Politics

[jeanes]

They have broken ground on this one (the deal was cut almost three years ago). It is about ten miles down the road. My assessed property value has doubled in one year.

Samsung plans to build a $17 billion chip plant in Texas

The semiconductor factory in Taylor marks the largest-ever investment made by Samsung in the U.S.

www.cnbc.com

Glad to have the industry and the jobs but not looking forward to the increase in taxes or traffic.

 

[Red Leg]

Glad to have the industry and the jobs but not looking forward to the increase in taxes or traffic.

Traffic around us has already increased exponentially in the last few years. Not the DC Beltway yet, but still a dramatic increase. I assume you are talking about property tax. The bad news is that it has gone up - the good news is the increase is directly related to the increased value of the property. We own our home free and clear. The percentage increase in its value over the last 24 months outstrips all my other investments.

 

[Major Bonkers]

Dear Gentlemen,

The rest of us are bored stiff with your argy-bargy over the Ukraine. If you want to continue being rude and arguing over each other, please take it to a separate forum and leave this one to arguing about the useless of Sleepy Joe and the greatness of Donald Trump.

Also: please calm down. Nature Boy has a perfect right to his opinions (as does Vashper - I for one am sorry that he has left this website). That's what free speech and democracy are all about. We can disagree with both of them - as I do - whilst respecting that they love their respective countries and hold sincerely-held opinions. Please be civil. The great President Reagan achieved more through charm than his great successor did by mean tweets.

I am completely uninterested in the world of fertiliser. As I understand matters - and I have no wish to be enlightened further - fertiliser comes from potash which is mined in Belarus and (due to EU sanctions) shipped through Lithuania. Further, at least as I understand, only Germany and - to a lesser extent, Italy and Hungary - have a significant exposure to Russian energy blackmail, the rest of Europe having sufficiently diversified their sources of supply.

Meanwhile, here is an interview with John Mearsheimer. He is of the Nature Boy school of thought. I disagree with his analysis - in the comments, it is described as a post hoc facto justification of his previous arguments (which seems fair to me).

 

[Rocked and Loaded]

In what world do you live that only production by American owned companies is okay?
Samsung would still be building it on US soil, providing US jobs and paying US taxes. Who cares who the final owner is and in what country he or she resides?

Especially when the foreign company is from a closely allied nation. Samsung is South Korean, not Chinese.

 

[Nature Boy]

Umm okay, so now the U.S. is going to not allow foreign companies to make IC's? You'd rather send Samsung back out of the country?

Give them money vs a us company? See if Korea does that for us?

 

[Nature Boy]

Dear Gentlemen,

The rest of us are bored stiff with your argy-bargy over the Ukraine. If you want to continue being rude and arguing over each other, please take it to a separate forum and leave this one to arguing about the useless of Sleepy Joe and the greatness of Donald Trump.

Also: please calm down. Nature Boy has a perfect right to his opinions (as does Vashper - I for one am sorry that he has left this website). That's what free speech and democracy are all about. We can disagree with both of them - as I do - whilst respecting that they love their respective countries and hold sincerely-held opinions. Please be civil. The great President Reagan achieved more through charm than his great successor did by mean tweets.

I am completely uninterested in the world of fertiliser. As I understand matters - and I have no wish to be enlightened further - fertiliser comes from potash which is mined in Belarus and (due to EU sanctions) shipped through Lithuania. Further, at least as I understand, only Germany and - to a lesser extent, Italy and Hungary - have a significant exposure to Russian energy blackmail, the rest of Europe having sufficiently diversified their sources of supply.

Meanwhile, here is an interview with John Mearsheimer. He is of the Nature Boy school of thought. I disagree with his analysis - in the comments, it is described as a post hoc facto justification of his previous arguments (which seems fair to me).

That's who I quoted and obviously I agree with him.

 

[Nature Boy]

Especially when the foreign company is from a closely allied nation. Samsung is South Korean, not Chinese.

Weird how we still protect them, for free. Read the trade deal we have with them. It is what it is.

 

[BRICKBURN]

Gentlemen; This thread got "reported".

You have got to have gone down a bloody deep hole for that to happen in the "Politics" thread. I leave this thread alone 99.9% of the time. It's politics, where else can three people have opposing views on crossing the street properly?

Go watch the sunset for a minute or I'll help you.

Fair warning: Please skip the insults, and actually reply to posts in a thoughtful considered manner, not inflammatory one liners.

 

[Rocked and Loaded]

Weird how we still protect them, for free. Read the trade deal we have with them. It is what it is.

It’s not weird. We’ve had a strategic interest in maintaining they’re independence since the fighting ended in the Korean War (even though the war never technically ended).

South Korea is an important strategic and economic partner in our efforts to deal with China. I would think you would be more supportive of that based on your previous posts.

The Korean company, Samsung, moving some sensitive manufacturing out of China and into the USA can only be a good thing. American jobs are created, American taxes will be paid, and sensitive manufacturing is leaving China. Profit will go to Samsung’s shareholders rather than the Chinese government.

