tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53963354804605465082024-03-13T03:13:21.800-07:00Capitalism++Industrial Era Capitalism was great for the past and it worked in that context; however, today it is our duty to configure a system for the post-automation society; the NEXT 50, 100, 200 years; bringing to bear the best of our collective intelligence, quantitative rigor, and intuitive forecasting capabilities, moving forward. For more than 50 years America's best and brightest have called for unconditional, LIVABLE #BasicIncome. It's time to join them. Here's why.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger149125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-38787999032814301652015-09-24T10:30:00.000-07:002015-09-26T11:40:55.456-07:00#BasicIncome: How much is Basic?<span style="background-color: #d9ead3;"><i><span style="font-size: x-small;">25Sep15 UPDATE: Paragraph 20 revised</span></i></span><br />
<span style="background-color: #d9ead3;"><i><span style="font-size: x-small;">26Sep15 UPDATE: 125 reads, 6 upvotes on reddit. Maybe not all reads are redditors, but still a nice measure of general disdain for real numbers, indexed to real economy, versus popularity of other posts.</span></i></span><br />
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The current consensus answer to the question, "How much unconditional basic income is enough?" has been carefully groomed over the past couple of years; not derived by collective intellectual honesty or peer-verified empirical rigor, but imposed by pure repetition, Fox News style. While a small minorty attempt to inject <i>livable</i> basic income into the discussion, the adjective goes largely ignored in the generally most active community, <a href="http://reddit.com/r/BasicIncome" target="_blank">/r/BasicIncome</a>.<br />
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There is nothing of substance to support vague round numbers, arbitrarily tossed out by Charles Murray <i>for discussion's sake</i>, as he put it, and then more or less seconded by Peter Barnes. The figure of $1,000/mo was pulled out of thin air and has been increasingly filled with copious amounts of hot air, like a balloon expanding to the point that it currently blocks a clear view of the horizon.<br />
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Relax ... it's just a little pin prick. <br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-C-_2_NheNCw/VgN0s4IlIzI/AAAAAAAAc2M/mrTGp9pFOKQ/s1600/poverty.balloon.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-C-_2_NheNCw/VgN0s4IlIzI/AAAAAAAAc2M/mrTGp9pFOKQ/s1600/poverty.balloon.jpeg" /></a></div>
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We started a conversation about iterating capitalism with a guaranteed annual income, and have discovered that not all conversations are created equal. Casual street level conversation is generally limited to existing, known quantities. It's purpose isn't to delve too deeply, it's just to pass the time. Policy conversation is not like that at all. Policy conversation can't afford to go with lowest common denominator, or accept quick and loose fitting analogies; not if it intends to materially influence the direction of a society for the long term.<br />
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Conducting this experiment on social media has been interesting. We've observed how quick-n-random numbers, typical of casual conversation, based on nothing but handy references to commonly understood ballpark figures, have somehow gained sufficient, utterly unfounded, self-confidence to present themselves as viable public policy decision making data. The folks at <a href="http://www.basicincomeaction.org/about_basic_income" target="_blank">BasicIncomeAction</a> have actually put these numbers -- "maybe $1,000 a month, or $800 or $1,500 a month" -- into their proposed legislative platform. Out of thin air. Derived from nothing. Moreover, the <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/BasicIncome/wiki/index#wiki_how_much_would_the_basic_income_be.3F" target="_blank">full range of proposals</a> that span from $500 to $3,200 a month, is abruptly cut in half.<br />
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If public policy actually gets made based upon such lackadaisical processes and haphazard figures, it could indeed mark the full triumph of idiocracy in dumbing down the entire global brain, with very real and dire consequences for human well being.<br />
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What's occurred since we began this blog appears like a kind of collective <a href="https://youtu.be/JTvcpdfGUtQ?t=8m49s" target="_blank">Dunning Kruger</a> effect. The $1,000 #BasicIncome proposal might go down in journal history as one of the first readily identifiable cases of this phenomenon, en masse. Like McArthur Wheeler, believing that if we rub lemon juice all over $1,000, in the form of our own convenient "<a href="http://ieet.org/index.php/IEET/more/santens20150921" target="_blank">opportunity multiples</a>," which conveniently fill the gaps of our forgone conclusion, then poverty can magically be equated with sufficiency.<br />
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While our little experiment has been highly effective in engaging public discourse and raising public awareness of a previously mothballed policy that is needed now more than ever, it has been disasterous in terms of reaching anything resembling a rigorous, data-driven policy recommendation. So, insert all of the classical arguments against democracy as tyranny-of-the-dumbest common denominator, here. We still don't fully agree with those criticisms, but certainly understand their foundations in a contemporary light.<br />
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In the case of determining the level of a livable basic income -- "at levels that sustain life in decent circumstances," in the words of Martin Luther King, Jr. -- the federal poverty level quickly comes to most minds, because it is easy. Lazy. By definition, the <a href="https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=us+federal+poverty+level" target="_blank">poverty level</a> is "a level of personal income <i>defining</i> the state of poverty" which therefore cannot equate, mathematically, to the current vague notion of "sufficient to cover basic needs" which the so-called leaders of the #BasicIncome community have decreed. Argue against this, however, and face the wrath of the bot mobs of /r/BasicIncome who insist that the phrases "sufficient to cover" and "defining of poverty" are somehow mathematically equivalent.<br />
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This is ipso facto idiotic, and thinking humans easily see through the false equivalence. That which defines poverty cannot simultaneously define sufficiency. Not in this dimension, on this planet, in 2015 CE.<br />
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However, we do regretably live in a world populated by mostly stressed out, poverty afflicted humans incapable of finding the luxury of time to engage in such reasoning. That leaves us, the privileged, to speak on behalf of those with no voice, from the perspective of those with no voice, rather than from the perspective of our own intellectual or material laurels. Speaking for others is always fraught with ambiguity and peril, but it's also the foundation of any representative form of governance, so it's not exactly uncommon. Every day in congress, people are speaking for and acting on behalf of you and me.<br />
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So the question becomes, how can we mitigate the negative effects of presumption in such cases? How can we work through public policy issues with authentic credibility and enlightened empathy? One of the best ways is to live at that same low standard. Live and breath the situation for which you purport to propose solutions. So that's what we've done. That's why we consider our relatively few voices of greater value and validity than the multitude of voices repeating a number pulled out of thin air and filled with hot air.<br />
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When we talk about the phrase Livable Basic Income, we are talking about amounts that Martin Luther King Jr defined as, "levels that sustain life in decent circumstances." Yes, that's a vague concept that we must substantiate, if we are to forge sound policy, and that has been <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/BasicIncome/wiki/index#wiki_how_much_would_the_basic_income_be.3F" target="_blank">the thrust of the work</a> all along. <br />
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The federal poverty level most certainly does not coincide with MLK's standard of "life in decent circumstances." The poverty level is not fit for any purpose other than a deplorably low reference point that marks utter destitution. Apparently, pedantics are justified here, because people continue to make emphatic false equivalence arguments. A poverty level is a point at which nobody can reasonably argue against the statement, "this has gone much too far, this essentially constitutes economic violence."<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<b>A poverty level cannot equate to a sufficiency level.</b> Yet, this is precisely what the $1K basic income bot drone air brigade uses to carpet spam social media. According to the $1K argument, <i>Poverty is Sufficiency</i>. Straight out of Orwell.</blockquote>
