So what happens when California goes bankrupt...

There have been significantly less and less labor union members in the USA almost every year, and CEO pay and wallstreet bonuses continue to rise (until the catastrophe this year) to even more obscene levels, when compared to CEO's compensation in most other countries around the world. When less and less of the blue collar workers producing the product can afford to buy the product that they are producing ( a new car or a new house) with real wage growth and not just some temporary inflated credit bubble purchasing power, this is where we end up. How many Hispanic blue collar workers in Mexico (or workers from around the world) can afford to buy the new automobile, etc. that they produce? My Republican friends (with whom I usually try to avoid talking politics with) always try blame it on the rapidly dwindling collective bargaining labor unions.  Excessive CEO pay (legal robbery in many cases)  seems to have nothing to do with it. Yeah, illegal aliens sapping the California system and working practically for slave wages (and knocking down the wages, retirements, health care, etc. of  blue collar Americans who are locked in a losing competitive wage war with them and workers from around the world from world trade, globalization, etc.)  that make them so they can't afford to buy the product they are producing (again, a new car or a new house) has nothing to do with it either? The unsinkable, best the world has ever known, etc. Titanic is sinking (possibly even mortally damaged, time will tell if we start expanding our declining manufacturing capacity per capita in the USA or not), but not yet sunk. The captian at the time (the anti-labor union, anti-collective bargaining, anti-real wage growth and benefits for blue collar workers, anti-blue collar health care, anti-blue collar retirements, pro New World Order as told by Republican President Bush Sr., pro let the illegals flood in through the porous border security, pro recklessly expand the trade agreements with China, India, Russia, etc. to knock the blue collar workers of America down to their level of compensation, Republican Bush Jr. Administration) is running for his lifeboat. The real blue collar wages, real blue collar benefits, and real blue collar retirements (oh, that's right my Republican friend told me that I shouldn't have a retirement anymore because I can just use my 401K for retirement and count on the biggest rigged gambling casino ever devised "Wallstreet" instead for retirement someday)  sure have taken a beating under the Republican administration the last 8 years haven't they? Now, here we all are, Every single last one of us, those who are to blame, and those of us who are not to blame (but a victim of the circumstances none-the-less). It's too bad that there aren't enough lifeboats on the sinking and greatest of all time Titanic for all of us who are just hard working, law abiding, and innocent Americans!

biggest rigged gambling casino ever devised "Wallstreet" 

 

You're right about that friend. Also the CEO bonuses is legal robbery, it's the only thing it can be. Somehow apparently it's legal to use the bailout money for bonuses too. I love discussion like this but hate thinking about it because it makes me too fucking ANGRY!!!

 

 

Anybody wanna take a shot at when the house of cards falls down? I Wonder what the timeline is we're lookin at

I just hope we start building stuff in the USA again with workers who can afford to buy the products they build, buy a car, and buy a house for their family. It will be worse for all of us if it all falls down. It is definitely falling, but  who really knows if it will all fall down? Here's a pleasant thought. The USA increased the manufacturing output per capita after the Great Crash and the Great Depression with WWII which eventually brought the manufacturing per capita USA economy back better than ever. Great, just great (sarcasm, of course) ! One other point, since the thread is about California going bankrupt. Why is their incentive for the illegal aliens to have 10-12 kids per unmarried couple to draw freebies from the system, which is going bankrupt? How about one child can be put on wellfare for an unmarried mother, even if she is/has been living with her employed boyfriend for the past 10 years or more (which is many times the case while working the system). The second child and beyond , support them yourself, once again since the system is going bankrupt and the entire country/system might eventually collapse?  When too many people are on the land and the land can no longer support/feed them all, bad things usually follow for all. When food gets too expensive because there are too many people for the land to support (overpopulation) too many people starve, too many people get desperate, governments get toppled, genocide, etc. People are living longer than ever, infantry based armies with an overabundance of young prime fighting men are not needed to defend the land like they were for thousands of years. Throw in some climate change (if that is happening or just naturally changing Earth cycles), unprecedented droughts, food shortages, Revelations, etc. Scary stuff and difficult to talk about without being perceived as some sort of racist. Really, it is probably just more pragmatic for people to start talking about such difficult subjects? We haven't even mentioned the terrorists (mostly porous border security on this side while being mostly controlled by drug lords on that side of the border, Al-Qaida/Bin Laden, why again hasn't he been brought to justice by now?) wanting to strike on American soil to cause the maximum American economic damage and a possible bankruptcy/system wide collapse? When? If? Possible? Unfortunately, it certainly seems possible?

Jerry Jones is considered to be an asshole by many but I'll bet he could give the USG many pointers on how to make and save money.  He said that he gave the NFL much information that enabled them to make more money and that he had a lot of other good ideas (at least, HE thinks they are good ideas). Comment: As long as the Congress could make a direct cut or arrange it so their friends could make money off of it they should go along.  That is our main problem with the economy now, the Congress of these United States is bought and paid for by big business and other lobbyists.

I do believe history repeats itself, and the scariest part about that IMO is the answer to this question...

 

After the Great Depression what stabilized the economy? (maybe a poor choice of words)? Basically this event helped fix Americas economic problems. These events always do.

 

You come up with the answer to that and you'll know what appears to be coming soon, except this time the end result can't be the same or this thing that we call Earth is over even before 2012.

 

 

 

California's bonds have been reduced to near-junk status and will run out of money by Febuary.

 

  " The city of Vallejo—population 120,000—declared bankruptcy earlier this year because it was locked into spending 74 percent of its $80 million general fund budget on public-safety salaries.

 After five years on the job, public -safety employees (police/firefighters )are entitled to lifetime health benefits."

 California budgets are being crippled by outsized public sector union pension obligations .

    Like with the California Federation of Teachers their salaries  cannot be renegotiated in tough times to balance a budget. They can only go up, never down.........The State government can only reduce the rate of increase .......

Good luck governor if you can't cut spending , you will have to lay-off more people and raise taxes,that on a aging population, a declining tax base, and durning a fiscal crisis.

 

After the Great Depression what stabilized the economy? (maybe a poor choice of words)? Basically this event helped fix Americas economic problems. These events always do.
-------------
and it wasnt the new deal

the new deal is the beginning of the endless debt and safety net that has brought us here

The number #23 for example.

They had on the local news that they will be doing IOU's on refund checks, so if you get a California refund, you might get an IOU instead.  They also mentioned something about not paying certain workers, but I missed specifically who they were talking about.

 In answer to your Topic Heading, Who Cares???