 

[jeanes]

Traffic around us has already increased exponentially in the last few years. Not the DC Beltway yet, but still a dramatic increase. I assume you are talking about property tax. The bad news is that it has gone up - the good news is the increase is directly related to the increased value of the property. We own our home free and clear. The percentage increase in its value over the last 24 months outstrips all my other investments.

Traffic is outstripping the roadways around us. When we moved to this area Round Rock had a population of 4,900. Things have changed. We also own our house. I am amazed at the increase in valuation. Never thought I would live in such a high priced house nor pay this much in property taxes. The price of progress, I guess. I might add that these taxes are paid to Williamson County and the school district not Korea.

 

[PHOENIX PHIL]

Give them money vs a us company? See if Korea does that for us?

What money has the US given them? I’m not saying they haven’t, but you’ve made this statement, please support it with facts. If we have ”given” Samsung or other foreign companies money to open operations in the U.S., could that not be viewed as an investment that could result in a return that exceeds the original investment? I mean after all Samsung isn’t going to open that fab in Austin to take advantage of cheap labor.

 

[mdwest]

Korea does in fact subsidize A LOT of businesses, both foreign and domestic, despite Natureboys lack of belief in such actions..

South Korea to inject W4.3tr to support struggling small business owners

South Korea will inject 4.3 trillion won ($3.6 billion) in subsidies to support owners of small businesses and self-employed people struggling from social distancing rules necessitated by the pandemic, top officials said Friday. The support measures come a day after the government decided to...

www.koreaherald.com

Deloitte, PWC, Amazon, etc.. all have HUGE operations (among many, many others) in Korea and have been incentivized by the Korean government to conduct operations there..

And we (the US) often screw over our trade partners, violate trade agreements when its convenient to us, etc.. the Koreans are still raising hell over US actions tied to the "Inflation Reduction Act" as I type this...

Korea may take U.S. to WTO over EV subsidies

The Korean government will may file a complaint against the United States with the World Trade Organization (WTO).

koreajoongangdaily.joins.com

We (the USA) "give" US companies money all of the time.. the local/municipal governments do it, county governments do it, state governments do it, and the federal governments do it..

I personally moved a firm out of Virginia to Wyoming because WY was a much more favorable environment for my business to operate out of (we were highly incentivized to do so)..

We have also offshored operations and personnel in some cases.. because... we were highly incentivized to do so...

billions get paid out in subsidies, tax incentives, etc to a host of industries and individual businesses for moving their facilities/operations to certain locations, conducting certain types of business, etc...

Why does anyone think all of the tech firms started moving to Austin during the Perry years, and continue to flood into TX under Abbott? They (both US and foreign) were incentivized to do so.. not just by the cheap(er) labor costs, cheap(er) facilities costs, cheap(er) energy costs, etc.. but also in cold hard dollars offered by various government entities..

The same game is played all over the world.. its not exclusively a US thing... The European countries do it, Asian countries do it, etc..

No one has to like it (or not like it)... but if you don't play the game... you have no opportunity to win... you will absolutely lose.. and if you play the game poorly, you suffer the consequences (not everything about hundreds of thousands of californians moving into TX has been a good thing for example.. in fact, much of it sucks rocks in my opinion.... but there is no denying the tech boom and people migration from the west coast has boosted property values, boosted median wages, and brought a ton of work to TX.. There is no question that having Toyota USA move its HQ to the DFW area brought a ton of money into the local economy, has increased property values, etc...

Companies (whether they are US, Korean, Canadian, or Thai, or from anywhere else in the world) will act in the shareholders' interests (whether publicly traded or privately held).. its actually THE LAW in the US that companies act in the interest of its shareholders (i.e. fiduciary responsibility).. If Samsung isn't incentivized to move an operation to the US (whether through tax breaks, subsidies, or other attractants), they ARE going to move somewhere.. and the US will see no benefit from it... Whether or not there are detriments is situation and circumstance dependent..

Its a fools game to just let them go elsewhere because "Koreans!!!!!"....

Anyone that understands even the bare fundamentals of global economics, macro economics, and micro economics understands this...

Isolationism sounds great on the surface.. but if you are indeed the only isolated country on the planet (whether by your own design or someone else's)... things get pretty shitty pretty quickly... Ask the average North Korean how great things have been for the last 60 years (not politically... but economically)..

 

[Newboomer]

The tl;dr version.

Nature Boy wants an isolationist America based purely on having read the comments section of some far right propaganda website (far as I can tell) and is very angry that America is willing to spend money to protect an ally and cement their eastern european interests. He clearly hasn't considered or simply doesn't understand the implications of what that actually means for America's position in the world. Also, half baked conspiracy theories.

He's now getting defensive as half the forum has piled on telling him how stupid of an idea that is. Also, he keeps moving the goal posts and has resorted to childish name calling.

It's been wild...

With all his shifting parameters and contradictions, I detect the stench of troll.

