I agree too, and I'm debating with myself if it is worth being part of the few that see and try to speak out against the Fed, even to the point of dying, for a world that does not give a crap; for a world where the majority thinks everything is OK and fair.
The decision to taper was always going to be data-dependent, so I am not at all surprised that the taper did not occur. I haven't sold any of my metals based on the taper talk, and I even bought more in the last few months. Good for me, and I thank folks like Peter Schiff for educating me over the past several years and inspiring me to dump my dollars.
I like to think that civilization has gotten better (in general) after every civilization falls. We have the internet now, forums for learning new ideas. I think we are only likely to see the world improve once our current civilization more or less collapses, however.
I'd highly recommend reading "Government Unnecessary but Inevitable". Because while anarchists like myself often joke that if the worst possible scenario is that government reasserts itself, then we have everything to gain and nothing to lose. But if government is inevitable (which I don't think it is, but the case put forth is quite strong), then the best solution is to allow free movement of peoples to lead to better governments. Because surely not all governments are equal.
I would recommend Lysander Spooner's "Letter to Grover Cleveland" & No Treason no. 6, "The Constitution of No Authority," & Frederic Bastiat's "The Law." I think those are the 3 most powerful tracts on political philosophy ever written. On economics, the best introductory stuff is Henry Hazlitt's "Economics in One Lesson," & Bastiat's "That Which Is Seen, & That Which Is Unseen." Rothbard's "Man, Economy & State" is the only treatise on economic theory one need ever read. Trust me on that.
Which scheme do you think they will try? And do you think the discontent from the "Wage Slaves" will make them deal with inequality or try to keep the status quo?
A public managed central bank, A 5% personal and business tax, a little less for investments, and a re-training program for displaced workers, and an incentive program for new companies to attract workers for the 1st year or two in business?
Yeah, I know about that one. My hopes of seeing it passed & signed into law by the current President, at least in it's present form, or any form in which it actually has teeth & truly relieves the U.S. economy (& to a great extent, the global economy) of the unaccountable death grip of the irresponsible central-planners at the Fed, & all the havoc, pain & misery they wreak, are not very high. Congress is full of the craven, cowardly, & unscrupulous. So is the White House. Our hopes are dim.
The gov't did what it had to do. People are BUYING houses like crazy! You know why? Because of Bernanke's policy - quantitative easing to infinity. Gov't buys the bonds, stimulates the stock market to RECORD HIGHS never seen before. People have money in their pockets to buy homes -- and can SAVE some money too! Interest rates are at "o". Where else will people make a 50%-100% return on their money? Come on! Give Bernanke & Obama some credit!
Why would it then NOT make sense in a global, integrated economy? I can hardly imagine how any good, sensible economic policy could be rendered folly on account of the policies of other countries. As long as our economy remained free & unhampered by special interest-driven interventionism, then our structure of prices & production could always easily adjust to whatever conditions are created by the manipulations & internal interventionism of foreign govt's; they would hurt only themselves.
Argument is not about telling the other side they are wrong, it is about telling them why they are wrong. So the question is not, "Is the State legitimate?" The question is "Is the State avoidable?" So tell me why it is not inevitable. The essay I suggested is only 20 pages long, and regardless of the way you feel about it after reading it, it is worth reading legitimate criticisms of the system (though judging by the rhetoric rather than substance I fear you may not have a system in mind).
In an extraordinary event like war, when The State expands by large degrees, people must pay for it. Scarce resources are being diverted away from lines of production that bring demanded consumer goods & services to market, toward implements of death & destruction. People are being made poorer. That reality doesn't change if it's financed by inflationary expansion rather than direct taxation; it's only made harder to discern precisely. It makes knowing exactly who is paying & how much impossible
Of course businesses will always tend to flock to where the prospects for greater profit margins are most plentiful - in the cases where this is economically plausible or even possible. But that very fact sets in motion forces that tend to push wage rates up & diminish profit margins, until they're brought into equilibrium. More businesses competing for the same pool of labor; demand>supply. Profits are always transitory & ever-tenuous. They're always diminishing as markets adjust to change.
It's amazing to me that even the average economist doesn't see that this is a bad thing. Even when the big fall does happen, the government propaganda is going to convince the majority of people that it was what is left of the free markets fault.
Well, quite unfortunately, a lot of so-called "mainstream" economists today are in favor of the Fed, & the concept of fiat money & fractional-reserve/central banking in general -at least those of them who are most in the media spotlight, anyhow. Meanwhile competent economists like Peter Schiff are laughed at by those frauds, even as he's proven right time & again. Rothbard is my favorite economist of all time. Greats like H. Hoppe, R. Murphy, R. Higgs & Peter Klein up there deserve more credit.
