Wealth distribution

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Originally Posted by HoreTore

I favour taxing what is owned rather than what is earned, even though the end result probably isn't that big since the state has to rake in the same amount of money, and that for the most part means the same people paying.

I could go on and on about how wealth taxation is better than income taxation, as the last election in Norway had removal of wealth taxation as one of the hot issues, and I argued endlessly with friends on how we should instead increase the wealth tax and reduce the income tax. The biggest problem with the wealth tax is the human brain: we react strongly to something being "taken away"(why do I have to pay tax on this house I already paid for?!?!?), but we don't really react at all if we don't get the chance to buy that thing. But since we seem to be all in agreement here, I won't do the wall of text-thing now...

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Clear thinking on your part. If your goal is wealth redistribution from rich to poor (I don't agree with that goal as you know, but that does seem to be the goal behind using taxation to re-balance society) then taxing anything aside from wealth is counterproductive. Taxing income means taxing the actively employed middle class...the backbone of all Western economies...but only taxes the "current accounts" of the rich.

It is one of the things I find idiotic in the USA right now. We have a progressive income tax that, in practice, hammers the upper middle class and drains the wealth accumulation potential of the working class, while shielding from taxation the very people the US political left blames for the imbalance. The solution? Higher taxes on corporations (which are passed to the working class in higher prices) and higher income taxes on wage earners over 150k (which includes lots of owner operator small businesses and other small business employers, thus discouraging job creation; and yes, it does take thousands of dollars more from the salaries of big corp CEOs....who make less than 20% of their compensation in salary and are taxed at 15% (lower then their staff's income tax rates) on the rest.

The system, as currently constituted, is inane.

Give me a modified consumption tax like the Fair Tax or a flat tax on all earnings (of any form or stripe, no exceptions).

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Originally Posted by Seamus Fermanagh

If your goal is wealth redistribution from rich to poor

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Taxation is only "a means to a means to an end", it is not the way to achieve the goal.

As I said previously, taxation is only important due to what you can do with that tax money. The actual answer to poverty is meaningful employment in private sector jobs with proper wages, for all. Taxation alone isn't going to do anything towards that goal.

Even though I agree with you on wealth v income tax, I wouldn't go so far as to abolish the income tax altogether. Tax diversification is also important, both to ensure a stable tax revenue(you can't plan long term without stability) as well as lessen the impact of loopholes.

But even more important, the process needs to be simple. If I need to do anything more than I currently do to pay my taxes(which is reading a letter from the government every january for half a minute before throwing it in the trash), I'll storm the bastille.

As an interesting aside, the price of gold is fairly arbitrary but it is not quite the same as fiat money. The reason is mostly the chemical properties of gold (which mean that you can store it and transport it in a practical fashion) and the fact that is not actually rare without being plentiful (unlike, say, Xenon, Helium or Iron). You need your money to be not too difficult to obtain or else very few people can use it. Its chemical properties also mean you are quite likely to find it in its metallic crystalline form, which means it's likely to be shiny which humans happen to find interesting and attractive. So it makes for a good gift or money as it is both expensive (so the recipient can appreciate the effort) and quite useless (so there is little incentive to demand too much of it, damaging real productivity).

The flipside means that in a modern, advanced economy gold is subject to speculation and other manipulations like any other common commodity. In these days you might as well pick 'oil' as your money.

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Originally Posted by Seamus Fermanagh

Give me a modified consumption tax like the Fair Tax or a flat tax on all earnings (of any form or stripe, no exceptions).

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How does a Fair Tax work better than Income Tax? As I understand it, it's a kind of Value Added Tax, which in the UK has been noted as working against the poor as the tax paid on necessities is a much bigger slice of their overall resources than that paid by the rich.

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Originally Posted by Pannonian

[A FairTax] has been noted as working against the poor as the tax paid on necessities is a much bigger slice of their overall resources than that paid by the rich.

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There are actually terms for this.

A tax that gets smaller as more wealth is involved is called a regressive tax.

A tax whose marginal rate increases as more wealth is involved is called a progressive tax.

Ideally and theoretically, I like the idea of a consumption tax as the main form of taxation.

However, I fear it will be eaten alive by the iron law of unintended consequences the minute it hits reality, and so I don't really consider more than a supplement to other taxation...

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Originally Posted by Pannonian

How does a Fair Tax work better than Income Tax? As I understand it, it's a kind of Value Added Tax, which in the UK has been noted as working against the poor as the tax paid on necessities is a much bigger slice of their overall resources than that paid by the rich.

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Not sure if it would function as well as designed in practice. The Fair Tax is supposed to function as noted here. Yes, it is a wiki, but it is pretty religiously "policed" by Fair Tax advocates and is a fair summary of their approach. The basic idea is to be revenue neutral, but to tap into currently untaxed aspects of the economy (black and gray markets because the money is eventually used to buy something that is subject to the tax). Ostensibly, the Fair Tax would replace ALL other forms of federal taxation -- excises, income tax, Spanish war tax on telephones etc. Supposedly, the "prebate" lowers the effective tax burden on lower income families, down to an effective federal tax burden of 0% on necessities.

The Fair Tax has detractors as well, who argue that it is a waste of time because it won't work as planned or, more commonly, because it is politically undoable and hence a waste of time.

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Originally Posted by Seamus Fermanagh

Not sure if it would function as well as designed in practice. The Fair Tax is supposed to function as noted here. Yes, it is a wiki, but it is pretty religiously "policed" by Fair Tax advocates and is a fair summary of their approach. The basic idea is to be revenue neutral, but to tap into currently untaxed aspects of the economy (black and gray markets because the money is eventually used to buy something that is subject to the tax). Ostensibly, the Fair Tax would replace ALL other forms of federal taxation -- excises, income tax, Spanish war tax on telephones etc. Supposedly, the "prebate" lowers the effective tax burden on lower income families, down to an effective federal tax burden of 0% on necessities.

The Fair Tax has detractors as well, who argue that it is a waste of time because it won't work as planned or, more commonly, because it is politically undoable and hence a waste of time.

