Monday, October 30, 2006

The Numbers Polka

Don Surber has a funny post (as they say not funny "ha-ha" but funny weird) up about the cost of balancing the budget:
In 1835, the seventh year of the tyrannical presidency of Andrew Jackson, the federal budget ran a surplus and the national debt was eliminated.

The nation immediately plunged into a recession.

The powers that be in Washington learned their lesson. We have not paid our national debt off since. Congresses and presidents were careful ever since to spend more than they dare tax their constituents.

The one exception was the 1920s, when Republicans ran up 10 consecutive budget surpluses.

Then came the Great Depression.

In recent years only Nixon and Clinton presided over surpluses. Their reward? One was forced to resign or face impeachment; the other was impeached.


Now correlation does not prove causation, but it is worth your eyes. Anecdotally, I was listening to some Market analyst guy and he was prdicting doom and gloom in the market. How might this appear? His answer the next few months might "explore the low end of historic high numbers spectrum." I'm shaking in my boots.

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