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Really, who cares about consequences?
Tuesday, Aug. 18, 2009 | 2:02 a.m.
Let’s say that tonight after work, I stop at a bar, suck down a few drinks, and on my way home, I swerve across the road and T-bone a sport utility vehicle. Inside are a man, a woman and their two children. Sure, it’s a tragedy, but think of the tremendous economic ripple effect!
First of all, we both need new cars, seeing as I turned mine into a projectile and theirs into a 4,000-pound abstract metal sculpture. Next, with all those contusions and broken bones, it’s going to be a banner day for people who manufacture neck braces, gauze bandages and x-ray film.
Hey, don’t forget the local gas station that sold the fuel to power the police cars, ambulances and medevac helicopters so they could ferry us to the hospital, where grievers will come and buy balloons from the gift shop and sloppy Joes from the cafeteria.
And, of course, the denouement would occur if at least one of the victims were to perish. Talk about a wealth of additional beneficiaries: Casket manufacturers, florists, sympathy card printers, epitaph chiselers, embalmers and grave diggers. Makes “Cash for Clunkers” look like chump change, huh?
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What's your point?
Lame.
Re: Mr. Snow's Comment
You forgot about the lawyers! The bar girls will have to hire lawyers to defend them for selling you the drinks in the first place and the lawyers will have to employ paralegals and private detectives. Why, this economic program of yours makes even that old Cheney/Bush "Democratic Imperialism" Voodoo seem real and your program is entirely self-sustaining because, as the economy continues to tank, more and more people will be stopping in bars to drink their brains out! Thanks!
Do tea baggers need a point, John? Isn't snark enough?
oh, Bye the way did you forget to mention that you had no insurance and the poor victims in the other vehicle only had liability coverage. Think about that one...
Are you serious you don't get the point? All of these "stimulus" programs, Cash for Clunkers, TARP and now health plan reform all are smoke and mirrors. The term Voodoo economics definately applies to all. Yes, we may be "stimulating" the economy, but at what price? Your grandkids paying our debt to China 50 years from now?
John, Pol Prag, Ann
The point is that the stimulus programs including the cash for clunkers is based on a major, yet very simple, economic fallacy.
Read about the broken window fallacy here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_...
http://www.examiner.com/x-19142-Tucson-L...
Comment removed by staff.
That is only because you live there...
Pointless post has no point.
If you want to argue the economics of using gov't money to stimulate the economy, there are better ways than talking about car crashes.
@ Patrick_R_Gibbons, whatever. I found it lame only because the letter referenced to go, hypothetically, if out after work and get a few drinks in you, it will generate jobs down the road (pun intended). It's a lame analogy. Consider the source.
fallacy: 1. a mistaken idea; error 2. a flaw in reasoning
good point Roger. God help us if your not being sarcastic. Looking at it in economic terms is a fresh angle. The loss of a mother or son can't be quantified. To live the rest of your life crippled in a wheelchair, because some drunk missed the signal happens every day.Every day. I suggest you take a cab, and what is it that your drinking to give you such ideas? What if you broadside people on welfare? What if you hit some people who don't call 911 and they want payback? and they break your bones? Who is going to come to the hospital to visit you? Sloppy Joes? That is really sick, buddy, get some help, sloppy joes are bad for your health, nothing but carbs.