has a 4 year head start and billions of dollars to spend strategically. He shouldn’t be underestimated.

[pancakes3]

It makes perfect logical sense that Trump loses in 2020 but in my heart, I don't think it's going to happen.

Breaking it down: It was a +74 electoral vote victory.

PA is probably the most likely state to go Blue imo, and at 20 votes it makes it a 34 vote delta.

I don't think Ohio*'s in play given how poorly Hillary did in 2016, and I wouldn't count on red-leaning swing states of Arizona, or Nevada. They could flip, but I don't think campaigning is going to change hearts and minds.

The other classic swing states: Colorado, Georgia, Iowa, NM, Texas, and Virginia are pretty locked in to how they voted in 2016. I'd be equally shocked if Colorado/VA/NM turn Red as I would if Georgia, Iowa*, and Texas* turn Red.

So it boils down to winning 2 of Wisconsin, Michigan, Florida, NC and Minnesota. NC is gerrymandered to hell, and Minnesota's not much better, so don't hold your breath there. By process of elimination, it comes down to Wisconsin, Michigan, and as always, Florida. Michigan's a good bet but Wisconsin swung Red hard in the midst of the blue wave*. Nobody ever knows how Florida is going to act, so really it's a coin flip and I don't think it looks good tbh.

*to be fair, Ohio, Iowa, and Texas went hard blue in 2018 but I just can't see:
Ohio flipping, given that Hillary won 43% of the vote to Trump's 51%;
Texas, who hasn't voted D since Carter flipping;
Iowa, who's favoring Buttigieg over Sanders/Warren and effectively kneecapped Warren's chances, holding their nose and flipping

There are wildcards like Oklahoma (7) and Missouri (10) that could flip (strong blue wave). There's the hail mary of poor southern states flipping because they freaked out when Trump tried to take obamacare away (Tennessee (11), Louisiana (8), West Virginia (5)) so who knows? Cobble together 35 electoral votes out of those how you will, and it's a Dem president, but these are the same voters that are hundreds/thousands of miles from the Mexican border who gleefully chanted "Build That Wall." Same voters that know that Obamacare is a godsend to them but still say "Not MY president." Same voters that live in frack country and are actually being poisoned by EPA deregulation who think that Trump was tasked by God to Make America Great Again.

FWIW, flipping PA, Missouri, and Oklahama would end in a tie.

It's just unnervingly frustrating that Michigan, Pennsylvania, and NC - three states that should have followed Virginia down the Blue path, are still stubbornly Red. Texas too, for that matter. Wealthy states with well-educated electorates and a extreme wealth disparities between the rural and urban areas have everything to gain with the Dem platform. And yet social issues like abortion and gun control dominate the conversation in these states.

[bsilver]

Quick question are you going to vote for Trump or sit out of the election?

Neither.
Just don't want another hold my nose and vote for Hillary type election, like in 2016.
A candidate that can generate broad enthusiasm is needed, to get high Dem turnout. So it's not about me, but winning.

I think the narrative that any of the Democratic candidates are a hold your nose vote is part of the problem. Hillary was literally the best candidate out of anyone running in 2016, everything she warned the country about Trump has come true. Everyone should have shown up to elect the first female President especially when it’s against an actual rapist.

Any of the Democratic candidates in the primary would make a better President then not only Trump but any Republican. The Republican Party is a criminal organization that’s only interested in maintaining their own power and enriching themselves. It doesn’t matter who the eventual nominee is, Democrats should be showing up to vote to crush Republicans. Saving your country and Democracy should be what drives enthusiasm not a single candidate. I encourage everyone on this site to volunteer for whoever the eventual nominee is, register voters, call up family and friends in swing states. Get them to show up and vote Democrat. I don’t know what more motivation you need.

I wish defeating Trump was motivation enough. It is for me and most Democrats and left-leaning voters.

