Blog 46 Boxing Day, 2016
Unless you happened to get a set of stuffed leather mitts for Christmas, "Boxing Day" must have another meaning. Well, Children, I can tell you. Boxing Day was the day after Christmas Day, when all the boxes the gifts came in were packed away for use another year. You might call it domestic recycling. That was Step One.
Then, your boxes stored, you took your Christmas money and went shopping.
When the owners of stores checked the figures at the end of a Boxing Day, they found they were onto a good thing, and extended their pre-Christmas Sale prices another day, and advertised their Boxing Day Sale! That was Step 2.
Lately, I notice, it has become "Boxing Week Sale!" And surely we can predict a universal Boxing Month Sale! Wow! Then, the Boxing Year Sale, December 26 to December 24!!
Certainly the corporate chain stores, whose employees have forgotten that Sunday used to be called "the day of rest", will rejoice at Boxing Year. The shareholders will demand it, ecstatically.
But what about the money - what the Cogs Blog is all about?
Where does the money come from for a year-long Boxing Day? I should expect to see department stores, as long as they exist at all, to be manned (or womanned) by robots. (Shapely female robots for the Men's Department, of course.) Some wage-savings there will go straight to the bottom line. And the corporate bosses who work seven days a week anyway, will convince the government that its job is to provide the customers with money to spend. Governments will do as they are told as always and, instead of taxing, will just send out a steady flow of GAI payments.
GAI? It's an old idea: Guaranteed Annual Income - for all citizens. Maybe, Baby, its time has come at last!
And where will the governments' money come from? Won't that be inflationary?
Oh, come on, now, get with it. Government money (the kind with the presidents' pictures on it) is rapidly disappearing. And banks don't print money. Banks create credit, which already covers almost all of our money needs. So governments can create credit, too. Indefinitely.
As for inflation, so what? Even if it happens, the law of money will still operate: money goes where money is. It will still accumulate at the top. The Forbes Five Hundred listing of the world's richest people will simply list more billionaires and fewer millionaires, then more trillionaires than billionaires. Quadrillionaires? Sure. We might want to shorten the names of our monetary units to "bills", "trills" and "quads". Everybody will soon forget the zeroes. This is no pipe dream. (Some old folks can remember when a loaf of bread cost 12 cents. Really.) Inflation is just something we do already. Only, with GAI, everybody gets what they want. The poor get three meals a day. The management classes get do their satisfying, creative work. The shareholders get their dividends, and the accumulation addicts, accumulate.
All that sounds like an almost boringly good alternative to the world's current situation..
Happy New Year!
Your devoted blogger.
Monday, 26 December 2016
Sunday, 18 December 2016
Blog 45 "Free" Trade and Global Power, or Why Danny Won't Mow My Lawn.
Blog 45 Free Trade and Global Power
I hired a boy to mow my lawn. At least I think I did. It was his idea. He knocked on my door and asked if he could mow my 1500 square feet of ratty turf. Ten dollars. His lawnmower. "Okay," I said "Start Monday." He did a good job. Every Monday he came. Every Monday, I paid.
About halfway through the summer, I received a birthday present, a shiny green power mower. Well, that should be an improvement, I thought. I'll save a hundred dollars over the summer and also benefit from some needed exercise. So when Danny came on Monday, I told hin that would be his last cut. I paid him, and added a $10 tip.
That evening Danny returned with his lawyer father, who told me that I could mow my own lawn, but I had to pay Danny another $120 for another twelve weeks of the season, plus another $10 tip. He used the phrase, "compensation for the loss of future profits." Keep that phrase in mind. We'll get back to it.
Neighbourly discussion followed, which got nowhere (though at one point he did attempt to twist my arm behind my back. I stepped on his instep, and he swore, but let go of my arm. Finally we hailed a passing neighbour and asked him if he would help resolve a dispute, acting as a third party we both trusted. He agreed, and we each stated our case. He thoughtfully turned it over and then said, "Well, if I am going to be a judge here, I'll have to charge you $10, plus a $10 tip, each."
To avoid an assault charge, I capitulated, and paid..
Does that phrase "compensation for loss of future profits" suggest what the next 200 words of this blog is about?
Part 2
Well, it's a new breed of international trade treaties, which began with Chapter 11 of NAFTA, the North American Free Trade Agreement, 1994, a deal between, Canada, the United States and Mexico.
NAFTA's Chapter 11 is not about trade; it was about investor protection. Essentially, it says that if an investor (read: "corporation") of one signatory country invested in another country, and that country's governments made any regulations or laws that affected the profits of "the investor", said investor could claim compensation from the offending national government for loss of profit, including loss of future profits. (You may want to read that sentence again.)
The lawsuit format is as follows:
Each party, the investing corporation and the national government that made the regulation, appoints one adjudicator, and the two appoint a third one. Two out of three is a win.
(I read a recent piece on the exorbitant fees charged by the three adjudicators.)
Every so-called free trade agreement since 1994 has contained these investor protection clauses.
From the corporations' point of view, all of the hundreds of pages of a treaty's trade provisions about tariffs on turnips and regiulations about raisins are mere window dressing. What counts is the investor protection clauses.
In the current global conflict between global corporations and national states, when this joker is in the pact, the deck is stacked. There are now, in fact, dummy corporations set up for the sole purpose of suing a national government for loss of future profits!
Time for the nation states to fight back?
Actually, they are. At least some peoples are - by turfing out corporate-friendly governments and electing... Well, you know who...
Okay.
Okay!
Well, at least I feel good about the exercise, and the green mower works well, too.
I hired a boy to mow my lawn. At least I think I did. It was his idea. He knocked on my door and asked if he could mow my 1500 square feet of ratty turf. Ten dollars. His lawnmower. "Okay," I said "Start Monday." He did a good job. Every Monday he came. Every Monday, I paid.
About halfway through the summer, I received a birthday present, a shiny green power mower. Well, that should be an improvement, I thought. I'll save a hundred dollars over the summer and also benefit from some needed exercise. So when Danny came on Monday, I told hin that would be his last cut. I paid him, and added a $10 tip.
That evening Danny returned with his lawyer father, who told me that I could mow my own lawn, but I had to pay Danny another $120 for another twelve weeks of the season, plus another $10 tip. He used the phrase, "compensation for the loss of future profits." Keep that phrase in mind. We'll get back to it.
Neighbourly discussion followed, which got nowhere (though at one point he did attempt to twist my arm behind my back. I stepped on his instep, and he swore, but let go of my arm. Finally we hailed a passing neighbour and asked him if he would help resolve a dispute, acting as a third party we both trusted. He agreed, and we each stated our case. He thoughtfully turned it over and then said, "Well, if I am going to be a judge here, I'll have to charge you $10, plus a $10 tip, each."
To avoid an assault charge, I capitulated, and paid..
Does that phrase "compensation for loss of future profits" suggest what the next 200 words of this blog is about?
Part 2
Well, it's a new breed of international trade treaties, which began with Chapter 11 of NAFTA, the North American Free Trade Agreement, 1994, a deal between, Canada, the United States and Mexico.
NAFTA's Chapter 11 is not about trade; it was about investor protection. Essentially, it says that if an investor (read: "corporation") of one signatory country invested in another country, and that country's governments made any regulations or laws that affected the profits of "the investor", said investor could claim compensation from the offending national government for loss of profit, including loss of future profits. (You may want to read that sentence again.)
The lawsuit format is as follows:
Each party, the investing corporation and the national government that made the regulation, appoints one adjudicator, and the two appoint a third one. Two out of three is a win.
(I read a recent piece on the exorbitant fees charged by the three adjudicators.)
Every so-called free trade agreement since 1994 has contained these investor protection clauses.
From the corporations' point of view, all of the hundreds of pages of a treaty's trade provisions about tariffs on turnips and regiulations about raisins are mere window dressing. What counts is the investor protection clauses.
In the current global conflict between global corporations and national states, when this joker is in the pact, the deck is stacked. There are now, in fact, dummy corporations set up for the sole purpose of suing a national government for loss of future profits!
Time for the nation states to fight back?
Actually, they are. At least some peoples are - by turfing out corporate-friendly governments and electing... Well, you know who...
Okay.
Okay!
Well, at least I feel good about the exercise, and the green mower works well, too.
Monday, 28 November 2016
Blog 44 The New Feudalism, Saluting Nelson
Blog 44 The New Feudalism, Saluting Nelson
Have just ordered a book with "Feudalism" in the title. It promises to be an interesting read. So in preparation for a likely blog on it, let me, briefly, recall the traditional historical stuff on feudalism.
Place: Europe
Time: say, 1000 to 1400 AD
Subject: Economic and political organization of mediaeval society.
Whoa!! That's a large pretentious mouthful. Take it one word at a time.
Highlights (with key points underlined for quick reading.)
Three classes: nobles, peasants, and clergy. Not much in the middle.
Wealth based on land-owning.
That means wealth was not based on manufacturing, trade, finance, factory fishing fleets, tourism, mining, or transportation infrastructure construction. So forget this paragraph
Instead, focus your imagination on farm laborers tilling and toiling, without our modern machinery, to produce food for the owners of the land. All the land was owned by the secular nobility (few) and the Church "lords" (few). Most of the rest of the population were peasants, who labored on the land, or, when needed, fought their lords' wars to grab more land.
The law of money operated then as now. Wealth (land) bought power, and power (land) seized wealth (some other lord's land).
A critical feature of the unequal distribution of wealth was the absence of trade and transport between territories. Local states, kingdoms, dukedoms, were isolated from each other (towns were rare). That is, feudalism looked like the total opposite of today's integrated, global, urban economy - except for the unequal distribution of wealth in both.
The feudal system came out of the disintegration of the largest international community hitherto known to Europe - the Roman Empire.
By 476 AD, when the last Roman emperor was deposed by a barbarian* invasion from the north, local strongmen all across Europe had begun a thousand-year process of forging their own independent, self-sufficient estates based on agriculture and warfare.
It was a shoddy business. (During the process they even forgot how the Romans had made concrete!) So the feudal age was all about localism, agriculture, petty wars - oh, and religion.
Thomas Hobbes, looking back, glumly called it life in a state of nature. "No arts, no letters (literature), no society, and which is worst of all, continual fear, and danger of violent death; and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short." (1561).
Perhaps you can see why Joyce Nelson's new book, Beyond Banksters: Resisting the New Feudalism, interests your thoughtful blogger. I survey our own fracturing world, in which our rulers (bound by the law of money) have possibly brought us to an irreversible (?) tipping-point into revolution, separation, isolation and war.