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What has been the experience with VAT in the UK is that poor and rich alike pay taxes at the point of purchase. But with the poor consuming necessities the same as the rich, the tax paid on these necessities is a much bigger proportion of their income/savings than the same thing paid by the rich. Perhaps it's a bigger chunk in absolute terms as well as the rich can afford to buy a large amount in one go, and sellers are willing to offer discounts if they get their money in one large chunk, whereas the poor need to stagger their purchases which thus precludes discounts. And as for the consumption tax replacing all taxes, the poor have a much lower base rate anyway, and it still hardly helps them cope with price rises.

Just about the best thing that's happened with VAT is the free rein to tax whatever the government likes on consumer drugs like tobacco, alcohol, etc. The most sensible thing they can do is legalise and add cannabis and other currently prohibited stuff to it. Politically impossible though alas.

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Originally Posted by Montmorency

All "money" is ultimately fiat money.

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You are basically correct.

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Originally Posted by HoreTore

Indeed.

Gold is only marginably more valuable than the cotton in our current bills. Arguing a return to the gold standard is missing the point completely. Especially if you then believe that the value of money will be based on something other than what it is currently based on.

Money has always been and will always remain based on the production value of work. That's the basis of it, gold and cotton is simply the way we represent that value, and we do so because it's a lot easier to carry around a few bills than it is to carry around 2-3 cows.

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You are totally incorrect.

This is how money used to act.

If you pay attention this may teach you something: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_IgcmsqnVM


Reforms would also make wealth redistribution possible.

Related, and interesting:

Why do the Super-Rich Feel so Persecuted?

The extremely wealthy are objectively far wealthier, far more politically powerful and find a far more indulgent political class than at any time in almost a century—at least. And yet at the same time they palpably feel more isolated, abused and powerless than at any time over the same period and sense some genuine peril to the whole mix of privileges, power and wealth they hold.

There is a disconnect there that is so massive and glaring that it demands some sociocultural explanation. [...]

I saw several years ago that many of the wealthiest people in the country, especially people in financial services, not only didn't support Obama (not terribly surprising) but had a real and palpable sense that he was out to get them. This was hard to reconcile with the fact that Obama, along with President Bush, had pushed through a series of very unpopular laws and programs and fixes that had not only stabilized global capitalism, saved Wall Street but saved the personal fortunes (and perhaps even the personal liberty) of the people who were turning so acidly against him. Indeed, through the critical years of 2009, 10 and 11 he was serving as what amounted to Wall Street's personal heat shield, absorbing as political damage the public revulsion at the bailout policies that had kept Wall Street whole.

Let's start by stipulating that no one expects the extremely wealthy to react happily to mounting discussion of wealth and income inequality or left-wing diatribes about "the 1%." But again, the reaction is extreme and excessive and frequently runs into less comical versions of Perkins' screed, with weird fears of persecution and threat from the folks who quite truly rule the roost.

Also: The Cognitive Dissonance Of The One Percent

[M]any of these extremist plutocrats must surely know, somewhere in their psyches, that they collectively failed—and failed terribly—in self-regulating and thereby protecting the very capitalist system they depend on for so much.

These masters of the universe had to go cap in hand to the federal government to bail out their sorry, incompetent asses. They were revealed not as brilliant engineers of our collective wealth, but as enablers of the debt-mania, tech-hubris and bubble-creating that destroyed so much from 2007 onwards. They were exposed as something much worse than greedy; they were revealed as incompetents whose mistakes and over-reach created untold misery and hardship for countless millions. Their own self-image—again, somewhere deep down—must have shattered a little.

People respond to revelations of their own incompetence in different ways. But the proudest—and this group of people are not exactly renowned for humility—can sometimes respond by internalizing an ever more extreme version of their own previous mindset. They cannot compute the fact that they failed, and so they have to construct a version of reality that insists it was all someone else’s fault, and then build on that an ideology of their own unrelenting heroism, which is now, on their minds, unfairly impugned. And the only target of blame that can plausibly fill the gap is the federal government.

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Originally Posted by HoreTore

lol.

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Yes, very funny. Norway uses the same system. Fractional Reserve Lending.

You money is created from debt just like everyone else’s.

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Originally Posted by Fisherking

Yes, very funny. Norway uses the same system. Fractional Reserve Lending.

You money is created from debt just like everyone else’s.

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Youtube University strikes again!

Try offering someone with actual knowledge as opposed to a dimwit activist with no qualifications beyond high school next time.

This is your source:

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I soon caught the Mother Earth News bug, started doing yoga at 4 am with people in white turbans, chanting with Krishnaites and then suddenly got the urge to go West.

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Now that's an authority on world economics if I ever saw one!!

Why is everyone on the tinterweb mad about fractional reserve lending when its bloody central bank interest rates that cause more harm.

That blooming Zeitgeist crowd has a lot to answer for

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Originally Posted by gaelic cowboy

Why is everyone on the tinterweb mad about fractional reserve lending when its bloody central bank interest rates that cause more harm.

That blooming Zeitgeist crowd has a lot to answer for

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Fractional reserve lending has been the way banks have functioned since paper money was introduced back in the 18th century. And to top it off, the bank informs you of it every time they send your statement. Why on earth would banks give you interest on deposits if they didn't lend it out again? The reason why the tinfoil crowd throws a hissyfit over it, is because it:
a) is a suitably technical term
b) can be made to look suitably evil by playing around with motives and other nonsense
c) is not something the average tinfoiler knows about, since the tinfoilers knowledge of economics in particular and how the world functions in general, is close to zero

There are plenty of other completely mundane things conspiracy nutters twist into something horrible. Fluoride water immediately pops into mind, as well as GMO.

The quality of discussion has dropped dramatically.

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Originally Posted by Myth

The quality of discussion has dropped dramatically.

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You realize that people have been saying that since Q.T.Cicero's time...and probably before.

HoreTore thinks just because it is the way it has always been done that it is the only way things should be done. Either that or he fears someone might find a conspiracy somewhere in the material.

But it is not the way it has always been done.

There are several alternatives to who controls the money supply.

The topic was Wealth Distribution and how to equalize it. It is hard to discuss that without addressing the mechanics of fractional reserve banking.

