“The Nasdaq Composite Index fell 48 points, or 3%, to 1,543. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index gave up 3.2% and the Morgan Stanley High Tech 35 Index fell by almost 4%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average shed 300 points to fall to 7,971,” Pimentel reports.
“The broader market fell sharply after Geithner revealed the Obama administration’s plan, which proposed the federal government putting up to $1 trillion in financing capacity to create a fund for troubled bank assets,” Pimentel reports. “The Federal Reserve also said it would expand a consumer-lending program to up to $1 trillion.”
“As trading progressed, every major tech stock was in the red. Apple (AAPL) lost $4.51 a share, or 4.4%, to fall to $98.00, Google Inc. (GOOG) fell $16.66, or more than 4%, to $362.11, and Dell Inc. (DELL) gave up 38 cents, or almost 4%, to fall to $9.26.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take:
• Government’s view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.
• No government ever voluntarily reduces itself in size. Government programs, once launched, never disappear. Actually, a government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life we’ll ever see on this earth.
• One way to make sure crime doesn’t pay would be to let the government run it.
• The most terrifying words in the English language are: I’m from the government and I’m here to help.
• The problem is not that people are taxed too little, the problem is that government spends too much.
• It is a paradoxical truth that tax rates are too high and tax revenues are too low and the soundest way to raise the revenues in the long run is to cut the rates now … Cutting taxes now is not to incur a budget deficit, but to achieve the more prosperous, expanding economy which can bring a budget surplus.
• Lower rates of taxation will stimulate economic activity and so raise the levels of personal and corporate income as to yield within a few years an increased – not a reduced – flow of revenues to the federal government.
• It is no contradiction – the most important single thing we can do to stimulate investment in today’s economy is to raise consumption by major reduction of individual income tax rates.
• Our tax system still siphons out of the private economy too large a share of personal and business purchasing power and reduces the incentive for risk, investment and effort – thereby aborting our recoveries and stifling our national growth rate.
• The largest single barrier to full employment of our manpower and resources and to a higher rate of economic growth is the unrealistically heavy drag of federal income taxes on private purchasing power, initiative and incentive.
– The first five of the above quotes are from Ronald Reagan; the last five are from John F. Kennedy