Well, we'll see what Nelson has to say about the irresistibility of it, and report to you. "Irresistibility". Wow, seven syllables and five 'i's!. It should be banned.
The book can be ordered at http://watershedsentinel.ca/banksters. About $25.
* Another verbal footnote: barbarian. The Romans, charmed by their own melodious Latin, thought that the speech of the northern Franco-German invaders sounded like barbarbarbarbar. So they called them barbarians. But if your name is Barbara, you should know also that dark Mediterranean men have for centuries been bewitched by blue-eyed, blond Nordic women...
Have just ordered a book with "Feudalism" in the title. It promises to be an interesting read. So in preparation for a likely blog on it, let me, briefly, recall the traditional historical stuff on feudalism.
Place: Europe
Time: say, 1000 to 1400 AD
Subject: Economic and political organization of mediaeval society.
Whoa!! That's a large pretentious mouthful. Take it one word at a time.
Highlights (with key points underlined for quick reading.)
Three classes: nobles, peasants, and clergy. Not much in the middle.
Wealth based on land-owning.
That means wealth was not based on manufacturing, trade, finance, factory fishing fleets, tourism, mining, or transportation infrastructure construction. So forget this paragraph
Instead, focus your imagination on farm laborers tilling and toiling, without our modern machinery, to produce food for the owners of the land. All the land was owned by the secular nobility (few) and the Church "lords" (few). Most of the rest of the population were peasants, who labored on the land, or, when needed, fought their lords' wars to grab more land.
The law of money operated then as now. Wealth (land) bought power, and power (land) seized wealth (some other lord's land).
A critical feature of the unequal distribution of wealth was the absence of trade and transport between territories. Local states, kingdoms, dukedoms, were isolated from each other (towns were rare). That is, feudalism looked like the total opposite of today's integrated, global, urban economy - except for the unequal distribution of wealth in both.
The feudal system came out of the disintegration of the largest international community hitherto known to Europe - the Roman Empire.
By 476 AD, when the last Roman emperor was deposed by a barbarian* invasion from the north, local strongmen all across Europe had begun a thousand-year process of forging their own independent, self-sufficient estates based on agriculture and warfare.
It was a shoddy business. (During the process they even forgot how the Romans had made concrete!) So the feudal age was all about localism, agriculture, petty wars - oh, and religion.
Thomas Hobbes, looking back, glumly called it life in a state of nature. "No arts, no letters (literature), no society, and which is worst of all, continual fear, and danger of violent death; and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short." (1561).
Perhaps you can see why Joyce Nelson's new book, Beyond Banksters: Resisting the New Feudalism, interests your thoughtful blogger. I survey our own fracturing world, in which our rulers (bound by the law of money) have possibly brought us to an irreversible (?) tipping-point into revolution, separation, isolation and war.
Well, we'll see what Nelson has to say about the irresistibility of it, and report to you. "Irresistibility". Wow, seven syllables and five 'i's!. It should be banned.
The book can be ordered at http://watershedsentinel.ca/banksters. About $25.
* Another verbal footnote: barbarian. The Romans, charmed by their own melodious Latin, thought that the speech of the northern Franco-German invaders sounded like barbarbarbarbar. So they called them barbarians. But if your name is Barbara, you should know also that dark Mediterranean men have for centuries been bewitched by blue-eyed, blond Nordic women...
Sunday, 6 November 2016
Blog 43 After the Election
Blog 43 After the Election; (Your Humble Historian Predicts)
Does it matter who wins? Whether it's Hillary or Donald, she/he will do what all presidents, particularly Republicans, have done of recent decades. Once elected, distance yourself from the main bank of electors who supported you. For Trump, that will be the white, slightly racist, somewhat xenophobic working slobs who have taken a beating in recent years in the great transfer of wealth, and, of course, the Christian Right, who also long for the return of the good old days. In neither of these groups will Trump see anything useful to him. So "You're fired!" He'll take the short term view, confident that when he starts running for a second term sometime in 2019, they'll be easy to bamboozle again. Clinton may do a little more to benefit both Trump supporters and her own 2016 base in young people, women, Latinos. But as for corporate wealth and power? She'll find it easier to join 'em than to buck them.
Forecast: The United States of America is in for twenty years or more of continuing decline in consensus. "United" they will not be in social cohesion nor national patriotism. Nor even in political union.
In my modest forecast: the states will claim their constitutional power to secede into separate ideological islands, which they will justify defending, if necessary, with pure citizen firepower. The Second Amendment was never intended to permit every man woman and child to pack a gun. But what it did intend we may well see - citizen militias exerting their right to do so in defense of their "states". So forget about "Unum", and start again at "Pluribus"
Sooner or later, let us hope, a new generation will see the folly of their parents in the early 21st century and insist on at least a return to peaceful co-existence, or, better - who knows? - happy reunion and a "great" American democratic republic again.
They will recall one of the greats: Abe Lincoln, who said "A house divided against itself cannot stand." He was talking about slave and free. The same will be said about poor and rich.
The irony would be rather amusing, too, to hear future historians, recording the big picture, giving credit for the resurrection of the great new American democratic "Share the Wealth" republic to President Trump, because he started it all. I'm serious. So don't be anxious about Tuesday. It just a blip on the cosmic screen.
Wednesday, 26 October 2016
Blog 42 Do We Really Need Governments?
Blog 42 Do We Really Need Governments? - Some Tricky Musings
Let's just start with some background by establishing that there are different forms of government.
In alphabetical order. Asterisk* indicates a form of government defined by Aristotle about 2500 years ago. Nothing new there.
Anarchy*, aristocracy*, autocracy*, democracy 1 (mob rule)*, democracy 2 (representative government), dictatorship, "kleptocracy", monarchy*. oligarchy*, plutocracy, tyranny.* Wow, is that all?
Anarchy means "no government". Aristotle thought of it as "mob rule" He called it "democracy." (Literally, in Greek, "rule by the common people").
Aristocracy - means "rule of the best." Two perverted forms of it are are Oligarchy, which means "rule of the few" and Plutocracy - rule of the rich" from Plutus, Roman god of riches, (Now we're getting warm. )
Autocracy, Aristotle's "tyranny" (modern "dictatorship"). Means "myself-rule" a ruler who rules for his/her own benefit, by force, usually.
Democracy 2, representative government, of, by, and for the people - to quote Abe Lincoln.
Kleptocracy. modern rhetorical term based on the Greek word for thief. So government by thieves.
Monarchy - Rule by a king or queen. Can be autocratic or constitutional.
Note: At the present time, all these forms of government call themselves democratic.
Back to our question. Do we need governments?
Let's talk about modern "democracy".
We all know what the word means. It means rule by the people. So the theory is that the ultimate power lies with the people. But in a population of several million (or billion), different people have different views. So, in practice elections are held, and a candidate with the most votes becomes the people's representative for a defined period.
However, in theory and, especially, in practice democracy works better in small states than in large ones.
So, fundamentally, what does a government do. Two main things, tax and spend.
In the process, money is taken from individuals and corporations, and spent to provide public goods and services, notably for people who can't provide for themselves. It's a kind of charity, but what else could you do? Keep 'em quiet, the Roman emperors said, and they won't revolt. It is a good thing. Really.
If you consider the return on investment, much of it is very good. Public health care keeps workers healthy, and reduces absenteeism in the work force. Education provides better workers, but, the flip side, also smarter voters. Roads, railways, canals, a justice system, benefit almost all classes.
Something else governments are spending large amounts of their tax money on today is paying the interest on government debt. Not much attention to paying down the debt itself, for some strange reason.
(So one way to get some of your taxes back is to save your money and buy your government's bonds.)
The fourth big expenditure - the military. Can't say much about the social value of that, but it does provide employment, and when the weapons are put to use, population reduction.
But - new point - governments all over the world are on the ropes. High debt levels mean higher taxes and/or lower public expenditure. So if you are against taxes, but not against privates banks creating all money, you can advocate that at least some of the big four expenditures be cut. If you could choose only one, which would it be? Health care, education, transportation infrastructure, or military spending?
Why?
Think, now.
My choice would be debt repayment, just because I don't like interest payments. Debt reduction would be really hard on our banks, which have lent most of that money to governments. And some recent governments have tried paying it off - by borrowing more money bank-created money. (????) Can't be done.
But if governments were to resurrect their old sovereign practice of creating their own national interest-free money...
That, would be a real showdown between national states and banking corporations. On which side would you lay your bet - if you had any money left for betting, after your taxes and your mortgage payments?
Banks or governments?
Couldn't we just maintain a beneficial balance between them?
Let's just start with some background by establishing that there are different forms of government.
In alphabetical order. Asterisk* indicates a form of government defined by Aristotle about 2500 years ago. Nothing new there.
Anarchy*, aristocracy*, autocracy*, democracy 1 (mob rule)*, democracy 2 (representative government), dictatorship, "kleptocracy", monarchy*. oligarchy*, plutocracy, tyranny.* Wow, is that all?
Anarchy means "no government". Aristotle thought of it as "mob rule" He called it "democracy." (Literally, in Greek, "rule by the common people").
Aristocracy - means "rule of the best." Two perverted forms of it are are Oligarchy, which means "rule of the few" and Plutocracy - rule of the rich" from Plutus, Roman god of riches, (Now we're getting warm. )
Autocracy, Aristotle's "tyranny" (modern "dictatorship"). Means "myself-rule" a ruler who rules for his/her own benefit, by force, usually.
Democracy 2, representative government, of, by, and for the people - to quote Abe Lincoln.
Kleptocracy. modern rhetorical term based on the Greek word for thief. So government by thieves.
Monarchy - Rule by a king or queen. Can be autocratic or constitutional.
Note: At the present time, all these forms of government call themselves democratic.
Back to our question. Do we need governments?
Let's talk about modern "democracy".
We all know what the word means. It means rule by the people. So the theory is that the ultimate power lies with the people. But in a population of several million (or billion), different people have different views. So, in practice elections are held, and a candidate with the most votes becomes the people's representative for a defined period.
However, in theory and, especially, in practice democracy works better in small states than in large ones.
So, fundamentally, what does a government do. Two main things, tax and spend.
In the process, money is taken from individuals and corporations, and spent to provide public goods and services, notably for people who can't provide for themselves. It's a kind of charity, but what else could you do? Keep 'em quiet, the Roman emperors said, and they won't revolt. It is a good thing. Really.