 

[John Wasmuth]

I’ve got a South Korean Tractor. Best tractor I’ve ever owned.

 

[Tbitty]

Yep, that is my stance. You can tell me I'm wrong. Maybe I would have been wrong about Vietnam, Aghan, Iraq, Somalia, etc. during those conflicts. Oddly, they all turned out as grftting disasters in all ways. Ukraine is NOT of vital importance to the survival of the USA. But it makes our own inflation issue 10x worse.

Thank you.

I believe this is an agree or disagree situation, not right or wrong. Only time will tell if this is a worthwhile venture for the US to support a country half the world away, and given that there will only be one outcome, we will never be able to compare results of a "what if" alternative.

The biggest difference to this war and support that separates from Vietnam or Afghanistan/Iraq is that we are sending support in forms other than direct involvement or American lives.

I agree that the US would by and large be able to function the same as we do now regardless of our involvement or the outcome of Ukraine war. But I disagree that it is so drastically affecting our inflation issues. It's late and I don't want to dive into specifics, but I'll summarize to say we have way too many other irons in the fire that are killing the economy. We've been throwing away money for foreign aid to the many wars you listed and some you didn't for years that hasn't caused the inflation we are seeing now - its the "everything else" that causes problems.

 

[Ray B]

With regard to inflation- that is to say a decrease in the value of money, it has to types of causes: Cost Push & Demand Pull. Americans are experiencing both. the largest portion of Cost Push is the increased price of energy (petroleum) due to govt policies that have reduced production and investment, which then causes the cost of everything to increase. The Demand Pull is the flooding of the population with Billions and trillions of dollars, thus pushing the demand line up to higher prices. the Ukraine war has aspects of both cost Push and Demand Pull, but from the numbers that I've seen it amounts to only a small portion of the changes in price. The US govt and agencies such at the FED are the primary culprits.

 

[Nature Boy]

December 1, 2022 8:27am EST

Pentagon awards Raytheon $1.2B bid to supply Ukraine with advanced surface-to-air missile systems​

Who'd thunk it? "old weapons" . Only a billion or 10 hundred million.

 

[Nature Boy]

With regard to inflation- that is to say a decrease in the value of money, it has to types of causes: Cost Push & Demand Pull. Americans are experiencing both. the largest portion of Cost Push is the increased price of energy (petroleum) due to govt policies that have reduced production and investment, which then causes the cost of everything to increase. The Demand Pull is the flooding of the population with Billions and trillions of dollars, thus pushing the demand line up to higher prices. the Ukraine war has aspects of both cost Push and Demand Pull, but from the numbers that I've seen it amounts to only a small portion of the changes in price. The US govt and agencies such at the FED are the primary culprits.

I agree mostly but the Russian oil would help some on a worldwide demand basis. Inflation is like 8% and their stated goal is to get it to 2%? Lol, good luck. In my view they should be doing nothing to the rates as this is supple side driven (oil, etc. like you said) which the gov't can't really fix at the moment. In the meantime, Powell is going to drive up unemployment and crush the economy. We are from my research at least 1 year from being able to do anything on energy, which affects everything. They leave our fuel and food, ya know, the things that affect all.

 

[Nature Boy]

Umm okay, so now the U.S. is going to not allow foreign companies to make IC's? You'd rather send Samsung back out of the country?

Simple, pass a law. Go see if samsung would allow a US company to make chips in Korea? or a TV

 

[Red Leg]

Okay, mob rule peeps, explain that Raytheon contract. Lol. Watch them run away now, move the goal posts, tell me more BS.

What is your issue with the Raytheon contract? Specifically. I get it that you are not able to understand the national interest aspects of our support for Ukraine, but fortunately the majority of our elected representatives from both parties do. As part of the allocation approved by congress to support Ukraine, DOD has issued a contract to Raytheon to produce NASAM air defense missile systems which will be delivered next year. It is a cost effective weapon system in that it uses existing AMRAM air-to-air missiles coupled with a current search and acquisition radar system. It is simple, effective and really good at knocking down cruise missiles.

The money for that contract goes from DOD to Raytheon as the prime contractor. What is the point you are attempting to make?

Tucker Carlson: Zelenskyy sits atop a money-laundering scheme so brazen Democrats won't let it be audited​

Fox News host Tucker Carlson gives his take on the United States sending money to Ukraine on 'Tucker Carlson Tonight.

I haven't even watched this but it might interest some.

Tucker has his own narrative to sell. His real concern is the southern border - a laudable one. He denigrates every aspect of our support for Ukraine with the thesis that supporting Ukraine is somehow a zero sum game with respect to the border crisis. That is of course nonsense, but it gets dressed up with respect to his opinions about Zelensky and money laundering.

At least he has quit giving a stage to the embittered Russian apologist Douglas McGregor. Of course, he won't bring either Kellogg or Keane into the discussion in spite their being under contract to Fox, because their extremely informed take won't fit Tucker's narrative.