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The U.S. just had the most Q1 layoffs in a decade

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Re: The U.S. just had the most Q1 layoffs in a decade

#211

Post by xnyan »

geggam wrote: post #133
manfredo wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure how your quote is relevant to the statement that the Federal Reserve is part of the US government. The Federal Reserve is "independent within the government" [1] not separate from the government. There's a whole page on the Federal Reserve website's FAQ section dedicated to explaining this. Your quote seems to be about how commercial or State banks apply to become a part of the Federal reserve system. 1.…

Can you not read ? "Any" bank can become a member. It is quite clear in plain english.

Let's get down to brass tacks. There are 0 realities in which the fed could go off and say, buy a yacht for every board member or invest in Russian spy operations - whatever the law says, they are considered by the US and operate as effectively a branch of the US government.

If you have any recorded evidence to support the argument the Fed is not in practice operated as branch of the US Government I'd be very interested ion reading it

Re: The U.S. just had the most Q1 layoffs in a decade

#212

Post by tardo99 »

Rooster61 wrote: post #53
vkou wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The stock market finds the 'correct' price for stocks, by aggregating conflicting beliefs and predictions of traders. When the beliefs are overwhelmingly pessimistic, stock prices drop. Why should companies behave any differently with respect to layoffs?

> The stock market finds the 'correct' price for stocks, by aggregating conflicting beliefs and predictions of traders. 10-20 years ago, maybe. It's now driven largely by semi-autonomous algorithms monitoring swings/trends. I'd argue that it finds a 'simulated' price rather than a 'correct' price. The stock market is much less susceptible to emotional speculation than it used to be, for better or for worse. A quick g…

Didn't people blame algorithms for the 1987 market crash? Are you sure they reduce volatility? I suspect they just compress it all into short spans of time -- i.e. they just move it around.

Re: The U.S. just had the most Q1 layoffs in a decade

#213

Post by dragonwriter »

xnyan wrote: post #211
geggam wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you not read ? "Any" bank can become a member. It is quite clear in plain english.

Let's get down to brass tacks. There are 0 realities in which the fed could go off and say, buy a yacht for every board member or invest in Russian spy operations - whatever the law says, they are considered by the US and operate as effectively a branch of the US government. If you have any recorded evidence to support the argument the Fed is not in practice operated as branch of the US Government I'd be very interes…

> If you have any recorded evidence to support the argument the Fed is not in practice operated as branch of the US Government I'd be very interested ion reading it

Pedantically, it's an independent executive agency [0], not a branch (that term refers to the Executive, Legislature, and Judiciary); like other such agencies it has a governing board appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate.

[0] https://www.federalreserve.gov/faqs/about_12799.htm (doesn't use the term “executive”, but that's often omitted in discussing such agencies.)

Re: The U.S. just had the most Q1 layoffs in a decade

#214

Post by hopler »

dba7dba wrote: post #146
JustSomeNobody wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>... it is a manager's job to lay off employees. I feel awful for those people whose lives have just been disrupted so. I’m particularly empathetic because, as a foster parent, I know very well what may happen to some of those families.

I've never been a manager or had any role in laying someone off. But I've been laid off myself and know plenty people who get laid off and suffer the consequences, some quite severe. So I sometimes wonder, how do these managers who lay off people sleep at night? I mean they are just doing their job so that THEY themselves don't get laid off. And next I wonder, who are these rich rich people who want more money so tha…

Businesses aren't infinite sources of money. Money should be spent paying people to do useful work, not paying them to produce products no one wants. Rich people spend money, supporting jobs. Layoffs aren't the problem here, inequality of income is the problem. A person's number of hours worked per lifetime is not the important variable, income per lifetime is.

Re: The U.S. just had the most Q1 layoffs in a decade

#215

Post by hopler »

rabidrat wrote: post #177
AnimalMuppet wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You lay people off so that the company doesn't go bankrupt. Going bankrupt ruins more peoples' lives.

How does a profitable company justify layoffs then?

Because the work isn't needed. They arguably should pay workers more so workers can weather a future layoff or furlough, not pay people to come to work and do nothing.

Re: The U.S. just had the most Q1 layoffs in a decade

#216

Post by hopler »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #166
dba7dba wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've never been a manager or had any role in laying someone off. But I've been laid off myself and know plenty people who get laid off and suffer the consequences, some quite severe. So I sometimes wonder, how do these managers who lay off people sleep at night? I mean they are just doing their job so that THEY themselves don't get laid off. And next I wonder, who are these rich rich people who want more money so tha…

Layoffs are the price we pay for stable employment for some people. Otherwise, we all get to be "consultants" scrambling for the next gig, basically.

Unstable employment is the price we pay for stable employment?

Re: The U.S. just had the most Q1 layoffs in a decade

#217

Post by hopler »

temp-dude-87844 wrote: post #21
BluSyn wrote: post #2

"The report said worry about an economic slowdown was the main driver of companies' layoff intentions." I sometimes wonder if these sorts of economic projections end up being self-fulfilling prophecies. If everyone tightens up spending because they expect a recession, that essentially guarantees there will be one.

This has long been empirically observed (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_thrift ), but different schools of economic thought have different opinions about whether it's sufficient to result in a vicious cycle.

The escape from the paradox of thrift is to create things now that will be valuable in the future (durable goods, or education), or to lend money to people who need things now (aka investing). (Or give money away for that's but that's economically equivalent to lending, in a general sense.)

Re: The U.S. just had the most Q1 layoffs in a decade

#218

Post by bbatha »

petra wrote: post #203
mywittyname wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> (not well, maybe, but it worked) Obviously we don't have the alternative universe where President McCain opted to do nothing for comparison. But looking at the economic boom we're living in 10 years out, it's difficult to make an argument that the government's handling of the housing crisis was poor. I have a hard time coming up with an outcome more ideal than what we got. 2008->2018 was a much nicer decade than 19…

Maybe. But what about housing prices that came with QE, aren't they just delaying the catastrophy ?

If 'delaying the catastrophy' equates to the longest expansionary period in US economic history I'd say we did a pretty good job.

Re: The U.S. just had the most Q1 layoffs in a decade

#219

Post by empath75 »

airstrike wrote: post #208
akeck wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The market was posting all time highs until a few months before the DotCom bust?

More relevant, but that isn't enough. The market was also posting all time highs in 2012, 2013, 2014... If you want a simple proxy, looking at the S&P 500 P/E ratio is a slightly better metric[0]. It's still not the same as explaining the mechanism through which the next recession will occur, but then again if you could explain it a priori, you'd be a billionaire. __________ [0] https://www.multpl.com/s-p-500-pe-rati…

I’m not making the argument that posting all time highs means a crash is coming, I was simply pointing out that it doesn’t mean that it’s not.

Re: The U.S. just had the most Q1 layoffs in a decade

#220

Post by xxpor »

behindmyscreen wrote: post #152
xxpor wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because people believe in the FDIC, not that there won't ever be a bank run.

Believe in it? Trusting FDIC is tantamount to trusting the full faith and credit of the US Government. If you don’t trust it what are you doing here?

That's my point.
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