Do evangelicals not worry about debt?

[Jalinth]

It just occurred to me that since evangelicals fervently believe the Rapture is coming within their lifetimes (just try asking one; they're dead serious about this), this might explain why they don't give a shit about George W. Bush deficit-spending his way to glory. They literally expect to be teleported out of the national debt.

What do you think?

Did you read this slate column? www.slate.com/id/2109203/

It pretty much states that fiscal conservatives in the Republican party are dead. It also equates the debt issue to the Southern states - they like tax cuts and federal spending. So who pays for it? Your North East and Western states (think of what % of income tax New York City alone pays).

Eventually, the US will run into the same brick wall that Canada did - but they don't have a government structure that can easily handle it. In Canada, Chretien and Martin could essentially run roughshod over everyone - dictatorship in action. They consistently underestimated revenue, overestimated expenses year after year - while the spending cuts weren't huge, they did stop spending from spiraling upwards by systematic lying about the deficit (necessary lying unfortunately, but still lying). The US doesn't have the same ability - you'd need a strong, fiscally conservative president (not sure exactly when the last one was), and strong fiscal conservatives with clout in both the Senate and the House all at the same time. They are will also run into demographics problems within a decade - workers will start leaving the workforce at an increasing pace, putting severe pressure on Social Security while reducing tax collections. As a Canadian, this is a bad thing, since if the US goes down, so does Canada (although we might be able to avoid drowning) - we've been unable to really extricate ourselves from an overreliance upon US trade.

[Enforcer Talen]

oh yeah. this ones going to be *fun*.

[Darth Raptor]

Speaking purely from personal experience here, the Evangelicals have to be "good stewards" of whatever God puts them in charge of. For example; God gave humanity dominion over all non-human animals, but that isn't a full license to shoot as many elephants as you can to make piano keys. Responsible management of game, livestock and pest populations while generally respecting nature is considered good practice.

Likewise, all money is God's money, and it isn't a good idea to spend it carelessly. Fundamentalists really do believe in fiscal responsibility, for the most part. It's just that they also tend to believe God will bail them out whenever they get too far in the red, so long as all irresponsible spending has been in line with God's PlanTM.

I really don't think the Rapture is much of a factor. At any rate, God gets pissed when tenants destroy His property; regardless of the fact he fully intends to destroy it Himself. Honoring a covenant and tending properly to what you're given charge of and all that.

[Darth Wong]

I like the line "God will provide." Good indicator of how dense they can be.

[Drooling Iguana]

It just occurred to me that since evangelicals fervently believe the Rapture is coming within their lifetimes (just try asking one; they're dead serious about this), this might explain why they don't give a shit about George W. Bush deficit-spending his way to glory. They literally expect to be teleported out of the national debt.

What do you think?

Not only is the so-called Rapture bad politics, it's bad religion, too (Hmm, I think I need some new CDs). The Rapture has no basis in the Book of Revelation - actually, Revelation says that God will come and take those who are faithful, AFTER the seven years of shit happen.

So, in other words, it's going to occur some time in 2008?

[Enforcer Talen]

didnt, for a while, fundies not believe in extinction, cuz man could never kill anything that god created?

[neoolong]

I like the line "God will provide." Good indicator of how dense they can be.

You ever try that when asked if you'll be paying by cash or credit card?

[neoolong]

My point being that it seems like the Rapture and expecting God to provide a solution are ideas concerning more abstract concerns like the deficit than more concrete examples like paying the mortgage.

[THEHOOLIGANJEDI]

It just occurred to me that since evangelicals fervently believe the Rapture is coming within their lifetimes (just try asking one; they're dead serious about this), this might explain why they don't give a shit about George W. Bush deficit-spending his way to glory. They literally expect to be teleported out of the national debt.

What do you think?

Hey,Mike these are ppl who think that the huge job losses are aren't a big deal and that ppl who do worry about it are superficial. They think "morals", "values" and "faith"should come first. Trust me this is no exaggeration.

[Patrick Degan]

The US doesn't have the same ability - you'd need a strong, fiscally conservative president (not sure exactly when the last one was)

Clinton.

[Gandalf]

didnt, for a while, fundies not believe in extinction, cuz man could never kill anything that god created?

Sort of, it was said that God would never allow such a thing to happen to his creations.

[Jalinth]

The US doesn't have the same ability - you'd need a strong, fiscally conservative president (not sure exactly when the last one was)

Clinton.

No - he had no time to be a fiscal conservative - too much time spent on interns.

[tharkûn]

I doubt most fundies link the rapture to the debt. Most subscribe to the Laffer Curve, supply-side economics, or some other economic policy that basic states that if the government bleeds red ink for the "right reasons" it will grow the economy hence government revenue faster than debt will eat into it.

