Libido dominandi is the lust to dominate others. Controlling food supply is a classic means, and the perfidious Albion discovered the efficiency of controlling merely the salt, and thus controlling the entire population of say India or China.
In USA today, government control over food is as bad as it has been anywhere in the history of mankind, in terms of sheer malevolence. Subsidizing bad food, flooding the ghetto with food stamps to pay for this bad food (fritos) as an act of genocide, and then speeding up the process by flooding the ghetto with crack, and then making "ownership" of seeds and kids of food a part of intellectual property rights is all designed to eliminate the lower classes.
Those entities charged with protecting the food and drug supply do nothing to stop this criminality, but work tirelessly to crush any small farmer desiring to provide consumers with good food.
I and a friend were reflecting on how in the 1960s forward there was a renaissance in seemingly all fields: food, shelter, entertainment, religion, clothing, business, politics ...what heady times! Today we seem to have such a renaissance in food only.
Perhaps all other fields are discouraged by our political system and its scortched earth policies to anyone who would be free. Perhaps it reflects the predatory rage the system experiences when it sees its pretty work of welfare state being undermined by good food. In any event, there is a renaissance in food, and the state in all its violence, is attacking, as we see in the in the Rawsome Foods raid. Such raids are happening all over USA.
One things about the success of this movement is the aspect of "lifestyle" over "profit." Here we see one such farmer. A lesson here is to see his creativity, and allow ourself the freedom to pursue your mission with a emphasis, most natural, of lifestyle over profits.
We need this to save our country.
Saturday, August 27, 2011
Food And Revolution
Friday, August 26, 2011
Hong Kong
Hong Kong is a place to visit if you want inspiration... check out the trade show schedule at hktdc.com. You can get good, clean safe rooms for $50 a night, breakfast included, and getting around is easy. You can often get cheap flights on Cathay Pacific if you register (free) to attend some show. Hong Kong is the size of Switzerland, but even freer and more diverse.
Thursday, August 25, 2011
How the Monetary System Works
This was written 25 years ago, about events 50 years ago and forward, by Nobel Laureate Robert A Mundel:
"The rules of the game of the (monetary) system constitute a combination of laws, commitments, conventions and gentlemen's agreements by which the inner country (the United States) pegs its currency (the dollar) to gold and the outer countries (Let us call them Europe) peg their currencies to the dollar, either directly or indirectly through another currency (such as the pound sterling or the franc). This means that the United States acts as the residual buyer or seller of gold, whereas Europe acts as the residual buyer or seller of dollars."
It sure lays some nice ground work for what is happening now....
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
On Buffett's Proposal
Forbes has an article on “Billionaire Warren Buffett's call last week for higher capital gains and income tax rates on those with incomes above $1 million a year...”
the author makes the case “...Buffett has betrayed his duty to those less fortunate by lending his name and prestige to an ignoble myth – that taxes targeted at the rich do not affect the middle-class and poor. Nothing could be further from the truth.”
After asserting the rich can afford to pay more, the author gets specific...
“ Let's consider what happens when the rich pay more in taxes. With less disposable income... there is an offsetting reduction in the amount of money and employment in the private sector. Although the rich may not notice the difference, the middle-class and poor pay the price.”
So less money about in private industry, less jobs for the middle class. Just so.
The author points out Buffett says that “People invest to make money, and potential taxes have never scared them off,” and calls this “disingenuous, if not silly. ”
Well, I think Buffett is a villain, but he is right here. We self-employed are driven by lifestyle, which is largely “pre-tax.” Sicne we plow everything back into the business, and that takes out time and money, our pretax business is out livlihood and goal anyway. The taxes can go to 95% without too much trouble, for we in business. I expect thay will. This will be a tremendous problem for people who depend on property, paychecks and pensions, but not for the self employed.
The author goes on...
“People invest to make money after tax: the higher the tax rate, the fewer investment opportunities that can produce an acceptable after-tax return. The result is fewer investments, less wealth creation, less opportunity, fewer jobs, and more poverty.”
Yes, some do, and this is the result. But the real killer is the govt policy of “get big or get out” wherein there is a relentless governmetn oppression upon people who would start a business. There is the real problem with our economy: a failure ot respect the rule of law and a lack of freedom.
The author notes “Mr. Buffett has sheltered the bulk of his fortune from the federal death tax by putting it into several foundations that, over time, will give the money away.”
Well, yes he has hidden his wealth, but no it will not be given away. these foundations last forever becuase of the way they are structured; the exist to concentrate power in the hands of the elite. Get rid of all protections of these foundations, and you’ll see the politics and economy of USA change swiftly.
The author makes a suggestion: “(Buffett) and his wealthy friends will use their combined resources and talents to create a jobs training program that over time would replace 47 federal programs now provided by 9 federal agencies, many of which overlap and only a handful of which have assessed their outcomes. In exchange, the federal government would have to end these programs in proportion to the number of individuals served by the Buffet initiative.”
The author claims there would be savings, but misses the point. Nonthing government offers serves as any response to human needs, so having someone else do it does not advance matters.
Simply eliminate the 503c1 or whatever the charitable foundation law it, and thse people will be faced with investing those billions in the taxable market, not to have them protected by taxpayers.
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
USA Economy: We Pay $105,000 For Your Chevy Volt
USA taxpayers are paying 50 billion plus to bailout GM, but that does not count the specific program bailouts. For example, the award-winning Chevy Volt is a heavily subsidized program, beyond the $50 billion taxpayer bailout of GM.
