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Post by franklin on May 1, 2010 18:56:15 GMT -5
Franklin, in a global economy the dollar is a major medium of exchange along with the currency of a few other major economies, like the Euro, Sterling, Yen, to name a few. If extra dollars are simply printed and flood the economy it does more harm that good for the particular economy that hosts the dollar. See, this is the kind of thing I’ve been talking about like everything I posted here, and in the thread “Liberal imperialism” (the kind of thing meaning things that are overall not good for the economy). Government debt is also considered as being a great burden to the economy but despite this it was highly important to the development of the capitalist system, it gave life to the Bank of England and remained an important part of the London Stock Exchange. Adam Smith thought the national debt was a burden to the economy, and said that the practice enfeebled every state that practiced it and advised that England should not be so bold as to think that the economy can handle any amount of debt Hume on the other hand in his history of England was much more dramatic than Adam Smith and said that it would bring absolute ruin to the state. This is from an article I put in the attachment: "UK National Debt Charts" www.ukpublicspending.co.uk/debt_brief.phpDescription for this chart says: Attachments:
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Post by franklin on May 2, 2010 12:58:38 GMT -5
Another thing Homeylu,how is heavily subsidizing agriculture (in modern times) good for the economy? That with tariffs and one article (however old from several years ago) said that the policies of the European Union make it so people have to pay more for food because food prices are kept up despite subsidies. Even with later increase in prices of corn, milk ect. the expenses involved in subsidies I would think, would exceed the profits. It is not profitable in that the expenses are simply given to the public while the profits go to a few (this is the exact same article I posted on the other thread) Attachments:
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Post by franklin on May 2, 2010 15:05:40 GMT -5
This is from the early 20th century. Notice the importance placed here about the banking system being centralized "The Encyclopedia Americana: a library of universal knowledge, Volume 13" books.google.com/books?id=PWYMAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA246&dq=#v=onepage&q&f=false[The Gold Reserves.— London is recognized as the world's central market for gold and yet her reserve stock of the metal is, notwithstanding the enormous volume of her financial dealings, at time actually less than that of her principal rivals......That London can work on such a small basis of gold is due in the first place to the fact that the English system of a single centralized reserve is a more economical one than the system prevailing in countries where centralization is less developed]
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Post by franklin on Jun 27, 2010 13:21:37 GMT -5
Franklin, in a global economy the dollar is a major medium of exchange along with the currency of a few other major economies, like the Euro, Sterling, Yen, to name a few. If extra dollars are simply printed and flood the economy it does more harm that good for the particular economy that hosts the dollar. It would depreciate the value of the dollar, and allow American manufactured products to be purchased very cheap. Let me try to explain it using another currency, (This is only an illustration) Let say the exchange rate between the Egyptian pound and the U.S. dollar is 7:1. So it would cost 7 Egyptian pounds for 1 dollar. So lets say and Egyptian wanted to import a particular American product (not including taxes and custom duties) that cost $10, this product would cost them 70 le (Egyptian pounds.) Suppose the dollar depreciated in value due to flooding the market. Now the exchange rate become 3:1. So 1 U.S. dollar cost only 3 le (Egyptian pounds). They can now purchase the same U.S. product for only 30le, where as it once cost them 70 le. Do you see how this would hurt the U.S. economy? By contrast, An Egyptian product may become more expensive to one using the American dollar. Although American products can be purchased less expensively, we have to consider the COST of manufacturing such product to realize if it became more or less profitable. You do make an important point because I would think that would mean there would be less businesses because the cost to start manufacturing and so there will be more monopolies Thus a strange contradiction that it seems to make things less profitable but it also makes a small number of people extremely rich and powerful and validates my theory that modern imperialism is not profitable but at the same time makes certain people extremely rich Will all the resources in Afghanistan, if they ever become exploited to their fullest extent, be able to pay off the price of occupying that country?
