The Best Economic Plan I've Heard Yet...

Um, I thought 300 million people given a million dollars= 300 million dollars. We don't have a trillion people in this country...

>_> other than that, I give you a thumbs up.

2007 estimate of people in the United States was: 301,139,947

...so actually it wouldn't even be half of $700b. (which was a number Paulson said they pulled out of the air, alot of number crunchers said the real amount of money spent probably would've actually be higher if not in the trillions you're talking about).

Time to pull out the calculator XParanoiax, 300 million people times 1 million dollars, is $300 TRILLION. You're math would be $1 per person. $1 per person for 300 million people would be $300 million total. To give 300,000,000 people $1,000,000 a piece would be 300,000,000 X 1,000,000 which is 300,000,000,000,000 or three hundred trillion.

I didn't think the dollar had gold behind it anymore and we had quit using the gold standard.
Even if everyone did get a million, the way some people spend it would be gone in no time.

WHY are you timesing it?

And the dollar isn't, which is why if they cut alot of their own spending to pay for this idea, it'd probably work better.
I know people are shopping freaks, and not all of them would spend it wisely...but that doesn't really hurt the economy much other than that the people will learn nothing and risk committing the same mistakes later. Perhaps it should come with a letter telling people to stop being stupid and telling them HOW to stop being stupid, Iri.

I don't know if a note is going to keep people from being stupid, but it's worth a try.
Hey, I say if people want to spend it all in a short period of time there is really nothing anyone can say. I can sit here right now and spend at least a half million on a house, furniture, etc. It is what you spend it on that will make the difference. To better your life or not.

I'm multiplying because it is a multiplication problem. X amount of dollars to X amount of people.

If you have $1 million dollars, and I have $1 million dollars, our combined total is $2 million. That's 2 people with $2,000,000. Correct? I thought so.

Therefore 100 people would have a total of $100,000,000. That's 1 million per person for 100 people.

100,000 people would mean $100,000,000,000. That's $100 million for 100,000 people.

100,000,000 people would be $100,000,000,000,000. Thats $300 trillion for 100,000,000 people.

If 300,000,000 people have $1,000,000 a piece, what is the total amount of money?
$300,000,000,000,000 3 hundred trillion dollars. If you have some sort of alternate way of working that out I'd like to see it.

Bleh, my Dad says you're probably a bit low on your estimate of money actually estimated here but he says you're more right than I am. (I was consulting with him to see if I was crazy lol)

Mind you, you're talking to an insomniac. It made sense to me, but I forgot some math rules and was stuck in memories of word problems...so I hereby apologize and you can ignore my reply below lol.

But again, it only equals inflation if we print that money (and other bad things if we borrow it). If we simply relocate it from other spending elsewhere (like say the war(s), which is getting up to that money spent)) then it works fine...in theory anyway.

However, if they only go about it in a way that creates inflation then it's not a good idea I agree.

I really appreciate everyone's responses here but it's not really meant to be taken seriously - although it sure would be nice, wouldn't it...lol...?

I admit I didn't actually do the math before posting this because it was meant to be with tongue firmly in cheek here, but it actually could work with a much smaller amount per family instead of per person. I mean, when you look at it in the way that our government is constantly spending our money on things we may or may not (usually NOT!) agree with and more often than not aren't even aware of, so why not give us something we actually SEE and can SPEND on more than some overdue bill or gas for our cars for a couple of weeks?

Let's face it, some people would blow it on stupid things, although they would be stimulating the economy as they did so, but I'd like to believe more would put it to good use and some actually would use it to start up a small business and create a few jobs - heck, if it's an unemployed person, even if they create a job for themselves that's a plus, right?
Annie

Printing 300 Trillion dollars would turn our dollar to dirt and we would all be forced into poverty. And yes $1,000,000 X 300,000,000 people= $300,000,000,000,000 or 300 TRILLION DOLLARS, that is more than the entire world's supply of gold can sustain. What you're promoting is financial suicide.

I'm not promoting, I'm discussing. And I asked above why you're timesing it, are you basing your math on the super low value of the dollar?
I was AWARE of inflation's dangerous levels before and that's why I didn't support the bail out because of where they'd get that money (they'd PRINT it and cause levels of inflation that would destroy the dollar), it's why I said you had a plus for everything else you said...because we need some correcting here in our practices of how we treat our currency and where we spend it in order to make any move economically stable...

But AGAIN, until I know why you're timesing it instead of the simple 1 million per 300 million people, equals 300 million dollars...

Lol, you've got to be kidding me. Get a calculator, multiply $1,000,000 by 300,000,000 people. $300,000,000 would be $1 for each of those people. 300,000,000 dollars divided among 300,000,000 people is $1 per person. Not trying to be a pain here but your math is seriously flawed.