If you consider the return on investment, much of it is very good. Public health care keeps workers healthy, and reduces absenteeism in the work force. Education provides better workers, but, the flip side, also smarter voters. Roads, railways, canals, a justice system, benefit almost all classes.
Something else governments are spending large amounts of their tax money on today is paying the interest on government debt. Not much attention to paying down the debt itself, for some strange reason.
(So one way to get some of your taxes back is to save your money and buy your government's bonds.)
The fourth big expenditure - the military. Can't say much about the social value of that, but it does provide employment, and when the weapons are put to use, population reduction.
But - new point - governments all over the world are on the ropes. High debt levels mean higher taxes and/or lower public expenditure. So if you are against taxes, but not against privates banks creating all money, you can advocate that at least some of the big four expenditures be cut. If you could choose only one, which would it be? Health care, education, transportation infrastructure, or military spending?
Why?
Think, now.
My choice would be debt repayment, just because I don't like interest payments. Debt reduction would be really hard on our banks, which have lent most of that money to governments. And some recent governments have tried paying it off - by borrowing more money bank-created money. (????) Can't be done.
But if governments were to resurrect their old sovereign practice of creating their own national interest-free money...
That, would be a real showdown between national states and banking corporations. On which side would you lay your bet - if you had any money left for betting, after your taxes and your mortgage payments?
Banks or governments?
Couldn't we just maintain a beneficial balance between them?
Tuesday, 18 October 2016
Blog 41 The Money Scene (review)
41 The Money Scene (reprise) Where does money come from?
First, there are two distinct kinds of money. There is cash, actually printed or minted by governments . And there is credit money, created by banks and rented to us.
You probably use the rented money for almost all of your transactions if you pay by cheque, debit/credit card, or electronic transfers. Credit money does not come from a printing press. But you do have to rent it. (Hey, Doc, you mean pay interest. You can say it out loud.)
Okay. Now for the big mystery, the real secret. How do banks create the money we use>
It has been said by wiser accountants than me, "It is so simple it's hard to believe."
First, there are two distinct kinds of money. There is cash, actually printed or minted by governments . And there is credit money, created by banks and rented to us.
You probably use the rented money for almost all of your transactions if you pay by cheque, debit/credit card, or electronic transfers. Credit money does not come from a printing press. But you do have to rent it. (Hey, Doc, you mean pay interest. You can say it out loud.)
Okay. Now for the big mystery, the real secret. How do banks create the money we use>
It has been said by wiser accountants than me, "It is so simple it's hard to believe."
The Money Scene
You may have seen those TV ads where a young couple smile at each other, and a bank officer - well-dressed, good-looking and devoted to the young couple's best interests - has just told them what they want to hear. She will give them $25,000 for that new car, or for their daughter's school fees, or whatever.
What follows - not shown in the ad - is a lot of document signing. Finally comes the critical moment. After you have signed the documents, the bank agent tells you that $25,000 has just been transferred to your account.
At that moment, at that very moment, $25,000 in new money has entered into the world's economy.
It is certainly real money. You write the cheque and get your car. Or your daughter gets her school uniform.
The process is so simple: a bank willing to lend makes an agreement with a client willing to borrow. And it is same process, exactly, if General Motors or Exxon wants to borrow a billion dollars. It's not cash, but it is money, ready to be spent.
And it is new money. The bank does not take it from a stack of cash in its vault nor shave it from an ingot of gold in the basement. It just pops into existence! Really!
So, remembering the law: Money goes where money is, let's follow the trail. What was the key question you asked before signing (and signing, and signing) the papers to get the loan? Of course, "What is the interest rate on the loan?"
The key word in the global monetary system has to be "interest". Sometimes called "rent".
So the couple, or you, can live in this $25,000 Loan Street dwelling as long as you pay the rent. Correct? But, no, you say. We have to pay back the principal of the loan.
No, no, and no!
Now this may be a little difficult to grasp, too. The bank really does not want you to pay back the principal, ever* So long as you pay the rent they will rejoice to let you keep the credit money. (After all, they created it out of thin air.) For you, on the other hand, if you no longer had to pay the rent, that would be great. Right?
And for the bank? Well not so good. It would be a bad thing for the bank. When you pay back the principal of a loan, they have to write a profitable asset off their books. No loans on the books, no rent/interest coming in. No rent, no profit. No profit, no salaries for bank execs, and no dividends for shareholders. Not good.
You see how the system works? The expectation that you will pay off the principal is just window dressing.
Let me finish with a mind-expanding question. What if you had no government-created non-debt cash money? For the world's banks that is the great and glorious ultimate profitable goal. And they are getting closer to it! Just think, if banks controlled interest rates and fees, and you had no cash available to escape to...
*Next blog will face-off governments and banks. Tune in, I hope you may learn something else new.
Sunday, 18 September 2016
Blog 40 Three Points for Peace
Blog 40 Three Points for Peace A 3-in-1 blog: not the short one we promised last blog. Sorry. But you could read it in three separate coffee breaks.
1. Police and the People
As policemen march to the funeral of a fallen police officer, what thoughts lie behind those grim faces? Could it ever be, "My job would be much less dangerous if we could somehow make friends of these people instead of provoking them."
It is challenging, scary thought, but the alternative is escalation, to everybody's peril.
The initiative must probably come from the police, but they should invite/welcome the people they fear to join the discussion.
2 Religious War. Here's a secret recipe for peace between three religions. Get Christians, Muslims and Jews to start a program - preferably a mass program (no pun intended) - of reading each others' holy books. Let the people read without guidance from their clergy, and search for the similarities. Most will be hugely surprised. Why exclude the priests, pastors, imams, mullahs and rabbis? Because they would be unable to look for anything but differences.
Maybe I can make that point with six almost random quotations from the Hebrew, Muslim and Christian scriptures. (Two each from the Kuran, the Christian scriptures and the Hebrew scriptures.)
Which is which?.
(For the usual names - Jahweh, God, Allah - I have substituted "the Deity,"
Ready?
1 - Do not behave like those who slandered Moses. The Deity cleared him and he was exalted by the Deity.
2 - Make every effort to live in peace with all men and to be holy.
3 - Fear the Deity and speak the truth. He will bless your works and forgive you your sins.
4 - To the Deity belong wisdom and power, counselling and understanding.
5 - He will save the children of the needy; he will crush the oppressor.
6 - Let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Deity in heaven.
Hint: The first quotation is from the Kuran, which has lots of other praises for Moses, Joseph, Abraham, Jesus, Mary, Jonah, and other characters well-known to Jews and Christians.
3. Narrowing the Wealth Gap. This is the big one; you might want to save it for tomorrow.
Corporations are arguably the chief institutional means by which the rich get richer and the poor get poorer; especially the banking corporations, which create money for buying up assets, but are not much interested in the poor.
The war between nation states and global corporations is about the world's wealth. At present the corporations are winning the war: wealth- and corporate-friendly governments are in power in most of the world. Need I quote examples? Democratic governments, weighted with debt, are definitely in decline.
The corporate propaganda has done a great job of deceiving people into believing that all their troubles stem from taxation by greedy governments. Not true.
But corporations are not invulnerable.
So, in 250 words, or less, CogsBlogger, how do we reduce the power of corporations over governments?
You can never go back, of course, but try your imagination on this scenario:
On the first Tuesday of every month the names of two corporations are posted, world-wide on social media, with a call to boycott their products, on the understanding that as soon as the corporations change, the boycott will be lifted.
The change required of the named firm would be to surrender the company's charter (which was issued by some government) and replace it with a new charter that contained:
i An over-riding social responsibility clause to replace the current exclusive responsibility to shareholders.
ii. A clause making all shareholders liable for the corporation's social violations (think BP oil spill, or Bhopal chemical spill), up to 10% of the market value of their share-holdings.
iii The issuing of 10% of the corporation's outstanding shares to the national government which issued the charter. The government, as 10% shareholder, is then to entitled to 10% of the firm's dividends. Just think, it might be possible for some national governments to abandon corporate taxation altogether. (Wow!)
This is a rough proposal. Lots of improvements and implementation details needed. Not to mention, secrecy at its hatching. Please don't say you saw it first on CogsBlog 40.
1. Police and the People
As policemen march to the funeral of a fallen police officer, what thoughts lie behind those grim faces? Could it ever be, "My job would be much less dangerous if we could somehow make friends of these people instead of provoking them."
It is challenging, scary thought, but the alternative is escalation, to everybody's peril.
The initiative must probably come from the police, but they should invite/welcome the people they fear to join the discussion.
2 Religious War. Here's a secret recipe for peace between three religions. Get Christians, Muslims and Jews to start a program - preferably a mass program (no pun intended) - of reading each others' holy books. Let the people read without guidance from their clergy, and search for the similarities. Most will be hugely surprised. Why exclude the priests, pastors, imams, mullahs and rabbis? Because they would be unable to look for anything but differences.
Maybe I can make that point with six almost random quotations from the Hebrew, Muslim and Christian scriptures. (Two each from the Kuran, the Christian scriptures and the Hebrew scriptures.)
Which is which?.
(For the usual names - Jahweh, God, Allah - I have substituted "the Deity,"
Ready?
1 - Do not behave like those who slandered Moses. The Deity cleared him and he was exalted by the Deity.
2 - Make every effort to live in peace with all men and to be holy.
3 - Fear the Deity and speak the truth. He will bless your works and forgive you your sins.
4 - To the Deity belong wisdom and power, counselling and understanding.
5 - He will save the children of the needy; he will crush the oppressor.
6 - Let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Deity in heaven.
Hint: The first quotation is from the Kuran, which has lots of other praises for Moses, Joseph, Abraham, Jesus, Mary, Jonah, and other characters well-known to Jews and Christians.
3. Narrowing the Wealth Gap. This is the big one; you might want to save it for tomorrow.
Corporations are arguably the chief institutional means by which the rich get richer and the poor get poorer; especially the banking corporations, which create money for buying up assets, but are not much interested in the poor.
The war between nation states and global corporations is about the world's wealth. At present the corporations are winning the war: wealth- and corporate-friendly governments are in power in most of the world. Need I quote examples? Democratic governments, weighted with debt, are definitely in decline.
The corporate propaganda has done a great job of deceiving people into believing that all their troubles stem from taxation by greedy governments. Not true.
But corporations are not invulnerable.
So, in 250 words, or less, CogsBlogger, how do we reduce the power of corporations over governments?