The best purpose a poverty level could serve in the algebra of calculating a livable, unconditional basic income is as a multiplier. As a multiplier, one might reasonably argue that 2.5 times federal poverty level, or 2.75, or 3 times constitutes humane "levels that sustain life in decent circumstances."<br />
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That any of this needs be explained at all, to people who claim to be well intentioned basic income advocates, is utterly disheartening and illuminates the contorted motives of the millions who obviously want a basic income at levels that will only further impoverish our society, rather than strengthen it. There is now a large cadre of very vocal, austerity-obsessed, libertarian types who have virtually taken over the basic income reddit community, in the name of instituting basic income as a purely cost saving, rather than life saving and preserving measure. <br />
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<i>Their objective is to eliminate all the existing support programs in our society and replace them with a cash benefit that is lower than what's already being spent</i>. What they miss is the fact that -- at truly livable levels -- overall costs to society will in fact decrease, astronomically. Many of those costs are hidden, off-balance-sheet, in the form of well documented mental and physical ravages of poverty. New data in recent decades has made these costs impossible to refute, if still difficult to economically quantify with precision.<br />
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The bottom line for the libertarian austerity cost-cutters who seem to have commandeered the megaphone on <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23basicincome&src=typd" target="_blank">#BasicIncome</a>, is that their approach effectively undermines the intentions of every historical call for unconditional basic income; namely, robust social sustainability through material economic justice. To their credit, it is a brilliant bit of psyops to have pulled this off, to date. To embrace an idea antithetical to their Ayn Rand utopia and forge it into a safety-net shredding machete.<br />
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Others seem to not yet understand, or do not yet want to acknowledge, that basic income isn't merely a novel economic theory or philosophy, like debating how many angels can dance on the head of pin. While many would like to frame it that way, in order to discredit and dilute the public energy that has grown at an increasingly rapid pace in recent years, the truth of the matter is that a long term policy that provides for a population's income security in a post-automation economy, is absolutely essential to social and institutional stability.<br />
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Sustainable, proportionate, reliable, <a href="http://capitalismplusplus.blogspot.com/2011/08/economies-are-circulatory-systems.html">currency circulation</a> protects against the imbalances of runaway industrial capitalism, which in the late twentieth and early twenty-first century has once again become utterly unfettered, just as it was in the nineteenth century heyday of robber barons. Unfettered capitalism doesn't work any better than any other unfettered economic or political system. Large human institutions need fetters -- checks and balances -- to prevent them from naturally becoming behemoths, golems, our greatest inventions that then turn upon us with dire unintended consequences. Fettered capitalism, free market socialism, capitalism++, call the next iterative hybrid economic system whatever you will: a well and transparently regulated market economy can and will restore sanity and sustainability to the circulation of the fruits of a people's collective labor. A livable basic income, <a href="http://j.mp/50ctPCGDP" target="_blank">pegged to real collective productivity</a>, is an undeniably legitimate <a href="http://dividendsforall.net/what-are-our-dividends/non-labor-income/" target="_blank">citizen's dividend</a>, and it is the economic ciruclatory system upgrade best adapted to conditions of a twenty first century post-automation civilization.<br />
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Below, we set forth a loose framework for thinking in more empirical terms about the question "<i>how much basic income is enough?</i>" Rather than using round numbers for the sake of discussion, rather than seeking to gut all existing social safety nets merely to save a buck, we set forth to define an empirical range of number that we can then set about fulfilling and funding by various means. Taxation and responsible cost-savings. Decommissioning far less effective, extremely costly, means-tested programs, <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/BasicIncome/wiki/index#wiki_how_would_you_pay_for_it.3F" target="_blank">etc</a>.
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
In short, <i>livable basic income</i>, or <i>citizen's dividend</i> is a policy that is primarily about bolstering the economic resilience of a nation, by assuring the economic viablity of the individual, in a post-automation economy. </blockquote>
A dividend that is pegged to real market productivity (GDP) can achieve the objective described by MLK "at levels that sustain life in decent circumstances." We will see below, objective measures of what those decent circumstances look like. Due to time constraints for the authors, fractional amounts pertaining to children are beyond the scope of this initial excercise. Certainly, any realistic basic income policy must not in any way diminish existing benefits for children.<span style="font-size: small;"> </span><br />
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Current annual measures of poverty, productivity, and relative sufficiency, linked to their sources:<br />
<ul>
<li>Federal poverty level: <a href="http://aspe.hhs.gov/2015-poverty-guidelines#guidelines" target="_blank">11,700</a></li>
<li>US per capita GDP: <a href="http://j.mp/50pctPCGDP" target="_blank">55,740</a></li>
<li>50% per capita GDP: <a href="http://j.mp/50pctPCGDP" target="_blank">27,870</a></li>
<li>/r/BasicIncome range: <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/BasicIncome/wiki/index#wiki_how_much_would_the_basic_income_be.3F" target="_blank">1,000 to 34,000</a></li>
</ul>
Using the Economic Policy Institute’s Family Budget <a href="http://www.epi.org/resources/budget/" target="_blank">Calculator</a>, we can calculate for ourselves "the income a family needs in order to attain a <i>secure yet modest standard of living</i> in 618 areas across the country."<br />
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<a href="http://www.epi.org/resources/budget/" target="_blank"><img alt="http://www.epi.org/resources/budget/" border="0" height="200" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-x_fCcEh6Bhw/VgN_q0-8oCI/AAAAAAAAc2k/gpZdyDlKWTA/s200/30ksanjose.png" title="Economic Policy Institute’s Family Budget" width="180" /></a><a href="http://www.epi.org/resources/budget/" target="_blank"><img alt="http://www.epi.org/resources/budget/" border="0" height="200" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-wpbkW7w49ew/VgN_q01zwMI/AAAAAAAAc2g/dKBWJsfOpNI/s200/30k.peoria.png" title="Economic Policy Institute’s Family Budget" width="180" /></a><a href="http://www.epi.org/resources/budget/" target="_blank"><img alt="http://www.epi.org/resources/budget/" border="0" height="200" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-3yQuS33FovM/VgN_q0NrsZI/AAAAAAAAc2c/ikaTz5If4H8/s200/30k.norleans.png" title="Economic Policy Institute’s Family Budget" width="180" /></a></div>
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These are the variety and caliber of numbers that any responsible and intellectually honest <a href="http://basicincomeact.org/" target="_blank">Basic Income Act</a> absolutely must take into account in the course of crafting legislation. <br />
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Martin Luther King Jr. used the phrase "life in decent circumstances." The Economic Policy Institute uses "secure yet modest standard of living." The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, <a href="http://j.mp/Article25UDHR" target="_blank">Article 25</a> says, "Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control." <br />
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These are the standards that responsible activists and policy makers absolutely must use in crafting the most important legislation of our generation.Michael Silverton's Metavalent Stigmergyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09391984708930471762noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-38353353255276812462013-12-01T12:58:00.003-08:002013-12-01T12:58:49.824-08:00An Historical Abberation: J.O.B. as sole Justification Of BeingAt most, the <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23JobTrance" target="_blank">#JobTrance</a> lasted a couple of centuries, less than a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saccade" target="_blank">saccade</a> in the scope of time, culminating in an ironically <a href="http://j.mp/JobTrance">comical</a>, if not essentially <a href="http://j.mp/JobTrance">farcical</a> era of phase change from competitive scarcity to <a href="http://apprehendingpostscarcity.blogspot.com/">cooperative abundance</a>.
