Political So now what

[Hickey]

RFK and now Tulsi Gabbard have both been added to Trump’s transition team. I like this.

 

[glockman]

I took it as being a poor, middle class public servant was bad.

Teachers are persona non grata because they think they should be paid a livable wage and don't want to carry weapons on them to protect the children.

The lowest wage a school teacher can make in Alpine school district (where i live and pay taxes) is $50 and hr. If that isn't livable, what is? That is starting out, first year out of college in the lowest paying "full time" teaching position.

 

[Pike2350]

The lowest wage a school teacher can make in Alpine school district (where i live and pay taxes) is $50 and hr. If that isn't livable, what is? That is starting out, first year out of college in the lowest paying "full time" teaching position.

Not sure where you find this information.
I assume you are talking about their annual salary based on "hours worked". We all know teachers work way more then the 1500 hrs/year that school districts pay for......but even then the lowest per hour wage based on 7 hours/day 185 days a year for a teacher in Alpine District is 39.19/hr. Lowest salary is $50,757....and that is not the best wage in Utah. It is not a horrible wage but NOWHERE near the $50/hr especially when you use an hourly statistics which is meant to convey full time job at 2000 hours/year

 

[Stephen]

Not sure where you find this information.
I assume you are talking about their annual salary based on "hours worked". We all know teachers work way more then the 1500 hrs/year that school districts pay for......but even then the lowest per hour wage based on 7 hours/day 185 days a year for a teacher in Alpine District is 39.19/hr. Lowest salary is $50,757....and that is not the best wage in Utah. It is not a horrible wage but NOWHERE near the $50/hr especially when you use an hourly statistics which is meant to convey full time job at 2000 hours/year

Looks like its slightly up this year, $52,406:

Human Resources

WELCOME TO ASD Human Resources Recuro HealthVirtual Urgent CareClick HereLYRAMental Health Made EasyClick HereEmployee Assistance ProgramUnlimited Virtual ConsultationsClick HereNEW TO URSI am New …

aeg.alpineschools.org

24-25 Certified .pdf

drive.google.com

And you know, for a new teacher right out of school, $52k ain't bad! But you're not going to be living the Miller High Life on that salary, and you're certainly not supporting a family of four.

To make ~$50/hour it looks like you'd have to be in Lane 3D, Step 18. So that's a fair amount of additional schooling, likely a Masters, and a number of years in the district under your belt.

 

[glockman]

Not sure where you find this information.
I assume you are talking about their annual salary based on "hours worked". We all know teachers work way more then the 1500 hrs/year that school districts pay for......but even then the lowest per hour wage based on 7 hours/day 185 days a year for a teacher in Alpine District is 39.19/hr. Lowest salary is $50,757....and that is not the best wage in Utah. It is not a horrible wage but NOWHERE near the $50/hr especially when you use an hourly statistics which is meant to convey full time job at 2000 hours/year

Yep, I was mixing numbers. $50k but that's still $40 hr which is above the median for Utah and that's the minimum you can make. So if the minimum is above the Utah median. If you don't consider that a livable wage, I dont understand your math.

 

[Cody]

Yep, I was mixing numbers. $50k but that's still $40 hr which is above the median for Utah and that's the minimum you can make. So if the minimum is above the Utah median. If you don't consider that a livable wage, I don't understand your math.

$50k isn't what it used to be, I think we all know that. Also, $40/hour for full time work (figuring 2k work hours per year) is $80k.

I also think that we all know that teachers put in more than 7 hours per day. They are there before the bell, and they are there after the bell. My son's 4th grade teacher did in home visits to every one of her kids...on her time...on her dime. I think realistically teachers work closer to 9 hours per day (some more, some less), probably 42 weeks per year. So that's about 1900 hours per year. A typical full time job with 2 weeks vacation is 2000 hours per year. So really, if they are making $27.58 per hour worked. It aint nothin, but I'm not doing that job for that pay.