But there isn't actually any OASDI trust fund. Only the federal gov't has the gall & lack of scruples to refer to a virtual box of IOU's - with no real, actionable plan or plausible hope of becoming sustainably solvent - as a "trust fund." I'd say rather than leaving such a hopeless mess to the states, just let people keep their own money, not presume that people are too stupid, careless & irresponsible to provide for their own or their loved ones' retirement years, & allow freedom for a change.
Indeed, government is counterproductive: the goods and services it provides come at the expense of taxpayers. Furthermore, those same goods and services could be produced far more efficiently, and with greater quality, by private enterprise.
Not paradise. Just good old private law society. Everything ruled by voluntary contracts and voluntary social organizations, hence without the monopoly of the use of force.
I don't know what you mean by "only-economic model." Trade barriers & others forms of interventionism don't have the effect of abolishing immutable laws of economic reality. If people suffer b/c the gov't interferes with the market's ability to adjust to changes necessitated by expanding the division of labor, then the fault lies in the govt's misguided intervention, not in the division of labor as such.
Quantitative easing I guess, well, Horde and Abstain would give them fits, for a week or two, but yeah, they would just buy more bonds to make up for the lost economic input.
It's the money. Almost all our political leaders are worried about how they will get elected next term and how many "gifts" they get, that's why I said publicly funded elections, yes, there would be a bigger tax load on everyone, but the result should be the ultra wealthy and large corporations having less "pull" with the government and government making laws and allocations for the best benefit for all. actually that is just one possible fix to a larger economic problem:)
"The rise of automation & robotics reduces the demand for labour without a prior increasing demand of products & services".. The only way a *prior* increased demand for goods & services could happen is if productivity increased beforehand. At any rate, labor-saving tech reduces unit costs of goods. This increases real wages; people now have more money to spend on other goods & services. This increases consumer demand elsewhere in the economy & increases available capital to expand to meet it.
How do we reform tax system? A good place to start would be to reinstate a Constitutional monetary system, where only gold & silver may be "legal tender," & abolishing the inherently fascistic, predatory central banking system & replacing it with a regime of free-market banking. Thus all taxation would be direct & easily discernible. The gov't would almost be obliged to shrink back to within Constitutional limits. But for the people to demand they do so anyhow would still be worthwhile.
Never heard of the Milanovic gross domestic income, reading up on it now. One his main points is that global inequality has changed from class(within a nation) to locational inequality(between nations). but the Fed's not going to go for this it's not profitable for them.
Au contraire, mon ami. The FRS has accomplished EXACTLY it's core mission- the confiscation of wealth. If you havn't read these, you're behind in your education: Secrets Of The Federal Reserve- Eustace Mullins Creature From Jekyll - G. Edward Griffin Babylon's Banksters - Joseph Farrell, PhD. Web Of Debt - Ellen Brown, J.D. The Power Elite - C. Wright Mills socially responsible bookseller portal: biblio.com
Remember: "economy & "economics" aren't called that for nothing. The whole idea is *economization* of scarce productive resources - including labor. The whole history of socio-economic progress consists of human ingenuity finding ways to produce more (or better quality) goods with the same (or less) expenditure of scarce resources. All forms of protectionism -including technophobia - preach that we should forsake real, actual wealth under the pretext of encouraging the means of producing it.
I agree much with what you are saying. However, there has to be some means of controlling the money supply, and I don't see a viable alternative to a central bank. I don't think the gold-standard is the answer. In order to have long-term growth, as the population grows (think about taking a limit), the money supply must expand. Gold is a finite resource. Therefore, there exists a point in the long-term where deflationary growth cannot exist.
How to guard against currency manipulation in other countries? Why bother? If our own monetary system was commodity-based & bank fraud/embezzlement known as fractional-reserves was outlawed instead of institutionalized here, then there would be no need to worry about what other countries did with their own currencies. As long as our gov't didn't prevent the market from adjusting relative exchange rates freely, then other countries would only be hurting themselves by manipulation of their own.
The history of the failure of socialism isn't just accidental, either. The problem is inherent & systemic; not just a case of having the "wrong people in charge." Without private property in the factors of production & a market price structure, there can be no real economic calculation, & thus no rational allocation of resources. The *theory* of gov't may be all beneficent & lofty; but the practical reality is quite different. In reality, the State is nothing but an unjust compulsory monopoly.