If humanity can find its way past this hiccup of hubris and hoarding, there may just be hope for us monkeys after all.<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/4RkX6enCbYM" width="560"></iframe>Michael Silverton's Metavalent Stigmergyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09391984708930471762noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-64187290788368524912013-06-22T11:11:00.000-07:002013-06-22T11:11:00.060-07:00Buying Things Will Not Make You Happy. Where to Attain Happiness @JeremyRifkin<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="344" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/1HfmZrEm4Qw" width="459"></iframe>Michael Silverton's Metavalent Stigmergyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09391984708930471762noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-80708290518848527292013-02-05T15:52:00.003-08:002013-02-05T16:14:05.727-08:00The Simple Math of U.S. Math JobsFrom the please-please-please-prove-me-wrong-but-numbers-don't-lie department:<br />
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In light of all the political jaw-boning about Science, Engineering, and Math education and careers; the huge unmet demand that is supposedly leaving so many Americans behind; we thought we’d take a look at the simple mathematical prospects for the mathematically gifted and inclined of all nations, who might take an interest in such amazing, high value jobs in the U.S., according to latest available (2011) Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), Occupational Employment Statistics (OES).<br />
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<table border="1" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" style="width: 400px;">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td valign="top" width="199"><div align="center">
<b>Profession</b></div>
</td>
<td valign="top" width="199"><div align="center">
<b>Employment</b><br /><b>per 1,000 Jobs</b></div>
</td></tr>
<tr>
<td valign="top" width="199">Mathematicians</td>
<td valign="top" width="199"><div align="center">
0.023</div>
</td></tr>
<tr>
<td valign="top" width="199">Mathematical Technicians </td>
<td valign="top" width="199"><div align="center">
0.008</div>
</td></tr>
<tr>
<td valign="top" width="199">Mathematical Science Teachers, Postsecondary</td>
<td valign="top" width="199"><div align="center">
0.418</div>
</td></tr>
<tr>
<td valign="top" width="199">Mathematical Science Occupations, All Other</td>
<td valign="top" width="199"><div align="center">
0.010</div>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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A "catch-all" major group called <b>Computer and Mathematical Occupations</b> achieves a whopping 26.557 out of 1,000 jobs (2.7%) with an impressive looking mean wage of $78,730, by conflating all the following occupations, many of which honestly have very <i>little or nothing to do with math</i>* in the everyday context: Computer and Information Research Scientists ; Computer Systems Analysts* ; Computer Programmers* ; Software Developers, Applications* ; Software Developers, Systems Software* ; Database Administrators* ; Network and Computer Systems Administrators* ; Computer Support Specialists* (joking, right?) ; Information Security Analysts*, Web Developers* (laughable), and Computer Network Architects* ; Computer Occupations, All Other* ; Actuaries ; Mathematicians ; Operations Research Analysts ; Statisticians ; Mathematical Technicians ; Mathematical Science Occupations, All Other. So this mashup category is pretty much useless as an apple to apples comparison; although <b>Mathematicians</b> proper do ring in at a nifty mean wage of $101,320. Ignore that <b>Marketing Manager</b> behind the curtain at $126,190.<br />
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In contrast, the occupation code providing the greatest number of jobs is <b>Office and Administrative Support Occupations</b> with a whopping 166.702 per 1,000 jobs (16.7%) and annual mean wage of $34,120.<br />
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What is the highest wage OES category? <b>Anesthesiologists</b>, 0.260 of every 1,000 jobs (0.03%) with annual mean wage of $234,950. There's just something aesthetically and poetically compelling about the people who put us to sleep, who keep us numbed to the real state of affairs, being the most highly compensated of all career categories.<br />
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So yeah, missy, do your math homework; and if have dreams of emigrating to the U.S., be sure to do all the hard work to get a visa, so you can capitalize on all the awesome math jobs in the U.S. Don’t worry, you can always transition to marketing after you get there with the super impressive, irrelevant math story.<br />
<br />Michael Silverton's Metavalent Stigmergyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09391984708930471762noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-68244765837758100122013-01-14T18:47:00.001-08:002013-01-14T18:47:07.181-08:00#BasicIncome Consequences: First, absolute elimination of #poverty; second, unprecedented liberation of individual creativity<a href="http://davidpidsley.com/blog/2011/2/7/simplifying-welfare-provision-a-universal-minimum-income.html">Simplifying welfare provision: a universal minimum income | David Pidsley | Social entrepreneur. Open data analyst:</a><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq"><div><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; color: black; display: inline !important; float: none; font-size: small; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;">What would be the consequences to its recipients? The first would be an absolute elimination of poverty.</span> The second would be an extraordinary and unprecedented liberation of individual creativity. Each of us with a secret dream of setting up his or her own business would not be put off by the threat of poverty if it failed.</span></div></blockquote>Michael Silverton's Metavalent Stigmergyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09391984708930471762noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-46958687795493620892012-12-28T08:08:00.000-08:002012-12-28T08:08:00.168-08:00#NotACliff #PoliMeme of the Day is True. It's Plain Old #PummelThePoorThe ‘fiscal cliff’ explained in charts (<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/the-fiscal-cliff-explained-in-charts/2012/10/23/5c5fca94-19fb-11e2-bd10-5ff056538b7c_gallery.html#photo=4" target="_blank">Washington Post</a>). <br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-eaoDGE6Lmb8/UN1iFOsjc9I/AAAAAAAAKFk/j7vq6hIvXd0/s400/fiscalcliff.by.bracket.png" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr align="center"><td class="tr-caption">It's #NotACliff. It's an anvil thrown off the cliff onto the heads of the poor.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div style="text-align: right;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>Grateful for cleaned up <a href="http://peltiertech.com/WordPress/guest-post-the-fiscal-cliff-explained-in-charts-a-critical-review/" target="_blank">graphics</a> by Jon Peltier. </i></span></div>
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This is the opposite of <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23EndPoverty" target="_blank">#EndPoverty</a> and the inverse of the <a href="http://j.mp/AbundanceAlgorithm" target="_blank">#AbundanceAlgorithm</a>. Michael Silverton's Metavalent Stigmergyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09391984708930471762noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-14464547772747285452012-12-28T00:05:00.001-08:002012-12-28T00:05:51.681-08:00#QE5: Quantitative easing for the people<a href="http://blogs.reuters.com/anatole-kaletsky/2012/08/01/how-about-quantitative-easing-for-the-people/">REUTERS:</a> <br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq"> Instead of giving newly created money to bond traders, central banks could distribute it directly to the public. Technically such cash handouts could be described as tax rebates or citizens’ dividends, and they would contribute to government deficits in national accounting. But these accounting deficits would not increase national debt burdens, since they would be financed by issuing new money, at zero cost to government or to future generations, instead of selling interest-bearing government bonds. </blockquote><blockquote class="tr_bq"> Giving away free money may sound too good to be true or wildly irresponsible, but <i>it is exactly what the Fed and the BoE have been doing for bond traders and bankers since 2009</i>. Directing QE to the general public would not only be much fairer but also more effective.</blockquote>Exactly. It's 200 years past time to implement the <a href="http://j.mp/AbundanceAlgorithm" target="_blank">#AbundanceAlgorithm </a><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq"></blockquote>Michael Silverton's Metavalent Stigmergyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09391984708930471762noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-75062917102347237652012-12-18T18:35:00.003-08:002012-12-18T18:35:34.829-08:00#GreatCompromise is to avoid #FiscalCliff by leaping into #EconomicAbyssMercifully, at least there's no more pain when you cease to exist altogether after years of fighting the inevitable decrepitude, right? <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/19/business/say-goodbye-to-the-government-under-either-fiscal-plan.html?_r=0&adxnnl=1&smid=tw-nytimesbusiness&partner=socialflow&adxnnlx=1355874124-YwAt1zgwFnfR8JamIzSa6Q">NYTimes</a>:<blockquote class="tr_bq">The truth is that both the president and House Republicans have agreed to shrink a critical part of the government to its smallest in at least half a century. This is regardless of which trillion-dollar proposal gains the upper hand. Without such spending, the government becomes little more than a heavily armed pension plan with a health insurer on the side.
