Austerity Is Dead – So Can We Fix The Infrastructure NOW? / real national security

[Botany]

http://blog.ourfuture.org/20130611/austerity-is-dead-so-can-we-fix-the-infrastructure-now

You might have heard that “austerity is dead.” You’ll certainly be hearing it, and with good reason: the U.S. deficit is down more than 50 percent from what President Bush left behind, projections of the rise in medical costs that drove future deficits are way down, the “intellectual foundation” that justified the push for cutting government has collapsed (as if it ever existed), and the European experiment has shown that budget cuts really just make things worse – much, much worse – and cause misery and suffering to boot. Meanwhile we have two real problems to worry about: unemployment and crumbling infrastructure. So can we hire people to fix the infrastructure now?

snip

Somehow, even with this obvious evidence that the stimulus worked the “serious people” in Europe and America threw out what economists had learned about how to get out of an economic crisis and demanded budget cuts instead. They actually claimed, in the face of the economy collapse, that the unemployment and slow economy was the result of “government spending.” They actually claimed that taking government money out of the economy would somehow help the economy.

Since 2010 Republicans have blocked further stimulus, claiming that we have a deficit emergency and “we’re broke.” In fact, they have forced deep cuts in spending, including the destructive “sequester” that is forcing down the level of recovery and looks like it will cost as many as 750,000 jobs just this year. And after this year it gets worse.

snip

The American Society of Civil (ASCE) Engineers releases their Report Card for America’s Infrastructure every four years. This Report Card grades the condition of the country’s infrastructure with a school report card, assigning letter grades to each type of infrastructure. This year’s America’s 2013 Infrastructure Report Card gives us a grade of D+ and says we are $3.6 trillion behind in infrastructure maintenance.

[annabanana]

1. Austerity is.. . . . . . .

useful.

.

.

.


It's primary purpose is to separate everyone from their money except the usual suspects.

[Botany]

2. The IMF just apologized to the Greek people for hurting them

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/01/03/an-amazing-mea-culpa-from-the-imfs-chief-economist-on-austerity/

Consider it a mea culpa submerged in a deep pool of calculus and regression analysis: The International Monetary Fund’s top economist today acknowledged that the fund blew its forecasts for Greece and other European economies because it did not fully understand how government austerity efforts would undermine economic growth.

[annabanana]

3. Did that apology come with a massive stimulus?. . No?

screw apologizing then