I'm generally ecstatic! 4 more years, thank you very much

[Guest LizMarie]

The layoffs are far less about Obamacare and far more about the fiscal cliff.

Let's talk a little bit here about economics.

GDP = C + I + G + (x - i)

That is, GDP = Consumption + Investment + Government Spending + Net Exports

Read that again and understand that Government Spending IS part of GDP despite rhetoric to the contrary. Now here is the problem with the pending fiscal cliff - if you raise taxes to reduce the deficit, you reduce consumption and investment, which results in recession. If you cut government spending, you cause a recession.

In short, there's no way to avoid a recession short of just printing more money but that causes inflation which lowers standards of living. So we're in a box economically. There's no way out of this without everyone feeling some pain. The only question is whether we control the pain ourselves and do some mix of cuts and tax increases to bring things along in a controlled manner or whether we let things fiscally come unglued, which will force us to make painful choices anyway.

[Charlize]

This is one reason why taxing people who simply sit on money and accumulate interest is not going to hurt the economy. Getting some of the money into circulation that was supposed to trickle down is a good idea. The investments from that group have not kept up with their massive accumulation.

Just my $.02.

Hugs,

Charlie

[Guest carolynn2fem]

Liz I have read many articals about firings and lay offs. obama care is sited as the main reason for it. bussiness is cutting back and going in to survival mode. abama care was never about health care for every one. it is about power over the people.

the EPA is another branch to obstruct bussiness growth and expansion, more regulations that take effect this year. too many to list

the DO energy is putting the coal industry out of bussiness. they are killing drilling where ever they can. they have to do that to raise oil and gas rate witch inturn raises electric. that will push the appeal of there little clown cars. obamas green energy is another failure that speaks for itself. Weather they fix the fiscal cliff or not we are going to have ression the fiscal may just derermin how bad it is.

Raising taxes on the evil rich people reduces net income to the government. this has being historicly proven. Regan had it right. government is not the awnser IT IS the problem

[Guest Melissa~]

http://www.forbes.com/sites/calebmelby/2012/11/12/breaking-down-centi-millionaire-papa-john-schnatters-obamacare-math/

The numbers are coming, in, and a few CEOs have backed off their threats and acknowledged their bluff.

Further a few greedy CEO's look even more dysfunctioned as the economy and employment numbers continue to improve. Nothing like their true position actively working against their workers, the economy and the indeed the country itself, merely as a political game.

[Guest LizMarie]

Carolyn, I recently did a full analysis of Stryker Corporation for a right wing friend who was waving their layoffs around as some sort of "proof" that Obamacare caused the layoffs just because Stryker said so. I examined the quarterly filings for Stryker going back several years and I searched the internet for news.

What I found was that Stryker, though profitable, has never met their own budget since 1998 when they began massive acquisitions. Further, acquisitions almost always result in layoffs particularly of middle management since they become redundant. And still further, Stryker had layoffs in 2009 before the ACA even passed Congress showing more management problems. Then on top of this, Stryker has been fined and investigated for everything from excess microbial levels in medical implants they make to outright kickbacks (fraud!) to doctors who recommend Stryker's products. So the company has been poorly managed for over a decade.

And then I found the real gem - most of Stryker's sales are overseas, in Europe and thus not even subject to the excise tax. But when they sent out quarterly guidance to investors in October, just last month, Stryker said layoffs would occur because of weakening sales in Europe due to poor economic conditions. Europe doesn't have Obamacare. How can Obamacare (the ACA) be responsible for what's happening in Europe? And most of the layoffs ended up happening in Europe again where the Obamacare mandate doesn't even apply.

So the truth in this particular situation appears to be that Stryker management blamed Obamacare to divert employee anger away from their own poor management decisions and from the bad economy in Europe.

I suspect that a lot of those blustering CEOs now regret having said what they said. And as Melissa noted, many are backing off. It's wise to not trust politicians blindly but the same rules should apply to businessmen or anyone else as well. Always question!

[Guest carolynn2fem]

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/how-many-businesses-have-announced-closings-or-lay-offs-since-obama-won-a-second-term/?fb_action_ids=4020748644034&fb_action_types=og.likes&fb_source=timeline_og&action_object_map=%7B%224020748644034%22%3A411663275572560%7D&action_type_map=%7B%224020748644034%22%3A%22og.likes%22%7D&action_ref_map=[] no questions but there is plenty to the contrary

[Guest LizMarie]

But the question is how many of those layoffs were coming anyway because of the weak economy? You can't just blame Obamacare for every layoff, as I mentioned with Stryker. Look at the first company in the article you linked, Energizer. They won't complete layoffs until September 2014. That's two years from now. So they are going to pay 2 years of Obamacare costs then suddenly lay people off? This doesn't add up from a business perspective. If you want to avoid the Obamacare hit, you layoff right now, before January 1.

Like I said, try to read critically and don't trust what a CEO says. Look at what happened to Hewlett Packard this week - they bought a company for $10 billion and found that they had to write off $8.8 billion of that due to outright accounting fraud! That is going to result in layoffs that have nothing to do with Obamacare. So it helps to be discerning when reading the news.

[Guest carolynn2fem]

Yes You are right energizer did not say when the lay offs would start. yes one needs to be discerning in reading what someone says. what obama says somes good and feels good the reality of his actions says something completely differnt. I see him doing everything that prolonged the great depression and nothing that makes a company look at hiring and expansion as a good idea. I am not just blaming obamacare add in the rest of his policies and world events. weather they come to a solution on the fiacal cliff or not there will be another resession and I would not rule out depression.

[Guest KimberlyF]

Not saying they're telling the truth or not, but many of the expensive provisions of Obamacare kick in in 2014, so Energizer's layoff sched mirrors that.