Buy a house and get a visa

[shalab]

Looks like Schumer is trying to implement Sanjeev idea  ;D. Apparently Canadians are the largest home owners now in the U.S followed by the Chinese and Indians.

 

 

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/bestoftv/2011/10/20/erin-schumer-residency-visa-plan.cnn?hpt=hp_t2

 

 

[moore_capital54]

This is a genius plan and yet somehow CNBC found some ahole to refute the idea to its core today. I was shocked at his statements and position. America is blessed to be in a position where successful business men with $500k in cash to their name would consider acquiring US real estate and moving their family to a new country just for the privilege of obtaining a visa.

[ERICOPOLY]

I first read about the idea in March 2009.

 

John Mauldin was the source:

http://www.zackvision.com/weblog/2009/03/buy-house-green-card/

 

Let’s assume one million new immigrants would buy homes. At an average price of almost $200,000, that would be $200 billion injected into the economy. And each of those homes has to be furnished, food has to be bought, clothing will be needed, local taxes will be paid. Airplane tickets to research potential areas, hotels needed during the interim period, and other related expenditures would add up. Over two years, this could easily be another $100 billion.

[Parsad]

there always has to be a gimmick. we just can't ever let things restore to their natural balance. gov Always interfering with the markets.

 

Would you have preferred Bernanke, Paulson and Geithner just minded their own business and let BAC, JPM, GS, GE, eventually WFC, BRK and most other leveraged financial institutions fail in 2008? 

 

Government can work, as long as they don't cater to special interests and actually have the country's best interest at heart.  Cheers!

[Green King]

there always has to be a gimmick. we just can't ever let things restore to their natural balance. gov Always interfering with the markets.

 

Would you have preferred Bernanke, Paulson and Geithner just minded their own business and let BAC, JPM, GS, GE, eventually WFC, BRK and most other leveraged financial institutions fail in 2008? 

 

Government can work, as long as they don't cater to special interests and actually have the country's best interest at heart.  Cheers!

 

What where the chances of BRK failing if the government didn't bail out the banks ?

How attached was BRK to the rest of the system ? 

[ERICOPOLY]

there always has to be a gimmick. we just can't ever let things restore to their natural balance. gov Always interfering with the markets.

 

Would you have preferred Bernanke, Paulson and Geithner just minded their own business and let BAC, JPM, GS, GE, eventually WFC, BRK and most other leveraged financial institutions fail in 2008? 

 

Government can work, as long as they don't cater to special interests and actually have the country's best interest at heart.  Cheers!

 

What where the chances of BRK failing if the government didn't bail out the banks ?

How attached was BRK to the rest of the system ?

 

Warren already said that Berkshire would have fallen just like the rest of them.

 

What won't make his checks clear?  Ideology.

 

[Guest misterstockwell]

 

Would you have preferred Bernanke, Paulson and Geithner just minded their own business and let BAC, JPM, GS, GE, eventually WFC, BRK and most other leveraged financial institutions fail in 2008? 

 

Government can work, as long as they don't cater to special interests and actually have the country's best interest at heart.  Cheers!

 

Sometimes I wonder if we would be better off if they let the weak fail. It would have been tough going, but from those ashes would have risen something better I think. The definitely needed to let weaker small banks fail. It was totally unfair to those who ran their banks conservatively.  Instead, we are still putting band-aids on wounds instead of fixing them, all at taxpayer expense.

[ERICOPOLY]

there always has to be a gimmick. we just can't ever let things restore to their natural balance. gov Always interfering with the markets.

 

What natural balance?

 

Government regulations are keeping wealthy people from coming here.  Open the floodgate, let the market be free.

 

:)

 

 

[given2invest]

This is a genius plan and yet somehow CNBC found some ahole to refute the idea to its core today. I was shocked at his statements and position. America is blessed to be in a position where successful business men with $500k in cash to their name would consider acquiring US real estate and moving their family to a new country just for the privilege of obtaining a visa.

 

agree

[Parsad]

What where the chances of BRK failing if the government didn't bail out the banks ?