To put it in perspective, this would cut the government’s civilian discretionary budget to the smallest it has been as a share of the economy at least since the Eisenhower administration — when a quarter of the population lived under the poverty line, thousands of children still contracted polio each year and fewer than one in 12 Americans older than 25 had a college degree. According to estimates by the Congressional Budget Office, <b>even going over the so-called fiscal cliff would not cut it as deeply</b>.
We’ve had this debate several times before. President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal was based on the proposition that government should play a much bigger role to guarantee Americans’ economic security. In the 1960s, President Lyndon Johnson asserted the government’s responsibility to alleviate the plight of the poor and disenfranchised. Three decades ago, President Ronald Reagan changed course, ushering in an era of government retrenchment that persisted pretty much unabated until we were walloped by the Great Recession.</blockquote>Michael Silverton's Metavalent Stigmergyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09391984708930471762noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-15381408764139989802012-12-17T14:57:00.003-08:002012-12-17T15:30:37.816-08:00Industrial Capitalism's #GreatDecoupling. #Jaws2013. No Signs of Closing. Ever. <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/12/opinion/global/jobs-productivity-and-the-great-decoupling.html" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="301" src="http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2012/12/12/opinion/global/12iht-edbrynjolfsson12/12iht-edbrynjolfsson12-popup.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
For followers of this space, this is the best Christmas gift possible. Must reading at <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/12/opinion/global/jobs-productivity-and-the-great-decoupling.html">NYT</a> by <a href="http://twitter.com/erikbryn">@erikbryn</a>. Sadly, human on the whole haven't even reacted to climate change in any meaningful way; so we're not particularly any more enthusiastic about how the humans will respond to these facts, as to any others.
<br />
<blockquote>
first drawn by the economist Jared Bernstein, productivity growth and employment growth started to become decoupled from each other. Bernstein calls the gap that’s opened up “the jaws of the snake.” They show no signs of closing.
<br /><br />
As the jaws of the snake opened, wages suffered even more than job growth. Adjusted for inflation, <b>the average U.S. household now has lower income than it did in 1997</b>. Wages as a share of G.D.P. are now at an all-time low, even as corporate profits are at an all-time high. The implicit bargain that gave workers a steady share of the productivity gains has unraveled.
<br /><br />
Digital labor, in short, substitutes for human labor. This happens first with more routine tasks, which is a big part of the reason why less-educated workers have seen their wages fall the most as we moved deeper into the computer age.
<br /><br />
As we move ahead the Great Decoupling will only accelerate.
<br /><br />
Digital progress lowers prices, improves quality, and brings us into a world where abundance becomes the norm.
<br /><br />
But there is no economic law that says digital progress will benefit everyone evenly. As technology races ahead it can leave a lot of workers behind. In the short run we can improve their prospects greatly by investing in infrastructure, reforming education at all levels and encouraging entrepreneurs to invent the new products, services and industries that will create jobs.
<br /><br />
While we’re doing this, however, we also need to start preparing for a technology-fueled economy that’s ever-more productive, but that just might not need a great deal of human labor. Designing a healthy society to go along with such an economy will be the great challenge, and the great opportunity, of the next generation.</blockquote>While there is "no economic law that says digital progress will benefit everyone evenly," we live in an era that we are participating in the very process of biological evolution; amending natural laws and processes that humans had absolutely no hand in engineering. In contrast to the relatively immutable laws of physics, economics are completely man-made; these are not immutable laws by any stretch. We can and must re-make economics in the image of service to humanity; before the machines fully incorporate a contrary belief system. It's worth repeating tried and true reason statement of these principles and aims:<blockquote>"Human progress is our Cause,<br />Liberty of thought our Supreme Wish,<br />Freedom of Conscience our Mission, and<br />The guarantee of Equal Rights To All People Everywhere,<br />Our Ultimate Goal."</blockquote>
Michael Silverton's Metavalent Stigmergyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09391984708930471762noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-76329948260472751412012-12-07T00:25:00.001-08:002012-12-07T00:38:40.923-08:00Public Money is NOT Debt. It is Equity in the Commonwealth. All of us.Michael Kumhof: The Chicago Plan Revisited - The Advantages of 100% Money (Quotation at <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tnehf-U527g&t=12m24s">12:24</a>)<br />
<br />
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/tnehf-U527g" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>Michael Silverton's Metavalent Stigmergyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09391984708930471762noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-56506201489013232672012-12-05T08:58:00.003-08:002012-12-07T00:29:17.348-08:00People are not any company's greatest asset<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Today,<a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/12/05/us-citigroup-jobs-idUSBRE8B40NY20121205"> Citigroup</a> announced that it is cutting 11,000 jobs worldwide, about 4 percent of its staff, to save as much as $1.1 billion a year in expenses.</blockquote>
People our <i>not</i> any company's greatest Asset. This is one of the most pernicious lies perpetuated by an inherently sociopathological system. Sociopathological in that it acts like Doris Day to the world, while psychologically battering her children behind closed doors. Sociopathological in that it speaks in terms of relationship, mutual concern, support, aid, teamwork, all the while acting exclusively in terms of control. Stark, infinitely self-absorbed, merciless, my-way-or-the-highway control. Econ101 teaches us that Assets are the opposite Liabilities. When times get tough, we cling to Assets, and cut Liabilities. Yet, employees and workers continue to swallow this "you are our greatest asset" bait, hook, line, and sinker, every day.<br />
<br />
We don't have to be Sherlock Holmes to figure this out. Every detective show in history teaches us the same lesson: "People say lots of things, I'm looking at <i>behavior</i>." Without any elaborate philosophizing or story telling, all we have to do is <a href="http://j.mp/WIPcrack" target="_blank">look</a> at how the past 100 years of industrial capitalism has <i>behaved</i>. We have the <a href="http://j.mp/NonParticipantRate" target="_blank">outcomes</a>, right in front of us. Overwhelming, empirical, even if seemingly <a href="http://j.mp/AnInconceivableTrut" target="_blank">inconceivable truths</a>. The homeless children, the displaced, discarded, and demoralized adults doped up on anti-depressants to dampen the desperation that any normal, healthy human being experiences when the red carpet that was rolled out for them is yanked up with glee, sending lives tumbling, while the perpetrators of this sick, sick game ROTFL.<br />
