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Economists Predicted Long U.S. Presence In Iraq = Recession

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Rogues And Scholars
User ID: 360566
1/23/2008 11:18 PM
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Economists Predicted Long U.S. Presence In Iraq = Recession

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FLASHBACK: Economists Predicted That A Prolonged U.S. Presence In Iraq Could Lead To A Recession

In yesterday’s press briefing, a reporter asked White House Press Secretary Dana Perino about the tie between the current U.S. economy and the Iraq war. Perino quickly dismissed the reporter’s question, insisting that the U.S. economy has been “very strong” and adding that the money was necessary to “take the fight to the enemy” after 9/11.

Oil prices are at approximately $88 a barrel, although they have dropped from the record high of $100 earlier this month. As Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz recently noted in Vanity Fair, “The soaring price of oil is clearly related to the Iraq war. The issue is not whether to blame the war for this but simply how much to blame it.”

Before the war, economists were predicting that oil prices at just $75 a barrel could potentially send the U.S. economy into a recession. Therefore, the current economic situation should not come as a complete shock to the Bush administration. A look at economists’ pre-war predictions:

“A war against Iraq could cost the United States hundreds of billions of dollars, play havoc with an already depressed domestic economy and tip the world into recession because of the adverse effect on oil prices, inflation and interest rates, an academic study [by William Nordhaus, Sterling professor of economics at Yale University] has warned.” [Independent, 11/16/02]

“If war with Iraq drags on longer than the few weeks or months most are predicting, corporate revenues will be flat for the coming year and will put the U.S. economy at risk of recession, according to a poll of chief financial officers.” [CBS MarketWatch, 3/20/03]

“If the conflict wears on or, worse, spreads, the economic consequences become very serious. Late last year, George Perry at the Brookings Institution ran some simulations and found that after taking into account a reasonable use of oil reserves, a cut in world oil production of just 6.5 percent a year would send the United States and the world into recession.” [Robert Shapiro, former undersecretary of commerce in the Clinton administration, 10/2/02]

“Gerd Häusler, the IMF’s director of international capital markets, said that ‘purely from a financial markets perspective, a serious conflict with Iraq would not be a very healthy development.’ … Häusler said there could be a repeat of what happened in 1990 following the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, when there was a sharp rise in oil prices.” [World Bank, 9/02]

Anonymous Coward
User ID: 351137
1/23/2008 11:21 PM

Re: Economists Predicted Long U.S. Presence In Iraq = Recession	Quote
1+1=2. gee. i wonder who added that one up..

Rogues And Scholars
User ID: 360566 (OP)
1/23/2008 11:21 PM

Re: Economists Predicted Long U.S. Presence In Iraq = Recession

Quote

Getting us out of Iraq can get us out of recession[/b[

The American Prospect’s Harold Meyerson has an op-ed in the Washington Post today outlining the nature of the coming recession, and how our economic response is going to have to change if we’re to fix it.

“Wait,” you’re thinking, “is he saying we’re in recession? Surely not! I know it’s a worry, but no one’s actually said it’s official yet.”

Let’s take a look at the facts, then:

Citigroup, America’s largest bank, has been hit with a staggering $10 billion in losses this quarter. Naturally, the company is doing what all companies do as a first response to crisis–cutting thousands of jobs–and is begging foreign investors to pump cash into its reserves to keep it solvent.

Countrywide, America’s largest lender, reported spikes in delinquencies and foreclosures so severe that the company was looking at bankruptcy protection. It was hailed as a relief when Bank of America announced plans to buy the lender, but think about this–how bad is our economic state when our biggest giants in their respective industries are doing so poorly?

And what about the consumer, that bulwark of economic growth through spending? Well, thanks to a combination of collapsing home equity, high gas, energy, and food prices, and nearly insurmountable personal debt, consumers are falling behind on loan payments, credit card debt is on the rise, and retail sales are plummeting from lack of consumer spending.

If this isn’t a recession, it’s damn close, and like the wolf hungrily stalking its prey, will be upon us soon.

Back to Meyerson’s column. He accurately notes that the mazelike structures of current Wall Street investment strategies make it nigh-impossible to accurately oversee these transactions, which has led to so many billions of dollars’ worth of losses. Moreover, he also notes that without some serious infusion of jobs, cash, and direction from the government, this recession may deepen into a depression that will take years to recover from.

“Okay,” you may be asking, “but where can we get the money for such a thing? That’s going to be expensive!”

Well, here’s one simple idea–ending the war in Iraq immediately and bringing our troops home. Imagine what we could do with the influx of capital we’re wasting on a failed venture that has cost thousands of lives and tens of millions of dollars. I live in DC, so I used my own city as the basis for calculation:

more at [link to www.scholarsandrogues.com]

Rogues And Scholars
User ID: 360566 (OP)
1/23/2008 11:23 PM

Re: Economists Predicted Long U.S. Presence In Iraq = Recession	Quote
MoveOn has a petition here to tell Congress to “quickly pass a stimulus package” that helps mitigate this “Iraq recession.” [link to pol.moveon.org]

Rogues And Scholars
User ID: 360566 (OP)
1/23/2008 11:25 PM

Re: Economists Predicted Long U.S. Presence In Iraq = Recession

Quote

article continued from above
[link to www.scholarsandrogues.com]

Taxpayers in District Of Columbia will pay $2 billion for the cost of the Iraq War through 2007. For the same amount of money, the following could have been provided:

504,157 People with Health Care OR
3,465,229 Homes with Renewable Electricity OR
33,815 Public Safety Officers OR
33,333 Music and Arts Teachers OR
946,048 Scholarships for University Students OR
174 New Elementary Schools OR
6,801 Affordable Housing Units OR
620,958 Children with Health Care OR
266,133 Head Start Places for Children OR
33,333 Elementary School Teachers OR
29,432 Port Container Inspectors

Any one of these projects provides a golden opportunity for new jobs and economic revitalization for my city, or the even better long-term investment of raising kids with decent educations and the ability to make better lives for themselves. But we’ll never know, because that money went instead to turning a country into a protectorate of our empire just to keep the oil pumps working.

I said not long ago that in order to win, Democrats should run on the economy instead of Iraq, and I still hold to that. But I am rethinking that approach–instead of trying to push Iraq aside in people’s minds, Democrats and progressives should link the two together. Every dollar spent in Iraq, fighting a war started on a lie that has cost us immeasurably, is a dollar not spent on rebuilding our country’s prosperity, peace, and future solvency.

End the war, bring our troops home, and let’s get down to the equally painful business of rebuilding our country’s economic base and transiting us out from a system based on debt, consumption, greed, and graft. We’ve done it before, and we can do it again. We don’t have any choice in the matter

Anonymous Coward
User ID: 360877
1/23/2008 11:42 PM

Re: Economists Predicted Long U.S. Presence In Iraq = Recession	Quote
I flunked ecanomiks at Yale.

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