How attached was BRK to the rest of the system ?

 

Lower than most financial institutions, but significantly higher than say Coca-cola.  If credit seized, how would Berkshire companies like Netjets, Clayton Homes, BNSF, Mid-American finance their operations?  It would have gone down but slowly.  Possibly selling assets at fire-sale prices to pay debt and save the remaining businesses, while making sure the insurance businesses had plenty of capital, as much of their equity portfolio would have collapsed.  And as mentioned, the Chairman and CEO has already said that they would have gone down too.  Cheers! 

 

[Valuebo]

What where the chances of BRK failing if the government didn't bail out the banks ?

How attached was BRK to the rest of the system ?

 

Lower than most financial institutions, but significantly higher than say Coca-cola.  If credit seized, how would Berkshire companies like Netjets, Clayton Homes, BNSF, Mid-American finance their operations?  It would have gone down but slowly.  Possibly selling assets at fire-sale prices to pay debt and save the remaining businesses, while making sure the insurance businesses had plenty of capital, as much of their equity portfolio would have collapsed.  And as mentioned, the Chairman and CEO has already said that they would have gone down too.  Cheers!

 

please provide a source for Buffett's comment that brk would have failed. it has to be on the Internet no? Buffett built brk to survive anything including the failure of some investment banks.

 

I remember him saying something in the lines of "If the goverment didn't step in and saved the system from colapsing, ultimately even Berkshire would have failed".

[ERICOPOLY]

I've seen him say it would have failed in an interview.  I can't find the interview, but in this NYTimes letter he says Berkshire would have fallen, albeit last.

 

Many of our largest industrial companies, dependent on commercial paper financing that had disappeared, were weeks away from exhausting their cash resources. Indeed, all of corporate America’s dominoes were lined up, ready to topple at lightning speed. My own company, Berkshire Hathaway, might have been the last to fall, but that distinction provided little solace.

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/17/opinion/17buffett.html?scp=1&sq=Berkshire%20bailout%20November%202010&st=cse

 

 

 

[Valuebo]

"might have been the last to fall..."

 

So? He says BRK might have been the last to fall in case the dominoes toppled, not that it might would have fallen.

[ERICOPOLY]

"might have been the last to fall..."

 

Might have been the second to last to fall.  Might have been the fourth to last to fall.

 

He admits not to know the exact order.  Thus, "might" have been the last.

 

[EdWatchesBoxing]

"...might have been the last to fall, but that distinction provided little solace. "

 

If you read the sentence to the end, I think Buffett was saying that Berkshire would have failed too.

[ubuy2wron]

Who cares wether BRK would have failed or not. Does any rational person think that having all of the large institutions fail would be a good thing for anyone other than perhaps a very small slice of the 1%. Academics talk and write about creative destruction in their ivory towers yet in the real world were we live the consequences are real not theory.Democracy and capitalism have created more good than any other systems of human organization. Government has to protect its citizens from the externalities caused by capitalists chasing profit. Do you think their would be an unpolluted water body in the US if their did not exist so called BIG BAD government. It is a hoary old economic conundrum "the tragedy of the commons" whenever you have resources which are public in nature you have misuse.

[alwaysinvert]

Tragedy of the commons due to misuse of public resources are externalities of capitalism?  :o

 

Capitalism is an economic system in which the means of production are privately owned and operated for profit from investment, usually in competitive markets.

[AZ_Value]

Who cares wether BRK would have failed or not. Does any rational person think that having all of the large institutions fail would be a good thing for anyone other than perhaps a very small slice of the 1%. Academics talk and write about creative destruction in their ivory towers yet in the real world were we live the consequences are real not theory.Democracy and capitalism have created more good than any other systems of human organization. Government has to protect its citizens from the externalities caused by capitalists chasing profit. Do you think their would be an unpolluted water body in the US if their did not exist so called BIG BAD government. It is a hoary old economic conundrum "the tragedy of the commons" whenever you have resources which are public in nature you have misuse.