<br />
The Mayan calendar does not predict or promise that the Earth itself will cease to exist as of Dec 21, 2012. It does, however, turn out out to make very timely recommendation for the #EndOfTheWorld as we know it and a reboot to a new and virus-free #EarthOS.<br />
<br />
Not only are we <a href="http://capitalismplusplus.blogspot.com/2011/11/great-money-map.html" target="_blank">allowed to speak of alternatives</a>, we must implement them, now. We know how the <a href="http://j.mp/AbundanceAlgorithm" target="_blank">abundance algorithm</a> works. It's time. Because human beings <i>can be</i> the Earth's greatest asset.Michael Silverton's Metavalent Stigmergyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09391984708930471762noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-10658955963353520742012-11-26T16:27:00.001-08:002012-11-26T16:29:29.782-08:00Calories, Joules, Watts vs. Dollar, Euro, Yen<p><span style="color: #111111; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 22px; background-color: #f9f9f9;">"We have to begin regarding Calories, Joules and Watts as the <a href="http://dkmatai.tumblr.com/post/36311403769/economics-cant-violate-the-laws-of-physics-rising" target="_blank">key currencies</a> rather than the Dollar, Euro and Yen."</span></p><p><img style="vertical-align: middle;" src="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mdwu8myR3u1qf5nfp.jpg" alt="We Are Here" width="500" height="468" /></p><p><span style="color: #111111; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 22px; background-color: #f9f9f9;">"<a href="http://dkmatai.tumblr.com/post/36311403769/economics-cant-violate-the-laws-of-physics-rising" target="_blank">At present</a>, economics is the study of how people transform nature to meet their needs and it treats the exploitation of finite natural resources including energy, water, air, forests, arable land and oceans as externalities, which they are not. For example, we cannot pollute and damage natural ecosystems and their local communities ad infinitum without severe repercussions to their underlying sustainability."</span></p><p>"<span style="background-color: #f9f9f9; color: #111111; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 22px;">The current model of the disposable economy operates as a system for transforming low-entropy raw materials and energy into high-entropy toxic waste and unavailable energy, while providing society with interim goods and services and the temporary satisfaction that most deliver. Any such transformations in the economy mean that there will be less low-entropy materials and energy available for natural ecosystems. Mounting evidence of this conflict demonstrates the limits to our national, regional and global growth!"</span></p><p><span style="color: #111111; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 22px; background-color: #f9f9f9;"><br /></span></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-90771160905069491462012-09-16T21:50:00.001-07:002014-10-03T19:19:04.094-07:0050% U.S. Unemployment? Not in 20 years. Right Now.<span style="background-color: yellow;">Note: You say we exaggerated? Your <a href="#2014BLSUpdate">2014 BLS Update</a> is below. </span><br />
<br />
#IncomprehensibleTruth is still truth. This is only the very beginning of the kinds of breathtaking wake up calls and cataclysmic shifts we'll discover amidst accelerating #BigData in the coming decade.<br />
<br />
The first tenant of economics is, "compared to what?" What do we <i>mean</i> by #Unemployment? How many ways has that word been laundered, spun, and compared to false and misleading metrics, to date? This chart begins to pull back the curtain; but you should <a href="http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred-mobile/" target="_blank">get the data for yourself</a> and press #OpenData into service of both illuminating our current predicament and forging new ways forward.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Ldxpll05keg/Uwy6p68sBmI/AAAAAAAABXs/mcVt507iD6k/s1600/50pct.totnonpart.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Fig 1. -- Total U.S. Labor Non-Participant Rate." border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Ldxpll05keg/Uwy6p68sBmI/AAAAAAAABXs/mcVt507iD6k/s1600/50pct.totnonpart.png" height="371" title="" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Fig 1. -- Total U.S. Labor Non-Participant Rate.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">LEGEND</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><b>totnonpart</b> (top purple line) = </span><span style="font-size: x-small;"> Total U.S. Labor Non-Participant Rate. Number of Americans displaced, discarded, disabled, dropped out of the count and completely off the Workforce Map.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><b>civnonpart</b> (orange/yellow line) = Civilian Labor Force Non-Participation Rate (100-civpart).</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><b>u6rate</b> (green line) = True Total #Unemployed, plus all marginally attached workers plus total employed part time for economic reasons.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><b>unrate</b> (bottom blue line) = MSM Consensus Crowd-Control #Unemployment Story</span><br />
<br />
Source: Federal Reserve Economic Data (<a href="http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred-mobile/" target="_blank">FRED mobile</a>)
<br />
<br />
Don't like that slice on The Data? Try the direct <a href="http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300000" target="_blank">BLS view</a> on for size:<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://data.bls.gov/generated_files/graphics/latest_numbers_LNS11300000_2004_2012_all_period_M12_data.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://data.bls.gov/generated_files/graphics/latest_numbers_LNS11300000_2004_2012_all_period_M12_data.gif" /></a></div>
<p id="2014BLSUpdate">2014 BLS Update</p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://data.bls.gov/generated_files/graphics/latest_numbers_LNS11300000_2004_2014_all_period_M09_data.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://data.bls.gov/generated_files/graphics/latest_numbers_LNS11300000_2004_2014_all_period_M09_data.gif" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
Still don't like The Data? Think it's out of context? Try this <i>compared to what</i> view, vs. GDP & Profits:<br />
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<a href="http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred-mobile/" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-eX6X2kphFdg/UYPhXxtjxoI/AAAAAAAANgc/CorHwvUlMBI/s1600/58percent.YouAreHere.692x531.jpg" width="600" /></a>
<br />
What will really bake your post-scarcity noodle is that right now, in 2013, we've created the first <a href="http://alexmcmanus.org/2013/04/03/printing-food-things-that-could-happen-in-the-next-10-years-3/" target="_blank">3D printed food</a>, straight from the Star Trek replicator. <a href="https://twitter.com/JasonSilva/status/330352067300429824/photo/1" target="blank">Got change for a paradigm?</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-12736580446068164512012-03-04T21:16:00.000-08:002012-03-04T21:16:23.965-08:00Wall Street Psycho Inmates Still Running the AsylumOh, you thought the worst was over? They're already trying to bury the bodies again. "Now, citing competitive concerns, bankers are pressing the Fed to limit its release of information—expected as early as next week—to what was published after the first test of big banks in 2009" (<a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204276304577261554100410414.html">Lenders Stress Over Test Results</a>, WSJ).
So much for sunlight, transparency, and truth.
