Your Economic Recovery Program

[bitplane]

At least this batch of techno-alarmists is more entertaining than the last 50.

Fire bad! Thok like cold meat! Wheel Bad! Thok like walking!

As a singularitarian and technology geek I welcome our robot overlords, I just can't imagine new types of jobs for humans if technological change continues at its current rate.

If AI can do every job a skilled and creative human can, you've got a lot more to worry about than your naughty bits.

I completely agree. Fire up the paperclip maximizer, we've got a solar system to tile!

I agree that automation doesn't nec hurt workers, but it doesn't nec help them either under the current arrangement, as most of the profit from that productivity gain gets captured by the super-rich. If we lived in a different socioeconomic system, I'd be a lot more excited about advancements that allow productivity to be gained, because then it is much more liekly that people will actually have the choice to work less and maintain a basic standard of living - eg the mythical world where the dripfeed essentially provides you basic shelter and food for next to nothing and one can build on top of that.

Yeah, Russell wrote about a 4-hour work day almost 80 years ago. We've got all this extra productivity and no extra slack, no change at all.

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[myrkul]

At least this batch of techno-alarmists is more entertaining than the last 50.

Fire bad! Thok like cold meat! Wheel Bad! Thok like walking!

As a singularitarian and technology geek I welcome our robot overlords, I just can't imagine new types of jobs for humans if technological change continues at its current rate.

That's not necessarily a bad thing. By definition, if there are no more jobs for humans to do, every human need will have been met.

[indio007]

Someone has confused saying automation has caused the current economic situation with saying technology displacing workers is bad. It's not bad per se. However it has been used in a way that the end result is bad.

Stop trying to read between the lines.

[GideonGono]

Since we are still in a Global Economic World Wide Depression I'm wondering what the general consensus is out there regarding:

1) What caused it (primarily)
2) What is your plan to get out of it (includes any laws or programs you would add or repeal)


I'll post my program after I put some finishing touches on it.

Fractional Reserve Banking is the main culprit IMO, together with assorted laws like legal tender and such. They have enabled the US & other govts to drown themselves in debt. You cannot fix anything without abolishing this system. It is designed to concentrate wealth in the hands of a few and this will continue no matter what policies are implemented. Millions may die due to the ensuing political and economic chaos, but this is largely unavoidable. You simply cannot run an entire planet on a flawed monetary system for decades and expect to fix things without pain.

[BioMike]

Since we are still in a Global Economic World Wide Depression

Global? Only the 1st world are affected. Anything outside the Americas, Europe and Australia are doing just fine.

[haydent]

http://tarpley.net/five-point-program.pdf

30 MILLION PRODUCTIVE JOBS TO REBUILD US INFRASTRUCTURE, INDUSTRY AND
AGRICULTURE: THE PROGRAM TO END THE ECONOMIC DEPRESSION
 
by Webster G. Tarpley, www.tarpley.net
November 14, 2009
 

[myrkul]

http://tarpley.net/five-point-program.pdf

30 MILLION PRODUCTIVE JOBS TO REBUILD US INFRASTRUCTURE, INDUSTRY AND
AGRICULTURE: THE PROGRAM TO END THE ECONOMIC DEPRESSION
 
by Webster G. Tarpley, www.tarpley.net
November 14, 2009
 

US infrastructure is pretty fucked up.

[bitplane]

As a singularitarian and technology geek I welcome our robot overlords, I just can't imagine new types of jobs for humans if technological change continues at its current rate.

That's not necessarily a bad thing. By definition, if there are no more jobs for humans to do, every human need will have been met.
[/quote]
No, that's not right. Assuming that you still need food, water and shelter, how exactly would you convince anyone who owns the means of production to produce for you if you have nothing to offer them in return?

[myrkul]

That's not necessarily a bad thing. By definition, if there are no more jobs for humans to do, every human need will have been met.

No, that's not right. Assuming that you still need food, water and shelter, how exactly would you convince anyone who owns the means of production to produce for you if you have nothing to offer them in return?

Well, either way you look at it, in a society where every need is met by robots, there won't be anyone who "has not"... at least, not for long.