You can never go back, of course, but try your imagination on this scenario:
On the first Tuesday of every month the names of two corporations are posted, world-wide on social media, with a call to boycott their products, on the understanding that as soon as the corporations change, the boycott will be lifted.
The change required of the named firm would be to surrender the company's charter (which was issued by some government) and replace it with a new charter that contained:
i An over-riding social responsibility clause to replace the current exclusive responsibility to shareholders.
ii. A clause making all shareholders liable for the corporation's social violations (think BP oil spill, or Bhopal chemical spill), up to 10% of the market value of their share-holdings.
iii The issuing of 10% of the corporation's outstanding shares to the national government which issued the charter. The government, as 10% shareholder, is then to entitled to 10% of the firm's dividends. Just think, it might be possible for some national governments to abandon corporate taxation altogether. (Wow!)
This is a rough proposal. Lots of improvements and implementation details needed. Not to mention, secrecy at its hatching. Please don't say you saw it first on CogsBlog 40.
Friday, 9 September 2016
Blog 39 Of Divided Families, Part 2 The Wealth Gap
Blog 39 Of Divided Families: the Wealth Gap
Power
Money
Power
Money
History knows that human societies rise and fall. Often the fall stage is signalled by wide, bitter, irrational divisions. In 2016 the hopeful word there is "irrational" - because that can be corrected; I'll get to that in Blog 40.
As we have seen (Blog 38) religion can divide, and
Law and Order efforts can divide.
This blog argues that the law of money creates the "wealth gap" which underlies most other divides. So let's go there, now.
Money goes where money is.
That means that those who have the most money will amass even more; and those with the least money are doomed to have less.
Are we there yet, Mommy? We're getting there.
In modern times (call that the last 300 years) we have seen the rise of Britain, and the rise of America, (to say nothing of the rise of capitalism, the rise of social democracy, and the rise of technology).
Then comes the fall. Why? Let me suggest that the wealth gap is often the trigger. Here's the pattern.
Step 1. The law of money leads to a point where a few people own most of the wealth in a community In 2016 it was calculated that, in the community we know as Planet Earth, 1% of the people have achieved ownership of 50% of the planets human-held wealth. Earth's population is about 8 billion (8,000,000,000). That means that 80 million (80,000,000) persons own half the world's capital and resources. and the other half is divided among 7.2 billion (7,200,000,000).
Now 80 million is about the size of a medium size nation, say Germany, Turkey or Thailand. By global standards, then, it is not a big group at risk if the 7.2 billion were to turn on them.
History suggests they will. Current events suggest they already have!
In 1770, when the British Empire seemed irresistible as it spread around the globe ("The sun never sets on the Union Jack." they said), Oliver Goldsmith said:
Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey,
Where wealth accumulates and men decay.
Or, as my grandfather - a wise old man - expressed it:
"Shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in four generations."
Step 2. Rebellion/revolution. Revolutions almost always start with the middle class. (The poor are too occupied procuring their daily bread. It is the middle class, educated, but staring down a narrowing tunnel to insecurity and poverty, who look up searching for some one to blame. Occasionally, they even correctly identify the culprits ("Occupy Wall Street", for example). More often they take aim first at their established politicians or rulers.
Foreigners - in language, race, or religion - are often innocent targets.
Step 3. Once the middle class revolution has begun to take off, the poor get involved. They start out accepting the middle class leadership, but then, being more numerous, take over the revolution!!
And while the middle class have grievances to be remedied,
the poorer classes have a bitter history of injuries to be revenged!!
They often latch on to a radical leader who promises them what want to be promised.
That's when the really nasty stuff happens. That's when the policeman - decent, trained civil servant, a family breadwinner on a modest income - becomes a target, and huddles deeper into his, or her, cruiser and body armor, thinking, "A policeman's lot is not a happy one" So they upgrade their weaponry and strike back. And stupid violence escalates in the neighborhood. So much for law and order.
As for religious divisions, they are sharpened by leaders who favour restraint and even poverty. Others favour the "prosperity gospel" ("God wants you to be rich.") Some pump up the violent passages of their scriptures. Things are getting very bad.
But the wealthy ruling few have the most to lose. And since money buys power, they use it. They direct their politicians to "beef up" security, and to drum up wars.
Wars - a tried and true device for diverting dissent. And wars are good for business. Every bomb that explodes, every tank that erupts in flames, every plane that crashes, every building flattened, every coffin buried, requires work to replace it. Work means wages; wages cost money. So governments (encouraged by their masters) create or borrow money. Workers are happy to get it and spend it. The economy booms. (Shareholders, large and small, are ecstatic.) And it takes a few years for all the new money to work its way to the top.
Also, in a war the troublesome discontented from the working class can be persuaded to join the army on the promise of good pay. The troublesome discontented from the middle class - revolutionary leaders, intellectuals, journalists - can be jailed as unpatriotic, or spies or threats to public safety. It is claimed to be win-win-win, all round. And who remains to deny it?
Well, I'll leave with this over-long guide to the real daily news in 2016. So keep your eye on that TV and be questioning and critical. For instance, is China's sabre-rattling in the China Seas a device to divert middle-class unrest at home? And what is fuelling ISIS?
Your humble blogger is just reflecting on history. But Blog 40 will be upbeat, practical - and shorter. It will have practical advice and hope for the survival of us all.
As we have seen (Blog 38) religion can divide, and
Law and Order efforts can divide.
This blog argues that the law of money creates the "wealth gap" which underlies most other divides. So let's go there, now.
Money goes where money is.
That means that those who have the most money will amass even more; and those with the least money are doomed to have less.
Are we there yet, Mommy? We're getting there.
In modern times (call that the last 300 years) we have seen the rise of Britain, and the rise of America, (to say nothing of the rise of capitalism, the rise of social democracy, and the rise of technology).
Then comes the fall. Why? Let me suggest that the wealth gap is often the trigger. Here's the pattern.
Step 1. The law of money leads to a point where a few people own most of the wealth in a community In 2016 it was calculated that, in the community we know as Planet Earth, 1% of the people have achieved ownership of 50% of the planets human-held wealth. Earth's population is about 8 billion (8,000,000,000). That means that 80 million (80,000,000) persons own half the world's capital and resources. and the other half is divided among 7.2 billion (7,200,000,000).
Now 80 million is about the size of a medium size nation, say Germany, Turkey or Thailand. By global standards, then, it is not a big group at risk if the 7.2 billion were to turn on them.
History suggests they will. Current events suggest they already have!
In 1770, when the British Empire seemed irresistible as it spread around the globe ("The sun never sets on the Union Jack." they said), Oliver Goldsmith said:
Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey,
Where wealth accumulates and men decay.
Or, as my grandfather - a wise old man - expressed it:
"Shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in four generations."
Step 2. Rebellion/revolution. Revolutions almost always start with the middle class. (The poor are too occupied procuring their daily bread. It is the middle class, educated, but staring down a narrowing tunnel to insecurity and poverty, who look up searching for some one to blame. Occasionally, they even correctly identify the culprits ("Occupy Wall Street", for example). More often they take aim first at their established politicians or rulers.
Foreigners - in language, race, or religion - are often innocent targets.
Step 3. Once the middle class revolution has begun to take off, the poor get involved. They start out accepting the middle class leadership, but then, being more numerous, take over the revolution!!
And while the middle class have grievances to be remedied,
the poorer classes have a bitter history of injuries to be revenged!!
They often latch on to a radical leader who promises them what want to be promised.
That's when the really nasty stuff happens. That's when the policeman - decent, trained civil servant, a family breadwinner on a modest income - becomes a target, and huddles deeper into his, or her, cruiser and body armor, thinking, "A policeman's lot is not a happy one" So they upgrade their weaponry and strike back. And stupid violence escalates in the neighborhood. So much for law and order.
As for religious divisions, they are sharpened by leaders who favour restraint and even poverty. Others favour the "prosperity gospel" ("God wants you to be rich.") Some pump up the violent passages of their scriptures. Things are getting very bad.
But the wealthy ruling few have the most to lose. And since money buys power, they use it. They direct their politicians to "beef up" security, and to drum up wars.
Wars - a tried and true device for diverting dissent. And wars are good for business. Every bomb that explodes, every tank that erupts in flames, every plane that crashes, every building flattened, every coffin buried, requires work to replace it. Work means wages; wages cost money. So governments (encouraged by their masters) create or borrow money. Workers are happy to get it and spend it. The economy booms. (Shareholders, large and small, are ecstatic.) And it takes a few years for all the new money to work its way to the top.
Also, in a war the troublesome discontented from the working class can be persuaded to join the army on the promise of good pay. The troublesome discontented from the middle class - revolutionary leaders, intellectuals, journalists - can be jailed as unpatriotic, or spies or threats to public safety. It is claimed to be win-win-win, all round. And who remains to deny it?
Well, I'll leave with this over-long guide to the real daily news in 2016. So keep your eye on that TV and be questioning and critical. For instance, is China's sabre-rattling in the China Seas a device to divert middle-class unrest at home? And what is fuelling ISIS?
Your humble blogger is just reflecting on history. But Blog 40 will be upbeat, practical - and shorter. It will have practical advice and hope for the survival of us all.
Thursday, 25 August 2016
Of Divided Families: in two parts
Blog 38 Of Divided Families
Religion divides.
It was a terrorist episode. It happened in Northern Ireland in 1976.
The terrorist was shot and killed by police, but then crashed his car over the curb, killing three young children. Their mother, Anne Maguire, survived, but later committed suicide. Who suffered most from this stupid violence?
When the children's aunt, Mairead Corrigan, spoke on television that evening, another Irish woman, Betty Williams, who had witnessed the episode, began collecting signatures to stop this stupid violence.
What was it all about? Briefly, certain patriotic Catholic Irishmen lived for the day they would see North and South united into "One Ireland".
On the other hand, certain Northern Island, Protestant, Irishmen feared that their own particular version of Christian worship would be swamped by the Catholic majority version if "One Ireland, ever came to be. (As history, that is grossly oversimplified. Forgive me.) I will conclude only that I think "Jesus wept" at this stupid violence.)
So Williams' and Corrigan's work to stop the stupid violence in Ireland by organizing Mothers' Marches resulted first in their being co-recipients of the Nobel Peace Prize, and, recently, being credited in this blog (#37), as the sharpeners of the turning-point that ended the stupid violence of the Northern Ireland "Troubles."
Do you detect a theme in those last six paragraphs? Good! Let's carry that to the next topic.
"Law and Order" Divides.