<object id="wsj_fp" width="512" height="363"><param name="movie" value="http://s.wsj.net/media/swf/VideoPlayerMain.swf"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><param name="flashvars" value="videoGUID={4237CA0A-881B-46AC-9763-DDD84DF3705B}&playerid=1000&plyMediaEnabled=1&configURL=http://wsj.vo.llnwd.net/o28/players/&autoStart=false" base="http://s.wsj.net/media/swf/"name="flashPlayer"></param><embed src="http://s.wsj.net/media/swf/VideoPlayerMain.swf" bgcolor="#FFFFFF"flashVars="videoGUID={4237CA0A-881B-46AC-9763-DDD84DF3705B}&playerid=1000&plyMediaEnabled=1&configURL=http://wsj.vo.llnwd.net/o28/players/&autoStart=false" base="http://s.wsj.net/media/swf/" name="flashPlayer" width="512" height="363" seamlesstabbing="false" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" swLiveConnect="true" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/shockwave/download/index.cgi?P1_Prod_Version=ShockwaveFlash"></embed></object>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-27361618753084020222012-01-28T09:18:00.001-08:002012-01-28T09:19:02.071-08:00"Capitalism has shortfalls," says Richest Man in the World, Bill Gates.<blockquote style="color: #000000; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;"><p>“Capitalism has worked phenomenally. Look at North Korea versus South Korea, or China before and after 1979. <strong>Capitalism has shortfalls. It doesn’t ... take care of the poor, and it underfunds innovation, so we have to offset that</strong>. We don’t have to [ask] whether capitalism is wrong.” - <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/9041726/Bill-Gates-I-wrote-Steve-Jobs-a-letter-as-he-was-dying.-He-kept-it-by-his-bed.html">Bill Gates: 'I wrote Steve Jobs a letter as he was dying. He kept it by his bed’ - Telegraph</a></p></blockquote><p style="color: #000000; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;">This is precisely the premise of our work in these pages. It's not about whether an abstract system is right or wrong, but whether or not it's accomplishing all of our human objectives. Industrial capitalism worked for the stage of civilization that the so-called advanced west traversed over the past 150 years; it's simply not adequate for the next leg of the journey. We can and should immediately offset poverty and homelessness with<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="http://j.mp/WhatIsBasicIncome" target="_blank">Basic Income</a> and continue to evolve toward maximum human flourishing.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-66521091487902145852012-01-16T10:45:00.001-08:002012-12-03T13:05:19.406-08:00Core issue that killed #MLK was #EconomicInequality #ItsNotAboutRace It's about #BasicIncome Sustainable #Postscarcity #EndPoverty<div>
<span style="border-collapse: separate; font-family: Tahoma; font-size: medium;"><span style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;">It's so not about race. The core issue that killed #MLK was moving beyond superficial distinctions of color and creed, taking on the core malignancy of the human condition: escalating and unsustainable economic inequality. </span></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;">King's evolving political advocacy <strong>in his later years</strong> ... paralleled the teachings of the progressive </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highlander_Research_and_Education_Center" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: none; background-origin: initial; color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px; text-decoration: none;" title="Highlander Research and Education Center">Highlander Research and Education Center</a><span style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;">, with whom King was affiliated.</span><span style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;"> King began to speak of the need for fundamental changes in the political and economic life of the nation. Towards the time of his murder, King more frequently expressed his opposition to the war and<strong> his desire to see a redistribution of resources to correct racial and economic injustice</strong>.</span><span style="font-family: sans-serif; line-height: 12px;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;">Though his public language was guarded, so as to avoid being linked to communism by his political enemies, in private he sometimes spoke of his support for </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_socialism" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: none; background-origin: initial; color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px; text-decoration: none;" title="Democratic socialism">democratic socialism</a><span style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;">. In one speech, he stated that "something is wrong with capitalism" and claimed, "There must be a better distribution of wealth, and maybe America must move toward a democratic socialism."</span></blockquote>
<br />
<span style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;">Of course, the word <em>distribution</em> has long since become an emotionally hijacked firestarter keyword of the fundamentalist tinfoil hat lexicon; and actually, it's perhaps not the most accurate word to describe the challenges of a sustainable <a href="http://j.mp/EconomiesAreCirculatorySystems" target="_blank">postscarcity circulatory system</a>. Notwithstanding, a preponderance of economic scholarship over the most recent half dozen decades or so has <em>gradually converged on the most logical first step</em>, variously described as <a href="http://j.mp/WhatIsBasicIncome" target="_blank">Basic Income</a>, Universal Basic Income (UBI), Basic Income Guarantee (BIG), and similar language-specific nomenclature that crosses virtually all ephemeral cultural and language boundaries.</span><br /><br />
<span style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;">Follow, learn, and join the rapidly rising global </span><a href="http://twitter.com/#!/search/%23basicincome" target="_blank">#BasicIncome</a><span style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;"> trend on twitter:</span><br />
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;"><a href="http://twitter.com/basicincome" target="_blank">@BasicIncome</a></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;">Facebook: <a href="http://facebook.com/basic.income.rights" target="_blank">Basic Income Rights</a></span></li>
<li><span style="color: #0000ee; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="line-height: 19px;"><a href="https://twitter.com/rentabasica" style="font-size: 13px;" target="_blank">@RentaBasica</a></span></span></li>
<li><span style="color: #0000ee; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="line-height: 19px;"><a href="http://twitter.com/revenudevie" style="font-size: 13px;" target="_blank">@RevenuDevie</a></span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;"><a href="https://twitter.com/basicincome_j" target="_blank">@BasicIncome_J</a></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;"><a href="https://twitter.com/Grundeinkommen" target="_blank">@Grundeinkommen</a></span> </li>
<li><span style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;"><a href="https://twitter.com/BINews" target="_blank">@BINews</a></span></li>
</ul>
And if all that is still not enough to bring you up to warp speed, here's Captain Picard: <a href="http://j.mp/PicardPostscarcity" target="_blank">Make it So</a>.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-29472090289860228852012-01-15T17:11:00.000-08:002012-01-15T17:11:41.254-08:00Quants: "If people don't complain now, then it serves them right when the next financial crisis happens."<div style="text-align: center;">
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/ed2FWNWwE3I#t=35m22s" width="560"></iframe></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-34522034262316758702012-01-15T15:06:00.001-08:002012-01-15T15:16:47.161-08:00Captain Picard on the Fate of CapitalismMaybe all the data on this site is too mind numbing. Let's try something different.