[BioMike]

http://tarpley.net/five-point-program.pdf

30 MILLION PRODUCTIVE JOBS TO REBUILD US INFRASTRUCTURE, INDUSTRY AND
AGRICULTURE: THE PROGRAM TO END THE ECONOMIC DEPRESSION
 
by Webster G. Tarpley, www.tarpley.net
November 14, 2009

Wow, I would like to see the financial picture of that in detail. Very interesting.

Although I don't think the average US citizen would accept such socialist plan (looking back at the discussion of the health reform plan of Obama). I think the democrats might be able to get enough support from their people to implement such plan, but the republicans would not give them the opportunity to do so.

[niemivh]

Since we are still in a Global Economic World Wide Depression I'm wondering what the general consensus is out there regarding:

1) What caused it (primarily)
2) What is your plan to get out of it (includes any laws or programs you would add or repeal)


I'll post my program after I put some finishing touches on it.

1) Printing money will-nilly.
2) STOP!

Simple, brief, yes... But added complexity wouldn't help anything.

So a deflationary panic meltdown of the market by cutting off all new credit?

This would result in millions of deaths and probably WWIII.

Try again.

Because without an excess of credit, the wealth it represents would disappear.

Yeah, this is a massive simplification. Honestly, the correct answer under the ideal conditions would be "End legal tender", "End most federal agencies (assuming we are recovering the US economy", "Cut taxes" and "Pull out of any international organizations that would attempt to stop the US from doing this for being a so-called tax haven (UN, World Bank, etc)" in that order. Without doing that, the best option would be "No bailouts, wait out recession, then jack up rates to clear out excess credit" (Kind of like the Volcker solution).

Volckner solved less than he caused.  His actions devastated the industrial sector of the USA while chasing phantoms of inflation.  Inflation is about 13th on what the average person should be demanding out of a central bank policy.  In addition much of what the Central Banks consider inflation is a rise in wages -- to which they are against.  A 20% prime rate is exactly what we don't need right now.  That would cause incredible misery and hardship for 99% of the world and favor those that have money in this economy which really only is the rich and super rich, everyone else's effective debt burden would be greatly expounded by the deflation this would cause.  Works great for the bankers though, they sign you on to some debt when money is cheap (low interest rates) and then get you to pay that back after the price of money is made very expensive (high interest rates).

Uh, what?

Have you even heard of prices in the 70s? The US was a couple of clumsy rate decreases away from hyperinflation and collapse. Had Volcker not increased rates, the US would have been screwed over and Jimmy Carter's idiotic new government agencies wouldn't have helped in the slightest. As it was, he dealt with inflation and the US recovered from the recession and began to grow again. A lot of the growth was from easy credit policies, but at the very least the malinvestment of the past thirty years was cleared out and the economy was far healthier in the long run as a result. Mind, a solution like that might not work this time, it might take a more radical push (again, removing legal tender), but it would at the very least be better than bailouts, easy lending, lots of inflation, bailouts for other countries trying equally retarded strategies (Japan and the Eurozone lack the "worldwide reserve currency" status of the USA), and stagnation.

The facts of the 80s disagree with your wild claims about catastrophe from high rates.

The overall lack of solutions being posted to this board proves the general ignorance of the member of this forum on economics.  That goes for all that aren't reading this.

 

This depression can be stopped almost overnight, this is a political problem not a failing of economics or a lack of solutions that do exist if we seek to find them.

"DAMN IT YOU GUYS! YOU AREN'T COMING TO THE CONCLUSIONS I WANT SO IMMA CLAIM YOU DIDN'T PROVIDE ANY SOLUTIONS"

derp

I think American's typically have been so propagandized about the 'evils/dangers of inflation' that they are overly sensitive to inflation.  I'm sorry, while 14% doesn't sound immediately desirable that is a far far way from hyperinflation. 

Are you arguing that 14% is near hyperinflation or that it would somehow 'spark' a hyper-inflationary event?  If the former you're historically way off base and if the latter please explain how.

As for my comments regarding the lack of solutions there was only 1 person on this board at the time that I wrote that post that posted any 'program' worth a damn.  The other was 'let's trigger a hyper-deflationary meltdown and global panic' in the simplistic statement of 'stop printing money'.

[niemivh]

At least this batch of techno-alarmists is more entertaining than the last 50.

