[Starvid]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MrBill', 'S')tarvid wrote:
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'H')ow to sove this issue? Tax cuts for those with the lowest incomes, because they are sure to spend all the money they get. Finance it by repealing the Bush tax cuts for the super rich.

A state backed infrastructure program should also be considered.

[mattduke]

Inflation is by far the largest source of wealth inequality. Inflation redistributes wealth from the poor to the rich. The gold standard is the monetary system consistent with democratic principles. With sound money, the producers are rewarded (with carpenters that can buy a house and send their children to college), not the paper shufflers.

[Starvid]

Well, I agree. I'm an inflation hawk. We have a 2 % annual inflation target, and the central bank rather throws the country into recession than lose control of inflation.

[cube]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Starvid', 'B')ut if you don't redistribute income you'll end up in a feudal society, the way the US has become/is becoming. Just think Paris Hilton.

[LoneSnark]

Starvid, you are watering down the term. A feudal society is one in which a large percentage of the society is born into slavery. Feudal lords did not just rule over their serfs, they owned them.

So, to suggest our society in which everyone is free to be lazy and not work without fear of execution compares in any way to a feudal society is rediculous.

Raw wealth inequality means nothing. Compared to 1776 America where whole families took turns working themselves to death and still managed to go hungry every winter, America today is a bastion of equality of outcomes.

And don't buy into the myth of 30 years of post-war equality. Lyndon Johnson dreamed of a great society in 1965 because he knew the one he had was abysmally ungreat. I have seen the pictures of poor rural whites (my family among them) and even poorer rural blacks during the 50s and 60s. Today many Americans have trouble paying for health insurance; back then many Americans had trouble paying for clean drinking water (my family included) and any form of healthcare was an unheard of luxury. If that was reasonable equality then praise God for releaving us of it.

[dorlomin]

State intervention into the economy is not good or bad, but either well or badly done. The post war West German and Japanese economies had huge amounts of state intervention into them. It would take a brave person to say that 1950-1990 they were good examples of poorly performing economies.

Nor is the US a paragon of non state interference. Comercial jet manufacture and computing are two massive industries that the US government injected large amounts of money into to give birth and grow them by R&D and millitary contracts.

When state intervention is done well it can work very well. When it is done badly you get 1970s Britain.

[MrBill]

I would agree, dorlomin. State sponsored capitalism has worked fine for the Asian Tigers. However, the government should have some sort of long-term plan, and then allow private business to get on with it.

Although a lack of pluralism can lead to crony capitalism and the backing national champions that can lead to inefficiencies being entrenched. Or poor services due to a lack of competition. None of which is in the public's interest. And then when a company is losing money and market share there has to be a review process that cuts the taxpayers' losses. Unfortunately, the longer such soft-support for corporations exists the more likely such decisions would be avoided and problems papered over.

In short I would suggest that such public policies work for a while, especially when there is an urgent need, but then eventually fall victim to government bureaucracy and entrenched business interests. If you can only stay export competitive through currency manipulation is that one public policy mistake too far?

[Starvid]

Feudalism is not everyone being born into serfdom, at least we didn't have that kind of feudalism in Sweden. Here the meaning of feudalism is a form of government where power is not held by the state, but by feudal lords who swear oaths of fealty to the king, who isn't really anything more than the biggest and baddest lord. Thankfully, we got rid of that in 1648. It also means you stay in the class you were born into (peasant, craftsman, priest, nobility).

So of course, feudalism is hyperbole. But that doesn't change the fact that immense wealth is being accumulated by an extremely small number of Americans, something which has and will result in what is in effect nobility. This will result in all the problems of nobility and monarchy us Europeans are so used too, and which is what the American founding fathers tried to get the Hell away from.

It doesn't change the fact that social mobility (be born poor, work hard, get rich) is far lower today in the US compared to 30 years ago, or the (for Americans at least) rather startling fact that social mobility is higher in the EU than in the US.

If you are born poor in the EU you have a greater chance of getting rich through hard work than you have in the US, and if you fail and stay poor you will still live in far less sqaulor than a poor American.

[frankthetank]

I'll just add that people love to complain, even when they have it really good...my wife included. I tell her often that i'll get her a plane ticket and she can go live in Bangladesh for a few months. I think a lot of us are scared because we really don't want the current setup to change!