1st I'd get rid of the Fed, I'd publicly fund all political campaigns to remove the strings and sway of corporations and the rich. So governments can operate more efficiently. Then a government enforced minimum wage based on individual company profit that would increase at a set amount as an individual companies profit increased so as to allow good profit for the business but also allow workers to share in those profits and reduce the stark inequalities in pay we have now.
Bernanke did NOT shock me! WHY would he taper off on stimulus 5 months before he VACATES his Fed position, and risk the whole house of cards collapsing? Come on! Get real!
Rule of Law thru institutions of rights-protection, criminal justice, dispute adjudication & arbitration, that provide services & compete in an open market, on terms of mutually-voluntary contract & exchange, just like firms that provide any & all other services in civil society. That's the ideal. There's no more valid justification for a compulsory monopoly in law & justice than there is for a compulsory monopoly in the provision of car insurance, medical care or canned goods or anything else.
What you are seeing in the stock market is where much of the inflation is going. What will happen to stocks and bonds when the Fed is forced to taper? What happens to inflated stock prices when interest rates rise? What happens to the dollar if the Fed continues to inflate in order to keep interest rates low? Remember, back in 2005 contemporary wisdom said to be in housing. Never forget to consider the long term consequences of short term policies.
Businesses don't aim to keep some "optimal economy." They pay workers on the basis of value productivity. Some make profits, some suffer losses. Capital investment mostly comes from the savings of others, more so than out of profits earned. As to "non-employable," etc. people, I don't presume to know how people should "manage" others. Society has always spontaneously & voluntarily created institutions to care for the elderly, infirm, & those to whom tragedy has unexpectedly befallen.
We need better story tellers. The Keynesians and the big government folks tell better stories than we do. Case in point: Bernanke. We know that what they've done is wrong and counter-productive. But frankly, he's told a better tale from an emotional perspective than we have. Everything in life is about story telling, and the best story tellers always win. Klein's arguments are correct, but logic won't win the day. I'd like to see the Klein's of the world learn to become story tellers.
Currency would be managed by spontaneous cooperation, just like the supply, demand & exchange value of all other commodities are in a free market environment. How much of others' paychecks should be taxed for campaign finance? ZERO. For unemployment, underperforming companies, etc. etc.? ZERO. All of that can be quite adequately handled by free, mutually-voluntary association & cooperation, via markets, fraternities, churches & other _voluntary_ charitable institutions.
re: "the natural or emergency expansion and contraction of currency volume to accurately reflect the real economy or an extraordinary event like war?" There would be no need to proactively do anything to "handle" that. Market forces spontaneously & automatically do that on their own, when left free to do so. Indeed, the ONLY time prices, wages & interest rates accurately reflect real-world conditions of relative supply & demand is when the supply of money & credit is NOT centrally planned.
As to how taxes are raised; first, you're operating under the uncritical assumption that monopoly statism, standing armies & taxation are all unquestionably necessary to begin with. They're not. All that's necessary for smooth social cooperation are institutions of law & justice; which don't require the establishment of a compulsory monopoly. If we absolutely MUST have a state, then it's few legitimate functions could all be funded by a uniform nominal import duty & annual flat tax on adults.
For one thing, gov't/central banks don't manipulate their currencies, interest & exchange rates for the purpose of helping the working class wage-earner; you're seriously duped if you think that's what's going on. Secondly, *countries* do not pay their workforce; individual companies pay their particular workers. & wages aren't determined by employer fiat; they're determined by supply & demand just like any other market price. I AM at the relative "bottom," & I ALWAYS prefer free markets.
I think referring to the social division of labor as a "foodchain" is entirely inappropriate, & fosters a sort of emotionalist view of market-based cooperation as vicious & uncivilized which is utterly fallacious. Indeed, it is market exchange which is the primary civilizing agent in society; even more so than institutions of state or religion. If those at the top succeeded b/c they efficiently allocate scarce resources toward satisfying urgent consumer demands, they only benefit society.
re: ".. a supranational framework of business that is immune to domestic fiscal/monetary policies?" If it were up to me, I would have the rule of Law - & thus free markets - reign the whole world over. As it is, I don't even consider such a supranational, "immune" framework of business to be possible. As to severe corrections & who would absorb the costs; corrections would be handled by the free functioning of the market price system, & costs would be absorbed by those who incurred them.