Fire bad! Thok like cold meat! Wheel Bad! Thok like walking!

As a singularitarian and technology geek I welcome our robot overlords, I just can't imagine new types of jobs for humans if technological change continues at its current rate.

That's not necessarily a bad thing. By definition, if there are no more jobs for humans to do, every human need will have been met.

And the elite's world-view is clearly when that time comes they no longer need us.

I think this is the rational for those that are afraid of such levels of technological development.  But I still think it's ill-founded.

[niemivh]

Since we are still in a Global Economic World Wide Depression I'm wondering what the general consensus is out there regarding:

1) What caused it (primarily)
2) What is your plan to get out of it (includes any laws or programs you would add or repeal)


I'll post my program after I put some finishing touches on it.

Fractional Reserve Banking is the main culprit IMO, together with assorted laws like legal tender and such. They have enabled the US & other govts to drown themselves in debt. You cannot fix anything without abolishing this system. It is designed to concentrate wealth in the hands of a few and this will continue no matter what policies are implemented. Millions may die due to the ensuing political and economic chaos, but this is largely unavoidable. You simply cannot run an entire planet on a flawed monetary system for decades and expect to fix things without pain.

I think you are mistaken about your overall premise:

1)  The primacy of debt in our system is obviously overpowered the rest of the political process, but most of this debt was private bank (excluding the Federal Reserve) issued for things like: leveraged buyouts, mergers, acquisitions, massively leveraged stock traders, credit card debt, soaring mortgage debt, etc.  As you can see from this list these are all examples of where by and large most of the newly issued debt went in the past many decades.  How many of those things sound productive?  How many of those things lead to legitimate economic growth?  How many of those things improve the lot of mankind?
2)  The problem of perpetual debt is not a main cause of our present problem.  I think it comes from the position of trying to see the economy as a state-based construct rather than a dynamic flow of ideas, productivity, research and human progress that can continue essentially in our present paradigm forever.  Reason is there is always wealth to be created and always new people being born and always new and better things to develop and better ways to develop them, hence the fact that there is always more debt (future value) than money (present value); consider that what the debt represents is embryonic growth of a future but when that future arrives there is a more valuable and better future right up ahead hence a never ending upwards trend.  The problem is the fact that all this debt was allowed to sweep up the economy in a tidal wave without adding to the overall value of the system as would research, infrastructure or something worth a damn.  So the overall burden of the actual productive economy has been beaten and bloodied by all what I'd refer to as "phony (non productive) debt".
3) Thomas Jefferson knew what the central bank was capable of and was opposed to it for a variety of reasons.  Some of them, I would argue, were completely in a self interested nature but the primary other to which he is quoted is that:

"If the American People allow private banks to control the issuance of their currency, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the People of all their Property until their Children will wake up homeless on the continent their Fathers conquered."

Notice that he isn't so much worried about the nature of printing money ad infinitum, as prices would remain somewhat stable on an upward trend if inflation remained somewhat low (depends to where the money is introduced into the system).  He is realizing with brilliant accuracy that it is the process of inflation (housing bubble, student loan prices ballooning, credit cards with easy terms) and then a deflationary crash (2008, stock market plunge, foreclosures, businesses going bust, depressed wages) helped along by the central bank to which Greenspan and Bernanke did nothing to stop is the worst engine of looting the populace.

The problem here is obviously the malfeasance of the Federal Reserve.  If we had a Central Bank much more along the lines of the 1st and 2nd Central Banks of the USA we could invest Trillions in rail and infrastructure projects, Trillions in research and be having 9% levels of economic growth like other countries who actually control their monetary policy in their own national interest.  

[niemivh]

http://tarpley.net/five-point-program.pdf

30 MILLION PRODUCTIVE JOBS TO REBUILD US INFRASTRUCTURE, INDUSTRY AND
AGRICULTURE: THE PROGRAM TO END THE ECONOMIC DEPRESSION
 
by Webster G. Tarpley, www.tarpley.net
November 14, 2009
 

Thanks for posting that, I was going to post something similar expounding on what Tarpley wrote, this program is made to fit on a single piece of paper (1 page for each side).