[Tyler_JC]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Starvid', '
')
It doesn't change the fact that social mobility (be born poor, work hard, get rich) is far lower today in the US compared to 30 years ago, or the (for Americans at least) rather startling fact that social mobility is higher in the EU than in the US.

If you are born poor in the EU you have a greater chance of getting rich through hard work than you have in the US, and if you fail and stay poor you will still live in far less squalor than a poor American.

[venky]

I suspect that your chances of making it really rich; like becoming a millionaire are better in America than in Europe. This usually comes through success in a business or previously in real estate.

But going from poor to middle class; the relatively easy way for a lot of people of getting a college degree and a good job are probably better in the EU. IMO that is more important since the odds of the average person making it to millionaire are pretty slim; so social mobility for the general population is better achieved by access to education.

But this is just a hunch. I will be interested in either Starvid or Tyler providing figures or studies to back their claim up.

[yesplease]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tyler_JC', '[')url=http://www.nytimes.com/pages/national/class/index.html]Class Matters[/url]

I dare you to play around with that social mobility scale and tell me America isn't the land of opportunity.

[efarmer]

Q. What exactly is a "Stimulus Package"?

A. A stimulus package is what Mr. Bush unveiled Friday and
Asia and Europe responded to today. So far as the stimulus
part of it goes, it sure was a dandy, we haven't spent the
$145 Billion yet and the markets are responding with over
5% changes just today. Tomorrow the US market gets to
show that it can be stimulated just as good as any other
market if not better. Now that we have the stimulus part
working so well, I think we should start to work on making
this stimulus trick work in a chosen direction as an encore.

When we get big stimulus and desired direction going at
the same time, all will be right again and we will stop being
so stimulated. Not being stimulated might sound bad, but
in this case it would feel very good and we would like it.

[MrBill]

It must feel pretty good to an old whore to get off her back after a long night and stop being stimulated?

[efarmer]

"You only find out who is swimming naked when the tide goes out."

Warren Buffet

Mr. Bill -

The thieves of U.S. finance have just grifted many banks and
institutions globally. The whole gang of banksters, hedge hogs,
ratings and insurance firms all played their part. They put the
American Brand on huge bundles of horse sh!t wrapped with gold
foil and festooned with red, white, and blue ribbons.

I know it is quite a list, but would you comment on the following
since I greatly enjoy your opinions.

1. Will New York as a market center pay a price for this deceit?

2. Do you see international pressure sufficient to have the UK
open up it's Cayman and BVI systems to expose specific criminals
in this mess, similar to what was done for drug money?

3. Do you see regional markets around the US emerge to take
away power from the now tinged market based in New York?

4. Do you see the FTC continue to allow hedge funds or private
investment banks to lease stock and vote in US regulated venues?

5. Do you think that central bank and federal bailouts were taken
as a given by the participants in the process and actually made the
scheme larger and more damaging by those involved?

[gg3]

.
Stimulus package: a box full of free samples of Viagra to hand out to voters at a campaign rally.

--

Feudalism.

It's a mistake to use "poor person works hard and becomes rich" as the quantifier for economic opportunity. This is a measure of movement from one tail of a normal curve (the bottom) to the other tail (the top), and will always produce an exaggerated impression, not the least because it tends to generate "human interest stories" aka tear-jerkers that stick in peoples' minds regardless of overall conditions.

This is also an example of how the human brain is poorly wired for statistics, and the proof of that point is the number of people who regularly play lotteries. (A close friend of mine calls lotteries "the math tax," as in, "tax on people who can't do the math.")

A more useful measure is movement into and out of the zone defined as economicallly secure for that culture, in terms of food, shelter, etc.

For example a useful definition of "poor" is "at risk of losing a basic element of subsistence e.g. food or shelter." Then we can make the distinction between "poorness" as defined, and "sufficiency" which is defined as "not being at risk of losing a basic element of subsistence e.g. food or shelter." In this case "sufficiency" includes everything from the economically-secure working class to the ultra-wealthy, and is consistent with the ideological premise that wealth is not a problem but poverty is.

So then what we want to look at, as a measure of a society that is free and fair and just, is the degree to which people cross the line between "poor" as defined, and "sufficient" as defined. To the extent that people are born into poor families and do not cross into sufficiency, we can say that there is a hereditary class system or caste system, which is one of the roots of feudalism.

