"It would be nice if we could all live in Santa Barbara or Charlotte, but trying to pack large amounts of our population in a few areas is going to be a disaster on many levels"

combines several world views

my preference

hyper density

mile high towers
with three d bridging
and all job sites
up to a mile under ground

but i'm a martian
" the demands imposed by global warming and peak oil mean that the suburban drive-to-a-good-job, drive-to-cheap-shopping, drive-to-a-big-house model will have to be radically revised"

case of
imposing aesthetic values
on notional prices
in the name of hard science

...
however
all is redeemed by this aside

"The U.S., (if it doesn't accept the model of debt peonage to a rapacious plutocracy and foreign powers, which Alex Tabarrok no doubt favors)"

ecce
the artificial ground rent vampire
we've "produced "
in the cause
of zoning amenity

paid out
partly as real estate taxes
and
partly as lot value based mortgage
interest payments

...
" Why is that zoning regulation and population growth fundamentally changed the nature of the real estate market starting in 1997?"

brad delongeurs et al
had a way

suddenly bumping up against
the limit of " rational job commute time"

anne
i think the optimal forex path
is a very complex critter to locate

indeed

all your plus points are gotten at by other means
then de industrialization
a post industrial policy for say ...las vegas
is one thing
for north american --save mexico -- quite another

beyond a dollar policy that rapidly leads
to an external balance
in the value of our material product trade

i submit
we need a more radical industrial policy

where its technically feasible
build it here
build it green/clean
build it right
and
build it for productivity max

warning this is hardly a jobs protection policy
to the extent we automate out
routine production jobs all the better

provided we the people of earth
rip away the trans nats
national can openers ---their control
thru IP barriers of fronteer techniques ---
the 2.5 billion souls of china plus india
can develop quite nicely without
de facto de industrializing the north of america and the west of europe by export trade booms

where we agree anne you cosmopolite u

i believe we need a statue of liberty immigration policy

every one please come here

now i caution the balance trade dollar will
reduce the "take back home " value
of your compensation
but still...

citizen ship ????
to me this is the real
spartan / helot bug a boo

even full employment of a vickrey kind
prolly won't end effectively
our paleface fears of swamping

...
" too much is riding on the remnants of the strong dollar policy"

yes the north south capital export friendly
high vs south dollar policy
tasks us
with its haunting haughtiness

its a tans nat gig thru and thru

for those with
a balanced and rebalanceable portfolio
of trans nat issues

what me worry

but we the work a job day weebles
are fast losing our ability
to make our way up in the world by our own products
its detestible to think
this nation that was once the arsenal of democracy
might well become a nation of deputies

deputies
of the globe's self appointed sheriff

...
"are you saying that you would like to see global creative destruction of the currency regime, rebalancing etc.?"
i think what would be best for the planet and its people
is not possible without a total make over of
the trans nat hi fi system

and without a world governing body
a total make over is also not possible

up shot
"...it seems ...that (any ad hoc posse of north nations ) rebalancing runs a high risk of war and famine."

...
that being now off my chest

"what would be the best case scenario in your view? What should the fed/government be doing?"

about everything
in the way of credit interventions
it can get to fly politically
both locally and globally
and right now
and multiplied by 100
"Doesn't the falling dollar act as a Smoot-Hawley tariff?"
yes but its only globe macro bad
if others try to counter it
by say
trying to re raise the dollar
or by a similar de-val attempt of their own

only if there;s a pandemic of devals
can we get the menace of chronic era long type
real cross border trade shrink

btw

my take

poor old smoot
and the industrial babbits behind him
get the horse collar
that far better
ought to be hung
around higher necks
hi fi necks
city and wall street necks

t'was the gathering effects of the draught
in cross border credit flows
not trade in real products per se
that killed the 20's boomlet

...
"This will force foreign central banks to buy our dollars in an effort to rebalance trade."

yes if they choose not to allow the drop
vis a vis their currency
as the euro's have so far

for peggers t'is true

".. in a way inflating the economy, with regard to foreign trade vis-a-vis
the U.S. is a heads I win, tails you loose situation."

that pretty well covers the world reserve currency advantage the imperial dollar holds
regardless of global market conditions
add to it forex manipulation
of low ball traders like china
and we can
live beyond our real makings ...so to speak

paradox by doing so we shrink our capacity for makings however

and must bust the pegs
or burden the non peggers
by a distorted exchange system like we have now

ps caution to exploiters of imperial privilege

the flow size of the advantage will vary

depending on
other nations trade gaps and reserve TARGETS

...
" Current policy does not differentiate between the two"

really ???

"Default can be very dangerous, as default can eliminate further extensions of credit"

if u'd turned over the present economy
maybe three or five years ago
i bet you'd;ve
found
the above line by price
on the warning label

...
price
its always a good working principle
to assume speculators exist
and have really good access
to credit lines
just when the shouldn't

speculators are not buying to use but to sell
or to hold
they are often called investors
its a name they like
like hoarders like the name savers

some folks like to say
investors by to hold on
speculators buy to sell out
in other words its all a matter of
how long you intend to
hold on

some say its whether you buy
for intrinsic value
or market fad
in my arrogant opinion

if any one is actually an investor

if one actually exists

she/he's only
not secretly a speculator
because they are either hapless rubes
primed for a skinning
or an even bigger thief
shooting fish in a barrel
like david m reubinstein