It should not be so. Law and order - to be a little more subtle, let's call it the ideal of justice - this ideal is one of the great inventions of the human brain. Every sensible body is in favor of it. In practice, it usually requires a force to thwart or apprehend clearly defined disturbers of the peace. Ideally, a clear definition of what is disturbing can be found in a written law. One mark of a democratic society is that most of the people have agreed to these written laws. Peace, law, public agreement.
In modern times, the credit for creating a body of civil servants whose job is to maintain law and order, usually goes to Sir Robert Peel, a British politician. In 1829 Peel established the London Metropolitan Constabulary of 1000 men. The English called them "bobbies" or "peelers", after Sir Robert. The idea was copied around the world.
The bobbies walked their beats in the city wearing high hard hats with chin straps, and enforcing the agreed-upon laws with their billy-clubs. They looked the law-breakers in the eye, and only if necessary bopped them. Policeman and suspect sometimes knew each other by name. Today, in certain places, they prefer to know only the colour of the skin.
We don't see the bobbies walking the streets much anymore. Where do you look for bobbies now? Pat your back with both hands if you said, "In cop cars," and blame Henry Ford for some of the increase in stupid violence in our cities today. It's always so satisfying to find some one to blame, isn't it?
The automobile has always been a marker of social division. Now it separates the police from the people. Armed with their automobiles instead of billy-clubs, urban policemen have lost touch with their people. That's not to deny other factors to explain the citizen/policeman fatality stories crowding the good news out of our media. But it a good point to start looking for a process to get them both back peaceably on the same side of the street.
To be continued... with a return to the law of money.
Religion divides.
It was a terrorist episode. It happened in Northern Ireland in 1976.
The terrorist was shot and killed by police, but then crashed his car over the curb, killing three young children. Their mother, Anne Maguire, survived, but later committed suicide. Who suffered most from this stupid violence?
When the children's aunt, Mairead Corrigan, spoke on television that evening, another Irish woman, Betty Williams, who had witnessed the episode, began collecting signatures to stop this stupid violence.
What was it all about? Briefly, certain patriotic Catholic Irishmen lived for the day they would see North and South united into "One Ireland".
On the other hand, certain Northern Island, Protestant, Irishmen feared that their own particular version of Christian worship would be swamped by the Catholic majority version if "One Ireland, ever came to be. (As history, that is grossly oversimplified. Forgive me.) I will conclude only that I think "Jesus wept" at this stupid violence.)
So Williams' and Corrigan's work to stop the stupid violence in Ireland by organizing Mothers' Marches resulted first in their being co-recipients of the Nobel Peace Prize, and, recently, being credited in this blog (#37), as the sharpeners of the turning-point that ended the stupid violence of the Northern Ireland "Troubles."
Do you detect a theme in those last six paragraphs? Good! Let's carry that to the next topic.
"Law and Order" Divides.
It should not be so. Law and order - to be a little more subtle, let's call it the ideal of justice - this ideal is one of the great inventions of the human brain. Every sensible body is in favor of it. In practice, it usually requires a force to thwart or apprehend clearly defined disturbers of the peace. Ideally, a clear definition of what is disturbing can be found in a written law. One mark of a democratic society is that most of the people have agreed to these written laws. Peace, law, public agreement.
In modern times, the credit for creating a body of civil servants whose job is to maintain law and order, usually goes to Sir Robert Peel, a British politician. In 1829 Peel established the London Metropolitan Constabulary of 1000 men. The English called them "bobbies" or "peelers", after Sir Robert. The idea was copied around the world.
The bobbies walked their beats in the city wearing high hard hats with chin straps, and enforcing the agreed-upon laws with their billy-clubs. They looked the law-breakers in the eye, and only if necessary bopped them. Policeman and suspect sometimes knew each other by name. Today, in certain places, they prefer to know only the colour of the skin.
We don't see the bobbies walking the streets much anymore. Where do you look for bobbies now? Pat your back with both hands if you said, "In cop cars," and blame Henry Ford for some of the increase in stupid violence in our cities today. It's always so satisfying to find some one to blame, isn't it?
The automobile has always been a marker of social division. Now it separates the police from the people. Armed with their automobiles instead of billy-clubs, urban policemen have lost touch with their people. That's not to deny other factors to explain the citizen/policeman fatality stories crowding the good news out of our media. But it a good point to start looking for a process to get them both back peaceably on the same side of the street.
To be continued... with a return to the law of money.
Friday, 22 July 2016
Blog 37 A Little Blob of Black History
Blog 37 A Little Blob of Black History ...
In the streets of our town there are dozens of pickup trucks. By a rough count, 4 out of 10 are black. So I wonder, what's the big deal with black in 2016?
Most of the trucks are driven by men. Is that significant? Maybe it's the daily news that drives buyers to black. Draped caskets, it seems, day after day, and worse - on the streets of nations that are not at war
In the "war" zones - Syria, South Sudan, Yemen, just to start the list - there may be a shortage of caskets. Bring in more bulldozers.
What's the meaning of black in 2016. Any connection with 1916? my historical persona asks. It was certainly black then. Europe a witless killing stalemate. Weapons equal on both sides: rifles with bayonets and a man attached to each one; machine guns and cannons, equal on either side of no-man's-land.
In 1916, another war was raging in Ireland. The enemy was England. Ireland was finally subdivided in 1921; the South became an Independent republic. But the war between North and South continued. For the Irish, the period came to be referred to as "The Troubles". The most prominent Protestant cleric in Ulster (Northern Ireland) was preaching that "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right." You don't need to be too bright to note that that sounds illogical. "Ulster will be right. Therefore Ulster will fight." I'll grant that as logic. But put backward, the Rev. Ian Paisley's words are a marvellously appropriate symbol for the perverse insanity of that whole period in Irish history.
In the divided Irelands. Republicans continued killing Protestant Ulstermen, and women and children. And Ulstermen killed Catholic men, and women and children. And ranted and raved as they did so.
But they're not doing it anymore. How come?
Well, in short, one woman saw that nobody wins in a war. Let me say that again. Nobody wins in a war. There are only losses for humanity. So in 1976 one woman decided to do something to stop the killing.
One woman began organizing what came to be called the "March of Mothers" - a whole series of demonstrations by women, Catholic and Protestant, who said, in effect, Stop the Stupidity.
Now it has always seemed to me that the Marches of the Mothers were the turning-point in the "Troubles". Common sense re-asserting itself, from, maybe, where it ultimately resides, the common people, initiated by one sensible, brave, individual woman.
Fast forward again to 2016. But I'll save that for the next blog, tentatively titled Of Divided Families.
But let me conclude with some glad tidings - from Iceland. No, not Ireland, Iceland. though a lot of Irish folk have migrated to that cool island over the centuries since the first settlement.
It is today a marvellous place to visit, especially if you stretch for the nine-day tour of the whole island. Take in waterfalls, lots of 'em, and some more impressive than Niagara Falls (not just because they are not lined on both sides of the rivers with dense tourist traps.) They are located out in sparsely settled beautiful countryside, and you have to walk to get to see them. You can also bathe in hot springs, boat around among icebergs which have fallen off glaciers, watch cavorting whales (even more impressive are the life-size models in the Whale Museum in Reykjavik. And if it is not the time of year for the best display of northern lights, the modest entry fee to the Aurora museum will give you a spectacular very-wide wide-screen movie of them for as long as you want to watch.
If you book a bus tour with Guthmundur Jonasson Travel, try to get Bjorn ("Call me 'Erik'.") as on-board guide. He is something different - knowledgeable on geology, history, art, botany - and genuinely interested, flexible, and patiently careful to leave no one behind.
Or you could rent a small camper or car, please not black, and travel the same roads. Iceland drivers drive on the left side of the road. Usually.
In the streets of our town there are dozens of pickup trucks. By a rough count, 4 out of 10 are black. So I wonder, what's the big deal with black in 2016?
Most of the trucks are driven by men. Is that significant? Maybe it's the daily news that drives buyers to black. Draped caskets, it seems, day after day, and worse - on the streets of nations that are not at war
In the "war" zones - Syria, South Sudan, Yemen, just to start the list - there may be a shortage of caskets. Bring in more bulldozers.
What's the meaning of black in 2016. Any connection with 1916? my historical persona asks. It was certainly black then. Europe a witless killing stalemate. Weapons equal on both sides: rifles with bayonets and a man attached to each one; machine guns and cannons, equal on either side of no-man's-land.
In 1916, another war was raging in Ireland. The enemy was England. Ireland was finally subdivided in 1921; the South became an Independent republic. But the war between North and South continued. For the Irish, the period came to be referred to as "The Troubles". The most prominent Protestant cleric in Ulster (Northern Ireland) was preaching that "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right." You don't need to be too bright to note that that sounds illogical. "Ulster will be right. Therefore Ulster will fight." I'll grant that as logic. But put backward, the Rev. Ian Paisley's words are a marvellously appropriate symbol for the perverse insanity of that whole period in Irish history.
In the divided Irelands. Republicans continued killing Protestant Ulstermen, and women and children. And Ulstermen killed Catholic men, and women and children. And ranted and raved as they did so.
But they're not doing it anymore. How come?
Well, in short, one woman saw that nobody wins in a war. Let me say that again. Nobody wins in a war. There are only losses for humanity. So in 1976 one woman decided to do something to stop the killing.
One woman began organizing what came to be called the "March of Mothers" - a whole series of demonstrations by women, Catholic and Protestant, who said, in effect, Stop the Stupidity.
Now it has always seemed to me that the Marches of the Mothers were the turning-point in the "Troubles". Common sense re-asserting itself, from, maybe, where it ultimately resides, the common people, initiated by one sensible, brave, individual woman.
Fast forward again to 2016. But I'll save that for the next blog, tentatively titled Of Divided Families.
But let me conclude with some glad tidings - from Iceland. No, not Ireland, Iceland. though a lot of Irish folk have migrated to that cool island over the centuries since the first settlement.
It is today a marvellous place to visit, especially if you stretch for the nine-day tour of the whole island. Take in waterfalls, lots of 'em, and some more impressive than Niagara Falls (not just because they are not lined on both sides of the rivers with dense tourist traps.) They are located out in sparsely settled beautiful countryside, and you have to walk to get to see them. You can also bathe in hot springs, boat around among icebergs which have fallen off glaciers, watch cavorting whales (even more impressive are the life-size models in the Whale Museum in Reykjavik. And if it is not the time of year for the best display of northern lights, the modest entry fee to the Aurora museum will give you a spectacular very-wide wide-screen movie of them for as long as you want to watch.
