Wednesday, April 29, 2009

A Quick Rant, Or would that be Rave?

Some persons are pretending they know what they are doing but it doesn't make sense. How can you know what you are doing when -- ...when the economic policy of the country is to give away money and not to the people who comprise the population of the country so that they can conduct their business affairs but rather it is given to the rich. These social institutions are called "private" businesses, but now that they lost ten or even one hundred billion (one thousand million) or more dollars we now know that they are not because the state has intervened, so for sure they are not. They lost this money in what had up until the other day been universally understood as what was called the market system. This was the language, this was what they said, until Just The Other Day. The "conservative" faction of government said that they had been supporting, or proclaiming, the whole set of values called market. But then they focused on just one part of the market system and bailed just that part out. The distinction between "pro-market" conservatives and "regulators" didn't matter either, at this point. Not only the "conservatives" but all the others as well jumped on the bandwagon to bail out the wealthy people. So, it everyone is doing the same thing, does that make it right?

The bail-out also does not make sense even from the logical point of view. say that because it is not logical to say the loans will be repaid. But since loans out now are not being repaid the new ones won't either: By what means would the new loans be repaid, if the present ones cannot be?

Kind of looks like a massive social dysfunction.

Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Credit Crunch

Martin Wolfe, FT, discusses one Simon Johnson, of the “Sloan School.” The paragraph that follows is an excerpt from Wolfe’s column on-line:

" “In its depth and suddenness,” argues Prof Johnson, “the US economic and financial crisis is shockingly reminiscent of moments we have recently seen in emerging markets.” The similarity is evident: large inflows of foreign capital; torrid credit growth; excessive leverage; bubbles in asset prices, particularly property; and, finally, asset-price collapses and financial catastrophe. "


(JS) No doubt it is similar. Why would it work the same way? It works the same way because there is no one in charge, and the principle is that of capitalism itself, not some particular policy or doctrine like the doctrine of a national leader or national party. Rather it is a set of principles called “the market” or free trade or capitalism. The basic rules of the game are the rules of capitalism. What the principle is not is the ideology of the Republicans or the Democrats in the U. S. Now I didn't say that capitalism was good ...

And I do not recall saying either that all we need is to not intervene, or that all we need to do is listen to the farthest Right Republican around, or to the standard wisdom of the economics pundit industry. I didn't say any of that. Did I?

Friday, April 10, 2009

Reality Therapy Needed

The problem is not that prices are going up --- or down. The problem is that nothing is real.

Sorry: but an economy needs reality. I really hate to be the one to break the news to you, but perhaps this is the truth.


check out the WSJ, for Friday, April 10, then. There's a front page article here on the economy of India, an economy where there is real need; raw, actual need. There is a real need for more material wealth for their poor people, and, apparently, they are being enabled, so to speak, to get more wealth. Some kind of process is being put into place, that have provided some real benefit in a case where it is not an abstraction, or a theory. No, it's a raw, human need, that exists. How can such a benefit obtain in this case, without complex financial instruments. How can anyone help the real economic problems of Indians, without things like derivatives and what not? How can it be done without the likes of George Soros and the like? How would you do that? This is happening without the concurrent enrichment of George Soros. Wonder how you do that?

I am so clueless. But I can thing, and I suppose you would have to put money and resources in the hands of the poor people of India. Then you would let them work to create the goods that they need to live on. Does that make sense? Is that really possible? Does that sound like "economics" to you? This is economics on the material level. Do economists study that? Do they study that ---- as much as they study other things?

Sunday, April 5, 2009

another

[here, you've got to start with the post written earlier and then come back to this one. Please do so.] Come get me. At any rate, though: what I notice here is that I could have italicised (="emphasized") the word "change," above. This is an important point. It all hinges on whether, or not, we want to, should, or are able to change or reform the basic macro-economic system itself. What we are seeing is a basic constitutional failure (I don't mean like the parchment document, I mean like constitution, of a body, of a system: one's constitutional health or integrity) to "attack" our system and change it. Just change it.
Is that hard to say? Of course, if anyone ever read this blog closely(even I myself don't! That stuff is hard!!), they can tell that I am supporting an idea of reforming the economic system, as against the standard free-market, traditional-conservative position which (if we stop to actually examine) says that since the system has to have cultural integrity or some kind of self-government, it follows that capitalism has to never be reformed. (That's an awkward sentence. Why? My fault or the system's? To rephrase: a system is natural and therefore the notion of reforming a natural is interference and incorrect) But I am a reformer. It is not that I am against freedom or the country's "American values." I just do not think that that has much to do with the matter of "hands off" on the economy. Now just how you are going to reform the economy is a separate matter. First I am saying that we do have to enact some kind of systemic reform or a real, genuine overhaul of the economic system itself (I am saying "yes" to that), and then of course you do have to ask what that would be. There has to be some content there. I gues I am trying to say that if you used the wrong program or made the wrong reform, it would fail.

latest post

Some persons are pretending they know what they are doing but it doesn't make sense. How can one have this kind of knowledge, of what one is doing, when one's policy --- the economic policy of the country --- is to give away money; and not to the people who comprise the population of the country so that they may conduct their business affairs but rather it is given to the rich, and to institutions, who were, right up until the lost ten or even one hundred billion (one thousand million) or more dollars, called "private" businesses. They lost this money in what had up until yesterday been called the market system. This was what they said until yesterday rolled up. (Shock therapy!! Times change! Get out your Naomi Klein book!) All of the "conservative" faction of the government said that they had been supporting a whole set of values that were values of what they called the market. But then the government focused on just one part of their so-called market system and bailed just that part out. The distinction between "pro-market" conservatives and "regulators" also dissolved. Not only the "conservatives" but others as well jumped on the bandwagon -- a bandwagon to bail out wealthy people.
But in an entirely different respect, the bail out itself does not make sense because they say the loans will be repaid. But even the loans out now were not repaid. How could all of the new loans be repaid if the present ones cannot be? Not that it is only loans. I believe some of it is also outright gifts. Am I correct?
Am not sure if I am correct about that. We think of it as gifts, but they say it is loans so maybe part of it is loans. That means the rest of it is gifts. Or part of it is gifts and the rest loans. I'm not sure. The truth is that I have lost interest. To take an interest would mean I am following something that does not make any sense. Amd that could be a waste of my time.
If we are going to lubricate the system with more money, it should just be that we distribute this money directly to the people. That is the basic function of making loans anyway, in a capitalistic system. It feeds capitalism -- "growth." Since a capitalistic system allows all the persons in the country to engage in free trade (or whatever the domestic economic freedom is called, and I do not see why that should be called free trade because what it is is freedom to engage in the economic activities of capitalism), when the system gives out loans --or gifts for that matter --it should logically be to the persons who live in or comprise that system. We don't expect that but it is the more logical idea.

Wouldn't it have made more sense if the nation had just said to the "investment" professionals: "your system did not make sense, so now we are going to have to change it"? Presumably, those people are "too big," and too prestigious, "to fail." So we all do. We all fail.

There is also the question of what those investment workers or financial sector workers would do if they were allowed to lose their sources of income. Presumably the problem would be that they'd form militias and attack us, or start sending the rest of the people arsenic in envelopes? If that is not the case, then what would be the problem?----except that the U. S. government is held hostage to the rich?

Disclaimer: if somehow I said something just now that made sense....I swear I didn't mean to, and I am really really sorry.
Jack S. Silverman,
Madison Wisconsin