Don't get the livable wage math? OK. Could you support your family off of $52k per year? I mean, it's doable. I haven't sniffed much over 30k for 5 straight years (my wife has brought some money in, so we're just above that 52k on average over the past 5 years) and I can tell you, it's ****ing hard man. That livable wage figures no more than 33% of your income going to rent. So that's $1430 in rent. Have you looked at what it would cost to rent a shitty 2-3 bedroom place recently? Close to 2k minimum. I live in sunny and scenic Gastown in a shitty 3 bed 2 bath condo, and it's $2600 plus utilities. So after taxes you net maybe $42k, and that means you have about $900 per month to cover food, utilities, transportation, insurance, medical, school expenses etc etc. Utilities and car insurance eat up half of that, so now you're feeding your family of 4 for like $100 per week. Have you seen grocery prices recently? Ya, it's "livable" but for someone who's doing a very important job that most of us aren't willing to do ourselves, it doesn't seem like enough. Trust me, it sucks.

And anyway, it's only considered "livable" for a SINK. A single person on 52k? Sure, no problem.

Livable wage figures (and this is figuring 33% going to rent/mortgage, which isn't likely doable right now)

1 adult, zero kids: $47,362
2 adults, 1 kid. $78,583k per year
2 adults, 2 kids $88,997

Living Wage Calculator - Living Wage Calculation for Salt Lake County, Utah

livingwage.mit.edu

I also think the notion that teachers should be assumed to have a second household income (if they aren't single) is totally BS. If you wouldn't assume that for an auto mechanic or police officer, then you don't assume that for teachers.

 

[Herzog]

I heard if Kamala could just get voted into office somehow - someway, that she would fix all these things! Just think how amazing that would be. No idea who’s been helping to tank everything with bad policy in the last 3+ years but yay!

 

[ID Bronco]

Everyone who "Just wanted someone else to vote for besides these two clowns" now has another choice.

 

[johngottfredson]

$50k isn't what it used to be, I think we all know that. Also, $40/hour for full time work (figuring 2k work hours per year) is $80k.

I also think that we all know that teachers put in more than 7 hours per day. They are there before the bell, and they are there after the bell. My son's 4th grade teacher did in home visits to every one of her kids...on her time...on her dime. I think realistically teachers work closer to 9 hours per day (some more, some less), probably 42 weeks per year. So that's about 1900 hours per year. A typical full time job with 2 weeks vacation is 2000 hours per year. So really, if they are making $27.58 per hour worked. It aint nothin, but I'm not doing that job for that pay.

Don't get the livable wage math? OK. Could you support your family off of $52k per year? I mean, it's doable. I haven't sniffed much over 30k for 5 straight years (my wife has brought some money in, so we're just above that 52k on average over the past 5 years) and I can tell you, it's ****ing hard man. That livable wage figures no more than 33% of your income going to rent. So that's $1430 in rent. Have you looked at what it would cost to rent a shitty 2-3 bedroom place recently? Close to 2k minimum. I live in sunny and scenic Gastown in a shitty 3 bed 2 bath condo, and it's $2600 plus utilities. So after taxes you net maybe $42k, and that means you have about $900 per month to cover food, utilities, transportation, insurance, medical, school expenses etc etc. Utilities and car insurance eat up half of that, so now you're feeding your family of 4 for like $100 per week. Have you seen grocery prices recently? Ya, it's "livable" but for someone who's doing a very important job that most of us aren't willing to do ourselves, it doesn't seem like enough. Trust me, it sucks.

And anyway, it's only considered "livable" for a SINK. A single person on 52k? Sure, no problem.

Livable wage figures (and this is figuring 33% going to rent/mortgage, which isn't likely doable right now)

1 adult, zero kids: $47,362
2 adults, 1 kid. $78,583k per year
2 adults, 2 kids $88,997

Living Wage Calculator - Living Wage Calculation for Salt Lake County, Utah

livingwage.mit.edu

I also think the notion that teachers should be assumed to have a second household income (if they aren't single) is totally BS. If you wouldn't assume that for an auto mechanic or police officer, then you don't assume that for teachers.

Teachers only work 9 months, have all the benefits known to man, and start at $52k. Is the idea of a career having a living wage that it is there on day one, no one ever has to pay their dues and work their way up? My sister in law makes 90k before benefits 8 years in, will retire after 20 years or whatever, gets all the same vacations as her kids…I don’t buy into the idea that it’s a bad gig. Look into landscape architect career paths, my industry can only dream of having it as sweet as teachers.