The transition from those analogies you're using to the actual real-world human actions & interactions they infer contains a lot of very debatable implications & assumptions of both moral & practical significance, which are all very conveniently skipped over in the process of the analogy. *People* do have to establish institutions of justice, dispute settlement, arbitration, etc. But there's no reason why the provision of those services should be the exclusive domain of a compulsory monopoly.
deflation... private credit debt $60 trillion .. deflation first, deflation leads to hyperinflation you wanna buy dollar. keep cash .cash is king . no banks. you wanna buy gold $700 is game silver 14 . stay in cash.. housing 2015--2017..
private credit debt chart expension. $60 trillion .. the private credit debt.. this is a 80 year credit debt expension... form 1 trillion to--60 trillion credit debt.. total credit market debt chart... google the chart....$56 trillion deleveraging .. we have to deflate..the only way out . less dollar, make the dollar stronger, all central banksters are printing dollar will go higher. deflation cash is king. do you think the fed wants to go bankrupt?..
A 'dollar' is a unit of measurement, not a piece of paper. Keep stacking those Federal Reserve Notes- they will make great kindling and toilet paper by 2017.... Me, I stack phyzz and expand my organic farm...
But the Federal Reserve is not a private sector, capitalistic institution. It's a state-created, state-sanctioned socialistic & monopolistic institution of macroeconomic central planning. What you basically just said is that a fascistic central-planning interventionist government is worse than a doting mom government.. which may or may not always be the case. Sure thing, we'll just discard this thread from here. No problem.
When you say "social concerns are a drag" on the free market, it reeks of the notion that there's a fundamental conflict in the market society between the interests of individuals & the welfare of society as a whole. That notion is fundamentally false. In a free market society, individuals' best interests are served only to the extent that they succeed in satisfying the most urgent demands of others. & since all association is mutually-voluntary, it's ex ante beneficial to all who participate.
farm is good organic farm is even better... good... keep cash you need to buy goods. with king dollar.... deflation makes dollar gain higher value.. google this?.... velocity money chart velocity money chart.. . deflation first and leads to hyperinflation we have to deflate.. toomuch debt . ..go to elliotwave deflation ... st
I suspect that your views on the subject contain no distinction between wealth derived via market entrepreneurialism on one hand, & political entrepreneurialism on the other. When I speak of "free markets," I mean a condition where the only avenue available to sustained wealth is the economic means; thru voluntary, peaceful contract, production & exchange; as opposed to the political means, which is thru state coercion & hegemony. The former benefits ALL of society; only the latter is evil.
You're looking at things thru a very narrow lens; making the same logical errors that technophobes have fallen into ever since the invention of the spinning jenny. Labor-saving tech does not reduce the aggregate demand for labor, especially in the long run. In fact, what it generally does is increase the demand for labor while increasing the marginal productivity of labor. Result is more jobs at higher real wages; & the more free & unhampered markets are, the faster the needed adjustments occur.
You're portraying the institution of government as analogous to a parent, whereas the people are as children; with no real *rights* in any meaningful sense, but rather whatever privileges the paternal state sees fit to allow us. Why should politicians & bureaucrats be considered deserving of such awesome, arbitrary authority over everyone else? If Government is a tool, then it can only possibly be a hammer. & hammers are not appropriate tools for anything other than smashing & pounding.
Well, quite unfortunately, a lot of so-called "mainstream" economists today are in favor of the Fed, & the concept of fiat money & fractional-reserve/central banking in general -at least those of them who are most in the media spotlight, anyhow. Meanwhile competent economists like Peter Schiff are laughed at by those frauds, even as he's proven right time & again. Rothbard is my favorite economist of all time. Greats like H. Hoppe, R. Murphy, R. Higgs & Peter Klein up there deserve more credit.
This is excellent and exactly what people need to hear. Keep it up, Peter!
Bravo! Imagine a world where People lived their lives...and criminals were put in jail...
I agree too, and I'm debating with myself if it is worth being part of the few that see and try to speak out against the Fed, even to the point of dying, for a world that does not give a crap; for a world where the majority thinks everything is OK and fair.
I hope we will see more such "Mises View" commentary on economic current events.
I would love to see the Mises channel give commentary on recent news.
It's absolutely amazing that a video like this can get so many views. The people who watch these videos are the ones that count.
Amen. These regular summaries would have high value.
More commentary like this please!
This was great. More like it, please.
Excellent video, thank you
You guys should make this a weekly segment (maybe that's already your plan).
Very nice commentary !!
The decision to taper was always going to be data-dependent, so I am not at all surprised that the taper did not occur. I haven't sold any of my metals based on the taper talk, and I even bought more in the last few months. Good for me, and I thank folks like Peter Schiff for educating me over the past several years and inspiring me to dump my dollars.
