What is the Secret of America's upsurge?

[rov1100]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-16881848

We are heading for a double dip recession in the UK but the US is flying high...what are we doing wrong?

[ummmm]

Didn't they go into recession quite a good bit before us?

[rojash]

They didn't vote for a government that decided it could fulfil its own ideological agenda by using the financial crisis as an excuse to introduce austerity measures.

[DTCwordfan]

post addendum to rojash's comment:

And they haven't tackled their underlying debt problems either, a disaster in waiting on which we hevily depend as for every $ we owe them, they owe us 3 (combined government and banking loans)

[Khandro]

I think it is whistling in the dark. Make no mistake, they are in very deep doo-doo.

[tonyav]

Maybe it has something to do with the presidential elections coming up later this year.

[VHG]

>>>>an excuse to introduce austerity measures.

The definition of "austerity measure" is "An official action taken by a government in order to reduce the amount of money that it spends or the amount that people spend"

So what are they supposed to do, keep spending money so we go even more in debt?

Allow consumers to keep spending money they dont have so personal debt rises?

Any idiot can keep spending government money (as we found out with Gordon Brown), that is easy.

Clearing up after the mess Gordon Brown and labour left us is more diffiucult.

Currently we are going through the difficult bit.

p.s. Obama is probably releasing more governemt money to create this "mini boom" in the US, but it will probably come back to bite them after the election.

[Brenden]

And like Brown, If Obama loses, he will not have to clean up. How many trillions in debt are USA?

[Khandro]

Brenden, take a look; http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/

[sandyRoe]

Did the USA have no debt before Obama was elected?

[NOX]

You can't 'save' your way out of a recession- any idiot knows that as well. Things have to be artificially started in order to get the economy moving, not everything drawing to a full stop because no-one has money to spend, firms are going under due to lack of govt and banking help and everyone is too scared to speculate.

[dickythecook]

I always thought it was Ronald Reagan and the Star Wars Initiative that plunged the U.S. into debt. Not Reagan on his own obviously. and not the films either. No doubt some one will educate me, TA.

[rojash]

"So what are they supposed to do, keep spending money so we go even more in debt? "

There is such as thing as a balancing act. If you set out to reduce spending purely on ideological grounds (rather than on sound economic grounds), you end up plunging the economy further into recession.

[DTCwordfan]

Unfortunately it's not about ideology, it's practical, as your shower, rojash, left us so perilously close to the cliff edge of being a massive Greece.

Brown and Darling (and Blair) should be done for treason.

Once back from the edge, then the stimulus can come in....such as using the money that India does not want from us (see front page today's Telegraph). Small that may be in the overall numbers, every bit helps and could be directed at propping up jobs as well as boosting industry and new businesses.

[rojash]

Coupla points DTcrosswordfan.

1) They're not my shower
2) If you take a course that deepens the recession, you end up with less revenue. With less revenue, you have two choices: either make even more cuts, resulting in a depression and a downward spiral, or greater borrowing. There is such a thing as false economy - like saving money by not servicing the car - you can end up with no car or a whacking great repair bill.

[jomifl]

Is the recession not due to the fact that China now has a lot of the West's money and we have high unemployement because we have given them all the work. When we buy shiploads of consumer electronics made for Apple in China, which will be thrown away in 2 years time when the next pocket miracle is produced then there is little hope.