 

[glockman]

$50k isn't what it used to be, I think we all know that. Also, $40/hour for full time work (figuring 2k work hours per year) is $80k.

I also think that we all know that teachers put in more than 7 hours per day. They are there before the bell, and they are there after the bell. My son's 4th grade teacher did in home visits to every one of her kids...on her time...on her dime. I think realistically teachers work closer to 9 hours per day (some more, some less), probably 42 weeks per year. So that's about 1900 hours per year. A typical full time job with 2 weeks vacation is 2000 hours per year. So really, if they are making $27.58 per hour worked. It aint nothin, but I'm not doing that job for that pay.

Don't get the livable wage math? OK. Could you support your family off of $52k per year? I mean, it's doable. I haven't sniffed much over 30k for 5 straight years (my wife has brought some money in, so we're just above that 52k on average over the past 5 years) and I can tell you, it's ****ing hard man. That livable wage figures no more than 33% of your income going to rent. So that's $1430 in rent. Have you looked at what it would cost to rent a shitty 2-3 bedroom place recently? Close to 2k minimum. I live in sunny and scenic Gastown in a shitty 3 bed 2 bath condo, and it's $2600 plus utilities. So after taxes you net maybe $42k, and that means you have about $900 per month to cover food, utilities, transportation, insurance, medical, school expenses etc etc. Utilities and car insurance eat up half of that, so now you're feeding your family of 4 for like $100 per week. Have you seen grocery prices recently? Ya, it's "livable" but for someone who's doing a very important job that most of us aren't willing to do ourselves, it doesn't seem like enough. Trust me, it sucks.

And anyway, it's only considered "livable" for a SINK. A single person on 52k? Sure, no problem.

Livable wage figures (and this is figuring 33% going to rent/mortgage, which isn't likely doable right now)

1 adult, zero kids: $47,362
2 adults, 1 kid. $78,583k per year
2 adults, 2 kids $88,997

Living Wage Calculator - Living Wage Calculation for Salt Lake County, Utah

livingwage.mit.edu

I also think the notion that teachers should be assumed to have a second household income (if they aren't single) is totally BS. If you wouldn't assume that for an auto mechanic or police officer, then you don't assume that for teachers.

The average individual income in Utah is $49,019. If you start out above that on your first day on the job and only have to work 9 months, you are doing way better than half the population as a government employee. I'm not angry about that, I think teachers are very deserving of a decent salary, but they get above average on day one. If you can't live on above average wages how are the roughly half of the population making below average doing it?

 

[Pike2350]

Teachers only work 9 months, have all the benefits known to man, and start at $52k. Is the idea of a career having a living wage that it is there on day one, no one ever has to pay their dues and work their way up? My sister in law makes 90k before benefits 8 years in, will retire after 20 years or whatever, gets all the same vacations as her kids.

No offense but I call BS on that figure. Not sure where she teaches but no step salary in Alpine District is 90k after 8 years and I assume most districts are pretty close in pay scales. The only way I could see that happening, assuming I am reading the .pdf correctly is a doctorate degree teaching secondary, extra period, and full year school. Maybe I am reading it incorrectly and you and your family are that open about what each of you make....but even then I would hardly call that "having it sweet"

The average individual income in Utah is $49,019. If you start out above that on your first day on the job and only have to work 9 months, you are doing way better than half the population as a government employee. I'm not angry about that, I think teachers are very deserving of a decent salary, but they get above average on day one. If you can't live on above average wages how are the roughly half of the population making below average doing it?

I am not saying they should be able to love the high life but I do believe, if after you graduate college and go into a job that is a "public necessity" you should make the average at minimum.

Let's face it, there is teacher shortages everywhere. People no longer want to be teachers very much and a lot of it is due to pay, but also all the BS that comes with it. From shitty kids that seem much worse today in acting up and being coddled by parents, to parents that think there kid is oh so special and will raise hell if the teacher does anything to contradict that.

I get they get a little extra time off during the year, but 3 month is a joke. The Alpine contract is for 185 days so that means w.5 months....close, however we all know most teachers do not work just 8 hours a day. My good friends wife is a 6th grade teacher at a Title 1 school in Murray. From my friends words m, she goes to school at 7am and usually isn't home until 5-6. Then there are various days throughout the year that can go to 7-8pm.