Really US debt isn't all that hideous outside of absolute terms. The debt, as a percentage of GDP, is down from its all time high. Likewise in comparison to other countries, like the UK, France, Germany, Japan, Russia ..., the US debt load is relatively light. The leading indicators for government debt hitting a brickwall are inflation and bond returns. One, the other or both gets multiplicatively higher just prior to default. As it stands inflation is a nuisance and bond yields aren't particularly high. For the foreseeable future US government debt retains its position as the gold standard for the bond market against which everything else is measured.

[The Yosemite Bear]

Well as per the bible all debts are to be forgiven every 5 to 7 years.

[Imperial Overlord]

Utah, the home of our beloved Mormon fundies, has the highest rate of fraud in the nation. Apparently the Saints habit of praying for financial advice makes them easy marks for Mormon con artists.

[Jalinth]

I doubt most fundies link the rapture to the debt. Most subscribe to the Laffer Curve, supply-side economics, or some other economic policy that basic states that if the government bleeds red ink for the "right reasons" it will grow the economy hence government revenue faster than debt will eat into it.

Really US debt isn't all that hideous outside of absolute terms. The debt, as a percentage of GDP, is down from its all time high. Likewise in comparison to other countries, like the UK, France, Germany, Japan, Russia ..., the US debt load is relatively light. The leading indicators for government debt hitting a brickwall are inflation and bond returns. One, the other or both gets multiplicatively higher just prior to default. As it stands inflation is a nuisance and bond yields aren't particularly high. For the foreseeable future US government debt retains its position as the gold standard for the bond market against which everything else is measured.

From what I remember of my economics classes, the Laffer curve is generally considered respectable. The main issue is that it only holds (ie: a reduction to tax rate increases revenue) true over a certain range of rates. At some point, a decrease in tax rates will have little impact on behaviour - the extra income an individual gets if the rate drops from 2% to 1% is much smaller than a drop from 89 to 90% in percentage terms.

I'd be interested in whether they really do even consider "fiscal" issues or do they view the world solely through a prism of their Christian views.

[SirNitram]

I doubt most fundies link the rapture to the debt. Most subscribe to the Laffer Curve, supply-side economics, or some other economic policy that basic states that if the government bleeds red ink for the "right reasons" it will grow the economy hence government revenue faster than debt will eat into it.

Really US debt isn't all that hideous outside of absolute terms. The debt, as a percentage of GDP, is down from its all time high. Likewise in comparison to other countries, like the UK, France, Germany, Japan, Russia ..., the US debt load is relatively light. The leading indicators for government debt hitting a brickwall are inflation and bond returns. One, the other or both gets multiplicatively higher just prior to default. As it stands inflation is a nuisance and bond yields aren't particularly high. For the foreseeable future US government debt retains its position as the gold standard for the bond market against which everything else is measured.

From what I remember of my economics classes, the Laffer curve is generally considered respectable. The main issue is that it only holds (ie: a reduction to tax rate increases revenue) true over a certain range of rates. At some point, a decrease in tax rates will have little impact on behaviour - the extra income an individual gets if the rate drops from 2% to 1% is much smaller than a drop from 89 to 90% in percentage terms.

I'd be interested in whether they really do even consider "fiscal" issues or do they view the world solely through a prism of their Christian views.

Polls just before the election were mentioned as being 'not about the economy', which seems to suggest to me it usually is, but this one was not. It was, as the Daily show put it, about terrorism and gays(And just as they put it, that makes it mighty odd that NYC went Blue and the Red states who have so few gays and have never had a plane fly into them, went the way they did..).

[Axis Kast]

Kerry tried to sop up the labor vote by promising he'd enact protectionist schemes that would undeniably hurt the economy overall.

What's wrong with Bush sopping up the fundamentalist vote by appealing to their desires? Personally, I have very little faith that Bush will fulfill any of their desires save those that are already popular in the mainstream (i.e. banning gay marriage).

[tharkûn]

From what I remember of my economics classes, the Laffer curve is generally considered respectable. The main issue is that it only holds (ie: a reduction to tax rate increases revenue) true over a certain range of rates. At some point, a decrease in tax rates will have little impact on behaviour - the extra income an individual gets if the rate drops from 2% to 1% is much smaller than a drop from 89 to 90% in percentage terms.

The Laffer curve is "derived" from a handful of basic premises:
A. At a tax rate of zero, the governt has zero revenue.
B. At a tax rate of 100% the government has effectively zero revenue.
C. The partial derivative of government revenue with respect to total tax rate is strictly monotonic.