But, I still say the actual candidate will make a big difference. e.g. 11% of black Obama voters in 2012 stayed home in 2016. That's ironic since Hillary Clinton swept the south in the primaries based on African-American support. Turnout could even be worse with a candidate like Sanders or Buttigieg.

Turnout of young voters is typically low. Obama generated interest but with a candidate like Biden, turnout will be back to the norm or worse.

It doesn't matter how "horrible" Trump/Republicans are. That's not sufficient to get enough D voters to the polls. We believed they were horrible and 2016, and they won. IMO the D candidate will determine turnout. Not the anti-Trump feelings of the D base, regardless of how hard they work.

[dckingsfan]

lol we had this new hire back in 2001 or so who proudly informed me that economists no longer support free trade, I nearly ripped her jugular out with my teeth I was so mad.

Not such a strong consensus about globalization of capital markets though. This paper indicates that the main accomplishment of financial market globalization is to shovel money from the poor to the rich.

https://voxeu.org/article/aggregate-and-distributional-effects-financial-globalisation

Not exactly an easy read (Gini coefficient/Chinn-Ito index). Specifically why when the Gini coefficient goes up by about 4% the effect is statistically and economically significant (one standard deviation)? But okay...

So, they seem to confirm that free-trade is still good but what is their consensus on how to globalize capital markets (or even if it should be done?). Are they saying the Euro was a bad idea? Or a better question might be - what globalized capital markets don't they like?

[closg00]

It makes perfect logical sense that Trump loses in 2020 but in my heart, I don't think it's going to happen.

Breaking it down: It was a +74 electoral vote victory.

PA is probably the most likely state to go Blue imo, and at 20 votes it makes it a 34 vote delta.

I don't think Ohio*'s in play given how poorly Hillary did in 2016, and I wouldn't count on red-leaning swing states of Arizona, or Nevada. They could flip, but I don't think campaigning is going to change hearts and minds.

The other classic swing states: Colorado, Georgia, Iowa, NM, Texas, and Virginia are pretty locked in to how they voted in 2016. I'd be equally shocked if Colorado/VA/NM turn Red as I would if Georgia, Iowa*, and Texas* turn Red.

So it boils down to winning 2 of Wisconsin, Michigan, Florida, NC and Minnesota. NC is gerrymandered to hell, and Minnesota's not much better, so don't hold your breath there. By process of elimination, it comes down to Wisconsin, Michigan, and as always, Florida. Michigan's a good bet but Wisconsin swung Red hard in the midst of the blue wave*. Nobody ever knows how Florida is going to act, so really it's a coin flip and I don't think it looks good tbh.

*to be fair, Ohio, Iowa, and Texas went hard blue in 2018 but I just can't see:
Ohio flipping, given that Hillary won 43% of the vote to Trump's 51%;
Texas, who hasn't voted D since Carter flipping;
Iowa, who's favoring Buttigieg over Sanders/Warren and effectively kneecapped Warren's chances, holding their nose and flipping

There are wildcards like Oklahoma (7) and Missouri (10) that could flip (strong blue wave). There's the hail mary of poor southern states flipping because they freaked out when Trump tried to take obamacare away (Tennessee (11), Louisiana (8), West Virginia (5)) so who knows? Cobble together 35 electoral votes out of those how you will, and it's a Dem president, but these are the same voters that are hundreds/thousands of miles from the Mexican border who gleefully chanted "Build That Wall." Same voters that know that Obamacare is a godsend to them but still say "Not MY president." Same voters that live in frack country and are actually being poisoned by EPA deregulation who think that Trump was tasked by God to Make America Great Again.

FWIW, flipping PA, Missouri, and Oklahama would end in a tie.

It's just unnervingly frustrating that Michigan, Pennsylvania, and NC - three states that should have followed Virginia down the Blue path, are still stubbornly Red. Texas too, for that matter. Wealthy states with well-educated electorates and a extreme wealth disparities between the rural and urban areas have everything to gain with the Dem platform. And yet social issues like abortion and gun control dominate the conversation in these states.