All money systems have pitfalls.

Rather than learn about the alternatives he would much rather attack the source without knowing what is in it.

Of course it is beneath his great wisdom…

Governments taking control of the money system is not the worst alternative.

In fact it is how most people believe money is created.

But rather than discuss inequities and alternatives, he would rather see people searching for conspiracy.

He seems to have intellectually crippled himself by trying to stay in what he believes is “The Main Stream”. How very conservative!

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Originally Posted by Seamus Fermanagh

You realize that people have been saying that since Q.T.Cicero's time...and probably before.

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And probably they are right :laugh4:

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Originally Posted by Fisherking

HoreTore thinks just because it is the way it has always been done that it is the only way things should be done. Either that or he fears someone might find a conspiracy somewhere in the material.

But it is not the way it has always been done.

There are several alternatives to who controls the money supply.

The topic was Wealth Distribution and how to equalize it. It is hard to discuss that without addressing the mechanics of fractional reserve banking.

All money systems have pitfalls.

Rather than learn about the alternatives he would much rather attack the source without knowing what is in it.

Of course it is beneath his great wisdom…

Governments taking control of the money system is not the worst alternative.

In fact it is how most people believe money is created.

But rather than discuss inequities and alternatives, he would rather see people searching for conspiracy.

He seems to have intellectually crippled himself by trying to stay in what he believes is “The Main Stream”. How very conservative!

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I try to stay in the realm of sanity, away from theories pushed by new age hippies with neither education nor qualifications.

If you're going to take apart the monetary system, I do expect a certain level of actual knowledge. Failed art classes and TV-jobs doesn't quite cut it.

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Originally Posted by HoreTore

I try to stay in the realm of sanity, away from theories pushed by new age hippies with neither education nor qualifications.

If you're going to take apart the monetary system, I do expect a certain level of actual knowledge. Failed art classes and TV-jobs doesn't quite cut it.

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But you really wouldn’t know, as you merely found it astatically displeasing and didn’t watch.

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Originally Posted by Fisherking

But you really wouldn’t know, as you merely found it astatically displeasing and didn’t watch.

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No, I didn't watch it, as I hate youtube movies with a passion. I have, however, read the "theory" in written form in its many variations, and I highly doubt an old hippie will offer anything new.

The conclusion remains the same: it's nonsense from the clueless.

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Originally Posted by HoreTore

No, I didn't watch it, as I hate youtube movies with a passion. I have, however, read the "theory" in written form in its many variations, and I highly doubt an old hippie will offer anything new.

The conclusion remains the same: it's nonsense from the clueless.

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I am sure there are those who would say the same of your teaching methods.

But they likely think they already know everything and there is no need to go over the material.

Very enlightened attitude, huh?

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Originally Posted by Fisherking

I am sure there are those who would say the same of your teaching methods.

But they likely think they already know everything and there is no need to go over the material.

Very enlightened attitude, huh?

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If you want me to go over it, present your ideas in the proper format, ie. in writing.

As for my teaching methods, I happily accept criticism. I already know they're far from polished since I only have a couple of years of experience. One of the main reason why I work where I do is because I am constantly challenged on the scientific validity of my methods.

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Originally Posted by Seamus Fermanagh

You realize that people have been saying that since Q.T.Cicero's time...and probably before.

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Was that when he complained about brother Marcus's love of hearing his own voice?

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Originally Posted by HoreTore

If you want me to go over it, present your ideas in the proper format, ie. in writing.

As for my teaching methods, I happily accept criticism. I already know they're far from polished since I only have a couple of years of experience. One of the main reason why I work where I do is because I am constantly challenged on the scientific validity of my methods.

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I don’t want to argue with you about what you think you know.

I would much rather argue, or even agree with you on a topic we are both informed upon.

I don’t want to discredit your teaching methods. That was only an example.

The crux is that we need a debt free money system.

Your statement as to what money is was wrong, however, it is what money should be. The creation of money as debt only ensures that it is accumulated in fewer and fewer hands over time.

The video’s conclusion is digital coin, but I don’t particularly favor that method.

Money is for the fair exchange of goods and services. Money created from debt automatically places us in a position where that has to be repaid to those who made it. In the current paradigm this is private banks.

Government too is shackled to the debt. Government bailouts of the financial system only incurred more taxpayer debt to the entities that created the problem to begin with. It did not fix the problem and it will reoccur.

It can only lead to eventual financial collapse unless it is fundamentally changed.

Governments can do this with expenditures and taxes but there would be a tendency to overspending or over taxing, which would cause unrest or create disparities in currency values.

I am more interested in alternatives and developing a stable currency system.

Without some different system, than the debt based money supply we are never going to truly be able to fairly redistribute wealth.

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Originally Posted by Fisherking

The crux is that we need a debt free money system.

Your statement as to what money is was wrong, however, it is what money should be. The creation of money as debt only ensures that it is accumulated in fewer and fewer hands over time.

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Your problem is that this statement doesn't make any sense. I would suggest reading up on economics, preferably starting with Smith and Schumpeter.

Fractional reserve lending is a completely mundane practice, and has existed from the beginning of banking. Yes, that includes 200 years of the gold standard. It doesn't translate into a meaningless statement as "money is debt".

Maybe the guys at rationalwiki can explain it to you.

Play semantics if you will but you are only playing silly games.

Currently money is only created by debt. Governments may print money but it does not belong to them. It belongs to the Central Banks.

Governments took on the debt when they bailed out the banks, did they not?

It is not a conspiracy. It is a fundamental flaw.

Money is credit or money is debt, in the end they are both the same.

The bank gives you credit for which you incur debt.

I think you understand far less than you believe you do.

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Originally Posted by Fisherking

Play semantics if you will but you are only playing silly games.

Currently money is only created by debt. Governments may print money but it does not belong to them. It belongs to the Central Banks.

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This isn't relevant at all. It's a textbook example of being not even wrong.

But I acknowledge it makes for a great conspiracy theory.

Go back to watching some more youtube movies made by clueless old hippies who failed their art class. I'll stick with reading nobel prize winners.