If we want good teachers teaching our kids we need to pay above average from the start because they are not only supposed to teach but also babysit our kids.

The counterside to this, they also need to fire bad teachers quickly....no tenure/union BS. Reward the good ones and can the bad....but make the job enticing enough that you can find good ones....not just "average" because average doesn't get you good talent.

 

[Cody]

Teachers only work 9 months, have all the benefits known to man, and start at $52k. Is the idea of a career having a living wage that it is there on day one, no one ever has to pay their dues and work their way up? My sister in law makes 90k before benefits 8 years in, will retire after 20 years or whatever, gets all the same vacations as her kids…I don’t buy into the idea that it’s a bad gig. Look into landscape architect career paths, my industry can only dream of having it as sweet as teachers.

Hey, I actually wanted to be a landscape architect until my drafting teacher crushed my dreams by being such an asshole.....

..... Which is my point. Teachers are asked to teach and guide our children as they grow. They are very much helping raise our kids and I think all of us can think back to a teacher that had negatively or positively impacted our own lives. I have plenty of memories if teachers having positive impacts, but it took less than a month for one shitty teacher to permanently alter my career path just by being a shitty person (that was later fired after decades of harassing female students). The strength of our entire society is largely based upon the quality of it's education system. I guess I fail to see any real good reasons why we wouldn't do everything in our power to find the best possible teachers for our kids, and a big part of that is pay. How many times have you angled to get your kid into the teacher's class that has the best value of wage vs experience? You want the good ones... So we should pay the money to attract the best talent. Paying just enough to get by isn't enough, in my opinion.

I feel the same for other public servants. I'd love for police pay to be significant enough that they could really hire the best LEO's. That's a similarly thankless, and also very difficult job that is underpaid. I think a case can be made for a causal relationship here too. If our education system was better funded and better staffed, I'd 100% guarantee you'd find a decent reduction in the amount of petty crime.

 

[Stephen]

Teachers only work 9 months,

This is a myth. Teachers work several weeks after classes end and several weeks before students return to school. Yes, they get about a solid month off in the summer, but for all the shit they have to deal with I feel like that's fair.

have all the benefits known to man,

Can you explain further?
My wife has worked for both Granite and Jordan School Districts and neither of them have benefits much better than those found at a similarly sized large company. And if you aren't grandfathered into the old URS pension system, the retirement isn't anything too exciting either.

Is the idea of a career having a living wage that it is there on day one, no one ever has to pay their dues and work their way up?

Huh? Yes, they get step increases based on years of service, but that's pretty standard in any large institution. Hell, even the corporate hell hole that is Goldman Sachs awards tenure! But every teacher has annual reviews, just like employees anywhere else. And teachers get let go for bad performance all the time! My wife has been an assistant principal for five years now, and every year she's had to let go at least two teachers for poor performance. So that's 10 teachers fired from what, 30? That's a super high percentage, and that's pretty much the norm at every school.

And never having to pay there dues? Do you remember your time in school? Kids are the worst. Teaching is constantly ranked as one of the highest stress careers you can have. It has the some of the highest levels of depression. I can't tell you the number of times my wife has been in tears either from the stress or from feeling like she's failed a student.

Additionally, it's not like teachers just walk straight from getting their degree to a job to retirement. If you expect to stay a teacher and maximize your earnings, you're going to have to keep going to school yourself! Through getting additional degrees or certifications to keep yourself current, or at the bare minimum going through regular trainings required by the district. Saying that they don't pay their dues shows a complete lack of understanding of the profession akin to me saying that all landscape architects do is lay sod and plant trees.

My sister in law makes 90k before benefits 8 years in,

I'd love to know what district she's in, because that's an astronomically high salary for that few years in. My wife taught in Granite for 10 years before moving to administration. She had a Masters and several certs along with her tenure and was barely cracking $70k at that point. One of my best friends has been an auto shop teacher in Granite for 12 years now, is an ASE Master Tech, Ford/GM/Toyota/Audi Master Tech equivalent, and has to keep up all his annual auto certs along with his teaching certs. He's the districts CTE Lead for auto and teaches 8 periods, and he's still below $80k.

I don’t buy into the idea that it’s a bad gig.