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Post by franklin on Sept 10, 2010 17:55:14 GMT -5
Having more accumulation of capital ultimately lowers profits because there is more competition, the more goods that are produced lowers prices and lowers the profits. This is the reason for the deliberate destruction of wealth in society so people can make personal profits on it This is why we have a system of debt money, it ensures the continual destruction of capital because if all the debts are paid back there is no money. From what I know a commercial bank’s profits come from expected profits in the future, because all the money in existence was actually loaned out. There is only enough money in existence to match the principal on these loans but not the interest, and the bank couldn’t really profit unless principal plus interest is paid back A bank can’t profit from simply foreclosing on homes and stop issuing out loans, because the dollar value of homes falls because of deflation This video talks about the creation of money from debt and how the “elite” purposely force inefficiency, wastefulness and scarcity. However they also have some crazy ideas but it is interesting. The beginning of the documentary talks about how the money is created out of debt which is important “ZEITGEIST II ADDENDUM (FULL MOVIE!) - PLEASE SHARE” www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gKX9TWRyfsOn inflation Keynes talked about the paradoxical nature of the system in which capitalists benefit from something that wreaks havoc against the capitalist system. “The Economic Consequences of the Peace” By John Maynard Keynes books.google.com/books?id=FYG2SAYY8bQC&dq=&pg=PA235#v=onepage&q&f=false[Lenin is said to have declared that the best way to destroy the Capitalist System was to debauch the currency. By a continuing process of inflation, governments can confiscate, secretly and unobserved, an important part of the wealth of their citizens. By this method they not only confiscate, but they confiscate arbitrarily; and, while the process impoverishes many, it actually enriches some. The sight of this arbitrary rearrangement of riches strikes not only at security, but at confidence in the equity of the existing distribution of wealth. Those to whom the system brings windfalls, beyond their deserts and even beyond their expectations or desires, become "profiteers," who are the object of the hatred of the bourgeoisie, whom the inflationism has impoverished, not less than of the proletariat. As the inflation proceeds and the real value of the currency fluctuates wildly from month to month, all permanent relations between debtors and creditors, which form the ultimate foundation of capitalism, become so utterly disordered as to be almost meaningless; and the process of wealth-getting degenerates into a gamble and a lottery. Lenin was certainly right. There is no subtler, no surer means of overturning the existing basis of society than to debauch the currency. The process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and does it in a manner which not one man in a million is able to diagnose.In the latter stages of the war all the belligerent governments practised, from necessity or incompetence, what a Bolshevist might have done from design. Even now, when the war is over, most of them continue out of weakness the same malpractices. But further, the Governments of Europe, being many of them at this moment reckless in their methods as well as weak, seek to direct on to a class known as "profiteers" the popular indignation against the more obvious consequences of their vicious methods. These "profiteers" are, broadly speaking, the entrepreneur class of capitalists, that is to say, the active and constructive element in the whole capitalist society, who in a period of rapidly rising prices cannot help but get rich quick whether they wish it or desire it or not. If prices are continually rising, every trader who has purchased for stock or owns property and plant inevitably makes profits. By directing hatred against this class, therefore, the European Governments are carrying a step further the fatal process which the subtle mind of Lenin had consciously conceived. The profiteers are a consequence and not a cause of rising prices. By combining a popular hatred of the class of entrepreneurs with the blow already given to social security by the violent and arbitrary disturbance of contract and of the established equilibrium of wealth which is the inevitable result of inflation, these Governments are fast rendering impossible a continuance of the social and economic order of the nineteenth century. But they have no plan for replacing it. We are thus faced in Europe with the spectacle of an extraordinary weakness on the part of the great capitalist class, which has emerged from the industrial triumphs of the nineteenth century, and seemed a very few years ago our all-powerful master. The terror and personal timidity of the individuals of this class is now so great, their confidence in their place in society and in their necessity to the social organism so diminished, that they are the easy victims of intimidation. This was not so in England twenty-five years ago, any more than it is now in the United States. Then the capitalists believed in themselves, in their value to society, in the propriety of their continued existence in the full enjoyment of their riches and the unlimited exercise of their power. Now they tremble before every insult;—call them pro-Germans, international financiers, or profiteers, and they will give you any ransom you choose to ask not to speak of them so harshly. They allow themselves to be ruined and altogether undone by their own instruments, governments of their own making, and a press of which they are the proprietors. Perhaps it is historically true that no order of society ever perishes save by its own hand. In the complexer world of Western Europe the Immanent Will may achieve its ends more subtly and bring in the revolution no less inevitably through a Klotz or a George than by the intellectualisms, too ruthless and selfconscious for us, of the bloodthirsty philosophers of Russia…. (He goes on) …If a man is compelled to exchange the fruits of his labors for paper which, as experience soon teaches him, he cannot use to purchase what