We have a hosepipe ban here Gruff - water shortage in NW England! I'm looking for a bet that all Lancashire cricket will now be washed out! Our Bulgarian neighbours can't work out why they don't just shut the stuff off 8 hours a day like back home. They still dig wells to irrigate crops on the family farm over there. Given how incompetent we are in government in the West I'm often amazed we get anything built,until I think of my experience elsewhere. My sense is that we did do a fair day's pay better than most others and need to get back to that. The cuts here will hurt more than most expect -and all over Europe as the private sector will probably have no bounce or innovation. I hope I'm wrong, but the kind of private sector I worked in has gone. What keeps springing up are management agencies for essentially public sector work, done at cheaper prices. I suspect this is wrong in principle. I'm all in favour of efficiency, but we need more than just this.
My suspicion is that the business models are outdated. Our pubs are closing everywhere, screwed by taxes, costly buildings, equipment, position and being just crap places. Nothing new is replacing them. I can think of nowhere where the old smoke stacks have really been replaced, and all the shipping and such is in other labour markets - we could draw up along list. Kids are being told to get educated, but frankly the factories and big companies did a much better job at that than universities and colleges. There is no vision and I think the 'invisible hand' is broken. Charles Murray talked about this 30 years ago. The new government is basically saying there is no money, so sod off and find new ways to do stuff. The single Gaussian copula (or multiple)is not of much interest,other than that our financial institutions waste a lot of electricity cooling CPUs to run it - Wiki has a reasonable explanation. I;m fairly good in the area and can't see that it's much more than another magic wand covering insider trading and betting with more knowledge than the market as a whole. I'm all for shaking out the apples, but I want to see more than vague, old and failed hopes of entrepreneurial enterprise and such. Most public debates are clapped out. Science would be looking for a new core programme for capitalism 4. On 16 July, 22:45, gruff <[email protected]> wrote: > "... On Jul 14, 4:07 pm, archytas <[email protected]> wrote: ..." > > > I believe many transactions should remain 'vanilla' Gruff and be very > > transparent. There are many moves towards this that involve auctions > > to supply goods and services. > > I agree. More transparency regarding certain aspects of a transaction > would be very useful, but care must be taken not to overdo > transparency. Some transactions involve information that would > disrupt the marketplace and/or the industry and other transactions as > well. Our business and financial dealings sometimes require > confidentiality and even secrecy. There is nothing inherently wrong > with either one as long as a basic set of moral equivalencies is > followed. > > > Rajan's paper really points to forever > > 'discounting cashflow' to do more with capital being flogged to more > > and more 'efficiency'. Whilst one can see that banking the proceeds > > of the day overnight to gain interest is a good thing, the way we are > > now transacting over and over appears madness and also ends up > > crooked. > > This is true, yet in spite of the recession and reform, which has just > passed over here, corruption and cheating will find a way. It's part > and parcel of the human makeup it seems. > > > Governments are heavily involved and banks make big profits > > betting with entitlements buying government stock gives them. My > > suspicion is it's a Ponzi scheme with a legal money printing press. > > Well, yes. Of course. In a sense inflation is a Ponzi scheme as > well. Interest certainly is. However, Ponzi schemes are sustainable > if they are done in moderation and without the ignominious albatross > of the name. A Ponzi scheme by any other name, works the same. > > > Over here, we are cutting the public sector and hoping old rules on > > private sector growth 'happen'.My guess is that is a long gone set of > > rules. > > Yes, you certainly are and right in line with many other of your > European counterparts as well. Personally I think it's moving in the > wrong direction under the simple rubric of needing to give an engine > more gas (closing the choke) on cold mornings when it's hard to start, > then leaning out the mixture once things warm up a bit. I still > strongly favor stimulus money being added. We can deal with the debt > down the road a bit, but the economic engine needs to be restarted > before we can even consider debt. > > > Jobs have either been public sector or part-time for many > > years now. > > It's actually better now than it was a quarter century ago when more > than half of our country was employed in one form or another by > government -- Federal, state, county (or parish) and city. > > > Risk management in all this relies on a massive > > spreadsheet (Gaussian copula) that can't work because the cheating > > that makes money is excluded. > > Okay, I've no idea what Gaussian copula is or how it works but any > plan that does not take into account the human element (cheating) is > not going to work well. > > > Almost no services I use these days > > require staff like they did, and none of the industries I worked in > > has come back or been replaced. What has sprung up is all kinds of > > financial service I don't need. My guess is economics is in real need > > of a radical purge and a back to basics phase so that it connects more > > directly with what we do. This won't happen. Social unrest and war > > are the usual change agents. > > Maybe we've grown beyond unrest. I certainly believe we've gone > further beyond war than ever before. (I hope I'm not blindsiding > myself by giving too much credit to our species.) As for the radical > purge, we're going through that now. Like any good depression or > recession, one of its most important functions is to shake a lot of > the bad apples out of the tree. Many businesses are cutting the fat > and government needs to do the same, but that's not likely to happen > given the political environment over here. Our government spends > money wastefully no matter which party is in power. Both are > profligate, just on different matters.