Tarpley's program is fantastic and ambitious and shows you what is possible if we seize the greatest power in our world (the US central bank) and make it work for the cause of human progress instead of bankers and parasites.   I'd recommend anyone here who doesn't know who Webster Tarpley is to read his books and follow his radio program.  This man's intellect and wisdom is really something of a throwback to an age when things like that were valued above all else.

[niemivh]

Since we are still in a Global Economic World Wide Depression

Global? Only the 1st world are affected. Anything outside the Americas, Europe and Australia are doing just fine.

http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2011/07/25/general-eu-east-africa-famine_8582795.html

[niemivh]

http://tarpley.net/five-point-program.pdf

30 MILLION PRODUCTIVE JOBS TO REBUILD US INFRASTRUCTURE, INDUSTRY AND
AGRICULTURE: THE PROGRAM TO END THE ECONOMIC DEPRESSION
 
by Webster G. Tarpley, www.tarpley.net
November 14, 2009

Wow, I would like to see the financial picture of that in detail. Very interesting.

Although I don't think the average US citizen would accept such socialist plan (looking back at the discussion of the health reform plan of Obama). I think the democrats might be able to get enough support from their people to implement such plan, but the republicans would not give them the opportunity to do so.

I'm not sure that this country will move 'this far to the left' (whatever that means anymore) until we have a complete meltdown or revolution, but I can hope.  I'd just be happy if we could stop our express train that we've been on for 40 years moving to the 'right'.  Pretty soon the politics will be so fascistoid that the political debate will be between choosing debtor prisons or concentration camps.

We have pundits on the radio laughing about people not getting an unemployment check and trying to destroy any means of social decency so we don't have old, sick, or disabled people dying in the streets.  The amount of cruelty and hatred in the general populace is starting to get nauseating.

Socialism means a different thing to each person you ask but if Tarpley's plan is socialist plan then sign me up.  If selling toxic Chinese plastic injected molded shit to each other is the best the naked Free Market has to offer I want alternatives.  Overall our level of GDP that is in the government sector is far lower than other 1st world countries and then when you account for how much of that is military spending it is pathetic.

[BioMike]

Since we are still in a Global Economic World Wide Depression

Global? Only the 1st world are affected. Anything outside the Americas, Europe and Australia are doing just fine.

http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2011/07/25/general-eu-east-africa-famine_8582795.html

If they get an economic depression, it's caused by all the "helping" they get. Hard working farmers that managed to get something produced won't be able to sell it then at all any more.

[compro01]

Since we are still in a Global Economic World Wide Depression

Global? Only the 1st world are affected. Anything outside the Americas, Europe and Australia are doing just fine.

http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2011/07/25/general-eu-east-africa-famine_8582795.html

how is the economic depression causing a massive drought?

liquid crisis != liquidity crisis.

[BioMike]

I'm not sure that this country will move 'this far to the left' (whatever that means anymore) until we have a complete meltdown or revolution, but I can hope.  I'd just be happy if we could stop our express train that we've been on for 40 years moving to the 'right'.  Pretty soon the politics will be so fascistoid that the political debate will be between choosing debtor prisons or concentration camps.

We have pundits on the radio laughing about people not getting an unemployment check and trying to destroy any means of social decency so we don't have old, sick, or disabled people dying in the streets.  The amount of cruelty and hatred in the general populace is starting to get nauseating.

Socialism means a different thing to each person you ask but if Tarpley's plan is socialist plan then sign me up.  If selling toxic Chinese plastic injected molded shit to each other is the best the naked Free Market has to offer I want alternatives.  Overall our level of GDP that is in the government sector is far lower than other 1st world countries and then when you account for how much of that is military spending it is pathetic.

The only thing to make people more social is to do social things for them. It is strange that the US socialist party is pretty small if there are so many poor and unemployed people in the US (all potential voters for that party if they would help them directly). I don't think you need a revolution or complete meltdown to get a more social society. Just a change of how people take care for each other.

[niemivh]

Since we are still in a Global Economic World Wide Depression

Global? Only the 1st world are affected. Anything outside the Americas, Europe and Australia are doing just fine.

http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2011/07/25/general-eu-east-africa-famine_8582795.html

how is the economic depression causing a massive drought?

liquid crisis != liquidity crisis.

Part of the problem is compounded by the global rise in food prices.  Sorry, thought you'd be able to discern that yourself.