Joe Louis, did America let him down?

Absolutely. Thus, my great sense of humor and misery.

With that moniker you are sporting, I don't even need to ask.

 

So the housing market got out of control. The housing market alone? Not the credit industry in general? Because what happens with the credit card industry or the auto loan industry to name a couple when the same bubble that we saw with housing industry hits? If you think that bubble isnt there you are blind and its a lot more inherent in the people you want to spend spend spend (i.e. households with incomes of less than $100,000, than the housing industry was). So government got a little too big, just little? take a look at the spending increases this government has gone through in a single decade compared to how our tax revenue has grown during the same period. But Im simple minded... No, Im not as narrow minded as the product of the "me" generation which felt it was great to spend beyond their means and pass the bill down to their kids and grandkids. Ive got news for you, the days of living like a king on lower middle class income and retiring at 62 are over my friend and spending everything you have and more aint gonna help that anymore than the fantasy of trickle down economics will. The bottom line is americans, all americans, black white brown or whatever, need to work harder, longer, and in some cases for less (hopefully temporarily). Becoming a slave to the banking industry (which is what you spending theory would accomplish, because unless you have liquidity you cant spend spend spend without credit) isnt going to accomplish that, flooding the market with devalued currency wont help that (ask Mexico) and keeping taxes for the rich artificially low wont help that either.

 

Uhhh... being offered vast sums of credit means you are a viable enterprise in which people with money believe. If you people are talking about the recent US "credit crisis" it was a complete fabrication on the part of the tea baggers. Top economists are almost unanimous in that assessment. There is no crisis. There was not going to be a crisis for a couple of decades. The US debt is around 90% of the GDP, whilst, say Japan's is approaching 200%. The US still has 3 coasts of importation, the greatest logistical system ever known to mankind, feeds itself entirely, and possesses a combination of natural resources and production ability unparalleled on this planet. It will remain a great investment, being offered almost endless credit for the remainder of our lifetimes... no matter what some private entity states.

 

Thats not entirely true. The problem of debt Im talking about is on an individual basis. The housing bubble, and several other likely credit bubbles are the result of people being given credit that simply should not have qualified for it. My eyes were opened to this when I worked in the financial sector and saw young couples that had $20,000+ in student loan debt, $60,000+ in auto debt, $200,000+ in mortgage, $8,000+ in credit card debt etc etc and had two or three kids with a combined annual income of less than $60,000. You do the math. That simply isnt sustainable and thats very very common. How many of you people know someone who doesnt make a whole lot of money but drives around in a escalade, or some other expensive car, or has a ton of credit card debt, or an expensive home or all of the above and you wonder "how the hell can they afford all that when I make more than them, have fewer mouths to feed, and Im struggling to make ends meet?" Well, look at 2008 and you will see a partial result of that type of mindset. I say partial because that problem hasnt been fixed by a long shot.

On the national level you are right, the "debt crisis" was not nearly as bad as the republicans made it out to be. They simply wanted to bloody the noses of the democrats and they didnt care if they hurt the country by doing it (yet theyll cloak themselves in the flag and call themselves patriots). But that doesnt mean that the country can continue to do business as usual. It cant. Changes need to be made and fairly quick but the way things were handled in the last couple of months were pretty sickening to behold. Basically the country's credit rating was being held hostage by a minority group of radical right wing wackos who care a lot less about the country and a lot more about their own warped ideological belief system. I heard one of them just today say they want the second revolution.:huh

 

Indeed.


And your moniker is rightfully mine, mo buchaill.

 

Oh, we absolutely in agreement here. The personal debt crisis was the result of badly regulated loaners and stupid ****ing borrowers. I am not crying when John Q Public, who makes 60K a year, can't keep his 400K McMansion from being foreclosed. But that was the bill of goods being sold in the late 90's and early 00's. "Your real estate will make you rich!" Too bad, more grandparents who lived through the Great Depression weren't around to offer fiscal advice.

Now, how good was Alan Greenspan's hook of the jab?

 

Louis was a man that donated to the War relief fund and got Tax on it for years. Here is a man who spend FOUR OF HIS PRIME YEARS IN THE ARMY. Also, half of Louis fight purse was gone to his promoters even before he got his share. Last but not least expenses such as plane travel and training came from his purses as well.