Well then, rather than just playing troll, why don’t you impart some real wisdom and insight to the problem?

Why don’t you actually contribute something rather than wasting everyone’s time.

You know, be relevant.

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Originally Posted by Fisherking

Well then, rather than just playing troll, why don’t you impart some real wisdom and insight to the problem?

Why don’t you actually contribute something rather than wasting everyone’s time.

You know, be relevant.

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The only two things you have offered, is a claim that fractional reserve banking is a big, scary monster treathening our monetary system and that we would be better off on the gold standard.

I believe I have explained how fractional reserve banking is a fundamental part of how banks work(how else would they get money to loan out?), and how they have always worked, and that gold is just as arbitrary a currency as our current cotton is.

What more do you want to know?

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Originally Posted by HoreTore

I believe I have explained how fractional reserve banking is a fundamental part of how banks work(how else would they get money to loan out?), and how they have always worked, and that gold is just as arbitrary a currency as our current cotton is.

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No one argues that this has always been the case. We are arguing that the ever growing debt will implode the system sooner or later. That it has always worked like that (banks are relatively new compared to our total years of history) doesn't make it right or good for us. If you think that the USA debt and the IMF/World Bank are good things then there is no point arguing. Sometimes I wonder if you are being incentivized to always state and bold/underline the mainstream position on every single topic in existence and ridicule any way of alternative thinking.

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Originally Posted by HoreTore

The only two things you have offered, is a claim that fractional reserve banking is a big, scary monster treathening our monetary system and that we would be better off on the gold standard.

I believe I have explained how fractional reserve banking is a fundamental part of how banks work(how else would they get money to loan out?), and how they have always worked, and that gold is just as arbitrary a currency as our current cotton is.

What more do you want to know?

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No you haven’t. No new information there. Unless you care to go back and edit some in.

Just drivel because you think you might be able to convince someone that you think you smell a conspiracy. So you couldn’t possibly watch a video so were on the same topic.

You seem to be either a crypto conservative or a raving paranoid on the topic.

But seeing as how you already know it all, please share you knowledge.

If you know how it works then you also know the pitfalls. Care to tell us any of those?

Why must the money supply be ever growing? What is the result when it stops?

Tell us about business cycles and what they do.

Show us why it can just go on for ever and ever.

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Originally Posted by Myth

No one argues that this has always been the case. We are arguing that the ever growing debt will implode the system sooner or later. That it has always worked like that (banks are relatively new compared to our total years of history) doesn't make it right or good for us. If you think that the USA debt and the IMF/World Bank are good things then there is no point arguing. Sometimes I wonder if you are being incentivized to always state and bold/underline the mainstream position on every single topic in existence and ridicule any way of alternative thinking.

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I have not made the claim that there is sufficient liquidity in the system at present. In fact, I am of the opinion that there's not enough liquidity, and that banks are allowed to operate at risk levels higher than what we need to have a stable market. I am also of the opinion that the various tools designed to hide/distort risk are incredibly dangerous, and undermines what stability there is in the market, and we saw the results of that in 2008.

My criticism towards you and Fisherking is your use of fractional reserve banking as explanation of the cause of it. That's what's nonsense and where you go wrong.

Also, reread my post. When it comes to fractional reserve banking, it operates now just like it has always done. The situation today is no different than in 1960, 1860 or 1760.

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Originally Posted by Fisherking

Why must the money supply be ever growing? What is the result when it stops?

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If you have an increase in total wealth, then you'll need more money to facilitate it. Inflation is prefered since spending is prefered. One meassurement of how much money exists are how fast the money changes hands. The more hands, the more people has actually done something with the money.

A stopped growth would be problematic yeah. But that isn't exactly helped by the gold standard. The big flaw with gold standard are that it's a limited resource. That means two things. First, without finding more gold, the amount of money can't increase. That means that for me to get more money, someone else has to lose money. A 0 sum game instead of growth. The second is that gold may have a fixed price in that standard, but that doesn't mean that gold has a fixed price in reality.

Say that Indian gold jewellry is going up (again). Then you can get the funny situation that none wants to sell gold to the US for money, because Indian jewellry gives twice as much. Or the Swedish goverment sells the gold reserve to India for jewellry and gets payed twice as much. Then they'll ask the US to trade that money for gold. Repeat until the gold market breaks or people shuts down the market because you're breaking the system.

To put it simple. It's very easy to break the gold standard nowadays. Spain broke their own silver market historically. By finding too much silver in the new world.

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Originally Posted by Ironside

If you have an increase in total wealth, then you'll need more money to facilitate it. Inflation is prefered since spending is prefered. One meassurement of how much money exists are how fast the money changes hands. The more hands, the more people has actually done something with the money.

A stopped growth would be problematic yeah. But that isn't exactly helped by the gold standard. The big flaw with gold standard are that it's a limited resource. That means two things. First, without finding more gold, the amount of money can't increase. That means that for me to get more money, someone else has to lose money. A 0 sum game instead of growth. The second is that gold may have a fixed price in that standard, but that doesn't mean that gold has a fixed price in reality.

Say that Indian gold jewellry is going up (again). Then you can get the funny situation that none wants to sell gold to the US for money, because Indian jewellry gives twice as much. Or the Swedish goverment sells the gold reserve to India for jewellry and gets payed twice as much. Then they'll ask the US to trade that money for gold. Repeat until the gold market breaks or people shuts down the market because you're breaking the system.

To put it simple. It's very easy to break the gold standard nowadays. Spain broke their own silver market historically. By finding too much silver in the new world.

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To add to that: George Soros sure taught you Swedes how much fun it is with fixed values on currency....

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Originally Posted by HoreTore

My criticism towards you and Fisherking is your use of fractional reserve banking as explanation of the cause of it. That's what's nonsense and where you go wrong.

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He is correct somewhat in a sense that if banks had higher reserves, we wouldn't feel the depression so much as banks would have been able to cover bigger part of their losses from the reserves, but that is definitely not the reason we had depression.