USA taxpayers forked over $240 million new money to GM for new R&D to develop the Volt. And since USA R&D is so 3rd world rate, we had to fork over $150 million to Koreans to develop the all-important battery. So that is $390 million. But there is more.
The Volt suggested price is $41,000. How much does Government Motors (GM) make? Well nothing... they cost about $40,000 to make, and sell by GM at $41,000.
The Volt has not proven popular. GM cut production projections from 60,000 to ten tousand 1st year production. GM sold less than 3200. Say they get 4000, which they will not.
4000 x $41000 = $164,000,000 in sales. To help sell the car, the taxpayers offer a $7500 rebate on the first 200,000 cars sold. Well, let's stick with the 4000 above. 4000 x $7500 = $30,000,000 taxpayers subsidy. (California taxpayers also offer some rebates, but we'll leave that out.)
So take the 390 million direct subsidies for the Volt and add $30 million in direct sales subsidies, and the taxpayer are paying (390 million + 30 million = 420 million... 420 million/400 = $105,000 direct taxpayer subsidies. So every time you see a Chevy Volt, or an advertisement for one, remember you paid to bail out GM, and you pay $105,000 for a car the buyer bought for $33,500.
Or another way of putting it, A Chevy Volt costs $139,500, of which the customer pays $33,500 and you pay $105,000. This does not include the $50 billion bailout, necessary for a company with such wacky and irresponsible management.
Well, who is buying the Chevy Volt. Collectors, govt agencies, and such. Some are even paying higher than the sticker price! Curious, that. Who would do so? Usually when people pay over the sticker price, it is due to shortage. That is not the problem here, so it would be interesting to investigate. What mischief is afoot? Wikipedia says some dealers are selling the car to other dealers, keep the $7500 rebate for themselves, and then resell the Volt as a low mileage used car. Nice.
USA is broke because almost all big business needs to be subsidized to survive. We literally cannot afford this. This is just one product item in one company. The list of similar boondoggles is endless. When the USA govt nationalized GM, it should have eliminated all subsidies and open-sourced all of its patents. At that point thousands of laid off workers would have started new companies. As it is our economy continues its downward path.
Monday, August 22, 2011
Root of All Evil
The Cobden Center has been putting out some very good stuff on the economy and economics. they are addressing what prescriptions might be best in these trying economic times. One of their best writers is Sean Cirrigan, who says, in passing,
This age old error of confusing the medium of exchange with the object of exchange is one we continue to commit."
Perzactly! Money is a medium of exchange. It emerges from among commodities. It solves the problem of double coincidence necessary for trade. If I go to market with eggs looking for milk, there is a good chance that I'll be successful in an exchange, since there are likely to be milkmen looking for eggs, and we both have well known items that are easily divisible. The coincidence that I am looking for eggs and I find them is rather sure. The double coincidence that the egg man is looking for milk is rather sure.
But what happens when I go to market with an air filter looking for a trailer hitch. Now the problem of double coincidence rear its ugly head. I amy find someone wanting an air filter, but unlikely to find a trailer hitch. And even if I did, the items are not easily divisible to make a trade. The subjective valuation is hard to assess as well. Out of trade emerged a commodity item that served as a medium of exchange: usually gold, often silver, and other base metals in history.
Money is so flexible than man began to trade to acquire money over needs. All major religions warn on money for money's, for example, Love of Money is the Root of All Evil. (1 Tim 6:10).
When people are pursuing money for money's sake, they are missing out on using the money for lifestyle sake. Buckminster Fuller was notorious for trying to live as if he would have no possessions. Problem was, as a world-famous architect, he was making tremendous amounts of money. So he kept spending it on his next project, his next big idea.
Where things get really ugly is when people lend money out to make money on money. Usury is the crime the religions condemn. Here the leverage allows the few to concentrate money, which in turn provides for all the evils we see around us: poverty, war, hunger, etc. If in fact these evils can be traced to the practice, then would we abjure the practice?
Sunday, August 21, 2011
Regulators Are Captured By the Regulated
It is a recurring theme in USA capitalism, that our system of regulators is always captured by the regulated. James Bovard has demonstrated this time and again.
Sometimes it is more subtle. The securities industry has the SEC and others that look out for fraud. And we have Fitch, Moody's and S&P. To sell investments to pensions and institutional buyers, there has to be a third party rating the investment. (USA was downgraded last week from AAA to AA+ by S&P.) Most of the stock market problems can be traced back in part to fraud on the part of the rating agencies, something well known and documented as it occurred. People like Warren Buffett rely heavily on the ratings agencies. He has been known to offer some pointed remarks their way, though.
Now we find Moody's, the rating service, one of three "qualified" by the government to rate securities for value and quality, has an insider stepping forward, naming names and specific instances of wrongdoing.
Wait wait, it gets better... guess who owns a powerful amount of Moody's? Warren Buffett.
So we have avuncular Warren Buffett, everyone's favorite investor, owning a rating agency, which heavily influences that market, being watched by an SEC that sees nothing, and shreds evidence when it gets it.
Too complicated for most people to follow, or more likely, they already understood it is all corrupt, so they do not waste their time inquiring.
There is an alternative to all of this. It is called free markets. The necessary and sufficient market regulation comes in the form of short sellers. They bet their own money that their own research proves something is amiss with a corporation. And then they borrow the stock of the corporation, and sell it. If the price goes up (the short seller is wrong) the short-seller loses money having to buy the stock at a higher price, to return it from whom her borrowed it. If the short seller is right, he makes money when he buys the stock at a lower price to return it from whom her borrowed it. We need no more regulation than that.
Legendary short-seller James Chanos knows crooks when he sees them. He is shortselling Warren Buffett's Moody's.