Don't forget to add Julien Benda's "The Betrayal of Intellectuals". It's a great and often forgotten little book.
I like to think that civilization has gotten better (in general) after every civilization falls. We have the internet now, forums for learning new ideas. I think we are only likely to see the world improve once our current civilization more or less collapses, however.
I'd highly recommend reading "Government Unnecessary but Inevitable". Because while anarchists like myself often joke that if the worst possible scenario is that government reasserts itself, then we have everything to gain and nothing to lose. But if government is inevitable (which I don't think it is, but the case put forth is quite strong), then the best solution is to allow free movement of peoples to lead to better governments. Because surely not all governments are equal.
Well said!
No one really expected tapering? Do not misunderstand,- great commentary!
Great vid, strong facts, as always.
I would recommend Lysander Spooner's "Letter to Grover Cleveland" & No Treason no. 6, "The Constitution of No Authority," & Frederic Bastiat's "The Law." I think those are the 3 most powerful tracts on political philosophy ever written.
On economics, the best introductory stuff is Henry Hazlitt's "Economics in One Lesson," & Bastiat's "That Which Is Seen, & That Which Is Unseen." Rothbard's "Man, Economy & State" is the only treatise on economic theory one need ever read. Trust me on that.
Which scheme do you think they will try? And do you think the discontent from the "Wage Slaves" will make them deal with inequality or try to keep the status quo?
A public managed central bank, A 5% personal and business tax, a little less for investments, and a re-training program for displaced workers, and an incentive program for new companies to attract workers for the 1st year or two in business?
Yeah, I know about that one. My hopes of seeing it passed & signed into law by the current President, at least in it's present form, or any form in which it actually has teeth & truly relieves the U.S. economy (& to a great extent, the global economy) of the unaccountable death grip of the irresponsible central-planners at the Fed, & all the havoc, pain & misery they wreak, are not very high.
Congress is full of the craven, cowardly, & unscrupulous. So is the White House. Our hopes are dim.
The gov't did what it had to do. People are BUYING houses like crazy! You know why?
Because of Bernanke's policy - quantitative easing to infinity.
Gov't buys the bonds, stimulates the stock market to RECORD HIGHS never seen before. People have money in their pockets to buy homes -- and can SAVE some money too!
Interest rates are at "o". Where else will people make a 50%-100% return on their money?
Come on!
Give Bernanke & Obama some credit!
Why would it then NOT make sense in a global, integrated economy?
I can hardly imagine how any good, sensible economic policy could be rendered folly on account of the policies of other countries. As long as our economy remained free & unhampered by special interest-driven interventionism, then our structure of prices & production could always easily adjust to whatever conditions are created by the manipulations & internal interventionism of foreign govt's; they would hurt only themselves.
Argument is not about telling the other side they are wrong, it is about telling them why they are wrong. So the question is not, "Is the State legitimate?" The question is "Is the State avoidable?" So tell me why it is not inevitable. The essay I suggested is only 20 pages long, and regardless of the way you feel about it after reading it, it is worth reading legitimate criticisms of the system (though judging by the rhetoric rather than substance I fear you may not have a system in mind).
That is why you will have a leg up to protect yourself.
In an extraordinary event like war, when The State expands by large degrees, people must pay for it. Scarce resources are being diverted away from lines of production that bring demanded consumer goods & services to market, toward implements of death & destruction. People are being made poorer. That reality doesn't change if it's financed by inflationary expansion rather than direct taxation; it's only made harder to discern precisely. It makes knowing exactly who is paying & how much impossible
Of course businesses will always tend to flock to where the prospects for greater profit margins are most plentiful - in the cases where this is economically plausible or even possible. But that very fact sets in motion forces that tend to push wage rates up & diminish profit margins, until they're brought into equilibrium. More businesses competing for the same pool of labor; demand>supply.
Profits are always transitory & ever-tenuous. They're always diminishing as markets adjust to change.
We need more short videos.
It's amazing to me that even the average economist doesn't see that this is a bad thing. Even when the big fall does happen, the government propaganda is going to convince the majority of people that it was what is left of the free markets fault.
Well, quite unfortunately, a lot of so-called "mainstream" economists today are in favor of the Fed, & the concept of fiat money & fractional-reserve/central banking in general -at least those of them who are most in the media spotlight, anyhow.
Meanwhile competent economists like Peter Schiff are laughed at by those frauds, even as he's proven right time & again.