The problem with higher bank reserves is that it makes the amount of money in circulation smaller, thus making investments more expensive. So, if we, for simplicity sake, say that because of the depression the 100$ we had became 90$ and if banks had higher reserves we would have lost less. That's true, but the economy wouldn't have developed as much so we would have had only 90$ in the first place and lost 2$, bringing our current wealth to 88$ - a net loss. A lot of it is psychology, a subjective feeling of loss

Bigger problem with the banks, especially in the US, is the risk factor, which is what really needs to be addressed.

On to the topic at hand - we've seen that the current model isn't the best. It needs to be tweaked. Taxation needs to be more fair, but naturally, it's much more complicated than it sounds.

I'd prefer if the state took a more active role in promoting social mobility, and adjust taxes (specifically for the wealthy) accordingly to that effect.

Having worked for a US company in the past, and currently employed in a subsidiary of a pretty big corporation now ($2 billion annual turnover) I see this time and again - growth, growth, growth! Always growth. Growth is to be expected. 10% growth year-over-year. No growth? Manager's heads start rolling.

But you see, growth can't come faster than what the limits are of our physical planet and the finite resources we are exploiting. Sooner or later we will hit a wall, and some corporate douches will insist on more growth. It's going to be sad and funny at the same time.

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Originally Posted by Myth

But you see, growth can't come faster than what the limits are of our physical planet and the finite resources we are exploiting. Sooner or later we will hit a wall, and some corporate douches will insist on more growth. It's going to be sad and funny at the same time.

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Even if the economy is stagnating doesn't mean that an individual company cannot keep growing. You can always take the business away from the competition and grow that way.

Doesn't change the fact that at some point we won't be able to grow because there won't be more resources to transform in actual goods/services. The artificial growth because of fake money can never be matched by actual goods produced. Even if you oust every other competitor and just have Megacorp PLC as the supplier of EVERYTHING they will still want growth.

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Originally Posted by Myth

Doesn't change the fact that at some point we won't be able to grow because there won't be more resources to transform in actual goods/services. The artificial growth because of fake money can never be matched by actual goods produced. Even if you oust every other competitor and just have Megacorp PLC as the supplier of EVERYTHING they will still want growth.

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I doubt we need to worry about this scenario. While theoretically possible it is practically unattainable.

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Originally Posted by Sarmatian

He is correct somewhat in a sense that if banks had higher reserves, we wouldn't feel the depression so much as banks would have been able to cover bigger part of their losses from the reserves, but that is definitely not the reason we had depression.

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Indeed, and that's what "not enough liquidity" means. The problem isn't fractional reserve itself(that would be absurd), but rather where the balance between access to credit and stability lies.

I would argue that 2008 showed us it's too far on the access to credit-side, and that we need to reign it back a little to the stability-side.


That's here the actual, sane discussion is. Screaming about "fake money", "return to the gold standard" and "money is debt" is nonsensical and does nothing else than to make a hard topic even harder.

LOL and the liquidity disappears where?

What part of the lending process negates the 0 sum game?

The gold standard was only a means of international money transfer. It was fixed by governments to a fixed amount in gold. But in order to increase money supply, reserves had to be increased.

Fait money is not the problem, as long as people have confidence in the value of the currency.

The system is not the same as it always was. The Banking systems of the past were not in control of currency. Governments were.

The problem is when banks create the money (or credit/debt). Repaying the loans result in no loss to the economy. Interest =Bank profits spent on operating costs and dividends put some of the interest payments back into circulation.

Bank investment, however, acquires real property (wealth) and concentrates it into fewer hands. In the past investment banks and lending banks were separate. That has also changed.

Simple taxation can not reasonably make up the difference. Governments too are borrowers. Their taxation merely goes to service their debt. Governments don’t control their currencies today, Central Banks do.

At some point the whole thing has to tumble down. Be it governments defaulting or banks defaulting or both.

It produces inequities but it has worked to some degree for over 300 years.

Sure it has.

There have been collapses too in the past. Something left out of HT’s “it’s just the way its always been“.
These were just extremes in the cycle.
Too in the past everything was more localized. A particular bank might default depriving a community. Then it was whole nations. Today we have a globally interconnected system. What happens when it reached the breaking point. Do we need to test it?

We just need to find a better way of doing things.

Can’t we find a means to enrich those who produce wealth rather than those who simply make money available? Otherwise, we all become slaves to debt, if not on a personal level, at least on a governmental one.

Because if we don’t, we will surely end up with a barter system again.

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Originally Posted by Fisherking

LOL and the liquidity disappears where?

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Once again.

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Originally Posted by Ironside

A 0 sum game instead of growth.

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It's still a zero sum game even with growth because if you gain money, the other person's money is now worth less even if you didn't take any of it away nominally. It's called inflation. That's why, when a bank gets your money and gives you 1% interest p.a. and there is an inflation of 2% p.a., the bank isn't really giving you money, it only compensates 50% of your loss.

Please keep posts to an intelligible level above quoting an entire post and simply reply with "lol" or baseless answers or attacks. Thank you.

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Originally Posted by Husar

It's still a zero sum game even with growth because if you gain money, the other person's money is now worth less even if you didn't take any of it away nominally. It's called inflation. That's why, when a bank gets your money and gives you 1% interest p.a. and there is an inflation of 2% p.a., the bank isn't really giving you money, it only compensates 50% of your loss.

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There's quite a difference between growth and inflation. Since wiki gave me the numbers to calculate with. USA got about 30% more money between 2005-2009, while the combined inflation was about 10%.

The situation you describe can happen when the banking Prime rate is low and you have high inflation.

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Originally Posted by Ironside

There's quite a difference between growth and inflation. Since wiki gave me the numbers to calculate with. USA got about 30% more money between 2005-2009, while the combined inflation was about 10%.

The situation you describe can happen when the banking Prime rate is low and you have high inflation.

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I actually mistook growth in general with just growth of the available money. If the money is invested and the investment provides a proper value, then the inflation won't be as high as the percentage of new money. I was still aiming at the fact though, that humans usually do not compare themselves with others in absolutes but see how they do relative to others and in that sense the growing wealth gap means that while some are getting richer, others become poorer, relatively speaking. It may not be great but as Fragony likes to say, it is how it is.

