Robert Reich: 3 Steps To Restore Balance Of Political & Economic Power In The US (VIDEO)

[99th_Monkey]

Robert Reich: Three Steps To Restore The Balance Of Political And Economic Power In The US (VIDEO)
by Randa Morris * Sept. 3, 2015 * Addicting Info

Concentrated wealth equals concentrated political and economic power. That’s bad for the 99 percent of Americans who don’t have billions of dollars sitting in off shore bank accounts. Logically speaking, what’s bad for 99 percent of Americans is bad for America as a nation.

In 2008 we saw what happens when Wall Street and the big banks are allowed to run wild. Americans paid the price for Wall Street’s reckless gambling and millions of hard working people lost their homes, their jobs and their bank accounts because of the fraud perpetrated by the big banks.

~snip~

In spite of the fact that the US economy has stabilized under the leadership of President Barack Obama, income inequality continues to climb. Nearly all of the economic gains that have occurred during the recovery have gone to the already too rich and powerful. None of it is accidental. It’s the predicted outcome of unregulated capitalism. Which is why the United States has laws designed to protect both the consumer and the market.

~snip~

It’s up to the government to ensure that free market remains truly free. That’s why we have anti-trust laws, and it’s why we have used them many times in the past to restore balance to economic and political systems. Clearly, Americans have never been as stupid as Republicans seem to think we are.

A new video from Robert Reich, posted to Facebook on August 30, lays out the three most important steps to restoring balance to the US political and economic systems. In just under three minutes, Reich explains what has to be done to avoid another economic crash like the Great Depression and 2008 global financial crisis.

1. Restore Glass Steagall legislation, which separated commercial and investment banking from 1933 to 1999, when parts of the Banking Act were repealed.

2. Tax Wall Street trades to discourage speculation.

3. Break up the big banks. No bank should be so large and so powerful that its failure could destroy national economic systems.


VIDEO HERE: http://www.addictinginfo.org/2015/09/03/robert-reich-three-steps-to-restore-the-balance-of-political-and-economic-power-in-the-us-video/

[Make7]

1. Video:

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[Shandris]

2. Won't work. The wealthy still retain the money. End of story.

Until money depreciates and is self-generating, this won't end. Why does every solution about 'income inequality' assume that income as we have always known it must be a thing?

Furthermore, why do we allow ourselves to only think in that metric even once it's pointed out?

[99th_Monkey]

3. Yes of course. And what does Robert Reich know anyway?

He was only Secretary of Labor under President Bill Clinton from 1993 to 1997.

or Richard Wolff, professor of economics
http://rdwolff.com/content/income-inequality

or Paul Krugman.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/16/opinion/krugman-why-inequality-matters.html?_r=0

These people all know nothing. We need to fall-in-line and suffer the Olicarchs. Got it!

[Shandris]

4. I invite you to reread, since clearly you misread my post.

Oh, see, there it is. When I talk about how it won't work because the money doesn't depreciate, that's generally the exact opposite of 'following the oligarchy'.

I can see how that might be difficult to interpret. If I were still in elementary school.

[99th_Monkey]

5. Perhaps I did misread your post

But I'm unfortunately still just as much in the dark about how
"it doesn't work", especially because the reply was laced with
a rather nasty insult.

A patronizing demeanor is very unbecoming, even if someone
is technically "correct" in what they're saying.

[Shandris]

6. That's fair, and I offer an apology.

Putting it in generic terms, any casual glance at the vast majority of our problems -- and by 'our', I mean people as a whole -- is...money. But money is an amazingly unusual thing in this world: we accept that NOTHING lasts forever...except money. Money, hey, that never changes. It accumulates and allows the most evil people to do the most evil things under the veneer of respectability because they get either a law or regulation to hide behind. Our entire political system - no, the entire WORLD political system - is based on it.

Money must depreciate. But if it can depreciate, then it must always likewise be available (or else you might starve to death later, barter notwithstanding!). So any replacement must be self-generating. We know policy can direct resources by use of incentives. Social activity should yield incentives, and through this aspect companies and businesses can continue to operate, but only so long as their workers decide to work for them - something that will now be based purely off of desire and communal need, or regional activity to export/import (again, much like now minus the profit motive).

With profit as a motive removed, and money being useful only as decoration (ie, gold being used as it used to be used instead of just being bars hidden away somewhere), and every person having more than enough social capital to meet all minimum + basic 'healthy life experience' needs (food, shelter, clothing, vacation, a bit of space, etc), people are free to actualize in whatever manner they choose. Modern conveniences can still be available, but no person is likely to have as much as they currently do in the First World individually.