Rothbard is my favorite economist of all time. Greats like H. Hoppe, R. Murphy, R. Higgs & Peter Klein up there deserve more credit.
But there isn't actually any OASDI trust fund. Only the federal gov't has the gall & lack of scruples to refer to a virtual box of IOU's - with no real, actionable plan or plausible hope of becoming sustainably solvent - as a "trust fund."
I'd say rather than leaving such a hopeless mess to the states, just let people keep their own money, not presume that people are too stupid, careless & irresponsible to provide for their own or their loved ones' retirement years, & allow freedom for a change.
Indeed, government is counterproductive: the goods and services it provides come at the expense of taxpayers. Furthermore, those same goods and services could be produced far more efficiently, and with greater quality, by private enterprise.
I'd like to live in an economy where there is no government at all.
Not paradise. Just good old private law society. Everything ruled by voluntary contracts and voluntary social organizations, hence without the monopoly of the use of force.
I don't know what you mean by "only-economic model." Trade barriers & others forms of interventionism don't have the effect of abolishing immutable laws of economic reality. If people suffer b/c the gov't interferes with the market's ability to adjust to changes necessitated by expanding the division of labor, then the fault lies in the govt's misguided intervention, not in the division of labor as such.
Quantitative easing I guess, well, Horde and Abstain would give them fits, for a week or two, but yeah, they would just buy more bonds to make up for the lost economic input.
It's the money. Almost all our political leaders are worried about how they will get elected next term and how many "gifts" they get, that's why I said publicly funded elections, yes, there would be a bigger tax load on everyone, but the result should be the ultra wealthy and large corporations having less "pull" with the government and government making laws and allocations for the best benefit for all. actually that is just one possible fix to a larger economic problem:)
"The rise of automation & robotics reduces the demand for labour without a prior increasing demand of products & services"..
The only way a *prior* increased demand for goods & services could happen is if productivity increased beforehand. At any rate, labor-saving tech reduces unit costs of goods. This increases real wages; people now have more money to spend on other goods & services. This increases consumer demand elsewhere in the economy & increases available capital to expand to meet it.
How do we reform tax system? A good place to start would be to reinstate a Constitutional monetary system, where only gold & silver may be "legal tender," & abolishing the inherently fascistic, predatory central banking system & replacing it with a regime of free-market banking. Thus all taxation would be direct & easily discernible. The gov't would almost be obliged to shrink back to within Constitutional limits. But for the people to demand they do so anyhow would still be worthwhile.
Never heard of the Milanovic gross domestic income, reading up on it now. One his main points is that global inequality has changed from class(within a nation) to locational inequality(between nations). but the Fed's not going to go for this it's not profitable for them.
Au contraire, mon ami. The FRS has accomplished EXACTLY it's core mission- the confiscation of wealth. If you havn't read these, you're behind in your education:
Secrets Of The Federal Reserve- Eustace Mullins
Creature From Jekyll - G. Edward Griffin
Babylon's Banksters - Joseph Farrell, PhD.
Web Of Debt - Ellen Brown, J.D.
The Power Elite - C. Wright Mills
socially responsible bookseller portal: biblio.com
Why wouldn't you abolish the FED alltogether? Without a FED - no worries about its chair, right?
I agree. I'd rather have no slavery than... just a little bit of slavery.
Remember: "economy & "economics" aren't called that for nothing. The whole idea is *economization* of scarce productive resources - including labor. The whole history of socio-economic progress consists of human ingenuity finding ways to produce more (or better quality) goods with the same (or less) expenditure of scarce resources. All forms of protectionism -including technophobia - preach that we should forsake real, actual wealth under the pretext of encouraging the means of producing it.
I agree much with what you are saying. However, there has to be some means of controlling the money supply, and I don't see a viable alternative to a central bank. I don't think the gold-standard is the answer. In order to have long-term growth, as the population grows (think about taking a limit), the money supply must expand. Gold is a finite resource. Therefore, there exists a point in the long-term where deflationary growth cannot exist.
How to guard against currency manipulation in other countries? Why bother? If our own monetary system was commodity-based & bank fraud/embezzlement known as fractional-reserves was outlawed instead of institutionalized here, then there would be no need to worry about what other countries did with their own currencies. As long as our gov't didn't prevent the market from adjusting relative exchange rates freely, then other countries would only be hurting themselves by manipulation of their own.
The history of the failure of socialism isn't just accidental, either. The problem is inherent & systemic; not just a case of having the "wrong people in charge." Without private property in the factors of production & a market price structure, there can be no real economic calculation, & thus no rational allocation of resources.