I'm not an economist, but what little I do know about money is, that it is created when needed. When there's a high demand, money will be created. Banks will lend out more than they have. The difference between the interests they charge and the interests they give, is also creation of money. Fractional reserve banking is as old as banking itself, nothing evil or conspiracy about it. It's just one of the key elements of banking.

Concerning weatlh distribution, some random thoughts or ideas:

1) in our current system, shareholders own the company. However, shareholders are not the only stakeholders in a company. Wouldn't it be more fair to make the workers in the company co-owners and let them have a say in the decision making process? Wouldn't it be more fair to let all workers combined be co-owner of the business they work in? Or even further: once the investor has earned his money back, with a certain compensation (profits): shouldn't it then be so that the labourers get ownership of the entire company?

2) when we talk about countries, we all say that democracy is the way to go. Quid with multinationals who are, in reality, mightier than countries and who are able to influence governments? Shouldn't we install a certain system of democracy when a certain treshold is reached? Should this be government control or more a combination of 1) together with a say in how it's run by either a democratically elected body or a union of consumers?

3) Alternative for 2): when companies get too much power, shouldn't they be forced to shrink (split)? Shouldn't we make it forbidden for companies to grow beyond a certain treshold, since that would give them too much power; power that has no democratic legitmacy at all and which democratically elected bodies cannot control? Do such powerful multinationals belong in a democracy? If our governments become a joke compared to their power, are we then still living in democracies? Shouldn't we let go of our self-righteous attitude and our superiority complex vs. those parts of the world that are not, on paper, democracies "like us" (but we aren't!), and admit that we have a problem?

4) continuing on the line of thought of 3): is it ok for somebody to have so much wealth that he can exercise, de facto, power over thousands of people; power he didn't get from the people, but he simply has because he is wealthy? Shouldn't there be a treshold, a certain cap on how much wealth (=power, but not given by the people) one individual can obtain?

5) Meritocracy: does the possibility to inherit wealth belong in a meritocracy? Shouldn't we get rid of inheritance laws? Whatever you leave after your death, gets redistributed instead of handed over to the lucky bastard who came out of the right vagina? Kings and Queens get this critique, but doesn't that go up for sons and daughters of billionaires?

6) On top of 5): free education for everybody and banning of private schools. No more quality labels and "best schools"; all education public and of the same quality. Wouldn't that be more in the line of equal chances for everybody?

7) a basic income for everybody. We live in times of overproduction and technological innovation which leads to the disappearence of jobs. Is it still morally justifiable to let people rot, whatever their attitude in life (as if being poor is an attitude problem :rolleyes:)? If we have the means to guarantee every human shelter, food, water, heating and education, then shouldn't we consider reaching that goal a priority above all?

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1) in our current system, shareholders own the company. However, shareholders are not the only stakeholders in a company. Wouldn't it be more fair to make the workers in the company co-owners and let them have a say in the decision making process? Wouldn't it be more fair to let all workers combined be co-owner of the business they work in? Or even further: once the investor has earned his money back, with a certain compensation (profits): shouldn't it then be so that the labourers get ownership of the entire company?

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What if the investor is also 'the/a boss', such as in most small businesses? Does he retain his stake as technically a worker in the company? Does he under any circumstances retain some majority stake and therefore authority, or must he pass elections by the workers?

What are the mechanisms of divesting laborers of their shares if they are "fired"? What are the mechanisms of firing? Who does the firing? Is it down to a vote by all of the companies laborers? In large companies this would be both inefficient and unfair. It seems to me that there are some functions (such as hiring and firing) that work better when centralized in one position or set of positions. Currently, in small businesses it is typically the management that performs this function, while in large companies it is contracted out, so to speak, to HR departments. And yet, in terms of co-ownership of and stakes in a company, hiring and firing is one of the most crucial powers, and centralizing it automatically creates a huge divide between those who have the power and those who lack it. (Though of course in large companies there are various tiers to these functions, since a low-level manager can't ever fire an executive, and while an executive often can't personally fire a low-level manager, he can easily have him fired by whoever manages that manager.) Bottom line, centralization and hierarchization seem to be structurally integral to business, yet also difficult to reconcile with democratic ownership of a company.

A preferable solution would be less extreme, since the proposal you present seems to bring us full-circle eventually: better to heavily check the excesses of bosses in companies of any size, while giving workers small or low-level financial and ownership stakes in the company, as well as both the privilege and responsibility of regulating their local work environments in conjunction with both their superiors and colleagues, and some mechanism for mobility through the hierarchy at-least-mostly independent from the existing top-level.

As to the specifics, I declare myself incompetent to postulate.

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4) continuing on the line of thought of 3): is it ok for somebody to have so much wealth that he can exercise, de facto, power over thousands of people; power he didn't get from the people, but he simply has because he is wealthy? Shouldn't there be a treshold, a certain cap on how much wealth (=power, but not given by the people) one individual can obtain?

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How do you manage that without encouraging, say, Mafias and other shady power-brokers who don't necessarily have a huge amount of explicit wealth or at least don't wield it explicitly?

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5) Meritocracy: does the possibility to inherit wealth belong in a meritocracy? Shouldn't we get rid of inheritance laws? Whatever you leave after your death, gets redistributed instead of handed over to the lucky bastard who came out of the right vagina? Kings and Queens get this critique, but doesn't that go up for sons and daughters of billionaires?

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What about sons and daughters of life-time millionaires? As in, a person who accumulated a million in liquid currency or whatever, over a lifetime? That's not really so much to pass on, right? Or, what about next-of-kin? Say, a single mother dies and her juvenile is taken in by grandparents - should the grandparents receive some of the mother's assets, especially if there was a will or other evidence that the mother would have wished for that to happen? (the transfer of assets, not the death :P)

A progressive inheritance-tax seems to make most sense, though loopholes that allow shuffling of properties and assets and so on between numerous hands in order to bypass taxes and eventually arrive relatively unmolested in the hands of some individual must be caught somehow.