Its not a bad gig, but its not an easy gig.

 

[Herzog]

I remember when $50k/yr was decent money. Seems like that was about, what, 4 years ago?

$100k is the new $50k.

 

[nnnnnate]

My wife basically has a PHD in educational psychology (all the course work but not the dissertation, Canyons considers it a phd) and if she worked full time she wouldn't be at 90k. She is part of special ed and holds required state and federal certifications for her position. She's worked 10+ years.

She's not fond of her principal and was planning to move schools over the summer until she found out what was available. All the schools that needed psychs were ACC or behavior unit schools. ACC is the low performing students (could be disability or IQ or ???) and the behavior units are for the kids that hit teachers or throw desks. Needless to say my wife stayed where she was and on the Monday, the first day with students, was already telling me about the crap her principle was up to and how she had bypassed a whole slew of district procedures and now the SPED team has to clean it all up.

Also, apparently they (Canyons District) are all fully staffed up this year with psychs. All those slots in the cluster schools were filled by interns straight out of college. My wife thinks they'll lose more than half of them before the school year ends. Things are that bad. It'll be one by this weekend, a couple at fall break, another couple at Thanksgiving, and a few more at Christmas break.

 

[johngottfredson]

No offense but I call BS on that figure. Not sure where she teaches but no step salary in Alpine District is 90k after 8 years and I assume most districts are pretty close in pay scales. The only way I could see that happening, assuming I am reading the .pdf correctly is a doctorate degree teaching secondary, extra period, and full year school. Maybe I am reading it incorrectly and you and your family are that open about what each of you make....but even then I would hardly call that "having it sweet"



I am not saying they should be able to love the high life but I do believe, if after you graduate college and go into a job that is a "public necessity" you should make the average at minimum.

Let's face it, there is teacher shortages everywhere. People no longer want to be teachers very much and a lot of it is due to pay, but also all the BS that comes with it. From shitty kids that seem much worse today in acting up and being coddled by parents, to parents that think there kid is oh so special and will raise hell if the teacher does anything to contradict that.

I get they get a little extra time off during the year, but 3 month is a joke. The Alpine contract is for 185 days so that means w.5 months....close, however we all know most teachers do not work just 8 hours a day. My good friends wife is a 6th grade teacher at a Title 1 school in Murray. From my friends words m, she goes to school at 7am and usually isn't home until 5-6. Then there are various days throughout the year that can go to 7-8pm.

If we want good teachers teaching our kids we need to pay above average from the start because they are not only supposed to teach but also babysit our kids.

The counterside to this, they also need to fire bad teachers quickly....no tenure/union BS. Reward the good ones and can the bad....but make the job enticing enough that you can find good ones....not just "average" because average doesn't get you good talent.

Good BS call. I was misremembering - her husband, a cop, had the base salary of 90k. She has been teaching for 6 years, has a salary of $61k, benefit package of $44k, total compensation of $105k. For 9 months work, which equates to $140k if it was a year round gig

 

[johngottfredson]

This is a myth. Teachers work several weeks after classes end and several weeks before students return to school. Yes, they get about a solid month off in the summer, but for all the shit they have to deal with I feel like that's fair.


Can you explain further?
My wife has worked for both Granite and Jordan School Districts and neither of them have benefits much better than those found at a similarly sized large company. And if you aren't grandfathered into the old URS pension system, the retirement isn't anything too exciting either.


Huh? Yes, they get step increases based on years of service, but that's pretty standard in any large institution. Hell, even the corporate hell hole that is Goldman Sachs awards tenure! But every teacher has annual reviews, just like employees anywhere else. And teachers get let go for bad performance all the time! My wife has been an assistant principal for five years now, and every year she's had to let go at least two teachers for poor performance. So that's 10 teachers fired from what, 30? That's a super high percentage, and that's pretty much the norm at every school.

And never having to pay there dues? Do you remember your time in school? Kids are the worst. Teaching is constantly ranked as one of the highest stress careers you can have. It has the some of the highest levels of depression. I can't tell you the number of times my wife has been in tears either from the stress or from feeling like she's failed a student.

