Charlie Rose Science Series
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Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution--and How It Can Renew America
by Thomas L. Friedman
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by Thomas L. Friedman
Buy it
01/30/2008
Henry M. Paulson Jr.
A conversation with the Secretary of the Treasury
Keywords:
A conversation with Henry Paulson, the Secretary of the Treasury about the economic stimulus package.
DVD
Charlie Rose DVDs on Amazon.
Charlie Rose DVDs on Amazon.
Audio
Audio available through Audible.com.
Audio available through Audible.com.
Transcripts
Transcripts available through Voxant.
Transcripts available through Voxant.
I am impressed that someone as senior in the administration has been assigned to look at clean technology and reducing our carbon emissions. Let's hope he can achieve some traction before this administration's term is up.
Charlie was at full pucker for this interview. If Charlie praised that greed monger Paulson, who told Bush last year that we had to get the Chinese to stop saving their money (due to Goldie's exclusive banking deal in China), one more time, I was going to send Charlie a case of Vaseline and a toothbrush. Charlie, how come you failed to question Hank about the 6 percent rise in Wall Street banking bonuses in 2007 - DESPITE the falling stock prices in the banks and the sub-prime fiasco? Just forget, Charlie, or did you not want to lose you magic decoder ring to the House of Hank? A disgusting interview with neither intelligence, information, nor integrity displayed by Five O'Clock Charlie and his personal greed.
Secretary Paulson somehow failed to suggest regulation to avoid this sub-prime bust in the future. The question is how do you avoid this in the fututre. What was his answer? Policy of response?. You need more state intervention/regulation. Minimum cash deposits on mortgages. Greater unemployment benefits/training, etc, etc. Like every other Western country...
Why does Mr. Paulson evade addressing the causes of the housing bubble and lack of savings? He pokes at safety nets. Safety nets may have had a role. But he as well as Bernanke know who has been the greater culprit - the fed's ridiculously low artificial interest rates. If Greenspan's 1% interest rates weren't bound to create this kind of bubble, I don't know what would. People will continue to have no interest in saving as long as the fed inflates the money supply and credit. The dollar itself has become a bubble! Longer term policy needs to be considered. The secretive fed needs to open its doors if not be abolished altogether, as a number of economists including Nobel Laureate Milton Friedman have suggested. Until then, you can expect others like Paulson to continue to hand-wave as the economy dwindles. (Here is a documentary that makes a strong case and shows to be much more informative than the beating around the bush of this interview: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5232639329002339531)
Anyone who has been involved in CA RE for any length of time was waiting for the music to stop in the RE appreciation game. By the length of the last two downturns, your looking at 4 to 5 years before prices start to recover. This RE bubble maybe have been the most excessive yet and as such will send prices plummeting down until wages and mortgage affordability as reflected by home prices meets once again. It is going to be one protracted black hole.
Charlie, You say that no one foresaw the sub-prime mortgage crisis. I do not pay much attention to economic policies, but I thought the bust was inevitable with adjustable rate mortgages. If I knew, I believe that most of the players had to have known but did not say anything because they were going to profit until the bust and they guessed or gambled that they would not personally be held financially responsible for the mess.
Just another view from the ivory tower. This man is so out of touch with reality, it's insulting. And yet he has the power to affect millions of lives. The entire interview seemed to amount to nothing more than "Let them eat cake." Indeed.
Once again Charlie Rose does a wonderful job of interviewing top rated guests. Great show. One of the best on TV. (But friends keep asking who is Charlie Rose? One of PBS' best kept secrets.) Paulsen clearly stated the economy is slowing. But to call it a recession is a game of symantics. How do you define recession? How do you call a bottom? By the time you know it happened it can be over. The numbers lag by months. The good jobs in services are in SALES, distribution (the transportation industry), and in financial services. Paulsen pointed out that US is still largest country there is in manufacturing, that employment in manufacturing is the same as it was in 1950, but the value of goods produced has grown seven fold. Hence, the jobs are not in decline, but productivity has increased.
Secretary Paulson and others complain about the "low savings rate". Would you please investigate how his Treasury Department has destroyed the Savings Bonds Series "I" program. The first thing they did was drastically lower the base rate and then when interest rates went back up, they left the rate low. Next, just last month, they lowered the annual limit of purchases from $30,000 to $5,000. They say that 98% of the purchases are $5,000 or less. SO WHAT???? To encourage saving they should be INCREASING the limit, not reducing it. And they need to pay A DECENT INTEREST RATE. Secretary Paulson is a hypocrite on this issue.
Secretary Paulson must be smoking the same stuff that President Bush is. Only a few weeks ago, the President stated that the economy is fundamentally sound. Tonite, Secretary Paulson practically repeated verbatim what the President had said when Charlie asked whether or not the country is in a recession. If the country's economy is so sound and it's only having a short term problem, then why the RUSH to enact such a MASSIVE economic stimulus package?? Especially one that will only push this country further into debt? Why are severe infrastructure problems, which helped to cause this problem (such as the loss of industries that created well paying middle class jobs) in the first place, not being addressed??? Prior to viewing his program, I saw a BBC broadcast in which the reporter made the comment that the US has a zilch saving rate, which indicates severe consumer overspending. The reporter also noted that a zip saving rate means that many people cannot survive an economic downturn (ie. little or nothing to fall back on financially). And yet, the reporter noted, the US government is basically saying via its stimulus package that the way out of a possible recession is for its people to continue spend. Duhhh???!!!! It's sad that it's an election year. Neither the Congress nor any of the presidential candidates is willing to bite the bullet and do the right thing, which this proposed economic stimulus package is definite not.
In the conversation with Secretary Paulson a couple of things jumped out at me. First, he spoke of good paying service jobs as though they are on par with the jobs being lost in our economy. It would have been helpful if he would have mentioned what these jobs were as I, having been laid off, am in the market for a good paying job. Second, as is frequently the case, it was mentioned we need to increase our rate of savings. Isn`t Secretary Paulson advocating a stimulus package with the goal of getting money in the hands of people who they hope will spend (not save) the money right away. Which raises the question I`ve yet to hear anyone answer. If the economy is consumer driven, how do you increase the savings rate and not put a serious drag on the economy. I don`t know anyone who can save and spend money at the same time. Now this could be due to the fact that I and the people I know just don`t make enough money. Some how I don`t think the Secretary or the people he associates with have that problem, which may explain his prospective.
To you, does Secretary Paulson sound scripted to the extent he's offending one's intelligence? I have to wonder, whose interest is he really serving? Moreover, how could have somebody with his verbal communications skills been the top guy at GS? Something doesn't add up; Is it that we are not grown-up enough to handle economic truth?