Lets go here then:

300,000,000 (population)
x 1 (million dollars)
____________
300,000,000

One person then would equal a million dollars.
You can't exceed more than 300,000,000 under the premise that you're just giving away a million dollars per person. When you have only so many people, and you have a number that's the millions place equivilent of ONE...

There's something to be said for doing things the old fashioned way, man. I hardly ever use calculators.

(If any readers are confused, I'm retracting the above post and I really really must not mylot when I haven't slept.)

Blagh.

You are multiplying 300,000,000 by 1 and considering 1 to mean $1 (million), correct?
So you're total sum would be $300,000,000(million) not just $300,000,000. That (million) adds 6 additional zeros to your final number, bringing you to 300 trillion dollars.

Just answer me this and we'll settle it, if 300,000,000 people have $1 a piece, how many total dollars do they have?

I REALIZED my errors, dearie. Read my reply to your post, please.

Don't have to rub my nose in it when being a human being, I know I was wrong and partly because I've deprived myself of sleep.

Lol it's cool, just didn't want people to get the wrong impression that those figures were right when they were extremely off. I understand the insomnia thing, been there plenty of times. Yea they could reduce enough foreign spending by just leaving all our military occupations in neutral and allied countries to save $700 billion a year, and that isn't including the other 500 billion we spend on average annually in Iraq and Afghanistan. That $700 billion being saved by leaving and unoccupying harmless or allied countries would allow us to stop paying the income tax without harm. We could still maintain the rest of our infrastructure without paying any income tax on our wages at all. That would put an extra $300 a month into the pocket of a minimum wage worker, or $600 a month into a two person minimum wage family income. At a rate of $10/hr it would mean an extra $400-$500
a month per person. Abolishing the income tax would allow people more spending money and help the market flourish by promoting a consumerist, free market economy.

*smiles* I wonder if you're a fan of Ron Paul too? What you're saying is eerily like what he's been saying for a loooong long time. And he actually predicted our current economic predicament, he's been the most right on the economy...no he's probably been the lone voice of right-ness economically on the public spectrum...and he's a congressman, not an economist, heh.

Although ANYTHING we do right now'd be pretty tough...because everything has painful consequences right now, we DID have an economy about income taxes once upon a time.

It'd probably just do well to make sure we make good on the "voluntary" part they went back on, actually.

I am not sure that giving $1million dollars to each citizen would work, it does look to be rather expensive, though if we gave each citizen $10,000, then this would come at $3 trillion, I think. Still very expensive but doable, but would giving each citizen $10,000 really provide long term benefit, I don't think so.

The key thing has got to be to restore confidence in the banking system, because if confidence is not restored, then we could have a run on the banks as we had during the great depression.

See this article which helps explain some of the reasoning for the bailout:
www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article4856477.ece

Hence the purpose of this bailout, or perhaps should we say bank rescue, get rid of the toxic IOUs that the banks have (not all of which are bad by any means, but cannot be sold in today's market) and this should give banks confidence to lend to each other again and then lend to businesses and us. If the credit stops, the the US economy will grind to a halt - be not in doubt about that.

WITHOUT not about...income taxes...sheezus, I should probably leave and not come back til I get some sleep...now..huh? Lol.

Er...Evan, you're forgetting inflation -- like I was temporarily because of my funky brain fart there.

If dollar value hits zero, which'd happen if inflation got too high, then we have NO system, no economy, whatsoever.
A temporary fix, like I said since this restored confidence would carry us a ways...until we collapsed entirely. Confidence, banks, these things in the end we CAN survive without. However losing our currency is the bottom line. It equals total and utter collapse.

I'm not sure how serious alot of people realize the current economic situation is.

If you give 300,000,000 million people $1,000,000 a piece, that's 300 trillion dollars, thats 100 x our annual national expenses. It is more money than the entire supply of gold in the world could back, someone should take this post down it's misinforming. It wouldn't do anything for the economy but turn our dollar to the value of a speck of dirt. Inflation is aweful, the problem is government being controlled by the Federal Reserve Bank, check out my profile and look at a few of my other posts for more on that. Whoever started this post, please pull it, it is misinformative and incorrect.

Lmao, I'm sorry Ocean...it looks like most of the serious...in the guts of the idea discussion's gonna take place on the front page!

Like I'm talking about above, this'd only work if we're not printing or borrowing money -- in which case it would be a good idea like we're contemplating here.

It sucks how much an otherwise good idea can be overall a bad one because of the circumstances today, huh?