The *theory* of gov't may be all beneficent & lofty; but the practical reality is quite different. In reality, the State is nothing but an unjust compulsory monopoly.
1st I'd get rid of the Fed, I'd publicly fund all political campaigns to remove the strings and sway of corporations and the rich. So governments can operate more efficiently. Then a government enforced minimum wage based on individual company profit that would increase at a set amount as an individual companies profit increased so as to allow good profit for the business but also allow workers to share in those profits and reduce the stark inequalities in pay we have now.
Bernanke did NOT shock me! WHY would he taper off on stimulus 5 months before he VACATES his Fed position, and risk the whole house of cards collapsing?
Come on!
Get real!
Rule of Law thru institutions of rights-protection, criminal justice, dispute adjudication & arbitration, that provide services & compete in an open market, on terms of mutually-voluntary contract & exchange, just like firms that provide any & all other services in civil society. That's the ideal. There's no more valid justification for a compulsory monopoly in law & justice than there is for a compulsory monopoly in the provision of car insurance, medical care or canned goods or anything else.
What you are seeing in the stock market is where much of the inflation is going. What will happen to stocks and bonds when the Fed is forced to taper? What happens to inflated stock prices when interest rates rise? What happens to the dollar if the Fed continues to inflate in order to keep interest rates low? Remember, back in 2005 contemporary wisdom said to be in housing. Never forget to consider the long term consequences of short term policies.
Businesses don't aim to keep some "optimal economy." They pay workers on the basis of value productivity. Some make profits, some suffer losses. Capital investment mostly comes from the savings of others, more so than out of profits earned.
As to "non-employable," etc. people, I don't presume to know how people should "manage" others. Society has always spontaneously & voluntarily created institutions to care for the elderly, infirm, & those to whom tragedy has unexpectedly befallen.
We need better story tellers. The Keynesians and the big government folks tell better stories than we do.
Case in point: Bernanke. We know that what they've done is wrong and counter-productive. But frankly, he's told a better tale from an emotional perspective than we have.
Everything in life is about story telling, and the best story tellers always win.
Klein's arguments are correct, but logic won't win the day. I'd like to see the Klein's of the world learn to become story tellers.
Currency would be managed by spontaneous cooperation, just like the supply, demand & exchange value of all other commodities are in a free market environment. How much of others' paychecks should be taxed for campaign finance? ZERO. For unemployment, underperforming companies, etc. etc.? ZERO. All of that can be quite adequately handled by free, mutually-voluntary association & cooperation, via markets, fraternities, churches & other _voluntary_ charitable institutions.
re: "the natural or emergency expansion and contraction of currency volume to accurately reflect the real economy or an extraordinary event like war?"
There would be no need to proactively do anything to "handle" that. Market forces spontaneously & automatically do that on their own, when left free to do so. Indeed, the ONLY time prices, wages & interest rates accurately reflect real-world conditions of relative supply & demand is when the supply of money & credit is NOT centrally planned.
Yea and for me its paradise =) because then everybody can care of their REAL problems, not state invented problems.
As to how taxes are raised; first, you're operating under the uncritical assumption that monopoly statism, standing armies & taxation are all unquestionably necessary to begin with. They're not. All that's necessary for smooth social cooperation are institutions of law & justice; which don't require the establishment of a compulsory monopoly.
If we absolutely MUST have a state, then it's few legitimate functions could all be funded by a uniform nominal import duty & annual flat tax on adults.
For one thing, gov't/central banks don't manipulate their currencies, interest & exchange rates for the purpose of helping the working class wage-earner; you're seriously duped if you think that's what's going on.
Secondly, *countries* do not pay their workforce; individual companies pay their particular workers. & wages aren't determined by employer fiat; they're determined by supply & demand just like any other market price.
I AM at the relative "bottom," & I ALWAYS prefer free markets.
I think referring to the social division of labor as a "foodchain" is entirely inappropriate, & fosters a sort of emotionalist view of market-based cooperation as vicious & uncivilized which is utterly fallacious. Indeed, it is market exchange which is the primary civilizing agent in society; even more so than institutions of state or religion. If those at the top succeeded b/c they efficiently allocate scarce resources toward satisfying urgent consumer demands, they only benefit society.
re: ".. a supranational framework of business that is immune to domestic fiscal/monetary policies?"
If it were up to me, I would have the rule of Law - & thus free markets - reign the whole world over.
As it is, I don't even consider such a supranational, "immune" framework of business to be possible.