However, I suppose you could argue that any minimum income or enforced living-standard should be enough for anyone under any circumstances (with extenuating circumstances such as chronic illness increasing the baseline for that individual), in which case you might as well redistribute all assets upon death, no matter how meager. On the other hand, you must then deal with people trying to, say, gift away or "invest" huge sums in their old age or decrepitude.

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all education public and of the same quality.

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Better to make private education more affordable and improve public education overall; the best way to make it affordable though, is not vouchers or whatever, but higher incomes across the board. Also, keep in mind that even among public schools there is an elite class, and we can not hope to have all schools, public or private, match that elite class. Should existing top-quality public schools be disbanded?

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If we have the means to guarantee every human shelter, food, water, heating and education, then shouldn't we consider reaching that goal a priority above all?

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A higher priority is to provide for the future and monitor our civilization's and planet's condition and take 'necessary measures' in order that such a goal could be continuously met over time. "The higher they are, the harder they fall", so it's only good sense to ensure that we have a solid foundation to rise from, rather than a flimsy Jenga tower, in the first place.

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Originally Posted by Montmorency

What if the investor is also 'the/a boss', such as in most small businesses? Does he retain his stake as technically a worker in the company? Does he under any circumstances retain some majority stake and therefore authority, or must he pass elections by the workers?

What are the mechanisms of divesting laborers of their shares if they are "fired"? What are the mechanisms of firing? Who does the firing? Is it down to a vote by all of the companies laborers? In large companies this would be both inefficient and unfair. It seems to me that there are some functions (such as hiring and firing) that work better when centralized in one position or set of positions. Currently, in small businesses it is typically the management that performs this function, while in large companies it is contracted out, so to speak, to HR departments. And yet, in terms of co-ownership of and stakes in a company, hiring and firing is one of the most crucial powers, and centralizing it automatically creates a huge divide between those who have the power and those who lack it. (Though of course in large companies there are various tiers to these functions, since a low-level manager can't ever fire an executive, and while an executive often can't personally fire a low-level manager, he can easily have him fired by whoever manages that manager.) Bottom line, centralization and hierarchization seem to be structurally integral to business, yet also difficult to reconcile with democratic ownership of a company.

A preferable solution would be less extreme, since the proposal you present seems to bring us full-circle eventually: better to heavily check the excesses of bosses in companies of any size, while giving workers small or low-level financial and ownership stakes in the company, as well as both the privilege and responsibility of regulating their local work environments in conjunction with both their superiors and colleagues, and some mechanism for mobility through the hierarchy at-least-mostly independent from the existing top-level.

As to the specifics, I declare myself incompetent to postulate.

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Why are you so opposed to changing the system? The problems you name exist now too, yet no opposition.

Anyway, if the investor works himself, then obvioulsy, he can keep a vote in his company. As a labourer. Like the rest of the people working.

Are we looking for an ideal system for maximum and thus ipso fact ice cold efficiency or do we aim for fairness?

Will the decison making process become harder? Perhaps. So what? Can't labourers elect their own CEO? Why not? Can't I at least elect the (wo)man who I work for? When it comes to countries, everybody cheers when wars are waged against countries that don't know our type of "democracy" (we don't have it either, but who cares)? But for labourers electing their own boss, oh no, that's dirty communism talking here, the idiot needs to be burned him at the stake or put in a mental facility.

What are the chances people will get fired just like that for maximimsing profit for the benefit of people who are not working at all in the company, but just own a piece of paper, sit on their butt and want to squeeze the maximum out of it, when the workers themselves own the company?

You also ignore my point 3). When the company gets too big, democratic processes become different and more difficult. And less democratic. Then just don't let companies become too big.

You need to change your aim. The aim is not maximum growth, maximum profits at the cost of all. The aim is not "the economy". The aim is letting people who work have a say in the matters. We call ourselves a democracy, yet we have this system of wage labour in which you do what you are told or you get the sack; which means you'll have no means to live if you don't accept somebody playing boss over you.

That's not a democracy, that's a hypocrisy.

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How do you manage that without encouraging, say, Mafias and other shady power-brokers who don't necessarily have a huge amount of explicit wealth or at least don't wield it explicitly?

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Excellent. You put wealthy people with way too much non-democratically legitimated power on the same line as professional criminals. That's a very correct comparison and a correct analysis. What do we do with scum? We put them in jail. Instead of putting the poor in prison, we have to put the white collar criminals in jail. Not giving them a free pass like we do now.

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What about sons and daughters of life-time millionaires? As in, a person who accumulated a million in liquid currency or whatever, over a lifetime? That's not really so much to pass on, right? Or, what about next-of-kin? Say, a single mother dies and her juvenile is taken in by grandparents - should the grandparents receive some of the mother's assets, especially if there was a will or other evidence that the mother would have wished for that to happen? (the transfer of assets, not the death :P)

A progressive inheritance-tax seems to make most sense, though loopholes that allow shuffling of properties and assets and so on between numerous hands in order to bypass taxes and eventually arrive relatively unmolested in the hands of some individual must be caught somehow.

However, I suppose you could argue that any minimum income or enforced living-standard should be enough for anyone under any circumstances (with extenuating circumstances such as chronic illness increasing the baseline for that individual), in which case you might as well redistribute all assets upon death, no matter how meager. On the other hand, you must then deal with people trying to, say, gift away or "invest" huge sums in their old age or decrepitude.

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Do you want a true meritocracy or not?

One million to pass on is not so much? Tell that to the son of a drug addict and a prostitue living in a ghetto.

What difference does it make for the son or daughter of a billionaire if his father or mother acquired it by work or inheritance. The son or daughter didn't; his or her only merit is to be born in the right family. Bravo, what an accomplishment.

No inheritances anymore. Period.

Everybody needs to start with the same weapons: education wise and wealth wise. And welfare state wise.

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Better to make private education more affordable and improve public education overall; the best way to make it affordable though, is not vouchers or whatever, but higher incomes across the board. Also, keep in mind that even among public schools there is an elite class, and we can not hope to have all schools, public or private, match that elite class. Should existing top-quality public schools be disbanded?

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I basically said: no more distinctions. That's not so hard to understand. Screw your "elite" schools. They are nothing more but a tool to institutionalise inequality.