he requires at a price comparable to that which he has received for his own products, he will keep his produce for himself, dispose of it to his friends and neighbors as a favor, or relax his efforts in producing it. A system of compelling the exchange of commodities at what is not their real relative value not only relaxes production, but leads finally to the waste and inefficiency of barter. If, however, a government refrains from regulation and allows matters to take their course, essential commodities soon attain a level of price out of the reach of all but the rich, the worthlessness of the money becomes apparent, and the fraud upon the public can be concealed no longer.] I recommend watching this it is from 1939 “Vintage pro-inflation propaganda” At the end of the video it claims the mere announcement of inflation will result in a rise in the stock market. The video is in favor of devaluing the currency. Inflation saves America! www.popmodal.com/video/2066/Vintage-pro-inflation-propagandaI'll post more later
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Post by anansi on Sept 10, 2010 23:54:05 GMT -5
So do you believe in the ideas of the Venus project as presented in the video? It is a great idea but then again Communism seemed like a great idea at the time, not saying that the Venus project is not the answer but can we get there knowing who we are.. www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gKX9TWRyfs
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Post by franklin on Sept 11, 2010 14:36:31 GMT -5
The solutions given are absurd At 1:23:20 He even advocates eradicating all laws by doing things like having machines pull cars over when someone is drunk while driving. Of course having drunk drivers automatically pulled over is a good thing but what he is advocating is having no laws or rules in society by having machines fix everything The thing is the people who come up with the solutions would be the ones who rule everything At the beginning of that video they quote from “Modern Money Mechanics” which talks about the fractional reserve system. I thought this was interesting the public has the same amount of money when it withdraws $100 worth of currency from a bank, however the banks could lose $900 “Modern Money Mechanics” www.rayservers.com/images/ModernMoneyMechanics.pdfPage 18 [The public now has the same volume of money as before, except that more is in the form of currency and less is in the form of transaction deposits. Under a 10 percent reserve requirement, the amount of reserves required against the $100 of deposits was only $10, while a full $100 of reserves have been drained away by the disbursement of $100 in currency. Thus, if the bank had no excess reserves, the $100 withdrawal in currency causes a reserve deficiency of $90. Unless new reserves are provided from some other source, bank assets and deposits will have to be reduced (according to the contraction process described on pages 12 and 13) by an additional $900. At that point, the reserve deficiency caused by the cash withdrawal would be eliminated.] It goes on to explain that when currency is returned to banks reserves rise again. Page 19 [Since only $10 must be held against the new $100 in deposits, $90 is excess reserves and can give rise to $900 of additional deposits(7).] This is a great documentary by Milton Freedman, he explains about how in the Great Depression and the fractional reserve system On part two he explains that as people withdraw their deposits from banks several dollars in the system are destroyed. This is why during the Great Depression the money supply fell by 1/3. This is why the 1939 propaganda video I posted earlier was talking about how the worth of the dollar rose when the Great Depression hit. See part two 3:20-3:40 He says that when depositors withdraw money there is a strong tendency for the quantity of money to fall because “Each dollar of cash which is withdrawn from a bank had been backing several dollars of deposits”. Also see part two 5:50-7:30 he talks about the creation and destruction of money. “Milton Friedman Debunking Myth Of The Great Depression” part 1 www.youtube.com/watch?v=_svuPVKiwjs“Milton Friedman Debunking Myth Of The Great Depression” part 2 www.youtube.com/watch?v=QpPF08IAZhY&feature=related“Milton Friedman Debunking Myth Of The Great Depression” part 3 www.youtube.com/watch?v=M_uAU3r4R2Q&feature=related
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Post by franklin on Sept 11, 2010 15:33:40 GMT -5
So the video Zeitgeist is right on many things including deliberate waste so that individuals can make profits greater than what they deserve, and also about fractional reserve lending. According to Milton Friedman instead of relying on the government enterprises can improve themselves in order to keep making profits "Milton Friedman - Monopoly" www.youtube.com/watch?v=tdLBzfFGFQU
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Post by anansi on Sept 11, 2010 23:11:20 GMT -5
So the video Zeitgeist is right on many things including deliberate waste so that individuals can make profits greater than what they deserve, and also about fractional reserve lending. According to Milton Friedman instead of relying on the government enterprises can improve themselves in order to keep making profits "Milton Friedman - Monopoly" www.youtube.com/watch?v=tdLBzfFGFQUThere is a book by Noemi Kline shock doctrine it most definitely should be on your reading list. in it she made mention of the Chicago school of Economic or the Chicago boys Miltion Friedman and others vs the Keynesian school who rebuild Europe after wwII. The Chicago Boys were the ones interfering with local developments and if they didn't get their way they send their economic hit-men or the Jackals(assassins)their way and methods if you read the book caused the near collapse of the global economy and paving the rise or return of the Latin American left. see Peru,Ecuador,Brazil, Venezuela,and even the United States because what we are experiencing right now even within the U.S is raw class warfare. About a civilization without the need for central authority the closest I came across is the Ejagham of Cameroon will post their story else where,but the Venus project seems like an anarchist solution with technology freeing mankind from drudgery..
