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Re: One Step At a Time
Posted by Reality (more from Reality) on Wed, 11 May 2011 05:01:57
In Reply to: Re: One Step At a Time, James, Tue, 10 May 2011 12:50:37
1. If you accept that government officials are incapable of monopolizing/managing the production and distribution of food/agriculture, one of the slowest changing sectors of the economy, what makes you think the same government officials capable of monopolizing/managing the production and distribution of money/credits? and the whole economy?

2. Any amount of money can monetize any sized economy. That's what the price mechanism is for. "Most modern economists" can't even agree on what the correct measure of money supply is, so how can they manage it to "small level of inflation"? Many "modern economists" erroneously substitute price increase for inflation, and in that case, "most modern economists" can not even agree on what a valid measure of price level is: whose "consumer basket" is it? Is "hedonic adjust" valid? Is substitution of steak by hamburg valid because they have similar protein content? Should housing price be part of the calculation? etc.etc. Different answers to questions can affect the resulting calculation by double-digits, an order of magnitude greater than the alleged ideal goal of "2% annual inflation." The whole idea of government managing inflation is a joke, as proven in the real life experiment that we have been living in for the past century. BTW, "most modern economists" (i.e. Keynesians since the 1930's) did not see the housing bubble either; nor the stock market bubble before it . . . and we are supposed to rely on those clowns to manage our lives?

3. Gradual price decline is not a disaster at all, unlike what most Keynesian think. The late 19th century US witnessed extended price decline, yet it was also the time period that witnessed the fastest real living standards improvement in the US. Even in our generation, prices in the computer and technology industry have been declining rapidly, and the consumers of the goods and industry itself have been prospering. It is in the sectors of the economy where Keynesian inflationary policies have the most impact that we have disasters: housing, banking, medicine, education, etc..

4. Saying that "in a cyclical arrangement, the printing + unprinting of money should have no net positive printing of money" is a bit like saying absolute monarchy should work to the benefit of the people because the monarch is divine-inspired. When we can find people who do not need to eat, dress, have a roof over their heads, or have a car (because they can teleport themselves from place to place instantly just like their decisions can be effected instantly without tiers of bureaucrats who would then have privileged knowledge), or prepare for retirement (i.e. becoming consultant for the same industries that they regulate) . . . and they do not have family and friends at all . . . then perhaps we can consider having such omniscient, omnipotent and impartial referees on the economy. Until then, the primary central banking tool (suppressing interest rate) looks, sounds and walks exactly like something that rips of savers and taxpayers to benefit the banking industry.

5. Canadian currency is affected by two factors: natural resource prices and the central bankers' desire to keep relative parity with the US-dollar so the manufacturing industries along the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River can be competitive. The first factor makes Canadian Dollar as if a form of sound money is already in place: Canadian Dollar and gold price are somewhat correlated. The correlation has been increasingly suppressed by the Canadian Central Bank after 2008-09 time frame. Canadian interest rate should have been much higher to stop the housing bubble, but it was kept low to help the manufacturing industries along the Lakes. There will be hell to pay when the current bubble bursts. The current nominal budget surplus is chimera just like "Clinton Surplus" in the US in the late 1990's. It's achieved by not fully counting mushrooming government liabilities: funding future retirement and medical expenses for the baby-boomer generation, and enormous liabilities from the eventual bank bailouts after the bubble bursts. At least the Canadians are smarter than the US in one regard: they are doing the best they can with the "surplus" -- paying down debt and giving it back to the taxpayers.

4. Your personal conception of "what's good in Keynesianism" has no more to do with the validity of Keynesianism than what Shakespeare's personal view on "the ideal king" being a justification for absolute monarchy. If pigs had wings, they could probably fly too. Keynesianism is not possible without fiat money printing . . . and that power is abusive and ultimately corrupt.

5. The US pursuit of various disasterous wars in the past decade after the Nasdaq bubble collapse has been an offshoot of Keynesianism. Almost every single modern Keynesian from Samuelson to Krugman asserted that WWII lifted the economy out of the Great Depression. Keynes died too shortly after WWII to spout such nonsense when people living through the period knew better. The so-called Keynesian approximation grossly distorts the relative importance of government coercive sector vs. the private sector where choice is voluntary: it literally counts the government criminal torturer's pay as GDP, while discounting private charity providing succor to the less fortunate as having no value! It is simply an intellectual framework for war and totalitarianism . . . albeit somewhat less explicit than some of the other 20th century collectivist ideologies.

I'm not at all interested in private emailing. Sun light is the best disinfectant. If you are afraid of what you write become embarrassing in the light of the day, you don't have to write them. My personal view is that, many people having gone through modern statist education simply do not realize the ramifications of some of those statist ideologies; therefore, on a personal level, there's nothing to be particularly embarrassed about being poisoned by those thoughts . . . so long as detoxification is quickly sought.





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