Additionally, it's not like teachers just walk straight from getting their degree to a job to retirement. If you expect to stay a teacher and maximize your earnings, you're going to have to keep going to school yourself! Through getting additional degrees or certifications to keep yourself current, or at the bare minimum going through regular trainings required by the district. Saying that they don't pay their dues shows a complete lack of understanding of the profession akin to me saying that all landscape architects do is lay sod and plant trees.


I'd love to know what district she's in, because that's an astronomically high salary for that few years in. My wife taught in Granite for 10 years before moving to administration. She had a Masters and several certs along with her tenure and was barely cracking $70k at that point. One of my best friends has been an auto shop teacher in Granite for 12 years now, is an ASE Master Tech, Ford/GM/Toyota/Audi Master Tech equivalent, and has to keep up all his annual auto certs along with his teaching certs. He's the districts CTE Lead for auto and teaches 8 periods, and he's still below $80k.


Its not a bad gig, but its not an easy gig.

Source: my wife taught school. Of my five kids, regardless of which insurance or even no insurance we had at the time, they all cost about $10k out of pocket, except when she was teaching, and it was about $50. What’s your comparison group for acceptable benefits? Goldman Sachs? Do you think those are equally strenuous hiring criteria? If you compare what most people can get right out of school with a relatively easy four year degree, Goldman Sachs is not the comparison group. My employee has a masters degree in the field, 15 years experience, and he gets salary and commission only, no benefits. How many fields are like that? Certainly all the trades.

Paying your dues means starting low and working up, pretty standard in most fields. If your standard is that your first job out of college immediately lets you buy a three bedroom home with the white picket fence, you should get a new dream. I went to 8 years of college, didn’t buy my first home until I was 36 and had 4 kids. The world doesn’t owe me anything just because I was working hard up to that point. I have zero problems with entry level pay being entry level.

On the salary of my sister in law, as mentioned, I did misremember. I just looked it up, my cousin who is 39 makes 90k salary, with $53k in benefits. So I’m sure you have to work longer than 8 years, but you can hit it in your 30’s, while having summers off. Which is fine to defend, but not ignored. It’s a huge perk that other careers don’t offer.

We all have terrible, stressful parts of our jobs. Teachers have relative stability compare to my industry, which can shut off at the first hint of a recession; I’m the first guy that gets axed from people’s budgets. I literally have no idea where my income will be or come from 4 weeks from now.

I’m all for teachers being well compensated, I just hate the hand wringing like they’re a victim class of workers.

 

[02SE]

Every teacher I had growing up, had 3 months off every year. My 4th grade teacher pretty much only showed us videos every day. Not a lot of effort put forward by Mr. Winward...

When I was trying to make my business viable, and hopefully successful, there were years I didn't take even ONE DAY OFF for months on end. Missed birthdays, holidays, sleeping at the office because I was too tired to drive home. Eating antacids like they were candy...

If they don't like their comparatively cushy job, they should do something else. Don't look to me for sympathy.

 

[Cody]

I remember when $50k/yr was decent money. Seems like that was about, what, 4 years ago?

$100k is the new $50k.

I don't think you can look at financial policy in a vacuum like that. The mechanisms that created that inflation didn't magically begin on January 20th, 2021. That's like economics 101 (taught by an overpaid business teacher )

There are a couple types of inflation, but most simply, it's an excess of buying power relative to the supply of things to buy. This is called "demand pull" in economics.

What do you think was going to happen after a decade where the cost of money was historically low, and was driving up the values of property and businesses? Was that going to be sustainable? Trump (and Obama prior) were just as much a part of this cause as Biden...in fact, probably more so. Both Obama and Trump got to ride that wave and nobody had to be the bad guy to tamp it down....

....Then Covid happened and that created all sorts of problems with the supply chain. This is called "cost push" inflation. When the cost of raw materials increase causing the price of things to go up. I don't necessarily fault Trump's initial inaction during COVID since I still think we were dealing with something that we had never dealt with (however, I do wonder if his defunding of the pandemic response team in 2018 might have been a mistake in hindsight), but he was the one who initiated the first 3 of the COVID stimulus bills so the printing of money to prop up the economy started with him. Then all the election nonsense happened....

