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The Economy

Discussion in 'Sports and News' started by TigerVols, May 14, 2020.

  1. Big Circus

    Big Circus Well-Known Member

    Does the complete picture include the owners taking on nine-figure loans to pay "dividends" to investors?


     
  2. Regan MacNeil

    Regan MacNeil Well-Known Member

    IT WAS FREE MONEY! THEY'D HAVE BEEN CRAZY NOT TO!
     
  3. The Big Ragu

    The Big Ragu Moderator Staff Member

    That is exactly the private equity model when an appointed czar is given the power to price fix the cost of money. I have posted about it at least a dozen times on here. They do one of two things. ... both start out with "cash cow" companies that deal in tangible goods. They purchase the company using the insanely cheap money that is sloshing around the economy, but would never be available for this kind of crap if a market was determining the cost of money (i.e. -- actual price discovery), rather than someone appointed by a politician who supposedly knows best. They lever up the company to do the purchase, creating moral hazard. That private equity firm is not on the hook for the cost as long as the money is free in real terms and plentiful. So it's a no brainer from their perspective, unfortunately.

    The two scripts are:

    1) flip the company. ... The cheap money drives up the valuations of assets (even dogshit companies that have no earnings), so the longer the distorted environment continues, there are buyers willing to buy the overly indebted company for a higher price yet, and those new buyers just tap the distorted debt markets to leverage up the company even more. Wash, rinse, repeat. ... it's malinvestment masquerading as economic prosperity. ... until the game ends. Until it ends, the debt loads get bigger and bigger, unfortunately.

    2) Bleed the company dry (what it looks like happened here). It's a cash cow. You pay out what it earns in dividends. ... and leave the debt behind, capitalizing on the fact that it costs nothing to keep servicing that debt because of the distortions in the debt markets. You can go on for as long as you can keep rolling over that debt at no cost.

    This is what the Federal Reserve engineered for a decade and a half. It's the malinvestment I have talked about. People cheered it on. What you are seeing now was always the inevitable outcome, it was just a matter of how long they would extend and pretend and how big of a debt mess it would layer on top of all of us.
     
    Last edited: Jun 15, 2023
    Azrael likes this.
  4. goalmouth

    goalmouth Well-Known Member

    West Coast ports and dockworkers reach tentative agreement on contract, credit Acting U.S. Secretary of Labor Julie Su for playing a key role in negotiations.
     
    I Should Coco likes this.
  5. Twirling Time

    Twirling Time Well-Known Member

    Commercial real estate is the next bubble to pop (thanks to covid and work-at-home). Could end up like the S&L debacle of the late 1980s - a tree falling in the forest - or it could drag everything else down with it.
     
  6. Driftwood

    Driftwood Well-Known Member

    I hope not. I have a farm I'm hoping will make a nice sub division in the next year or so once I can get things sorted out.
     
  7. Driftwood

    Driftwood Well-Known Member

    I was digging through a box today and found a Leave and Earnings Statement from when I was in the Navy in Dec. 1991.
    As an E4, I made $1,042.40 per month, and that included $50 sea pay.
    I ran the numbers through an inflation calculator today, and I effectively made more as a dumbass 20-year-old squid than I did in 2011, my last full year as a college graduate in the newspaper business.
     
  8. Twirling Time

    Twirling Time Well-Known Member

    Certain military leaders of the day used to preach about the "priesthood" of the armed forces. As if that was a virtue.
     
  9. I Should Coco

    I Should Coco Well-Known Member

    This a big deal and good news in my area. A whole lot of the PNW economy flows through the ports of Seattle and Tacoma.
     
  10. MisterCreosote

    MisterCreosote Well-Known Member

    I’ve told this story before, but I made more money at 18 and 19 delivering pizza than I did in the first seven years (including three “management” jobs) of my 10-year journalism career.
     
  11. garrow

    garrow Well-Known Member

  12. DanOregon

    DanOregon Well-Known Member

    I don't know how many people I've run across in recent weeks who work multiple jobs - I'm curious how much of the job growth is just people adding another check, rather than a new person in the job market. 10 percent.
    There also needs to be a discussion about companies having taxpayers subsidize their wages by not paying a living wage.

    Why Do So Many Americans Have More Than One Job?.
     
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