The Dem field is extremely weak and Trump has not unleashed the biggest campaign war chest in the history of politics. Also, Trump will be getting Russian assistance again, and Republicans will unleash every dirty trick they have in the book. Trump has to be heavily favored to win.

[pancakes3]

fwiw, i'm not much for talking about candidates, or counting electoral votes. that old adage about small minds discuss people, average minds discuss events, and great minds discuss ideas and all.

problem is, small minds vote too.

[Pointgod]

Neither.
Just don't want another hold my nose and vote for Hillary type election, like in 2016.
A candidate that can generate broad enthusiasm is needed, to get high Dem turnout. So it's not about me, but winning.

I think the narrative that any of the Democratic candidates are a hold your nose vote is part of the problem. Hillary was literally the best candidate out of anyone running in 2016, everything she warned the country about Trump has come true. Everyone should have shown up to elect the first female President especially when it’s against an actual rapist.

Any of the Democratic candidates in the primary would make a better President then not only Trump but any Republican. The Republican Party is a criminal organization that’s only interested in maintaining their own power and enriching themselves. It doesn’t matter who the eventual nominee is, Democrats should be showing up to vote to crush Republicans. Saving your country and Democracy should be what drives enthusiasm not a single candidate. I encourage everyone on this site to volunteer for whoever the eventual nominee is, register voters, call up family and friends in swing states. Get them to show up and vote Democrat. I don’t know what more motivation you need.

I wish defeating Trump was motivation enough. It is for me and most Democrats and left-leaning voters.

But, I still say the actual candidate will make a big difference. e.g. 11% of black Obama voters in 2012 stayed home in 2016. That's ironic since Hillary Clinton swept the south in the primaries based on African-American support. Turnout could even be worse with a candidate like Sanders or Buttigieg.

Turnout of young voters is typically low. Obama generated interest but with a candidate like Biden, turnout will be back to the norm or worse.

It doesn't matter how "horrible" Trump/Republicans are. That's not sufficient to get enough D voters to the polls. We believed they were horrible and 2016, and they won. IMO the D candidate will determine turnout. Not the anti-Trump feelings of the D base, regardless of how hard they work.

Well Barack Obama is not walking through that door and Bill Clinton is not working through that door. I feel you’re missing the bigger picture that you and every single American poster in this thread can make the difference regarding Democratic turnout. You have friends, you have family, you have coworkers, you have to fight. There wasn’t a candidate driving turnout during the midterms or special elections or even some of the Governors races. A couple of posts ago you just said that none of the candidates will drive turnout so it’s either you give up and let Republicans destroy your country or you figure out other ways to drive turnout. The actual electorate has agency here.

[I_Like_Dirt]

what i mean by that is:
don't hate on Warren because her "plan" to finance free college, or her tax plan is against your personal tastes because the power to spend and tax is firmly vested in congress. do be concerned about her power to enforce regulations against banks and white collar crimes in general because those are vested and established powers of the presidency. she'll face plenty of pushback to implement free college, m4a, and wealth tax in congress without your principled stance against socialism in the primaries. but one thing she can do carte blanche starting day 1 is to focus on wall street corruption, and do so with a vengeance.

This is where I really wish Bernie supporters would figure out what Warren is actually saying. The amount of times I've seen Warren criticized because they don't trust her to immediately implement M4A and only really trust her to immediately take action on corruption and economic reorganization is depressing. She's clearly being more measured in speaking to stuff that won't be able to change quickly and being more aggressive on stuff that the president might actually be able to start taking action on, regardless of whether she would be successful or not. That's smart, strategic thinking. Hoping to shout a bunch of things into existence simply because you're listing a bunch of things that happen to be good isn't a plan and it's what separates Warren from Bernie as what should clearly be the better candidate if someone is of that political mindset.

The flipside is that everyone keeps waiting for the charismatic leader and I will admit that I'm probably in the minority there. I don't necessarily want my leaders to be charismatic. It winds up being a necessity because the majority absolutely do want their leader to be charismatic, but to me it's far more important that any leader is astute, competent, honest, creative, flexible and reasonable. Charisma is just a way to sell things that may or may not have any business being sold.