...and the new President had to deal with the trifecta of inflationary forces. Demand pull, cost push, and a relatively micro event of hyperinflation caused by currency being handed out for essentially free. Biden had to deal this with a country divided against itself, and with a globally uncertain economic situation. At this point, it's hard to say if his results were good or bad relative to the other potential outcomes that could have happened. Where do his results fall in that spectrum of outcomes? Nobody, literally nobody, can say one way or another because there is literally zero historical context to compare the situation to. Maybe he did the worst possible job. Maybe he did the best possible job. Realistically it was probably more of a mixed bag. I'm not saying that to defend Biden, because I think he's a putz, but we should at least acknowledge the hand he was dealt was almost hopelessly stacked against him and that any other person in that job would have been facing a similar stacked deck.....

...including Trump. I also don't think that assuming the financial acumen of a man who's managed to bankrupt his casino's 4 times would have faired better. I don't know the inner mechanisms of a casino, but I feel like that's a business with a pretty high success rate? I'm just assuming. But I don't like Chapter 11's in some situations because it allows a business owner to walk away from all of the business debt after paying themselves some untold amount, and then leave banks, investors, and stockholders holding the bag with nothing to show for it. An unscrupulous business owner can use that to their advantage to basically siphon off money into their own pockets, put the business in debt (1.8 billion in Trump's case) and then fold the business debts up without personal penalty. Sure, it's legal and he got richer off of it, but I think it's shady and I don't think you can manage the finances of a country in a similar way.

Anyway,

 

[Herzog]

I don't think you can look at financial policy in a vacuum like that. The mechanisms that created that inflation didn't magically begin on January 20th, 2021. That's like economics 101 (taught by an overpaid business teacher )

There are a couple types of inflation, but most simply, it's an excess of buying power relative to the supply of things to buy. This is called "demand pull" in economics.

What do you think was going to happen after a decade where the cost of money was historically low, and was driving up the values of property and businesses? Was that going to be sustainable? Trump (and Obama prior) were just as much a part of this cause as Biden...in fact, probably more so. Both Obama and Trump got to ride that wave and nobody had to be the bad guy to tamp it down....

....Then Covid happened and that created all sorts of problems with the supply chain. This is called "cost push" inflation. When the cost of raw materials increase causing the price of things to go up. I don't necessarily fault Trump's initial inaction during COVID since I still think we were dealing with something that we had never dealt with (however, I do wonder if his defunding of the pandemic response team in 2018 might have been a mistake in hindsight), but he was the one who initiated the first 3 of the COVID stimulus bills so the printing of money to prop up the economy started with him. Then all the election nonsense happened....

...and the new President had to deal with the trifecta of inflationary forces. Demand pull, cost push, and a relatively micro event of hyperinflation caused by currency being handed out for essentially free. Biden had to deal this with a country divided against itself, and with a globally uncertain economic situation. At this point, it's hard to say if his results were good or bad relative to the other potential outcomes that could have happened. Where do his results fall in that spectrum of outcomes? Nobody, literally nobody, can say one way or another because there is literally zero historical context to compare the situation to. Maybe he did the worst possible job. Maybe he did the best possible job. Realistically it was probably more of a mixed bag. I'm not saying that to defend Biden, because I think he's a putz, but we should at least acknowledge the hand he was dealt was almost hopelessly stacked against him and that any other person in that job would have been facing a similar stacked deck.....

...including Trump. I also don't think that assuming the financial acumen of a man who's managed to bankrupt his casino's 4 times would have faired better. I don't know the inner mechanisms of a casino, but I feel like that's a business with a pretty high success rate? I'm just assuming. But I don't like Chapter 11's in some situations because it allows a business owner to walk away from all of the business debt after paying themselves some untold amount, and then leave banks, investors, and stockholders holding the bag with nothing to show for it. An unscrupulous business owner can use that to their advantage to basically siphon off money into their own pockets, put the business in debt (1.8 billion in Trump's case) and then fold the business debts up without personal penalty. Sure, it's legal and he got richer off of it, but I think it's shady and I don't think you can manage the finances of a country in a similar way.

Anyway,

Covid aside, sure was fun seeing all that money go into Ukraine instead of helping to rebuild the local economy.

Anyways. I was pretty much just stating that the inflation or whatever you want to call it, is rampant. I'd place the blame on the not-so-federal federal reserve... once we start talking international bankers and cartels, then this will get fun.