Trump understands that JOBS are Americans' main concern

So says John Crudele, here:

'I think Donald Trump — if he can stop himself from saying crazy things about his wealth, immigration and such — will be a very important factor in the 2016 election. Why? Because he understands that the main concern in this country today is the economy — which is another way of saying “jobs.” That was the chief thing on people’s minds in 2012 and during the last congressional election in 2014. It still is today and will be throughout the primaries and right up to the 2016 election. “I will be the greatest job president God ever created,” Trump said last week. People are worried about immigration because the newcomers will take the scant jobs available. China is bothersome because its manufacturing might is sapping jobs from the US. One group in this country doesn’t like another group because we are all fighting for the same jobs. Jobs, jobs, jobs!'

John Crudele isn't running for president

But he has some good ideas and some not so good ideas, just like those who are:

"When there are plenty of jobs, immigrants are no longer as unwelcome."

"[A]ll you have to do is change the rules regarding how people can use their trillions in retirement savings, and you’ll give a big boost to the economy that neither spendthrift politicians nor the Federal Reserve can accomplish now."

Read the rest, here.

John Crudele Of NY Post Still Not Really Sure What The Fed Has Been Trying To Do

Here in "Bernanke's rate ploy robs from middle class" John Crudele of The New York Post still can't seem to put two and two together even after all this time:

1:

Bernanke, who is leaving his job next month, controls something called the Fed Funds Rate. That’s the rate at which banks can lend each other money for a very short term, generally overnight. That rate is set by the Fed and has been stuck at a puny 0.25 percent for the last few years as the Fed tries to — well, I’m not really sure what the Fed has been trying to do. ...

2:

One of the few rates he has been able to keep low is the yields on things like money-market and savings accounts. The banks love him, since the less they pay out to depositors, the more money they earn.

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What do I gotta do, John, spell it out for ya?

The Fed has been trying to . . . rescue the banks. They don't keep the rate next to zero for this long if they didn't need to.

The middle class has been punished in the process, but lower interest rates presumably have allowed some in the middle class to refinance expensive loans at lower rates while their retirement investments have reflated. That's the rationalization, if not the reality experienced by most.

The banking crisis is over when ZIRP is over.

The Kookiest Jobs Story In Months: Republican House Ways And Means Tallies Just 270k Full-Time Since 1-09

Story here.

What's next, 911 really was an inside job? Paul McCartney did die?

To believe this number you have to believe all the numbers reported all the time by the Bureau of Labor Statistics have been wrong for 4.5 years and that everyone who works there is content to keep a secret, and can, but I'll bet you those are precisely the numbers House Ways and Means have been "crunching" to arrive at the "truth". 

I realize John Crudele at The New York Post is fond of that skeptical pose now that a former BLS official has been talking to him about his skepticism about the numbers, but really, have we all gone off the deep end in order to drive home a political point about what ObamaCare is going to do to the nature of work in America when it's not really yet self-evident? For example, average hourly earnings should be plummeting if Ways and Means is right, but they are not. Wages are up nearly 1.9% in the last year. Nothing to write home about, but completely dispositive of the thesis.

As usual the devil is in the details, which in this case means the word "net", as in net total. Well, net from what benchmark? The all-time high of full-time at 123.219 million under George Bush? Full-time isn't anywhere near recovering to that level, so it's impossible that for the Republicans net means net above the all-time high by the paltry sum of 270,000, as in 123.489 million full-time jobs. Would that the Republicans were right!

Alas, they are not. Usually full-time is presently 117.688 million, 3.873 million above the January 2009 level when Obama took office, not 0.270 million above the January 2009 level. That's the nominal number. Doug Short at Advisor Perspectives could run the population-adjusted figures for us to show us just how far behind we really are in recovering to trendline at the Bush peak. Population has continued to grow causing employment-population ratios to plummet and labor participation rates to tank under truly dismal GDP conditions, so there is value in looking at it from that perspective. It's true. Obama is a total failure at job creation. When he turns his gaze to them, they seem to vaporize. Rush Limbaugh thinks this is on purpose.

Meanwhile the numbers continue to improve because this is a giant capitalist ship with tremendous inertia whose communist captain can't turn her on a dime for another go at the iceberg. He wishes we were China, but we aren't.