[pancakes3]

lol we had this new hire back in 2001 or so who proudly informed me that economists no longer support free trade, I nearly ripped her jugular out with my teeth I was so mad.

Not such a strong consensus about globalization of capital markets though. This paper indicates that the main accomplishment of financial market globalization is to shovel money from the poor to the rich.

https://voxeu.org/article/aggregate-and-distributional-effects-financial-globalisation

I can get behind the idea that globalization is just privatized colonialism but i think the pushback is that it's also an effect of the sovereign government of the poor countries allowing it to happen. basically the difference between modern China and modern India. but also, most countries (see banana republics) are pretty helpless against the corrupting strongarm tactics of multinational corporations.

i also take offense that someone, an economist no less, so casually tosses around the term "free trade." we're not in Econ 101 any more. unfettered libertarian free trade free from oversight and regulation is objectively a bad thing because of externalities.

[pancakes3]

oh, and NK just flat out threatened the U.S. with a "Christmas Gift" if Trump doesn't make concessions re NK's nuclear program. cool.

[Wizardspride]

oh, and NK just flat out threatened the U.S. with a "Christmas Gift" if Trump doesn't make concessions re NK's nuclear program. cool.

[Zonkerbl]

lol we had this new hire back in 2001 or so who proudly informed me that economists no longer support free trade, I nearly ripped her jugular out with my teeth I was so mad.

Not such a strong consensus about globalization of capital markets though. This paper indicates that the main accomplishment of financial market globalization is to shovel money from the poor to the rich.

https://voxeu.org/article/aggregate-and-distributional-effects-financial-globalisation

Not exactly an easy read (Gini coefficient/Chinn-Ito index). Specifically why when the Gini coefficient goes up by about 4% the effect is statistically and economically significant (one standard deviation)? But okay...

So, they seem to confirm that free-trade is still good but what is their consensus on how to globalize capital markets (or even if it should be done?). Are they saying the Euro was a bad idea? Or a better question might be - what globalized capital markets don't they like?

Ok, so they're saying it's statistically significant - a 4% change in gini is statistically different from zero.

Also it's *economically* significant because a 4% change in gini is one whole standard deviation.

The finding is that liberalizing capital helped rich people and hurt poor people, although the average income/production affect was positive on net. This is probably because, in poorer countries in particular, the liberalization of capital markets only helped the wealthy. Why it hurts poor people they didn't speculate, but I assume moving capital around to where wages are lowest in the world didn't help any poor people in the liberalizing country.

The Euro zone is a different idea entirely requiring a separate analytical framework. They're not addressing the euro zone in this paper, although I can provide my game theoretic insights if you want, although they are fairly obvious - it's stupid to expect inflation undisciplined countries like Greece to live up to the standards of discipline practiced by Germany, so of course you are going to have to bail out the undisciplined countries periodically, and then to make matters worse Germany punishes the undisciplined countries with austerity which ends up just making everything worse. Just a poorly conceived idea executed even more poorly. It's amazing it's survived as long as it has.

[Zonkerbl]

lol we had this new hire back in 2001 or so who proudly informed me that economists no longer support free trade, I nearly ripped her jugular out with my teeth I was so mad.

Not such a strong consensus about globalization of capital markets though. This paper indicates that the main accomplishment of financial market globalization is to shovel money from the poor to the rich.

https://voxeu.org/article/aggregate-and-distributional-effects-financial-globalisation

I can get behind the idea that globalization is just privatized colonialism but i think the pushback is that it's also an effect of the sovereign government of the poor countries allowing it to happen. basically the difference between modern China and modern India. but also, most countries (see banana republics) are pretty helpless against the corrupting strongarm tactics of multinational corporations.

i also take offense that someone, an economist no less, so casually tosses around the term "free trade." we're not in Econ 101 any more. unfettered libertarian free trade free from oversight and regulation is objectively a bad thing because of externalities.