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Post by franklin on Sept 15, 2010 16:54:51 GMT -5
This video talks about the creation of money from debt and how the “elite” purposely force inefficiency, wastefulness and scarcity. However they also have some crazy ideas but it is interesting. The beginning of the documentary talks about how the money is created out of debt which is important “ZEITGEIST II ADDENDUM (FULL MOVIE!) - PLEASE SHARE” www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gKX9TWRyfsYour probably confused why I posted "Zeitgeist". I posted it because they were talking about the creation of money, which goes with the topic about how inflation is a tax. Other than this I said the video had "crazy ideas", as the quote above shows. And then I showed some more information on the creation of money and the effects of hyperinflation or hyper-deflation as one of the documentaries Milton Friedman shows Milton Friedman also talked about how many of Keynes's ideas were distorted and misused by Keynes's students
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Post by franklin on Sept 15, 2010 17:35:38 GMT -5
Notice how this speech by Ben Bernanke is similar to the 1939 “Vintage pro-inflation propaganda”, for example how prices rise because of the very mention of inflation (and tries to show this as a positive thing) "Remarks by Governor Ben S. Bernanke Before the National Economists Club, Washington, D.C." November 21, 2002 "Deflation: Making Sure "It" Doesn't Happen Here " www.federalreserve.gov/BOARDDOCS/SPEECHES/2002/20021121/default.htm#fn18[The conclusion that deflation is always reversible under a fiat money system follows from basic economic reasoning. A little parable may prove useful: Today an ounce of gold sells for $300, more or less. Now suppose that a modern alchemist solves his subject's oldest problem by finding a way to produce unlimited amounts of new gold at essentially no cost. Moreover, his invention is widely publicized and scientifically verified, and he announces his intention to begin massive production of gold within days. What would happen to the price of gold? Presumably, the potentially unlimited supply of cheap gold would cause the market price of gold to plummet. Indeed, if the market for gold is to any degree efficient, the price of gold would collapse immediately after the announcement of the invention, before the alchemist had produced and marketed a single ounce of yellow metal. What has this got to do with monetary policy? Like gold, U.S. dollars have value only to the extent that they are strictly limited in supply. But the U.S. government has a technology, called a printing press (or, today, its electronic equivalent), that allows it to produce as many U.S. dollars as it wishes at essentially no cost. By increasing the number of U.S. dollars in circulation, or even by credibly threatening to do so, the U.S. government can also reduce the value of a dollar in terms of goods and services, which is equivalent to raising the prices in dollars of those goods and services. We conclude that, under a paper-money system, a determined government can always generate higher spending and hence positive inflation.]
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Post by franklin on Oct 6, 2010 15:42:07 GMT -5
This is a great documentary to look at "The Secret of Oz" I was looking where I could find it on the internet and found this Japanese website. I am skeptical that the Wizard of Oz was written about the gold standard but other than that the documentary does give some useful information. The movie advocates having a debt free fiat money which is ironic because if anything "The Wizard of Oz" was for a bi metal standard using gold and silver as money. Anyway I highly recommend watching it Personally I kind of agree with what Keynes wrote (see quote from Keynes I posted earlier) that it is the government that creates the problems and the government blames the problems on the money changers or bankers who benifit. Show me who creates the laws and I don't care whither JP Morgan or the Rothschilds control the money v.youku.com/v_show/id_XMTcyMjM1MjE2.html
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