Anyway, these are my thoughts on why I said it won't work. 'Work' might be a bad choice of words; RR's plan will work in respect to making things a little easier, but it won't 'work' as far as a systemic fix - and a FIX is where we need to be looking before this system becomes unchangeable.

[99th_Monkey]

7. Thank you. I really appreciate that.

and your reply was quite helpful. I really am wanting to better understand -- despite my obtuseness regarding the field of economics -- the case you're making. So, if I'm understanding correctly, you propose to somehow remove the profit motive from a capitalist economy. do I have this right? If so, I love the idea of doing that, as you say, using incentives of some kind.

I am familiar with Richard Wolff's work, essentially advocating for democratization of the economy, one business at a time, where workers/labor owns the means of production, rather than having capitalists reaping obscene profits on the backs of workers. Does this get close to what you're suggesting? Or is there another way to move decisively away from the profit motive running amuck, at the expense of everyone except a handful of greed-heads?

I'd like to do a reality check at this point, if you'd bear with me, to let me know if I'm getting warm, or am still "not getting it"

[Shandris]

8. My pleasure. And yes, it sounds like on the broad we're absolutely...

...talking about the same goals: the removal of profit motive and the ability to gain power from manipulation of existing wealth. By smoothing out the 'income potential' (and I use that word very loosely), you eliminate the bulk of inequality.

Perhaps a small example will help get the basic idea more clearly. I'm going to use horribly inefficient numbers that are easy to understand. It's important to realize that this is meant to be just the shell of an idea, because the thought of a single person or tiny group of people making a system to represent democracy is, well, kind of backwards. IE, it would work best once people have the chance to comment on it and everything.

Let's assume that we call this new capital "UNITS". UNITS are constantly generated; every person deserves to live, and the base amount of UNITS each person gets is more than enough to eat healthy, quality foods (vegetable, grains, some meat if desired (but not American or even first-world levels)), shelter appropriately sized for a small family, and reasonable entertainment. I use words like 'reasonable' and 'appropriately-sized' even though they are vague because as I mentioned, the amounts are something that should be determined more democratically. So simply drawing breath earns enough social capital - UNITS - to live on. Anything else you may choose to do will increase the amount of UNITS you get by a small multiplier. You also get a tiny multiplier just by being around others (up to a limit, to prevent gaming the system). IOW...if you choose to work, to go out, to visit people, to help others...anything you may choose to do will net you an additional amount of UNIT as well. The only thing that costs UNIT are goods and services (naturally). Businesses purchase material by pooling UNIT from workers, and workers receive a full share of each product they sell. If a hierarchy is needed for some reason, a small multiplier can be added to compensate (like .1, .2, etc) and provide the 'incentive' motive, but it is expected that most business will not need a hierarchy. (the biggest complaint against these kinds of systems by conservatives is that there is no incentive. Can't be said here, as you still use the principle of Capitalism bolstered by all the best of socialism, minus profit).

BUT...remember that UNITs depreciate. So you have to keep at it to keep 'wealthy' (and even the most 'wealthy' won't have access to all the goods the current top 10% do, in most cases). And the range between 'wealthy' and 'poor' (if any of those can truly be said to exist at that point) is small enough that 'classes' never get a chance to form (and even if one somehow did, joining a class is detrimental to begin with, since that cuts your pool to draw UNIT multipliers from!).

And that's about what I've got. It's a modern world still, but not breathtakingly modern anymore. It's less authoritarian, because authoritarianism is, well, evil (imo). It's certainly a more fair world, for everyone. It's communal, but scalable. It's doable, if we as a race really want to. But if we really want to transform the world, we can't think about starting with the equivalent of changing the tablecloth after Katrina flooded our entire home. Hope that helps!

[99th_Monkey]

9. Who are you supporting/leaning-to in the Primary?

I think it's obvious I'm for Bernie, lock-stock & barrel. I don't see any other
candidate that's closer to supporting what you're talking about. He even has
a whole section in his economic platform re: incentives for worker-owned
business buy-outs/start-ups.

[Shandris]

10. Leaning Bernie, but officially undecided.

To be perfectly honest, I haven't paid too much attention to the candidates as I don't think they can, overall, bring the kinds of change we need.

But I'm also aware that it is highly unlikely such change will EVER come, and as such it's best to choose the closest I can and that seems to me to be Mr. Sanders at the moment.

[99th_Monkey]

11. Thanks for the exchange.

And i'd also like to apologize for accusing you of "lining up
behind the Oligarchy"; since that is clearly not where you
are coming from.

I'd also like to think Bernie's campaign is inclusive enough to
embrace -- as a longer term goal -- what you're advocating,
because I agree that moving around the deck chairs on this
capitalist Titanic is not going to do diddley-squat.

If it's not too 2008 of me,