If you book a bus tour with Guthmundur Jonasson Travel, try to get Bjorn ("Call me 'Erik'.") as on-board guide. He is something different - knowledgeable on geology, history, art, botany - and genuinely interested, flexible, and patiently careful to leave no one behind.
Or you could rent a small camper or car, please not black, and travel the same roads. Iceland drivers drive on the left side of the road. Usually.
Monday, 4 July 2016
Blog 36 Tipping Point
Blog 36 Tipping Point
The practice of "tipping", or to use its more grandiloquent format, leaving a "gratuity", is it worth a blog comment? Well, you judge.
In Iceland (of recent soccer fame. Note they spell it "Island"), and in Australia and New Zealand I have encountered a resistance to tipping. An Australian friend put it to me this way. "Employers ought to be paying a decent regular wage. Tipping encourages them to pay lower wages.
In North America, however, some of the hotel chains, when quoting for a conference or wedding reception will include the phrase, ("Gratuity included," or even "15% gratuity included.")
I have two questions about that. First, what is the intended message
in that little tag?
"You won't have to worry about how much to tip."
Or "You won't have to worry that you will face hidden costs."
Or "You don't have to make a donation of satisfaction to our staff. We take care of everything for you"?
Or all of the above?
Second question. Does all (or any) of that 15% go to the employees who perform the actual customer service? There would certainly be a corporate cost to calculating and handing out the appropriate tip to each employee. So does the employer levy a "handling fee"? In a well-run company the chief accountant could easily calculate the approximate cost of that "service to their employees".
But then there is the less measurable question: does the employer decide what is the "appropriate" amount to be handed on to each employee?
Why do I not like the answers to these questions?
What does it matter how the employees are paid - all salary, or a mix of salary and tips, or all tips? I hear a company CFO saying, "It's the bottom line that counts for the employee. So what's your beef?"
Well, let me change disciplines and point to another factor at work here, a factor which would be hard to capture with econometrics.
Tipping has been, and still is,
a mark of class distinction.
Tipping says, I am richer. (and therefore better), than you. Or in a more modern phrase, "It sucks to be you." That message is conveyed in the act of tipping, no matter how philanthropic the intent of the tipper. ("Philanthropic," by the way, is a Greek-based word meaning something like "love of one's fellow man.")
So, to history. Many of the first English settlers in New Zealand and, especially, in Australia, had good reason to be resent class distinctions. English prison sentences supplied the first immigrant of many Australian families. Some at least of the new New Zealanders must have risked the long sea voyage and the hazards of their faraway destination because they wanted to escape being in the "sucks to be you" class in England.
These were people who knew what it was to be a member of the underclass in a rigidly stratified society. So their new home was to be a different kind of country. It was not by chance that Australia is credited with the invention of the secret ballot. Note, too, that in an Australian election, failure to vote has been illegal and carries a penalty.
And what about Iceland? That country got its independence in 1944. But it had been a part of the Kingdom of Denmark for a century, during the time when European colonialism operated on the principle that "Colonies exist to enrich the motherland."
Since independence, its small population has developed an extremely democratic society. Tipping - sign of class distinction - seems to have had no part in it.
Let me finish with a little anecdote from R. L. Stevenson's novel, Kidnapped. I summarize from memory:
A Scottish lord, who was without two shillings to spare was honoured for his military service by an audience with the King of England. The King also gave him a little bag of gold coins. As he left the palace the Scot threw the bag of money to the doorman, and strode on, head high. Pride? Yes. Or self-respect?
So here's a question for you, dear readers. How is the Scottish lord's act relevant to our topic of tipping?
The practice of "tipping", or to use its more grandiloquent format, leaving a "gratuity", is it worth a blog comment? Well, you judge.
In Iceland (of recent soccer fame. Note they spell it "Island"), and in Australia and New Zealand I have encountered a resistance to tipping. An Australian friend put it to me this way. "Employers ought to be paying a decent regular wage. Tipping encourages them to pay lower wages.
In North America, however, some of the hotel chains, when quoting for a conference or wedding reception will include the phrase, ("Gratuity included," or even "15% gratuity included.")
I have two questions about that. First, what is the intended message
in that little tag?
"You won't have to worry about how much to tip."
Or "You won't have to worry that you will face hidden costs."
Or "You don't have to make a donation of satisfaction to our staff. We take care of everything for you"?
Or all of the above?
Second question. Does all (or any) of that 15% go to the employees who perform the actual customer service? There would certainly be a corporate cost to calculating and handing out the appropriate tip to each employee. So does the employer levy a "handling fee"? In a well-run company the chief accountant could easily calculate the approximate cost of that "service to their employees".
But then there is the less measurable question: does the employer decide what is the "appropriate" amount to be handed on to each employee?
Why do I not like the answers to these questions?
What does it matter how the employees are paid - all salary, or a mix of salary and tips, or all tips? I hear a company CFO saying, "It's the bottom line that counts for the employee. So what's your beef?"
Well, let me change disciplines and point to another factor at work here, a factor which would be hard to capture with econometrics.
Tipping has been, and still is,
a mark of class distinction.
Tipping says, I am richer. (and therefore better), than you. Or in a more modern phrase, "It sucks to be you." That message is conveyed in the act of tipping, no matter how philanthropic the intent of the tipper. ("Philanthropic," by the way, is a Greek-based word meaning something like "love of one's fellow man.")
So, to history. Many of the first English settlers in New Zealand and, especially, in Australia, had good reason to be resent class distinctions. English prison sentences supplied the first immigrant of many Australian families. Some at least of the new New Zealanders must have risked the long sea voyage and the hazards of their faraway destination because they wanted to escape being in the "sucks to be you" class in England.
These were people who knew what it was to be a member of the underclass in a rigidly stratified society. So their new home was to be a different kind of country. It was not by chance that Australia is credited with the invention of the secret ballot. Note, too, that in an Australian election, failure to vote has been illegal and carries a penalty.
And what about Iceland? That country got its independence in 1944. But it had been a part of the Kingdom of Denmark for a century, during the time when European colonialism operated on the principle that "Colonies exist to enrich the motherland."
Since independence, its small population has developed an extremely democratic society. Tipping - sign of class distinction - seems to have had no part in it.
Let me finish with a little anecdote from R. L. Stevenson's novel, Kidnapped. I summarize from memory:
A Scottish lord, who was without two shillings to spare was honoured for his military service by an audience with the King of England. The King also gave him a little bag of gold coins. As he left the palace the Scot threw the bag of money to the doorman, and strode on, head high. Pride? Yes. Or self-respect?
So here's a question for you, dear readers. How is the Scottish lord's act relevant to our topic of tipping?
Wednesday, 15 June 2016
A Policeman's Lot is not a Happy One
Blog 35 A Policeman's Lot is not a Happy One
There have long been two types of police force. 1. what we might call "democratic police" to protect the demos, the people, from the law-breakers, and 2. what we should call "political police", to protect governments from their people.
Democratic police. Political police.
In the increasingly divided societies we are seeing in the daily news this century (Syria, Egypt, America, are examples), the second function - protecting the government from the people - sometimes looks like the more important one
Governments representing a minority set of their people have gained power and claimed the "mandate" to implement a program representing only their minority constituency. Examples are the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, the Harper Conservatives in Canada, and possibly a deeply divided America after the current election. This is not democracy.
Such regimes are prone to expanding their Type 2 police power.
But figures from the US also tell of the rise of a third kind of police - police who are hired by private individuals and corporations to protect them, presumably from both governments and people. These private or contract police now outnumber public police in America.
We are not surprised, believing as The Cogs Blog does, that power draws money, and money buys power, and power draws...
power
money
The most significant division in many nations and across the globe today is the division between the rich ("the 1%") and the rest of the eight billion earthlings. A recent column by an investment commentator, using not the 1%, but the .01%, for the very, very rich, observed that "the billionaires are now drawing their wealth from the millionaires."
Seems like the wealth distribution is so lop-sided that the great majority of mere "people" aren't worth exploiting. But, of course, you still need your own police force to protect you from -- well, just in case.
(Pssst - an aware, enraged population, or a pesky tax-collecting government?
The columnist also noted that the current wealth inequity is now. greater than it was in 1929 (before the Crash). So?
But, let US conclude more brightly, with
WHEN A FELON'S NOT ENGAGED IN HIS EMPLOYMENT (his employment)
OR MATURING HIS FELONIOUS LITTLE PLANS
(little plans)
HIS CAPACITY FOR INNOCENT ENJOYMENT
(-cent enjoyment)
IS JUST AS GREAT AS ANY HONEST MAN'S
(honest man's.)
OUR FEELINGS WE WITH DIFFICULTY SMOTHER
(-culty smother)
WHEN CONSTABULARY DUTY'S TO BE DONE
(to be done)
AH, TAKE ONE CONSIDERATION WITH ANOTHER
(with another)
A POLICEMAN'S LOT IS NOT A HAPPY ONE.
From The Pirates of Penzance W.S. Gilbert, 1879
for more verses go to lyricsplayground.com/alpha/p/policemanssong.shtmi
There have long been two types of police force. 1. what we might call "democratic police" to protect the demos, the people, from the law-breakers, and 2. what we should call "political police", to protect governments from their people.
Democratic police. Political police.
In the increasingly divided societies we are seeing in the daily news this century (Syria, Egypt, America, are examples), the second function - protecting the government from the people - sometimes looks like the more important one
Governments representing a minority set of their people have gained power and claimed the "mandate" to implement a program representing only their minority constituency. Examples are the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, the Harper Conservatives in Canada, and possibly a deeply divided America after the current election. This is not democracy.
Such regimes are prone to expanding their Type 2 police power.
But figures from the US also tell of the rise of a third kind of police - police who are hired by private individuals and corporations to protect them, presumably from both governments and people. These private or contract police now outnumber public police in America.
We are not surprised, believing as The Cogs Blog does, that power draws money, and money buys power, and power draws...
power
money
The most significant division in many nations and across the globe today is the division between the rich ("the 1%") and the rest of the eight billion earthlings. A recent column by an investment commentator, using not the 1%, but the .01%, for the very, very rich, observed that "the billionaires are now drawing their wealth from the millionaires."
Seems like the wealth distribution is so lop-sided that the great majority of mere "people" aren't worth exploiting. But, of course, you still need your own police force to protect you from -- well, just in case.
(Pssst - an aware, enraged population, or a pesky tax-collecting government?