---

Note that in the classic definition of feudalism, an individual is a serf, and the serfs are attached to the land much as fixtures, whereas a slave in chattel slavery is movable property attached to the master.

So, you have a feudal estate, with serfs and slaves. You sell the estate. The serfs stay with the estate, the slaves go with you to your next estate, where there are also existing serfs. The person who bought your estate brings in their own slaves and keeps the serfs that went with your estate. (Imagine this in a real estate listing!:-)

The modern forms of involuntary servitude differ from the classic forms in that the modern culture has broken the relationship between people and land. Just as families are no longer settled in one place, neither are serfs attached to land. Instead, serfs in the from of illegal immigrants are migrants who follow the crop planting and harvest cycles; and slaves in the form of wage-slaves follow the business cycles. This removes the overhead cost of maintaining these individuals at times when they are of no utility to their masters. Yes, a more efficient form of man's inhumanity to man.

So when we speak of neo-feudalism, we have to consider that we are talking about a more complex society, and thus more complex forms of involuntary servitude.

The use of the dividing line between "poor" and "sufficient" is a starting point, the rest of the framework remains to be filled in.

[LoneSnark]

A slave cannot quit and subsist on savings. A wage-slave can pinch their pennies and retire early. That being the case, it is not any form of slavery.

Similarly, the tax code is not a form of enslavement, as you are again free to quit at any time of your choosing, no matter how inconvenient it may be for your government.

So, to sum up, there is no form of slavery here, no serfdom, no feudalism, nothing but self determined free agents.

Now, there are obviously racists which make our society less than ideal, but to suggest any of us are engaged in involuntary servitude is rediculous. Other than the slaves being impressed by the mafia or other street gangs, the rest of us are free to quit and return to nature for all anyone of authority will care.

[MrBill]

I agree. Everyone is born equal. No one is a slave. For the most part we offer a free education to anyone interested. Therefore, anyone is free to quit one low dead-end job to get another dead-end job or to accept a better paying job.

I cleaned toilets, worked as a waiter, and salvaged used bricks & lumber when I was young, so I would never have to do those jobs again. That is the difference in a free-society. Anyone that suggests anything was handed to me due to my birthright is simply ignorant!

We literally live in a meritocracy where even the blessed children of the rich end up poor through bad choices of their own while others go on to bigger and better things.

We owe nothing to illegal immigrants that choose to cross our borders and take up jobs that pay marginally better than what they could earn in their own FCK'd up country. That we choose to give them any form of legal protection and/or social safety net in the form of free medical care or other welfare is simply as sign of our compassion as a society.

The traditonal definition of poverty is simply an extension of our own sense of self-entitlement. If I earn a million+ and you only earn $500K then I guess we can declare you poor. Nevermind that we both have everything we need and no one goes hungry!

To suggest that we live in a feudal society because some have more and some made poor decisions is the height of relativism. It reminds me of an old Russian fairy tale.

Once there was a farmer who had one cow. And his neighbor had two cows. One day while digging in his field he came across a fairy. The fairy agreed to grant him one wish. The farmer thought about it for a while, and then he said, "I wish my neighbor's second cow would die." There happy? Everybody equal? ; - )

[Bas]

"Here, now go get yourself some candy"

[MrBill]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('efarmer', '"')You only find out who is swimming naked when the tide goes out."

Warren Buffet

Mr. Bill -

The thieves of U.S. finance have just grifted many banks and
institutions globally. The whole gang of banksters, hedge hogs,
ratings and insurance firms all played their part. They put the
American Brand on huge bundles of horse sh!t wrapped with gold
foil and festooned with red, white, and blue ribbons.

I know it is quite a list, but would you comment on the following
since I greatly enjoy your opinions.

1. Will New York as a market center pay a price for this deceit?

2. Do you see international pressure sufficient to have the UK
open up it's Cayman and BVI systems to expose specific criminals
in this mess, similar to what was done for drug money?

3. Do you see regional markets around the US emerge to take
away power from the now tinged market based in New York?

4. Do you see the FTC continue to allow hedge funds or private
investment banks to lease stock and vote in US regulated venues?

5. Do you think that central bank and federal bailouts were taken
as a given by the participants in the process and actually made the
scheme larger and more damaging by those involved?