 

Yeah... Sometimes ideologists make me laugh.

Do you think it's easy being in Paulson's or Bernanke's shoes and day after day presiding over a country literally on fire where for instance they tell you that the JNJs, PGs etc... can't roll their commercial paper and therefore can't make payroll and are about to start sending home hundreds of thousands of people, and you just sit and say "Hey... not my problem it's the market's problem and the market will take care of it!"

America was in trouble, not just the banks! The banks might have caused it but the whole country caught it and it is ludicrous to think that the people in charge of government had any choice but to do something to minimize the pain for everybody else.

 

It's like living in a neighborhood where one family is lighting 10,000 candles every night and everybody tells them that one day their house will burn down! And eventually it does burn down, so you go to the fire department and tell them that the house with the crazy people is burning down and everybody is like "Let it burn, that'll teach them!" What if they then come back and say "Well the problem is that all the houses in town are separated by just 5 inches and if it burns it's the entire neighborhood/town that will burn down"

Then what do you do? You send in the F'n fire department that's what you do if you're not insane!! And you deal with the crazy people later.

 

And when the fire is put out and the damage somewhat limited, the same people now saying we should have let them burn, nothing would have happened to my house, are usually the same people that will then resist what I consider to be the sensible thing for the town to do which is to decide to stop (yes regulate!!) crazy people from burning thousands of candles if it puts everybody else at risk.

 

[moore_capital54]

More People like on this board:

 

http://financiallyfit.yahoo.com/finance/article-113691-11403-3-true-story-living-well-on-11000-a-year

 

I couldn't find the right thread...

[Santayana]

Would you have preferred Bernanke, Paulson and Geithner just minded their own business and let BAC, JPM, GS, GE, eventually WFC, BRK and most other leveraged financial institutions fail in 2008? 

YES!!!!

Government can work, as long as they don't cater to special interests and actually have the country's best interest at heart.  Cheers!

Exactly!  In 2008 they catered to the special interests, which is why 3 years later we are still dealing with the same issues. 

[ERICOPOLY]

Regarding moral hazard:

 

Why did the bank stocks decline this summer?  I thought we understood that there is zero risk of them being allowed to fail. :o

[Aberhound]

there always has to be a gimmick. we just can't ever let things restore to their natural balance. gov Always interfering with the markets.

 

Would you have preferred Bernanke, Paulson and Geithner just minded their own business and let BAC, JPM, GS, GE, eventually WFC, BRK and most other leveraged financial institutions fail in 2008? 

 

Government can work, as long as they don't cater to special interests and actually have the country's best interest at heart.  Cheers!

 

The problems are income inequality and declining morality of the elites. The former seems to cause the latter. Think of the robber baron age around 1910. It brought out the worst problems: income tax, the federal reserve, two world wars, the change of the US from a republic to an empire, and the great depression.

 

The elites are using the threat of the collapse of the financial system to impose heavy debts on taxpayers, the taxpayers' children and the taxpayers' grandchildren. This is massive theft. Stupid policies favouring the elites are everywhere you look. Governments don't work well when dramatic income inequality allows the few to game the system.

 

Income inequality is so severe that the only way to fix it and to reduce the debts is to let those who lent imprudently to go bankrupt. Corporate wealth is so concentrated that the collapse of any one of the few will cause them all to collapse because of derivatives. If the financial system collapses it will win freedom for our children and grandchildren. The collapse is the only way to eliminate the debt from the system and rid us of the quadrillions of derivatives which reward the immoral.

 

The middle class and the poor can easily protect themselves by being prudent. Pay off debt and buy assets which will retain their value when the debt leverage is gone. I prefer a society where the prudent are rewarded and the parasites lose their position and power. Only the prudent will well survive the financial collapse and the collapse will teach morality. The generation that arose from the great depression was the "hero generation". They became moral people who left us a better world than they started with.

 

With immoral people in charge the collapse is going to happen anyways. All we can control is the severity of the collapse. The severity is controlled primarily by starting the bankruptcy process sooner before more massive debts are incurred and by expanding the bankruptcy system so that the work is completed more quickly.

