The World's Economic Problems Can Be Summed Up In One Sentence

[TomClash]

But first let me tell what it's NOT.

It's NOT about Poor People getting too much government assistance.

Or taxes being too high.

Or Old People getting too much social security.

Or the "lazy" jobless getting too many benefits.

Or too much education.

Or not enough education.

Or the Deficit.

Or the National Debt.

Or People of any Color, Religion, Race, Creed, Sex, Orientation or Lifestyle

IT'S ABOUT TOO MUCH MONEY GOING TO TOO FEW PEOPLE!

I love football but when a Super Bowl ticket goes for $288,000 and people out of work can't get jobless benefits . . . too much money is going to too few people.

When states can't balance their budgets without raising fees and cutting basic services but sales of pricey properties in the Hamptons go up 45% . . . too much money is going to too few people.

When wages stagnate for us but triple for the CEO of Goldman . . too much money is going to too few people.

When a hedge fund manager collects $5 billion betting against US . . . too much money is going to too few people.

When the masses in Egypt live on $2 a day but the Davos crowd in their $2,000 suits sipping glasses of 1990 Lafite Rothschild gushes over the "new normal" or "China Funds" . . . too much money is going to too few people.

Henry Ford . . . HENRY FUCKING FORD . . . understood that WAGES had to be HIGH to permit people to have enough money to BUY. Why can't these fuckers get it?

To the economists here, it's about AGGREGATE DEMAND STUPID! There isn't enough of it! And that's because too much money is going to too few people!

It's our money, made off our work, paid for with our sacrifice. We want it back. Give it up. Now.

Sorry for the rant . . . it had to come out. Thank you to the five people who took the time to read this screed!


:rant: :

[Cleita]

1. Well said.

:thumbsup:

[TBF]

2. Excellent rant - summed it up nicely. Resist. nt

[LongTomH]

3. K&R

More than five people will read this!:kick: :yourock:

[sixmile]

4. The real reason

Not enough jobs, too many workers.
Create jobs you create prosperous, safe societies. It's self-perpetuating.

[RC]

19. Sorry, that is another one of the symptoms.

[Enthusiast]

95. Exactly. Symptoms. nt

[Hannah Bell]

40. it's always the case where too few people own most of the money & means of production.

[hay rick]

57. The fruits of increased productivity

can be shared with workers, which increases their disposable income and which increases aggregate demand. Or the fruits of increased productivity can be hoarded by the few and used to provide approximately the same level of goods and services in the economy with the result that there is less need for labor, increased competition for available work and stagnant or declining wages and stagnant or declining aggregate demand.

[baldguy]

133. There are plenty of jobs.

They just happen to be in India, China and Indonesia.

Stop, right now & look on the bottom of the computer you're using right now.

Tell me, why does it say "Made in China" there? Why does it have to?

You can't buy a computer, or a cell phone, or a television, or any electronic gear that's made by American workers anymore. Those jobs don't exist here. The only reason they're in China is so the corporate oligarchs can earn a couple extra points on their stock portfolio.

[upi402]

5. You're on a roll

why stop now?... rant on!

[TomClash]

8. I guess I'm just sick of the BS

From all the politicians and pundits. It's all crap.

[upi402]

21. Me too

Fought it in every way possible for decades.
Many here are young and into the IT/tech culture. I know that culture and it's a stilted view. Obama and the blue dogs have never has ben Democrats and it's frustrating seeing our own who don't see it for what it is.

My .02

[TomClash]

26. That may be true

But the young IT culture also brought us wikileaks so I'm not so sure.

[upi402]

34. Robin Hood

..was right. IMHO some hackers & all whistleblowers are my modern day heros.
I just mean I'm swamped with all the 'factories are overwith, adapt or die'.

Me;
"No.Factories are booming, but at slave wages and not here -son"
On the bright side, cost of living is still high here. And the rich are fine too! Yay rich!

[TomClash]

58. Oh I see

I'm with you.