God bless the Republican House, but get off the number-of-angels-on-the-head-of-a-pin stuff. It's August, and we have gin to drink.

The Easiest Mortgage Loan Bailout Program Would Let Taxpayers Do It Themselves

According to the Federal Reserve's latest Statistical Release in September, here, the current value of all residential mortgages outstanding is $9.935 trillion.

That's down 5.8 percent from the 2007 peak of $10.542 trillion.

It is estimated that half of all residential mortgages are effectively underwater, meaning homeowners, if they could sell under current conditions, would not make enough from the sale to have 10 percent down for the purchase of a new home. This situation traps people in their homes, keeping them from moving to  take employment or retirement elsewhere.

The easiest solution to this problem is to allow holders of 401K, IRA and similar retirement accounts to withdraw funds without penalty, and perhaps even without taxation, if expressly used for the purchase of a new home, or for retirement of an outstanding mortgage or home equity loan. If not a complete tax forgiveness, government could settle for a flat tax at a low rate on such withdrawals in order to stimulate activity and help solve problems associated with indebtedness.

Holders of IRAs already know only too well that there are few exceptions to withdrawals without penalty. Perhaps the most useful of these few exceptions at present has been withdrawals permitted in certain circumstances for health insurance premium expenditures. Some people who have lost their jobs and their insurance have found this provision particularly helpful during this most severe period of unemployment since the 1930s. It has enabled them to purchase their own health insurance for themselves and their families with the funds.

The provisions permitting such withdrawals should be expanded to permit use of these funds to buy homes elsewhere, or pay off existing mortgages, which would do more than anything government has tried to do to date to stimulate velocity in the housing market.

People have saved plenty of dough to do it, too: $18 trillion.

Here's recent testimony about this from the Investment Company Institute:

Americans currently have more than $18 trillion saved for retirement, with more than half of that amount in defined contribution (DC) plans and individual retirement accounts (IRAs). About half of DC plan and IRA assets are invested in mutual funds, which makes the mutual fund community especially attuned to the needs of retirement savers.

Of course, not all of this money may presently be in the direct control of the individual taxpayers themselves to do with what they please, but a significant portion in IRAs and defined contribution plans, over $9 trillion, might very well be, according to ICI's latest data:

The risk to the retirements of people going forward if they are allowed to liquidate some of these monies is very real, but so is the prospect of a stagnant market of underwater mortgages devolving into bankruptcy, or even precipitating severe economic depression.

People should at least be given the choice under the current circumstances, perhaps with a sunset provision expiring in five years in order to spread out the effect.

A tip of the hat to John Crudele of The New York Post, who continues to argue for this solution in his columns.

Let Americans Use Their $15 Trillion in Retirement Accounts to Bailout Housing

John Crudele has mentioned this before, as have I.

Here he is once again in The New York Post:

Which gets me back to my favorite subject: my idea for fixing the economy.

If Washington wants to stimulate the economy without spending money (which it doesn't have) or reducing interest rates (which can't go any lower) or destroying the value of the dollar and stoking inflation (which Bernanke's QE is doing), then it should try my plan.

Change the rules on retirement accounts so that some small amount of the $15 trillion in these plans can be invested in real estate.

Let the Americans who can afford to buy real estate in their retirement plans do so.

Give them tax breaks. Encourage them to move into vacant condos in Florida, Arizona, California and everywhere else.

Get these properties off the books of banks and the federal government.

I'll get back to this another time when I have more space. But someone had better come up with a new idea -- and fast.

Another Voice for a Sensible Idea: Tax-Free Retirement Withdrawals for Real Estate

The only thing preventing many mortgages from being paid off free and clear for many people is the tax hit and withdrawal penalty they'd take to withdraw the funds from their retirement savings.

John Crudele for The New York Post looks at those funds and sees a kind of housing bailout in the waiting, where consumers might even actually use the dough to buy new or existing homes. Call it a housing stimulus spending bill:


Well, maybe it's time to listen to John (that would be me). Change the rules on retirement plans so the American people can rescue the ailing real estate industry, which, by the way, will take a decade to fix if left on its own.

Let people withdraw a relatively small percentage of the $15 trillion in retirement funds to purchase real estate. Give them a tax break -- maybe even a big one.


More at the link.