The columnist also noted that the current wealth inequity is now. greater than it was in 1929 (before the Crash). So?
But, let US conclude more brightly, with
"The Policemen's Song"
WHEN A FELON'S NOT ENGAGED IN HIS EMPLOYMENT (his employment)
OR MATURING HIS FELONIOUS LITTLE PLANS
(little plans)
HIS CAPACITY FOR INNOCENT ENJOYMENT
(-cent enjoyment)
IS JUST AS GREAT AS ANY HONEST MAN'S
(honest man's.)
OUR FEELINGS WE WITH DIFFICULTY SMOTHER
(-culty smother)
WHEN CONSTABULARY DUTY'S TO BE DONE
(to be done)
AH, TAKE ONE CONSIDERATION WITH ANOTHER
(with another)
A POLICEMAN'S LOT IS NOT A HAPPY ONE.
From The Pirates of Penzance W.S. Gilbert, 1879
for more verses go to lyricsplayground.com/alpha/p/policemanssong.shtmi
Wednesday, 1 June 2016
Blog 34 Fred and Franny, Inflation and the Price of Toothbrushes
Blog 34 Fred and Franny, Inflation and the Price of Toothbrushes
Your blogger re-read Blog 33 and thought it was not only unfunny, but, as an explantation of lenders' and borrowers' different attitudes towards inflation, it was somewhat thickish reading. (He might add, he was not the only reader who expressed that thought.) But that is not why you have had no postings for a month. Not sulking, just resting.
So, let me introduce you to - well let's just call him Mr. Fred Fewster. Mr Fewster is a nice guy. He lends his friends money. But he gets a little obsessive over bargains. For instance, when he saw his brand of fancy toothbrush - regular price, $4.89, on sale for $4.29, he bought 10 of them. On second thought, he went back and bought 6 more. Got a feel for Fred?
The same week, he loaned a young friend, a struggling student, $10,000 to pay for her last year at college. He did not charge any interest. Franny was the daughter of a friend. She was effusively grateful. Got a feel for Fred?
So Fred brushed his teeth, and Fanny finished college, got married, had children, and a career. Fred used up his sixteen toothbrushes at the rate of one a year.
Only then, did something remind Franny of the debt. She paid it off at once, with appropriate apologies.
Fred himself had also forgotten the loan. But it was time to buy some new toothbrushes. This time it cost him, with 16 years of inflation averaging 3% a year, exactly $6.89 per toothbrush. That was a sale price, of course.
So for lender Fred, toothbrushes were $2.60 more expensive than the last time he bought some. At the latest price he could get only 10 for the price he had paid for 16, sixteen years previously. If Fred had been a banker, that would not have been good business. Interest foregone on $10,000 for 16 years at say 3%, and an equal percentage of inflation loss on the toothbrushes..
Fortunately, friendly Freddy was not a bank. Just a generous friend of the family.
Who liked to book his dental care well in advance.
Your blogger re-read Blog 33 and thought it was not only unfunny, but, as an explantation of lenders' and borrowers' different attitudes towards inflation, it was somewhat thickish reading. (He might add, he was not the only reader who expressed that thought.) But that is not why you have had no postings for a month. Not sulking, just resting.
So, let me introduce you to - well let's just call him Mr. Fred Fewster. Mr Fewster is a nice guy. He lends his friends money. But he gets a little obsessive over bargains. For instance, when he saw his brand of fancy toothbrush - regular price, $4.89, on sale for $4.29, he bought 10 of them. On second thought, he went back and bought 6 more. Got a feel for Fred?
The same week, he loaned a young friend, a struggling student, $10,000 to pay for her last year at college. He did not charge any interest. Franny was the daughter of a friend. She was effusively grateful. Got a feel for Fred?
So Fred brushed his teeth, and Fanny finished college, got married, had children, and a career. Fred used up his sixteen toothbrushes at the rate of one a year.
Only then, did something remind Franny of the debt. She paid it off at once, with appropriate apologies.
Fred himself had also forgotten the loan. But it was time to buy some new toothbrushes. This time it cost him, with 16 years of inflation averaging 3% a year, exactly $6.89 per toothbrush. That was a sale price, of course.
So for lender Fred, toothbrushes were $2.60 more expensive than the last time he bought some. At the latest price he could get only 10 for the price he had paid for 16, sixteen years previously. If Fred had been a banker, that would not have been good business. Interest foregone on $10,000 for 16 years at say 3%, and an equal percentage of inflation loss on the toothbrushes..
Fortunately, friendly Freddy was not a bank. Just a generous friend of the family.
Who liked to book his dental care well in advance.
Dad, why does Mr. Banks complain of inflation?
He doesn't want to lend out "good money" and be paid back in "cheap money".
I still don't get it
Oh, well.
Wednesday, 4 May 2016
33 Will That Be Cash or Credit ? Part 2
BLOG 33 Will that be Cash of Credit? Part 2
Some thoughts on the disappearance of cash. Random order.
The move to a cashless society world-wide is an offensive by the global banking system to take the power of creating money totally away from national governments.
The lending class, fronted by the banks, have long argued that governments cannot be trusted to control the issuance of money, even the minuscule percentage remaining to them (estimates set that at "probably less than 2%" of the total money in use in the world. Governments - the shrill voices of the fearful bankers insist - will create more money than is needed and the value of the nation's/world's money will collapse. That would be a terrible catastrophe. It would unleash a monster -- H.I.D.!
OK. I give up. Why can't I get that funny cartoon of Humpty Inflation Dumpty falling off the wall to upload?
Oh, there you are. Not very clear, though.
Well, read on.
So what's really wrong with inflation? Maybe we should first ask that cutting question, quo bene? who benefits? No, let's first ask who has most to lose. That answer is easy: those who have the most of the world's money.
So it depends on who you are. Different people are affected differently by inflation.
In fact, it depends on two things. 1. How much money/wealth you have. If you have a lot, you may still be able to pay more for rent, restaurant meals, and your tailor, and rise above it all.
But if you have very little money/wealth - like most of the world's people - inflation may mean you have to do without food, or a roof, or (you middle class guys and gals) without private schools for your children, and a Fiat instead of a Ferrari.
2. Secondly, it depends on whether you are a lender or a borrower, because that brings interest rates into the picture.
So which do you prefer, high interest rates or low interest rates? (Think about that now. Your answer may certify which class or age group you belong to.) If you are a young working couple, looking to rising income, you may want to borrow money now. You grandfather, however, who has spent his lifetime saving for retirement at an expected return on savings of 6%, probably does not appreciate the current 2%. So if he does give or lend you a down payment, gush a little.
To summarize all that in a diagram:
Preferred by Preferred by
LENDERS 0 BORROWERS
0
0
0
HIGH INTEREST 0 LOW INTEREST
0
0
000000000000000000000000000000000000
0
0 ,
LOW INFLATION 0 HIGH INFLATION
0
0
Lenders prefer high interest rates, of course. Lenders also prefer low inflation, because inflation erodes buying power. They do not want to be paid back money that buys less than the money they lent. Makes sense.
So write down: "Lenders like higher interest rates, and lower inflation ."
For Borrowers, on the other hand, a little inflation is a good thing, especially if it means their wages increase. It could be significant, for instance, if wages have risen with inflation during the 25-year term of their mortgage.
So write down, "Borrowers like lower interest rates and higher inflation.
OThat is, if they are as smart as you are, and have learned today's rambling Cogs Blog lesson.
One final point: governments can and usually do create the money to keep their economies stable -- without inflation. So don't believe all you hear about the benefits of the cashless society.
Some thoughts on the disappearance of cash. Random order.
The move to a cashless society world-wide is an offensive by the global banking system to take the power of creating money totally away from national governments.
The lending class, fronted by the banks, have long argued that governments cannot be trusted to control the issuance of money, even the minuscule percentage remaining to them (estimates set that at "probably less than 2%" of the total money in use in the world. Governments - the shrill voices of the fearful bankers insist - will create more money than is needed and the value of the nation's/world's money will collapse. That would be a terrible catastrophe. It would unleash a monster -- H.I.D.!
OK. I give up. Why can't I get that funny cartoon of Humpty Inflation Dumpty falling off the wall to upload?
Oh, there you are. Not very clear, though.
Well, read on.
So what's really wrong with inflation? Maybe we should first ask that cutting question, quo bene? who benefits? No, let's first ask who has most to lose. That answer is easy: those who have the most of the world's money.
So it depends on who you are. Different people are affected differently by inflation.
In fact, it depends on two things. 1. How much money/wealth you have. If you have a lot, you may still be able to pay more for rent, restaurant meals, and your tailor, and rise above it all.
But if you have very little money/wealth - like most of the world's people - inflation may mean you have to do without food, or a roof, or (you middle class guys and gals) without private schools for your children, and a Fiat instead of a Ferrari.
2. Secondly, it depends on whether you are a lender or a borrower, because that brings interest rates into the picture.
So which do you prefer, high interest rates or low interest rates? (Think about that now. Your answer may certify which class or age group you belong to.) If you are a young working couple, looking to rising income, you may want to borrow money now. You grandfather, however, who has spent his lifetime saving for retirement at an expected return on savings of 6%, probably does not appreciate the current 2%. So if he does give or lend you a down payment, gush a little.
To summarize all that in a diagram:
Preferred by Preferred by
LENDERS 0 BORROWERS
0
0
0
HIGH INTEREST 0 LOW INTEREST
0
0
000000000000000000000000000000000000
0
0 ,
LOW INFLATION 0 HIGH INFLATION
0
0
Lenders prefer high interest rates, of course. Lenders also prefer low inflation, because inflation erodes buying power. They do not want to be paid back money that buys less than the money they lent. Makes sense.
So write down: "Lenders like higher interest rates, and lower inflation ."
For Borrowers, on the other hand, a little inflation is a good thing, especially if it means their wages increase. It could be significant, for instance, if wages have risen with inflation during the 25-year term of their mortgage.
So write down, "Borrowers like lower interest rates and higher inflation.
OThat is, if they are as smart as you are, and have learned today's rambling Cogs Blog lesson.
One final point: governments can and usually do create the money to keep their economies stable -- without inflation. So don't believe all you hear about the benefits of the cashless society.
Sunday, 10 April 2016
Blog 32 "Will That Be Cash or Credit?