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A higher priority is to provide for the future and monitor our civilization's and planet's condition and take 'necessary measures' in order that such a goal could be continuously met over time. "The higher they are, the harder they fall", so it's only good sense to ensure that we have a solid foundation to rise from, rather than a flimsy Jenga tower, in the first place.

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You make it sound as if there's a choice to make. A much better ambition would be an "and" "and" story. Whoever gives you the idea that that isn't possible, lies.

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Why are you so opposed to changing the system?

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Huh?

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Are we looking for an ideal system for maximum and thus ipso fact ice cold efficiency or do we aim for fairness?

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An efficient system would obviously move the world toward your ideals of fairness more than an inefficient one...

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When the company gets too big, democratic processes become different and more difficult. And less democratic. Then just don't let companies become too big.

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Sometimes, size - IOW centralization of production - is preferable. How about simply giving the state more stake in a company as it grows past some threshold?

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Will the decison making process become harder? Perhaps. So what? Can't labourers elect their own CEO? Why not?

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How many positions would be elected? Just executive ones? Is your solution to the hiring issue to have one person start a company and then hire another into the company and then democratically "elect" applicants or existing workers into every conceivable position? That's untenable. The point is, you can't undermine efficiency so much without literally collapsing the system. I understand that you'd be fine with a de-globalized society, but the cost of a transition to a 'simpler' standard of living would involve the deaths of hundreds of millions or even billions...

In big companies, if all workers are co-owners or stakeholders then it makes sense for them to all have a say in electing executives, but in a small company with no genuine executives to speak of it isn't quite right for an investor to start a small business and then immediately have his workers kick him out on a whim and appropriate his entire investment, whether to continue the business by their own standard or to just sell off all the assets and split the profits. That would clearly be another sort of vulture capitalism, or even just plain chaos.

You didn't really address my modified proposal, so how about this - hiring and firing remain much the same as they are, though perhaps more modularly: in a small business of 20 employees, everyone gets some say on an applicant chosen by the chief, and in a big company the workers in one department or project, for example, get some say on applicants into their area; firing would be similar - the boss can't fire someone without the majority of people in the small business, department, or project, etc. agreeing to the decision, but the boss does have a special veto that, for example, prevents co-workers from just firing that one guy nobody likes but is actually a good worker.

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You need to change your aim.

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My aim is sustainability, clearly.

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Excellent. You put wealthy people with way too much non-democratically legitimated power on the same line as professional criminals. That's a very correct comparison and a correct analysis. What do we do with scum? We put them in jail. Instead of putting the poor in prison, we have to put the white collar criminals in jail. Not giving them a free pass like we do now.

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Since prison should be geared more towards rehabilitation than "revenge", how exactly should white-collar criminals be treated? Anyway, the white-collar 'underground' persists precisely because they are powerful. So, in a place like Italy say, how do you prevent the Mafias from getting even more actual control over state and economic affairs, once your reforms would be implemented?

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Do you want a true meritocracy or not?

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Meritocracy is a convenient buzzword, but it does not work like the ideal some have. Anyway, I said that education should be improved everywhere, which you plainly agree with - so I don't see what your problem is.

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One million to pass on is not so much? Tell that to the son of a drug addict and a prostitue living in a ghetto.

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Obviously that would be taxed. What would happen in the example of the single mother that I gave? No assets directly passed on to the grandparents, just a rise in the minimum of support to them?

For the "no inheritances" thing to work, you would definitely first have to build the capacity to maintain a minimum standard for everyone or almost everyone, and just as importantly a public trust in that capacity. Referring back to an earlier point, this would entail that your reforms be introduced progressively over decades, and not all at once. "One step at a time".

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Screw your "elite" schools. They are nothing more but a tool to institutionalise inequality.

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These are public schools we are talking about. So, close down public schools just because they outperform other public schools (and private ones)? That's incredibly backwards.

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A much better ambition would be an "and" "and" story. Whoever gives you the idea that that isn't possible, lies.

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'Do everything at once' isn't a question of possibility, it's a question of pragmatism. Sure, we could try that - we'd fail. It's almost always - in any situation - to take things one step at a time.

I work in a retail store for $8.35 an hour, I understand wanting to have a stake in the company I work for and having more of a say on how it is run. But at the end of the day making corporations "democratic" does not make a lot of sense to me. My employment is a contract between myself and my employer. I'm selling my time and labor to them for monetary compensation.

A company doesn't exist to provide services to its employees like a government provides services to its citizens. It exists to provide services to its clients/customers in the hopes of making a profit. The workers are the ones who are providing services to the company.

CEO's wield a lot of power and authority, but technically they are employees like everyone else. The business is the one paying for the CEO's services, so it has every right to pick the person it believes will do the best job, not the workers. CEO's can and do get fired for poor performance just like regular employees. A couple of years ago the company I work for, JCPenney, hired Ron Johnson from Apple to be CEO. Ron Johnson was the executive responsible for making Apple's retail stores a huge success and he was supposed to help JCPenney make a turnaround. His ideas sucked and JCPenney's revenue tanked. Eventually the Board of Directors lost faith in Ron Johnson and they gave him the sack. His term as CEO only lasted about a year and a half, if I remember correctly.

Of course companies have a lot of power over their employees, and that's one of the main topics of this thread, so my post needs to address this point. But it's getting late so that will have to wait.

We put scum in jail; but not those scum.
The recent recession, bail-outs, slaps on the wrist demonstrate all to clearly that "justice" comes in differing forms for different classes.
The system certainly does not use "One law to rule them all"; so a better starting point might be to clarify the role of the justice system, and perhaps make explicit the exceptions.

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Originally Posted by HopAlongBunny

We put scum in jail; but not those scum.
The recent recession, bail-outs, slaps on the wrist demonstrate all to clearly that "justice" comes in differing forms for different classes.
The system certainly does not use "One law to rule them all"; so a better starting point might be to clarify the role of the justice system, and perhaps make explicit the exceptions.

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Step One: Celebrities who have not physically or sexually harmed another person pay a fine and damages and go home. Tired of the hoopla over low level bull excrement.

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer...t-society.html