This reminds me of the coal fires in Pennsylvania. Some people say that nothing will stop them until they burn themselves out. Others say they must be smothered and watered but no one wants to spend the money to make that happen. It would be billions. Better to put the pollution out into the air, destroy the land and water for thousands of years and make the residents sick. Keith you said Japan DID Keynes. Obviously they did Keynes like America did Keynes in the Depression and Obama is doing Keynes now.
It's not enough to stop the fires and the Pennsylvania Bankers would rather leave the fires burning then come up with the money to stop them. This seems to be the rule of the West. "You work for money, money doesn't work for you." And when you are finally screwed then have a war to get everyone excited, in grief, scared and spend all of that money you refused to spend to help yourself in peace. It doesn't matter how many pollution deaths there are amongst the people and especially the children. In peace time the world is all about money to them and life be damned. They even call making money "an Art!" Peace creates over population. Japan and FDR. Interesting. That story you told about Japan is not the story the economists tell here at all. They blame it on protection and the refusal to sacrifice groups within Japan for other groups because they are a cultured people. What was that book about that? "Culture Matters." Of course the REAL solution to this is a good European War or better still a hundred years war and theologian Soeren Kierkegaard complaining that no one has the passion to have a REAL war. A war where the population is lowered, everyone works together no matter what their political persuasion and they spend a lot of money that is burned and blown up for fun and don't forget the human sacrifice of your sons and daughters to Aries. You do realize the connection between Eros and Aries in Greek right. Today money is sexy. Just look at the British papers and the Australian American Wall Street Journal. The thrust of the male sword and spear. The lust and joy of battle! Irish American George Carlin called that Penis politics and I agree. Is it any wonder that the Irish worker who allowed his government to follow the poverty course, pay their bills and kill their economy, hate the economists next door? We have the rise of the NRA with my relatives in Oklahoma hoarding ammunition, you guys will have the rise again of dynamite and the IRA. Will you ever learn? Remember the Falklands! God, I sound like the Swiss, except this is not theory to me, it's personal. REH From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Keith Hudson Sent: Monday, August 02, 2010 10:18 AM To: Ed Weick; RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION, , EDUCATION Subject: Re: [Futurework] Usual Krugman rant Ed, At 09:17 02/08/2010 -0400, you wrote: Who's ranting? When it comes to employment, I don't see it as being primarily about mass producing consumer goods. There are many things that could be done to get people working and a Keynesian approach would probably be needed to get them to be done. American cities, roads, bridges and other vital pieces of infrastructure need to be rebuilt. Try it if you want. But Japan tried heavy Keynesian spending for a decade and somewhat less in the following -- but they were no better off after 20 years than at the beginning. Doing this might not employ all of the unemployed, but those who would have work would spend a lot more money on groceries, housing and other things they can't afford right now. Small businesses would benefit, multipliers would come into play and at least part of the currently depressed American world would reawaken. So, I tend to agree with Krugman -- bring Keynes back into the picture and let's see what happens. You'll get more of what we've had in the last 30 years -- declining real wages for average people (at least for those in work). Why, as Krugman argues, isn't government doing anything? It may be the nature of the Obama administration. Obama's opponents sit there staring at him and all he does is stare back at them. "Yes we can!!" is long gone. And so much now is about the forthcoming elections. Being perceived to be doing the right thing (really, doing nothing) will stand a better chance of getting votes than doing something would be. Raising tax revenues by getting people working could be important in terms of dealing with the deficit. Eliminating tax breaks for the rich could also be important. The European powers may be in a deflationary mode right now, but why should America be? And going back to some kind of gold standard arrangement is not the answer. It simply wouldn't work. It didn't work in the past, Can you tell me when and where it didn't work? so why should it work in today's far more complex world. The gold standard worked for England for 150 years and most of Europe for 80 on average and also for America for about 40 years -- all with no inflation whatsoever. All was cut short by the First World War when so much money was needed that it had to be printed. But then, later, when governments tried to go back onto a gold standard they did so without taking the subsequent inflation of the pound, dollar, mark, etc into account. Result? More inflation -- and even more so after Nixon cut off even international trade surrencies from gold in 1971. As more and more Chinese, Middle East oil exporters and big investors' money goes into gold and not dollars or government bonds, you can be certain that gold, as currency, is quietly re-asserting itself. All the Western banks are now grimly hanging onto what gold they still have because it's their only one sure asset they have these days. It can only mean one thing. We're going to revert to a gold standard -- or another reliable world currency -- sooner or later, whether after yet another chaotic episode like 2008/9 or by international agreement -- as China is calling for -- remains to be seen. Keith Ed ----- Original Message ----- From: Keith Hudson <mailto:[email protected]> To: RE-DESIGNING WORK, <mailto:[email protected]> INCOME DISTRIBUTION, ,EDUCATION Sent: Monday, August 02, 2010 2:13 AM Subject: [Futurework] Usual Krugman rant Paul Krugman is off on a typical rant this morning in the New York Times. He observes that unemployment will probably grow in the years ahead but says that there is "growing evidence that governing elite just doesn't care?" Of course they care! They care for their own skins in the coming years. Every conceivable type of government cares about unemployment, and has done so throughout history if it wants to maintain power and sleep easy. Paul Krugman refuses to entertain the idea that high and growing unemployment is structural. Why? Because, even after writing hundreds of op-eds over the years, he still thinks that Keynesianism can supply the solution. It might have done so in the 1930s when there was still a large tranche of still-expensive consumer goods awaiting mass production and purchase by a substantial proportion of the population. That's no longer the case. There's no long line of desirable consumer goods visible ahead of us. As regards existing goods, automation still proceeds. So "Congress is sitting on its hands" is it? And the Fed is not repeating inflation out of some sort of malignant obduracy, is it? (At least there are some officials who learn from their mistakes!) What's needed is not emotionalism on Krugman's part but some objective analysis in order to restore his status as a Nobel prize-winning economist and not a tub-thumper. Well, I'll give him some pointers. What we need -- and pretty soon, too -- is a total currency reform so that all advanced governments can write off their existing debts and not cripple our children and grandchildren with paying for their profligacy in the past few decades. And, from then onwards, a currency system that will make governments keep to sensible annual budgeting. We also need a substantial educational reform so that there'll be a demand pressure to expand or share the most interesting and highly-paid jobs. We also need substantial administrative/political reform so that we don't have a system whereby politicians have to selectively bribe this or that section of the electorate in order to remain in power. Keynes himself said something to the effect that governments always fall prey to outmoded ideas of a previous generation of economists. Well . . . that applies to economists, too. Keith Keith Hudson, Saltford, England _____ _______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [email protected] https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework Keith Hudson, Saltford, England
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