Recent news item. Denmark is proposing to rule that cash is no longer legal tender for retail purchases. Norway and Finland are also discussing the idea. Sounds as if that great bankers' dream - the cashless society - is just around the corner. And in three nations with a reputation for being social democracies, no less. Maybe Denmark is to be another Greece. "You have to pick off the little ones first."
The measure could be sad news for democrats around the world who have been watching the world-wide struggle between national states and global corporations for the world's wealth/power.
Or maybe the lining is silver. I'll save that for the next blog..
If implemented the measure would mean citizens will have no cash money in their pockets. But they will have that little card (or maybe a mere blink into an eye-scanner will do it) to provide them with purchasing power - in bank-created rental money.
So no matter how much cash you have socked away, if cash is on its way out, you will have to use credit money, that unavoidable tax on economies, personal and national. There will probably be a reasonable time period in which you can spend your cash before your government declares it worthless. After that, everybody will be a total borrower - for every cup of coffee or package of peppermints.
So what about the bigger picture? It could be that the cashless society is inevitable. Statements of the merits of it have been popping up like a barrage of trial balloons across the world. They say:
1. It will provide savings to merchants - in the costs of handling cash. Just swipe, and walk away with your bag of groceries. (They'll have to speed up that credit card transaction at the checkout. But that's a "mere technicality"). Importance rating on a scale of 1-5 0.9
2, It will prevent tax evasion, With everybody's income and money assets recorded in banks somewhere and accessible to government law enforcers, tax evasion will be a thing of the past! Just think of all those celebrity tax-evaders we keep uncovering! And how many more there must be!! Importance rating (if it works out that way) 4
3. It will be good for government budgets, Less spent on items like policing and courts and jails. So there will be more resources to spend on other public goods, like pensions, healthcare, free education. U know, the usual public values everywhere. Or on reducing taxes, or (reach for this one) reducing the national debt! Importance rating 3.5
Summing up: the absence of cash will reduce crime. There will be fewer robberies when people have nothing to steal but the clothes on their backs. And it will be easier to identify "proceeds of crime". and to track and prosecute vicious money-laundresses, terrorists and other base criminals, and - need I repeat - tax evaders!
Cogs Blog Prediction: You are going to hear more and more of these arguments on talk shows, newscasts, from political spokesfolk, financial advisors and indentured economists. Be sure to watch which way your politicians sway.
So, unless..
Unless what?
Unless the new credit money-mechanism is controlled by government-owned banks!
I have more to learn, but I believe Denmark already has a public bank, which lends to citizens. Still, Danes carry the highest level of private debt among 24 OECD countries. Maybe that is why they have been a target for this cashless economy move.
All this bears looking at further. Next blog maybe.
Tuesday, 15 March 2016
Blog 31 Notes from History: of Horses and Men, Elephants and Donkeys
The Roman Emperor, Caligula (full name Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus) is reported (probably falsely) to have made his favorite horse a Senator. The question still remains, was this idiocy or satire? That is, was he really crazy, or simply mischievously clever at putting down the old aristocracy?
So does it matter today? Probably not, but history does repeat, and repeat. And, as philosopher, George Santayana, said, "Those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it."
We may be witnessing a historical parallel today without knowing it.
For instance, the irreversible decline of a great republic.
On March 15 in 44 BC, Julius Caesar returned to Rome, a great Republic, from a series of very successful foreign wars. He had written a whole history of his exploits and sent it back to Rome like weekly news bulletins. It made him very popular.
The old Republican ruling class had lost touch with a large, various, and unruly populace. Knowing the law of money, as we do, we might safely surmise that their wealth bought their political power and their political power increased their wealth .... Well, you know. Till there were only a few rich and a great many poor.
When the poplar Caesar started home, he just happened to have brought back with him a seasoned army. That gave him a certain political independence.Officials of the ruling Senatorial class had ordered the popular general not to come back into Italy. But he did. He crossed the Rubicon River, and Rome was never the same.
We still use the phrase, "cross the Rubicon", to refer to a decisive action from which there is no turning back.
When the victorious warrior arrived back in the City itself, he was mobbed with supporters. They wanted to make him King! King!!
For six centuries, "King" had been a bad word in Rome. The great Roman republic had been born out of a successful revolution against their oppressive foreign kings.
Something like the American Republic, you know.
Well, they did not get Julius Caesar for their king. A group of Senatorials, including some of his good friends, publicly stabbed him to death.
But 17 messy years later, his adopted son/nephew, Octavianus Augustus, became the first in a long line of Roman emperors.
Augustus did not call himself King, but "First Citizen". Good PR department, I'd say.
The Republic never recovered.
A divided society, a wide gap between rich and poor, wealth, political power, military power. Hmmmnnnn.
Those who don't know history...
So does it matter today? Probably not, but history does repeat, and repeat. And, as philosopher, George Santayana, said, "Those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it."
We may be witnessing a historical parallel today without knowing it.
For instance, the irreversible decline of a great republic.
On March 15 in 44 BC, Julius Caesar returned to Rome, a great Republic, from a series of very successful foreign wars. He had written a whole history of his exploits and sent it back to Rome like weekly news bulletins. It made him very popular.
The old Republican ruling class had lost touch with a large, various, and unruly populace. Knowing the law of money, as we do, we might safely surmise that their wealth bought their political power and their political power increased their wealth .... Well, you know. Till there were only a few rich and a great many poor.
When the poplar Caesar started home, he just happened to have brought back with him a seasoned army. That gave him a certain political independence.Officials of the ruling Senatorial class had ordered the popular general not to come back into Italy. But he did. He crossed the Rubicon River, and Rome was never the same.
We still use the phrase, "cross the Rubicon", to refer to a decisive action from which there is no turning back.
When the victorious warrior arrived back in the City itself, he was mobbed with supporters. They wanted to make him King! King!!
For six centuries, "King" had been a bad word in Rome. The great Roman republic had been born out of a successful revolution against their oppressive foreign kings.
Something like the American Republic, you know.
Well, they did not get Julius Caesar for their king. A group of Senatorials, including some of his good friends, publicly stabbed him to death.
But 17 messy years later, his adopted son/nephew, Octavianus Augustus, became the first in a long line of Roman emperors.
Augustus did not call himself King, but "First Citizen". Good PR department, I'd say.
The Republic never recovered.
A divided society, a wide gap between rich and poor, wealth, political power, military power. Hmmmnnnn.
Those who don't know history...
Thursday, 25 February 2016
Blog 30 Power Play
Power |
| Money |
Blog 30 POWER PLAY
One of my favourite places is New Zealand. Not primarily because it was the first national state to experience the Neo-liberal destruction of the post-war welfare state, but because New Zealand has partly recovered from that public catastrophe.
In 1994, a new Labour government was highjacked by disciples of the Chicago School of Economics, and among the things done in the next four years was the privatization of publicly-owned infrastructure. In 1998, a big lesson was learned. With credit to Wikipedia, here's the story.
The 1998 Auckland power crisis was a five-week-long power outage affecting the central city Auckland, New Zealand. At the time, all of downtown Auckland was supplied with electricity by Mercury Energy via four 110 KV power cables originating from the national grid at Transpower's Penrose substation, with two cables each connecting to two central city substations at Liverpool Street and Quay Street. The two cables connecting to Quay Street were 40-year-old gas-insulated cable that were past their replacement date. One of the Quay street cables failed on 20 January, possibly due to the unusually hot and dry conditions, although this did not warrant a crisis; the three remaining cables could still supply the central city. The second Quay Street cable failed on 9 February, leaving only the Liverpool Street cables supplying the city. Due to the increased load from the failure of the first cables, these remaining two cables failed on 19 and 20 February, leaving the entire central city supplied by a single 22 kV cable from Kingsland, resulting in about 20 city blocks (except parts of a few streets) losing power. Queen Street was almost deserted for the first few days, as few businesses could operate. Some brought goods out onto the street to sell, but heavy rain in the first week made that impractical. Generators were brought in from around the country to power essential services and some businesses. These made queen Street a very noisy place and thus deterred customers.
In the five weeks it took to restore the power supply, about 60,000 of the 74,000 people who worked in the area worked from home or from relocated offices in the suburbs. Some businesses relocated staff to other new Zealand cities, or even to Australia. The majority of the 6,000 apartment dwellers in the area had to find alternative accommodation. Temporary power was supplied for a while from large container ships at the port supplying power to the CBD grid
The old gas cables were found to be repairable and were put back into service, but were restricted to 30 MVA capacity. The newer oil cables were irreparable, so to restore full supply to the city, a temporary 110 kV overhead line was constructed along the rail corridor between Penrose and Liverpool Street.
Subsequent public inquiries into the causes of the outage blamed two things - failure of components used beyond their replacement date, and "failure of governance." Translated, "failure of governance" means the directors of the recently privatized electric corporations were not technical people, but were solely focussed on serving their constituency - the shareholders. That is, making money for dividends.
The final lesson of the blackout I have found well summed up by
Sharon Beder, University of Woolongong, Australia:
"Electricity is not a commodity that can be governed by market forces. It is a service that is essential to human welfare and economic prosperity, and it needs to be controlled by those who place public interest ahead of commercial imperatives."
Let me conclude with two quotations offered in the New Internationalist article, "Ten Economic Myths that We Need to Junk.:
"The myth of private-sector superiority has three components that feed off and reinforce one another. First, that the private sector is always dynamic and best; second, that the public sector is costly and inefficient, and third, the conclusion that everyone benefits from the continual incremental privatization of the public sphere. All three elements are false." Andrew Simms British author.
and,
"Privatization means you take a public institution and give it to an unaccountable tyranny. Public institutions may have many side benefits. They're not for profit. They may purposely run at a loss because of the side benefits. So, for example, if a public steel industry runs act a loss it's providing cheap steel to other industries. Maybe that's a good thing. Public institutions can have a counter-cyclic property. So that means that they can maintain employment in periods of recession, which increases demand, which helps you to get out of recession. Private companies can't do that in a recession. Throw out the work force because that's the way you make money.
Noam Chomsky, in the film "The Corporation."
So Ontarians, what can you do to offset the increase in your hydro bills? (Remember those dividends.) Or to compensate for the inconvenience of longer blackouts, especially in those winter storms, where your TV news (when you can get it) shows your heroic public power workers labouring long days and nights to get the power flowing?
Can't help you. Your new neoliberal government has three years to go.
Maybe, after the election of the next government they might do as New Zealand has done, recover some of your public power ownership.
Or, for now, if you are a well-to-do opportunist, you could buy some of the newly-offered stock. Toronto Stock Exchange. Symbol (H). Easy to remember.
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