Thomas George

Recent Activity

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  Thomas commented on the article | over 3 years ago

  Tell the Candidates: Take Off the Gloves and Help Hurting Americans!

  There is no point in looking at wasteful spending elsewhere and saying "Jesus, you could have done this". People donated that money to campaigns to be used for campaigning. I am not sure whether a campaign can donate 90 million to charity, and not break any election laws.
  
  The donors could have made their donations to a charity if they wanted to, but they did not. No point blaming campaigns for it.

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  Thomas commented on the article | over 3 years ago

  Guest Blog - A Crisis of Conscience

  @Nicholas: Suggesting that money spent on banks has a measurable return on investment does not mean that I support the war efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan.
  
  Buying junk loans bring the collateral property along with it. it is fair to assume that the property price will appreciate in the future, and be profitable. Banking needs to be regulated better to prevent such large scale leverage.
  
  My point: Money availability is not the problem. It is just not a political priority. It will become one, if there is popular support for it.

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  Thomas commented on the article | over 3 years ago

  Guest Blog - A Crisis of Conscience

  It is interesting how the 700 billion used to buy distressed assets or bank preferential shares are being compared to expenses required for fighting poverty. Consider the following points.
  
  1. Banks have real estate mortgages that are in foreclosure. This brings a lot of property into the market reducing prices. Government has decided to buy these assets and release them into the market profitably many years later.
  2. Government invests in banks by acquiring preference shares, requiring the banks to pay the government a share of their profits every year until the preference shares are not bought back.
  
  Both these actions are revenue generating for governments.
  
  Spending money on providing food, health, and education in Africa does not have a revenue model. They are just expenses. Most of Africa keeps fighting among themselves based on tribal, religious, ideological differences, or purely for power.
  
  It is abundantly clear that no one will help those who are unwilling to help themselves. African countries have to figure out how they are going to get out of the mess that they are in.