As to severe corrections & who would absorb the costs; corrections would be handled by the free functioning of the market price system, & costs would be absorbed by those who incurred them.
The transition from those analogies you're using to the actual real-world human actions & interactions they infer contains a lot of very debatable implications & assumptions of both moral & practical significance, which are all very conveniently skipped over in the process of the analogy.
*People* do have to establish institutions of justice, dispute settlement, arbitration, etc. But there's no reason why the provision of those services should be the exclusive domain of a compulsory monopoly.
The STOCK MARKET is where you should've been, NOT gold and silver!
Hell yeah, I'm serious! Obviously I'm serious -- if you've looked at the stock market and RE sales.
The economy IS stimulated.
deflation... private credit debt $60 trillion .. deflation first, deflation leads to hyperinflation
you wanna buy dollar. keep cash .cash is king . no banks. you wanna buy gold $700 is game silver 14 . stay in cash.. housing 2015--2017..
It is because people like Bernanke make mistakes like this that cause others to invest in intrinsic commodities. Why, what's your plan?
private credit debt chart expension. $60 trillion .. the private credit debt.. this is a 80 year credit debt expension... form 1 trillion to--60 trillion credit debt.. total credit market debt chart... google the chart....$56 trillion deleveraging .. we have to deflate..the only way out . less dollar, make the dollar stronger, all central banksters are printing dollar will go higher. deflation cash is king. do you think the fed wants to go bankrupt?..
A 'dollar' is a unit of measurement, not a piece of paper. Keep stacking those Federal Reserve Notes- they will make great kindling and toilet paper by 2017.... Me, I stack phyzz and expand my organic farm...
But the Federal Reserve is not a private sector, capitalistic institution. It's a state-created, state-sanctioned socialistic & monopolistic institution of macroeconomic central planning.
What you basically just said is that a fascistic central-planning interventionist government is worse than a doting mom government.. which may or may not always be the case.
Sure thing, we'll just discard this thread from here. No problem.
When you say "social concerns are a drag" on the free market, it reeks of the notion that there's a fundamental conflict in the market society between the interests of individuals & the welfare of society as a whole. That notion is fundamentally false. In a free market society, individuals' best interests are served only to the extent that they succeed in satisfying the most urgent demands of others. & since all association is mutually-voluntary, it's ex ante beneficial to all who participate.
farm is good organic farm is even better... good... keep cash you need to buy goods. with king dollar.... deflation makes dollar gain higher value.. google this?.... velocity money chart velocity money chart.. .
deflation first and leads to hyperinflation we have to deflate.. toomuch debt . ..go to elliotwave deflation ... st
I suspect that your views on the subject contain no distinction between wealth derived via market entrepreneurialism on one hand, & political entrepreneurialism on the other.
When I speak of "free markets," I mean a condition where the only avenue available to sustained wealth is the economic means; thru voluntary, peaceful contract, production & exchange; as opposed to the political means, which is thru state coercion & hegemony.
The former benefits ALL of society; only the latter is evil.
How's all that gold and silver doing you guys bought from Peter Schiff.
You missed the boat!
You're looking at things thru a very narrow lens; making the same logical errors that technophobes have fallen into ever since the invention of the spinning jenny.
Labor-saving tech does not reduce the aggregate demand for labor, especially in the long run. In fact, what it generally does is increase the demand for labor while increasing the marginal productivity of labor. Result is more jobs at higher real wages; & the more free & unhampered markets are, the faster the needed adjustments occur.
U mean paradise? Yap me too! But Devil is against us =D
You're portraying the institution of government as analogous to a parent, whereas the people are as children; with no real *rights* in any meaningful sense, but rather whatever privileges the paternal state sees fit to allow us. Why should politicians & bureaucrats be considered deserving of such awesome, arbitrary authority over everyone else?
If Government is a tool, then it can only possibly be a hammer. & hammers are not appropriate tools for anything other than smashing & pounding.
Are you serious?
7:33 Ahhhhh...he's just a minarchist! ;-)
Alan Greenspan's language of obfuscation:
watch?v=0liegrixknA
Well, quite unfortunately, a lot of so-called "mainstream" economists today are in favor of the Fed, & the concept of fiat money & fractional-reserve/central banking in general -at least those of them who are most in the media spotlight, anyhow.
Meanwhile competent economists like Peter Schiff are laughed at by those frauds, even as he's proven right time & again.
Rothbard is my favorite economist of all time. Greats like H. Hoppe, R. Murphy, R. Higgs & Peter Klein up there deserve more credit.