Hi Babes Paranoia!
Oh dear well, I guess it is true what they say...money cannot buy happiness...love you too dear friend and I will see you around the Lot..looks like you really like this discussion dear ...Hugs xoxo Bless you! Hey can I borrow a dolla? hehhehheh xoxoox

It's true, it's true. I don't like it per se, but I don't get alot of opportunities to stretch what little I do know with the economy...and there's no accounting for my own mistakes...so..hoo boy, eh? Hehe.

Anytime, hun!

You are fortunate, my entire stimulus check went to debt. As a matter of fact I don't personally know anyone who got to spend it recreationally. Everyone I know used it to climb a few inches closer to the opening at the ned of the debt tunnel. It didn't help though, it really hurt everyone because it raised the inflation level and over time will gradually raise the cost of living to compensate.

I'm kinda with Bruce on this on the last stimulus...had it been up to me I woulda spent it on buying a fuel sipping mode of transportation (a scooter with approximately 75 MPG) so I could get a job no matter the distance (which'd help a ton). But my family's BARELY above debt, and since we're all living together I wasn't about to object to their spending my part of the stimulus on bills.

I think a few thousand would be within means for the country as a whole, stimulus-wise, concievably. I know I'd use it to start up my own business microfarming should life all go mostly well like it seems to want to do for us -- and that'd mean I'd be selling cheaper products (that'd be my goal anyway)...and that'd help the economy, wouldn't it? I know plenty of people who'd still be using it for bills, but I know that there's a good percentage that would be able to use it for making sure they don't have to worry about bills and by doing something that means participation in the economy.

Oh my family's stimlus check went to medical bills. That 1800 was about 7 visits to the doctor for my son who has autism.

Why are you spending yoru money for doctors visits if your son has autism? Do you realize that your child is entitled to ssi and all medical coverage if he is diagnosed with this? Please check with your ssi office.

Myself I do not believe the government should pay off my mortgage but I do believe that the banks should have the two choices, which are bring all loans down to the value of the homes or close to it and then give everyone a reasonable interest rate. If you are one that has excellent credit then you get a 2 percent and then start going upwards with that.Not for the whole term of the loan but for the next 5 years or so. Make arms illegal. If they are not willing to help with these horrid times then shame on them.

I would like to add that the problem I could see with doing something like this would be that I think it would cause the value of the dollar to drop dramatically. Now don't get me wrong I'd love to have $297,500. But it's never going to happen.

Printing more paper money without substance to back it will do nothing substantial for our economy, no matter where they put it. People forget how money works. The more money they print, the higher the cost of living. The inflation of our currency is the reason things are so much more expensive now than 10 years ago. Alot of it has to do with the 700 billion that Bush has already had printed for the "war on terrorism", but the fact remains that had this central Federal Reserve Bank not acquired complete control over the issuance of our dollar, the president wouldn't have been able to inflate our money by having it printed at will. The Fed prints money, adjusts interest rates, and creates credit bubbles, all with no public oversight or congressional approval. The problem here isn't that there is not enough money to go around. To the contrary, there is plenty of wealth, it is just divided up among a very small portion of our people. If CEO's didn't gouge their companies with 300-500 grand a year salaries or more, and if they didn't pull out their $100,000 bonuses, maybe the companies would have more money, and more wealth would be back in the market for others to share. These millionaires and billionaires horde up such a large percentage of the money, that we are forced to divide the tiny pieces that are left among the less fortunate majority. No one needs millions of dollars, realistically, for personal living. Why do we pay movie stars millions to shoot movies? Or sports players millions to play games? If we stop funneling all our wealth into the pockets of a few people, we could all be wealthier and live in a more balanced society.

This math is wrong, someone posted this previously and removed it because it's wrong. Giving every person (300 million people) $425,000 a piece would run a total cost of roughly $126 trillion, this again is more than the entire world's supply of gold can back and it is basically bankruptcy for our dollar. If you divided $85,000,000,000(85 billion) among 300,000,000(300 million) people, each person would receive $283 a piece, not $475,000. That estimate is not even close.

The person who wrote this was counting approximately 200 million 18 years and older legitimate American citizens. Not just the 300 million American population as a whole that would include children and probably illegal citizens. So his math was correct based on 200 million people.

Not that anything like this would work anyways. I just wanted to point out the math part of it and where those numbers came from.

Oh and I do agree with you about the CEOs. It's absolutely ridiculous the amount of money they are allowed to pocket while the economy is going down. This "bailout" should be coming out of their pocket since they are the ones that were running the companies that failed. What ever happened to accountability?

No, that's still wrong. 85 billion (85,000,000,000) dollars divided equally amongst 200 million (200,000,000) people is $425 a piece, not $425,000. Do the math.