 

I would agree my solution buys time.

And during that time, the Neo Liberal model of Capitalism is going to have to be looked at.

If it is going to be impossible to keep an average 3% world growth going, then the model does not work.

Which then brings in, to two painful issues for the States; their hegemony, and the use of the Dollar as the World Reserve Currency.

Both would need to be up for debate, as it does seem clear sooner or later, China is going to overtake the US, as the dominant World power.

Hopefully you do better job than us, when we (Britain) handed over power to you.

A new model of Capitalism would need to address the big issue; land/markets for growth. It will be almost impossible to keep the current model of those on better than average pay gaining more wealth, whilst those on average pay or less at best staying where they are (in real terms), relying on technological advances only, to increase their quality of life.

We would all need to adapt to a more Chinese model, with bigger state control putting monies into development of infrastructure, and on top of this, for the State to more evenly distribute wealth though state run enterprise rather than private enterprise schemes.

A break up of big global companies will be needed too, and this will be very painful. But the pain will need to affect the wealthy more than those of average wage or less. We cannot go down the path of the 1930s...

That is a very brief outline of what is going to be needed to resolve the issues of today.

 

I did a little study on Louis looking through historical records etc. and found a few interesting facts:

Louis donated his purse for the Buddy Baer fight to the Navy Relief Fund. This was a charitable organization set up to care for the families of men who had gone off to fight the war via the Navy. Louis' donated a total of: $47,100.94 to this charity.

3 months later Louis donated his purse for the Abe Simon fight to the similar Army Relief Fund. This purse totaled $36,146.

Larger figures are often given for both of these purses but that is because those figures give credit to Louis for the entire donated amount when in fact both Baer, Simon, and Mike Jacobs all contributed to the donations as well (with Jacobs donating his entire take from the Simon fight as well).

This totals: $83,246 donated (by Louis). Hardly the $500,000 someone above quoted. Furthermore this was income, and taxed as such. Had Louis never donated the money he would have still been forced to pay taxes on that amount.

Finally, and what is always overlooked when discussing how the evil government took advantage of the poor charitable Mr. Louis is that Louis was already in trouble with the IRS for his inability to pay taxes in early 1942 when he was taking part in those charitable bouts. In early 1942 he was contacted by the IRS and notified that he owed $117,000 in taxes from the previous year. A year in which he fought seven times and earned nearly $200,000 in one fight alone (Lou Nova). Louis notified the IRS in late January or early February of 1942 that he could not pay his taxes and asked for a deferment which was granted. Now keep in mind that this is a guy who a month or two later went on to literally give away nearly $40,000 to charity and at the same fight bought $4,000 worth of tickets for his friends and family.

Keep in mind that during Louis' first two years as a professional before ever winning the title he made literally HUNDREDS of times average annual household income.

I think the bottom line is that Joe clearly knew the situation he was in well before he gave away those purses and continued for years, literally, not taking care of it while spending money like a drunken sailor. Its also been fairly well established that Louis would borrow in advance of his purses and blow through that as well despite those around him trying to protect him at least to some degree.

I think clearly Louis is similar to the case of Mike Tyson. Who had vast amounts of money and simply spent himself into debt without caring of the tax consequences. He tried to put it off and put it off, literally for years, while that kept growing and growing. He was always looking at the next payday thinking he would just pay it off with that but didnt and eventually there were no more paydays and his creditors came calling.

 

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Let us face up to the elephant in the room. I do not know if it is your intention, as in the past you have shown to be arguably the most knowledgeable, sound poster on the board, but to me, you really come across as being racist in this thread.

 

Without question.

 

Agree or disagree, I have seen nothing racist at all in what has been stated here. What I do notice though (and it seems to be common practice, both here and out there in our society) is that whenever someone goes against the popular, fashionable (read: politically correct) point of view on a subject dealing with a non-white person, that person is immediately branded "racist!" or "hater!" These are mindless, Orwellian epithets designed to intimidate, shout down and keep in line all dissent.

Carlos and Booze, you both have shown yourselves to be intelligent posters here. Don't demean yourselves by copping-out and using the racism spitball. Klompton brings up many valid points that should be addressed in a debate like this.