Putting 700 Billion in context...

[readmoreoften]

I was watching a trailer for a documentary (on "The Church of Stop-Shopping" if you're interested) and one of the graphics mentioned that US consumers spend $690 billion dollars during the holiday season...

So, in other words, these banks are getting a bailout equal to the entire holiday season consumer expenditure in the US whenever Paulson thinks its necessary. How many entire-US-holiday-economies are there in the tax coffers?

[Indenturedebtor]

1. You'll have to ask China about the tax coffers thing

This money should have gone to keep people in their homes and to provide healthcare.

[Joe the Liberal]

2. I guess one way you could look at it is......

the 700 billion was Paulsons early Christmas gift to his buddies on Wall Street. The scum bag.

[sandnsea]

3. Or one year's defense budget, excluding wars

Isn't avoiding 25% unemployment worth one year's defense budget?

[Hannah Bell]

4. Or: it's more than 1 year's Social Security payments to 50 million people.

also - we've given out about 2 trillion to the financiers, someone said. That's the entire Social Security Trust Fund.

[crickets]

9. "the entire Social Security Trust Fund'

DING! That's what they wanted. Despite decades of trying they couldn't get it directly, but now...

[pa28]

5. Or another way.

Imagine handing a freshly minted million dollar bill to every person in San Francisco or Seattle. Yes, that's roughly correct . . . I strongly feel the "cure" here will prove worse than the disease.

[JDPriestly]

6. If it had saved pension funds and 401(K) investments, or even prevented foreclosures,

no one would mind. But the whole bail-out of the banks has been a waste of tax money. Paulson appears to be a fraud. Maybe it's too soon to tell, but it seems he had no strategy, no plan for using the money that was entrusted to him.

Paulson is a Bush yes-man. He is nothing more. The bail-out is a gift to Bush's friends and supporters. I doubt that it was ever considered as a way of helping the American people.

Again, what criminals. What frauds.

[natrat]

11. sadly paulson not the only fraid-A whole lot of democrats went along knowingly

[lapfog_1]

7. Hmmm,

do those "holiday expenditures" cover the basics (rent, food, gasoline, etc) in addition to the shopping for presents?

Because $700 B is $7,000 for 100,000,000 families (there are only about 310,000,000 people living here).

I know some people spend a lot every Christmas, but I doubt the average family budget for Christmas shopping is anywhere near $7,000.

[JJ]

8. Over $6,000 per US household

Imagine what could have been accomplished if that $700,000,000,000 had been distributed directly to the citizens.

[Greyhound]

10. Instant recovery/jump start. I'll bet the big 3 would have sold a bunch

of cars too.

But that smacks of SOCIALISM! Thank Dog we don't cotton to any of that there commie crap around here.

It's far better to give it to giant banks to finance their buying up little banks, cause as we all know the fewer the number of players in any industry, the better and cheaper their products and services become.