 

No one will voluntarily roll over the huge debts so the next step is to make the loans involuntary. Napoleon's efforts to fund his war machine is a good example of what we can expect. Maybe that is why the Dutch and the Germans refuse to agree with the bailouts proposed by the elites. They remember when they were at the wrong end of the bayonets and they were forced to loan all their wealth to Napoleon's war machine.

 

 

[ubuy2wron]

This is a genius plan and yet somehow CNBC found some ahole to refute the idea to its core today. I was shocked at his statements and position. America is blessed to be in a position where successful business men with $500k in cash to their name would consider acquiring US real estate and moving their family to a new country just for the privilege of obtaining a visa.

I also think this is a genious idea in fact I have mentioned this as a solution for some of the US problems. Does any one here think it will fly because if it does I want to sell my Vancouver home quick cuz it sure will kill our market which has been kept afloat because of immigration.

[Tim Eriksen]

there always has to be a gimmick. we just can't ever let things restore to their natural balance. gov Always interfering with the markets.

 

Would you have preferred Bernanke, Paulson and Geithner just minded their own business and let BAC, JPM, GS, GE, eventually WFC, BRK and most other leveraged financial institutions fail in 2008? 

 

Government can work, as long as they don't cater to special interests and actually have the country's best interest at heart.  Cheers!

 

The problems are income inequality and declining morality of the elites. The former seems to cause the latter. Think of the robber baron age around 1910. It brought out the worst problems: income tax, the federal reserve, two world wars, the change of the US from a republic to an empire, and the great depression.

 

The elites are using the threat of the collapse of the financial system to impose heavy debts on taxpayers, the taxpayers' children and the taxpayers' grandchildren. This is massive theft. Stupid policies favouring the elites are everywhere you look. Governments don't work well when dramatic income inequality allows the few to game the system.

 

Income inequality is so severe that the only way to fix it and to reduce the debts is to let those who lent imprudently to go bankrupt. Corporate wealth is so concentrated that the collapse of any one of the few will cause them all to collapse because of derivatives. If the financial system collapses it will win freedom for our children and grandchildren. The collapse is the only way to eliminate the debt from the system and rid us of the quadrillions of derivatives which reward the immoral.

 

The middle class and the poor can easily protect themselves by being prudent. Pay off debt and buy assets which will retain their value when the debt leverage is gone. I prefer a society where the prudent are rewarded and the parasites lose their position and power. Only the prudent will well survive the financial collapse and the collapse will teach morality. The generation that arose from the great depression was the "hero generation". They became moral people who left us a better world than they started with.

 

With immoral people in charge the collapse is going to happen anyways. All we can control is the severity of the collapse. The severity is controlled primarily by starting the bankruptcy process sooner before more massive debts are incurred and by expanding the bankruptcy system so that the work is completed more quickly.

 

No one will voluntarily roll over the huge debts so the next step is to make the loans involuntary. Napoleon's efforts to fund his war machine is a good example of what we can expect. Maybe that is why the Dutch and the Germans refuse to agree with the bailouts proposed by the elites. They remember when they were at the wrong end of the bayonets and they were forced to loan all their wealth to Napoleon's war machine.

 

Or possibly you are way off base.  You really think declining morality is caused by income inequality?  Are you positing that the rich got richer and eventually that led them to a loss of morality?  Or are you seeing the elites as a third group whose morality declines when the rich get richer and the masses don't?  Really.  Either way, that is sad.  You seem to have absolutely no understanding of human nature.  Thus all your conclusions are incorrect.

 

You attribute immorality to some but not all, and interestingly not the masses.  Why is that?  Were just lenders greedy and not borrowers????   

 

 

[Liberty]

Would you have preferred Bernanke, Paulson and Geithner just minded their own business and let BAC, JPM, GS, GE, eventually WFC, BRK and most other leveraged financial institutions fail in 2008? 

YES!!!!

 

Honest question: And after that, what would have happened..?