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Feature SECONDARY MARKET | 77 se c on da r y m a r k e t The M Report A na ly t ic s starting to look, meet the definition of "unemployed." There was also an indication of confidence in the drop in temporary workers, suggesting employers feel good enough about the economy to make permanent rather than temporary additions to staff. Statistics past and present support the idea that prioritizing jobs is the key to establishing long-term economic improvements, but perhaps the most important piece of evidence upholding the theory came directly from the president: "From our earliest days, we have had a tradition of substantial government help to our system of private enterprise. But today, the government no longer has vast tracts of rich land to give away and we have discovered, too, that we must spend large sums of money to conserve our land from further erosion and our forests from further depletion. The situation is also very different from s e r v ic i ng Could it be the extremists in Congress—threatening to withhold approval of an (unnecessary) increase in the debt ceiling without matching spending cuts—care less about patriotism than they do about pandering? On the surface, the Bureau of Labor Statistics' most recent report showed little to talk about: a 7.8 percent unemployment rate and 155,000 net new payroll jobs (net, that is, of the loss of 13,000 government jobs). However, the survey also contained some counterintuitive good news indicating momentum that puts the nation in an optimal position to refocus efforts toward stimulating U.S. employment. Though data showed the number of individuals counted as "unemployed" rose 164,000, the increase was more than accounted for by 262,000 new "re-entrants" to the labor force—that is, individuals who had been sitting on the sidelines who believe now they can indeed find a job and who, by Or ig i nat ion Try telling that to your credit card company: "I'm spending too much money. I'm too much in debt, so I'm not paying my credit card bill." Good luck with that. Congress, indeed, doesn't really have to do anything. The 14th Amendment to the Constitution is pretty clear on the subject in section 4: "The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned." Under that provision, the Treasury has no option but to pay the nation's bills. The notion of a debt ceiling itself may be unconstitutional. The administration could ignore the debt ceiling and wait for a constitutional challenge, which would bring the Supreme Court into the mix while at the same time undermining any remnants of confidence in the nation's finances. the old days, because now we have plenty of capital, banks, and insurance companies loaded with idle money, plenty of industrial productive capacity, and many millions of workers looking for jobs. It is following tradition as well as necessity, if government strives to put idle money and idle men to work, to increase our public wealth and to build up the health and strength of the people—to help our system of private enterprise to function again. "It is going to cost something to get out of this recession this way, but the profit of getting out of it will pay for the cost several times over. Lost working time is lost money. Every day that a workman is unemployed, or a machine is unused, or a business organization is marking time, it is a loss to the nation." But President Barack Obama can't take credit for those words—they belong to Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who delivered the poignant message during a national address dating back almost 75 years, to April 14, 1938. Roosevelt went on to state: "Let us unanimously recognize the fact that the federal debt, whether it be 25 billions or 40 billions, can only be paid if the nation obtains a vastly increased citizen income. I repeat that if this citizen income can be raised . . . the national government and the overwhelming majority of state and local governments will be definitely 'out of the red.' The higher the national income goes, the faster will we be able to reduce the total of federal and state and local debts. Viewed from every angle, today's purchasing power —the citizens' income of today—is not at this time sufficient to drive the economic system of America at higher speed. Responsibility of government requires us at this time to supplement the normal processes and in so supplementing them to make sure that the addition is adequate. We must start again on a long, steady upward incline in national income." Reading history, it seems, is important.