Well, if you had taken *my* class you would know the proper statement is, the policy of free trade results in a Kaldor-Hicks Pareto improvement.

Pareto improvement is when at least one person is better off and *no one else is worse off.* This is the gold standard for stating policies are "good" in economics, but basically never happens.

The Kaldor-Hicks variant of the Pareto improvement is "at least one person is better off and the winners can pay off the losers so no one is worse off."

Now what do you do with that? Economists explicitly say, at that point, we're not going to get involved in the politics of wealth distribution, that is inherently a political and not an economic topic. But does it mean "this policy is ONLY GOOD IF THE WEALTH DISTRIBUTION HAPPENS, it's just we're not getting involved in how that happens"? Or does it mean "well as long as the gains of the winners outweight the losses of the losers we'll say it's ok"?

Because the SECOND statement is IDIOTIC and BAD ECONOMICS. BUT THAT'S WHAT WE'VE DONE AS A PROFESSION.

It's WRONG. A policy resulting in a Kaldor-Hicks Pareto improvement is *only* a good policy *if the winners compensate the losers,* thus resulting in an actual Pareto improvement. FULL STOP.

Wealth redistribution, that channels side payments from winners to losers, is NOT SOCIALISM. It is WELL EXECUTED CAPITALISM.

[Zonkerbl]

ah, I finally understand what "inclusive growth" is supposed to mean

[Zonkerbl]

lol we had this new hire back in 2001 or so who proudly informed me that economists no longer support free trade, I nearly ripped her jugular out with my teeth I was so mad.

Not such a strong consensus about globalization of capital markets though. This paper indicates that the main accomplishment of financial market globalization is to shovel money from the poor to the rich.

https://voxeu.org/article/aggregate-and-distributional-effects-financial-globalisation

Not exactly an easy read (Gini coefficient/Chinn-Ito index). Specifically why when the Gini coefficient goes up by about 4% the effect is statistically and economically significant (one standard deviation)? But okay...

So, they seem to confirm that free-trade is still good but what is their consensus on how to globalize capital markets (or even if it should be done?). Are they saying the Euro was a bad idea? Or a better question might be - what globalized capital markets don't they like?

Ok, so they're saying it's statistically significant - a 4% change in gini is statistically different from zero.

Also it's *economically* significant because a 4% change in gini is one whole standard deviation.

The finding is that liberalizing capital helped rich people and hurt poor people, although the average income/production affect was positive on net. This is probably because, in poorer countries in particular, the liberalization of capital markets only helped the wealthy. Why it hurts poor people they didn't speculate, but I assume moving capital around to where wages are lowest in the world didn't help any poor people in the liberalizing country.

The Euro zone is a different idea entirely requiring a separate analytical framework. They're not addressing the euro zone in this paper, although I can provide my game theoretic insights if you want, although they are fairly obvious - it's stupid to expect inflation undisciplined countries like Greece to live up to the standards of discipline practiced by Germany, so of course you are going to have to bail out the undisciplined countries periodically, and then to make matters worse Germany punishes the undisciplined countries with austerity which ends up just making everything worse. Just a poorly conceived idea executed even more poorly. It's amazing it's survived as long as it has.

Ah, I forgot to answer your "so what is the proposed solution" question. In the United States we have this thing called Trade Adjustment Assistance (https://www.doleta.gov/tradeact/) that is an attempt to compensate people who lose their jobs to trade effects with education (which is dumb but better than nothing I suppose - cash would be better - if they choose to use that cash to get reeducated great). So the answer is to do something like that for the effects of financial market globalization. People who own capital and move it overseas should only do it if the gains to doing so is greater than the losses suffered by the domestic workers who lose their jobs. So anyone making such a transaction should pay a tax equal to the losses suffered by their domestic workers. If they still choose to make the investment, great - no one's worse off and he's better off.

[Wizardspride]

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