From those three givens you can sketch out some type of evenly symmetrical curve to describe government revenue as a function of total tax rate. No matter if the curve is sinuisoidal, polynomial, gaussian, or something else entirely; there will always be exactly one point where government revenue is optimized. This point is denoted as T*.

Advocates of tax cuts tend to argue that we are to the right of T* and hence reducing tax burden will lead to higher revenues. Opponents of tax cuts tend to argue that we are left of T* and that said cuts will decrease revenue. This is the major problem with the Laffer curve, nobody knows what it bloody hell it looks like except at the extremes nor where any given country lies upon it. Further complicating the problem is the fact that the economy is dynamic and the curve is not constant with respect to time (one of the assumptions is that government spending is constant ).

The Laffer curve is valid for all tax ranges, the problem is it happens to be so lacking of hard data that anyone can argue for just about any course merely by stating, "Well I think we start at THIS point here".

Christians vote very much on fiscal issues. Hell look at the black fundy vote, it almost always follows fiscal self-interest. Even among people who attend church more than once a week, Kerry polled over 30%. There vast swaths of Christians who are union members, minorities, or urbanites who vote of fiscal issues. The problem the democratic party has is that middle-class America trusts tax cutting republicans as much as tax increasing democrats for their fiscal benifit. With an even break on fiscal issues, social issues hold the balance. Problems further come when the "liberal elite" are dismissive of conservative Christians, it is often taken as a personal insult. Maybe such persons deserve to be insulted, but it sure as hell makes it easier for the conservatives to win elections.

[Illuminatus Primus]

What do you think?

I think you need to lay down the crack pipe and stop blaiming T3H EVAL FUNDIES RAR! for Kerry's asstomping on Tuesday.

Funny "moral issues" were the voted most important by Bush voters.

[Darth Wong]

Kerry tried to sop up the labor vote by promising he'd enact protectionist schemes that would undeniably hurt the economy overall.

What's wrong with Bush sopping up the fundamentalist vote by appealing to their desires? Personally, I have very little faith that Bush will fulfill any of their desires save those that are already popular in the mainstream (i.e. banning gay marriage).

The self-interest of organized labour is a more legitimate worldly concern than rabid fundie idiocy.

[The Dark]

I doubt most fundies link the rapture to the debt. Most subscribe to the Laffer Curve,

Which is not a problem if properly applied (your explanation in the other post is better than the one in my textbook ), but it doesn't seem to be applied properly right now.

supply-side economics,

Just call it what it is...neo-classicism. The same bullshit that was discredited by Keynes in the early 1900s, and has never shown any empirical evidence for believing in it. Supply-side economics is the Grimm's Fairytales of economics.

or some other economic policy that basic states that if the government bleeds red ink for the "right reasons" it will grow the economy hence government revenue faster than debt will eat into it.

What we really need to do is start using full-employment schedules, like Kennedy did. Yes, it does mean you'll bleed red during a recession, but it does seem to work in smoothing the boom/bust cycle IF you have a fiscally responsible administration. Not that that's damn likely anytime soon.

Really US debt isn't all that hideous outside of absolute terms. The debt, as a percentage of GDP, is down from its all time high.

However, the trade deficit is at an all-time high as a percentage of GDP, at roughly 5.4%. It has never before been above 4%, even when we were a capital-devouring expanding economy in the late 1800s. In another bad sign, the monthly average foreign purchases of American stocks and bonds has dropped ~22% in the last year. Foreign confidence in the American economy is dropping like a rock. It's estimated by the OECD that even if the dollar dropped 30% in value, we'd still be at a 4% trade deficit/GDP ratio. That would cause the Fed to triple interest rates, Japan would become deflationary again, and either the ECB would cut rates or Europe's economy would come near to collapse. The economy right now is more vulnerable than it's been in the last half century.

[Jalinth]

Christians vote very much on fiscal issues. Hell look at the black fundy vote, it almost always follows fiscal self-interest. Even among people who attend church more than once a week, Kerry polled over 30%. There vast swaths of Christians who are union members, minorities, or urbanites who vote of fiscal issues. The problem the democratic party has is that middle-class America trusts tax cutting republicans as much as tax increasing democrats for their fiscal benifit. With an even break on fiscal issues, social issues hold the balance. Problems further come when the "liberal elite" are dismissive of conservative Christians, it is often taken as a personal insult. Maybe such persons deserve to be insulted, but it sure as hell makes it easier for the conservatives to win elections.

Thanks for the info.
The whole deficit issue has so transformed the Canadian political scene that it is difficult to relate to other countries where it is not quite such a focus. Of course, looking at this massive tidewave that is about to swamp your country does tend to lead to a shift in focus. Hell, even the Dippers (the real socialist party in Canada) at least profess (with limited success) they will balance the budget.