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="360" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/ui6g23ygov8" width="480"></iframe>
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<br />
Explore more about how "<a href="http://apprehendingpostscarcity.blogspot.com/2012/01/economics-of-future-are-somewhat.html">the economics of the are future somewhat different</a>."Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-61632807934983543522012-01-03T08:07:00.001-08:002012-01-03T08:10:55.158-08:005 Utter Fictions of Money and 10 SolutionsWhen the tinfoil hat brigade says that our economy is a Ponzi pyramid, they're essentially right. After U.S. President Lincoln was assassinated (perhaps in part because he printed the Greenback; the people's currency), the banksters hijacked the system. "So it was a large fraud that was backstopped by a sort of over-fraud." - Ellen Brown. Cue the 20:25 mark to get the 30 seconds prior that provides context for that quotation. Where thinking people of conscience can legitimately differ is considering the matter of which form of social capitalism, or free market socialism, which mashup of an adaptive <a href="http://j.mp/MixedEconomy" target="_blank">mixed economy</a> to implement in order to address the resulting unsustainable resource skews, to provide sustainable <a href="http://j.mp/EconomiesAreCirculatorySystems" target="_blank">currency circulation</a> -- not distribution -- via a <a href="http://j.mp/WhatIsBasicIncome" target="_blank">Basic Income</a>, or similar program that ensures consistent, healthy, transpiration at the capillary level of the economic body.<br />
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<br />Regardless of what you might have been told by an abusive parent or others, you're smart. Probably very smart, or you likely wouldn't be reading these words. So, instead of spoon feeding you yet another forgettable Top 10, the subject of this post is your assignment: watch the full video. Do the <a href="http://j.mp/WhatIsBasicIncome" target="_blank">homework</a>. Write your list of the the top 5 Utter Fictions of Money and 10 Solutions that you discover in the comments here. We can do this. We can increment the system, raise it to a more sustainable, adaptive level without throwing out the baby with the bath water. That's the '++' of Capitalism++.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-65646172834642137862011-11-21T12:23:00.001-08:002011-11-21T17:03:07.707-08:00The Great Money Map<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
<span style="text-align: left;">As seen <i>live</i> on </span><a href="http://xkcd.com/980/huge/#x=-7444&y=-3374&z=5" style="text-align: left;" target="_blank">XKCD</a><span style="text-align: left;">!</span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Great Money Map: "There, I showed you it."</td></tr>
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Note the obviously substantial, real quantities required to provide very high levels of <a href="http://basicincome.tumblr.com/">Basic Income</a>,<i> "Amount needed to give everyone an income over $250,000 ... or $100,000."</i> These numbers make a comparatively modest <a href="http://twitter.com/basicincome">Basic Income</a> a complete no-brainer. It can even be done on a <a href="http://basicincome.org/">global basis</a>, as World GDP of $63,000,000,000,000 represents the sum total of all our efforts and energies, a pool of liquidity like the <a href="https://www.pfd.state.ak.us/faqs/index.aspx">permanent fund dividend</a> oils beneath Alaskan permafrost or Saudi sands.<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">"We are allowed to speak about alternatives."</span></b> #ows</div>
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We need not make value judgments to observe the clinical fact that hoarded wealth creates massive blood clots in any resource circulatory system. Massive <a href="http://j.mp/EconomiesAreCirculatorySystems">blood clots kill the entire body</a>, no matter where they lodge.<br />
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On the chart, a <a href="http://usbig.net/">U.S. Basic Income</a> of $44,700 costs the Top 1% a mere sliver. The most entitled whining is likely to come from the top 20%, who don't "feel" as rich as they actually are, in both relative and absolute terms; and those who wanted their own shot at becoming the next pathological hoarders and indiscriminate, unmitigated overindulging self-servers. Like porn, gross overindulgence may be difficult to define, but everyone knows it when they see it; and the consequent obesity is empirical.<br />
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Follow <a href="http://twitter.com/basicincome">@BasicIncome</a> on twitter as a vote of support for an idea <a href="http://j.mp/WarOnPoverty">who's time and necessity</a> have come. The more followers that account has, the larger the constituency we represent.<br />
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<i>Permalink: <a href="http://j.mp/GreatMoneyMap">http://j.mp/GreatMoneyMap</a></i><br />
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<i><br /></i></div>Michael Silverton's Metavalent Stigmergyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09391984708930471762noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-32592429248319871702011-11-21T11:21:00.000-08:002011-11-21T12:13:48.699-08:00An Inconceivable Truth: 53.9% Real U.S. Labor Participation Rate<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Even if you <i>still</i> haven't seen the Charles Ferguson, Sony Pictures Classics documentary </span><a href="http://www.sonyclassics.com/insidejob/" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Inside Job</a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">, which receives an unheard of </span><a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/inside_job_2010/" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">97% rating on Rotten Tomatoes</a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">, we now know that we pretty much can't believe a single word out of a single mouth on Bloomberg, CNBC, or any of the financial media. So today, we shed light on one of the most potentially disruptive and disturbing measures of just how delusional the current conversation about the </span><a href="http://j.mp/BreakTheJobTrance" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Job Trance</a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> has become.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>The current mathematical fact is this:</b> nearly half of all Americans, an inconceivable 46.1% over the age of 16, are non-participants in the Civilian Labor Force (CLF), today.</span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; border-collapse: separate;">That's right, a 53.9% Real Labor Participation Rate means a <i>46.1% total jobless rate</i>. Right now. November, 2011. Not 9%. Not even the begrudgingly acknowledged </span>U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) U-6 measure of 16.2%, as of October, 2011. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Nope. Not 9. Not 16. A full 46.1% of Americans over the age of 16 in America are JOBLESS, right now, and we're gonna' break it down for you in real time, right here: </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">the almost staggeringly inconceivable truth that the current financial reporting house of mirrors is set up to distort, divert, and deceive worker ants from seeing plainly. It's not a conspiracy, it's plain old diversion and deception.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Unemployment and the Civilian Labor Force Participation Rate</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When most people hear the standard headline numbers of "9% unemployment" or "16% unemployment," what do they imagine? If you're like most, those numbers might conjure a picture where 100 people live in a village and 5 villagers don't have a job. Or, when things are really bad, 16 people of the 100 don't have a job. Either way, in the worst possible case, 84 people of the 100 are in great shape (employed, anyway) so what's there to complain about, right? Things should drift back to normal any day now; certainly there is no need for drastic action like an <a href="http://j.mp/MLK4BasicIncome">emergency basic income act</a>.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That's exactly what the Wall Street econo-charlatans want you to believe, and it's astounding just how well it's worked, for so long. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So, let's get to the bottom of this supposedly simple<i> </i>measurement scheme. According to the U.S. BLS, the <a href="http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t15.htm">U-6 number</a> is "a percent of the Civilian Labor Force plus all persons marginally attached to the labor force." But what is this Civilian Labor Force, exactly? For that definition, we need to refer to the <a href="http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300000">Labor Force Statistics from the Current Population Survey</a>, where we find the latest October 2011 Civilian Labor Force Participation Rate of 64.2%. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Like every jot and tittle on this blog, don't believe me, </span><a href="http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300000" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">look it up for yourself</a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">. Here's what you'll find:</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Labor Force Statistics from the Current Population Survey</span></b></div>
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<span style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; border-collapse: separate;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Data extracted on: November 20, 2011 (10:01:11 PM)</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Series Id: LNS11300000</span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Seasonally Adjusted</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Series title: (Seas) Labor Force Participation Rate</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Labor force status: Civilian labor force participation rate</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Type of data: Percent or rate</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Age: 16 years and over</span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><a href="http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300000"><img border="0" height="321" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-6OxS2HtWrx0/TsnU_vP8UMI/AAAAAAAAAUI/O0T_wBUN29w/s400/laborparcipationrate.png" width="500" /></a></span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small; text-align: -webkit-auto;"><a href="http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300000">Civilian Labor Force (CLF) Participation Rate</a></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What does all this mean? It means that due to the exponential efficiency of information technologies and the globalization of business, the U.S. Civilian Labor Force Participation Rate has been on a rapid downhill slide for at least the past decade, resting now at 64.2%. We are a civilization far closer to a technological singularity than a return to anything even remotely resembling full employment. Pick your favorite comforting fiction, the facts remain.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>In 2012 we live in a completely different kind of civilization from 1912.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">To put a positive spin, as I'm keen on repeating, we are the victims of our own astronomical success. We are so productive and efficient as a post-information age society, that nearly 50% of Americans, age 16 years and over, are not among the Civilian Labor Force and <i>never need to be, ever again. </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What we've learned is that when mainstream corporate media refer to the peripheral U-3 and U-6 measures of unemployment, they are talking about <i>fractions of the Civilian Labor Force</i>, a term we've never heard explained or discussed in the mainstream. Therefore, when we read of 16% U-6, that means sixteen percent of the CLF, which is <a href="http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=16%25%20of%2064.2%25">16% of 64.2%</a>, or 0.1027. That is 10.27% of the whole, <i>further subtracted from</i> the 64.2%. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>64.2% CLF - 10.3% Net U6 = 53.9% Real U.S. Labor Participation</b></span></div>
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>Roughly half of all Americans, 46.1% over the age of 16 are jobless, non-participants in the Civilian Labor Force, today.</i></span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I heartily invite mathematical refutation of these numbers. It can't be done. Econospin word blenders can be used to mince and chop interpretations into various viscosities of indecipherablility, but the numbers are what they are.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So, by all means, let's keep fixating on the fiction of </span><a href="http://j.mp/BreakTheJobTrance" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">jobs, jobs, jobs</a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> and the make believe "unemployment rate" that has increasingly nothing to do with the real lives of growing numbers of Americans living in RV's, campers, cars, and tent cities across the United States. Put another way, if this isn't the end of the </span><a href="http://j.mp/BreakTheJobTrance" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Job Trance</a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">, the clarion call to all out </span><a href="http://j.mp/WarOnPoverty" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">War On Poverty</a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">, and the wake up call to an absolute </span><a href="http://j.mp/MLK4BasicIncome" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">National Economic Emergency</a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">, then I surely don't know what is.</span><br />
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<i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">PermaLink: <a href="http://j.mp/AnInconceivableTruth">http://j.mp/AnInconceivableTruth</a> </i>
</div>Michael Silverton's Metavalent Stigmergyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09391984708930471762noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-42599132881450544022011-11-13T12:49:00.001-08:002011-11-13T12:52:31.627-08:00World Ultra Wealth Report 2011: Uncovering Pockets of Opportunities<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"The fortunes of the world’s ultra high net worth (UHNW) individuals have surpassed $25 trillion <a href="http://www.wealthx.com/articles/2011/world-ultra-wealth-report-2011-uncovering-pockets-of-opportunities/">and is set to increase</a>, spurred by the growth of developing Asia. Wealth-X estimates that the global market of UHNW individuals has reached 185,795. Wealth-X forecast that the UHNW population in Asia-Pacific will surpass that of Europe in 2024 and overtake that of the U.S. in 2032."</blockquote>
In case there are any questions, later, about what caused <a href="http://j.mp/WarOnPoverty">The War</a>.Michael Silverton's Metavalent Stigmergyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09391984708930471762noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-17348105147715702752011-11-13T12:43:00.001-08:002011-11-13T12:47:14.042-08:00The End of Social Mobility in Uber-Capitalist AmericaNation of Change on <a href="http://www.nationofchange.org/why-income-inequality-suddenly-matters-1321114298">Why Income Inequality Suddenly Matters</a>:<br />
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"for all the right-wing mythology about "Eurosocialism" snuffing out upward mobility, data from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development show that social mobility in uber-capitalist America is actually lower than in most industrialized countries.</blockquote>
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This is why almost<b> three-quarters of respondents just told <a href="http://thehill.com/">The Hill</a> newspaper's pollsters that income inequality is a problem.</b></blockquote>
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This is why my local TV news is suddenly airing pieces on economic inequality between sports, weather and all the "you stay classy" small talk."</blockquote>
Too late for platitudes. This is our <a href="http://j.mp/WarOnPoverty">Declaration of War</a>.Michael Silverton's Metavalent Stigmergyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09391984708930471762noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-68733141532569575672011-11-07T06:56:00.000-08:002011-11-07T06:56:00.498-08:00It's the Arrogance and Entitlement, Stupid<br />
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Couldn't <a href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/11/04/1033303/-The-bank-said-Youll-be-back">make this up</a> if you tried:</div>
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Anyway, the bankster told her "You'll be back. Credit unions can't provide the services you need." We'll see about that. She withdrew over $200k from Wells Fargo. Next we went to Bank of America. I closed my last account with hardly any questions asked. Of course, I had taken most of my money out so there wasn't much left to take. My sister on the other hand had a large balance in multiple accounts. <b> They actually refused to cut her a check for the full amounts.</b> They only gave her 1/3 of her money and told her she'd have to come back to withdraw the rest. They claimed they were only allowed to make checks for a certain amount, and that they had no authority to cut additional checks on the same day. </blockquote>
<br />Michael Silverton's Metavalent Stigmergyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09391984708930471762noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5396335480460546508.post-46444040342952000422011-11-05T17:48:00.001-07:002011-11-06T09:33:30.904-08:00Who's Stupider?<div>“When I was a child, I thought as a child; when I became an adult, I put away childish things.”</div> <div> </div> <div style="text-align: center" id="preserve3ed1e82d203e4100b19036c008de668c" class="wlWriterPreserve" ><span> <object id="msnbc45b52e" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=10,0,0,0" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" data="data:application/x-oleobject;base64,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" width="420" height="245"> <embed name="msnbc45b52e" src="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32545640" width="420" height="245" flashvars="launch=45169216^422050^490490&width=420&height=245" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" wmode="transparent" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://www.adobe.com/shockwave/download/download.cgi?P1_Prod_Version=ShockwaveFlash"></embed></object></span></div> <div><strong><br>Transcript Excerpt</strong> </div> <div>>>the swaps market, which is where a lot of this leverage lives, has little to no capital requirements and exists in the off exchange with nobody clearing it. blaming greece for these problems is like blaming the subprime borrowers. greece stupid? yeah, you bet, they're real stupid. but they're also the size of dallas, texas. so who's stupider? greece, who was like, we'll take all the money, or the western bank regulators who said it was legal to give the greeks this kind of leverage?</div> <div> </div> <div>>> well, look at the swaps market. <font style="background-color: #ffff00"></font><font style=""><strong>the swaps market is anywhere between $300 trillion and $600 trillion</strong></font><font style="background-color: #ffff00"></font> (CORRECTED) -- <font style="background-color: #ffff00"></font><font style="">and <strong>the whole global economy</strong>, you know, its capital value</font>, is not that much. <font style=""><strong>it’s a fraction of that</strong></font> much. which means if rhode island fails, <em>just the swaps on rhode island's debt is enough to take down the entire u.s. banking system and ripple across the pond. and that's exactly the problem. greece is like rhode island failing</em>. </div> <div> </div> <div>>> that's the interconnectedness, and that's why you need not just financial reform in this country, but financial reform that has a global reach. </div> <div> </div> <div>>> absolutely.</div> <div> </div> <div></div> <div>So, isn't it time to grow up out of our <a href="http://j.mp/BreakTheJobTrance" target="_blank">safe little fairy land</a> and act like responsible <a href="http://j.mp/MLKOfficialDemands" target="_blank">grown ups</a>? Isn’t it time to stop pretending that this bass-ackwards game of Railroad Tycoon that we call Vintage 19th Century America Industrial Capitalism is any more legit or inalienable than Tidily-winks or Parcheesi? Isn’t it long past time to fold up that tired old board game and get to work creating a scalable, adaptive world game that might be worth our kids inhabiting over the next couple of decades and long beyond?</div> <div> </div> <div></div> <div>Now, to be clear, nobody is suggesting some kind of expeditious transition to a global peaceful <a href="http://apprehendingpostscarcity.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">postscarcity</a> scenario, here, right? I mean, who can afford the risk of a rational, diversified, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixed_economy" target="_blank">mixed-economic model</a> working in symbiosis with some kind of utterly <a href="http://j.mp/PatheticSocialistUtopianCrap">pathetic socialist utopian crap</a>? No, we simply MUST return to the conservative comfort of doing things the way we always have, bombing the living hell out of anything and anyone that we don’t understand or can’t utterly dominate and control, right?</div> <div> </div> <div>Or not.</div> Unknownnoreply@blogger.com