[Enthusiast]

96. Get sure because you are way off. nt

[hay rick]

63. Clearly you missed the SOTU.

Or not.

Too much money going to too few people. Obama is incapable of even mentioning the blindingly obvious.

[TomClash]

68. Like Jonathan Schell

I was bored.

[newspeak]

150. Oh, I thought it was because

the American people did not have the skills or the education. That's what some of the politicians and pundits like to tell us. It just seems so strange when we have engineers, programmers and other skilled labor out of work. It reminds me, I think it was close to twenty years ago, one of the auto giants was going to relocate out of country. The auto workers worked their butts off to keep the plant here, apparently production had some of the highest numbers, and yet the plant still relocated. The CEO couldn't use "lazy workers" as an excuse.

People need to realize that many "too big to fail" global corporations are not American anymore. There are a few that still care about communities and employees, but more do not. Only thing that matters in America to most of them is Wall Street--they'd betray the people and the country in a heartbeat for more moolah.

[Foo Fighter]

86. It's nothing but a dog-and-pony show.

It's a facade to keep up the pretension that the people in this courty actually have a representative democracy.

People are finally starting to catch on that it's all bogus.

Nothing but smoke and mirrors.

[jillan]

6. It's so easy to understand, why can't the wackos get it???? We can't afford to buy what they are

selling - in more ways than one!

[The Magistrate]

7. Hear Hear, Sir!

[yourout]

9. One word........Greed

[Angry Dragon]

10. +1000 .......... I was thinking the same thing

[cutlassmama]

28. me 2

[Knight Hawk]

55. ME 3

[lonestarnot]

148. 4 FOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOUR!

[Hydra]

11. The things you mentioned above

Are created by people whose job it is to create a perfect illusions that direct people away from the fact that the top 1-2% hold is the dirtiest money imaginable.

[Scruffy1]

23. No apology necessary-Solidarity Forever.

Besides the money there are many negative aspects to income inequality and the cross all levels of society. The most unequal states in the USA also lead in homicide, infant mortality, and social problems. These levels are elevated by inequality even among the top quintile-so it is just not the poor who suffer due to income inequality.

[Enthusiast]

98. But we shouldn't mention those factors.

It might sow discontent.

[Enthusiast]

97. Yup

Otherwise they wouldn't be holding all that money. Pretty obvious.

[Hydra]

134. It IS pretty obvious

That's the reason for the distraction and propaganda though. They have to make "success" and their vast wealth look sacred- the sign of a great mind and impeccable work ethic.

The funny thing is that I think a lot of them forgot that it's an illusion. Lloyd Blankenfeld claims to be doing "Gods Work." Almost all of them think we're too stupid to rule ourselves.

I guess it's the usual thing- the Thugs want to be the King.

[xchrom]

12. well said!

:applause:

[Starry Messenger]

13. k&r

But if tax them we will hurt their feelings and they will leave. :sarcasm:

[TomClash]

17. Then let's show them the door!

I know you'd agree.

[Starry Messenger]

25. Money first, they took it from us.

Call it an "exit fee". :D

[GliderGuider]

14. Yes, but that's the way the global system we've created works.

We all want a little more, we all want to rise a little higher. However...

Hierarchy acts as a power pump, and its goal is to move power (transfigured into wealth) from the periphery (aka you and me) to the center (aka them). It's not a moral failure so much as just the way that an unregulated hierarchy works. Since about 1950 those who already had wealth and power have worked tirelessly to remove regulation from the system, to permit more rapid and extreme consolidation of wealth and power.

Ultimately it's not sustainable, but the correction from the situation we have now could be painful. Look at Egypt for example...

[loudsue]

37. No, we do NOT "all want" that. Many MANY people are happy with ENOUGH

Not everyone needs more and more. It's the PROPAGANDA that says having way too much of a good thing is BETTER than a good thing. I would like security and a little extra to travel to see my friends & family in other states. I don't care anything about custom designed automobiles and huge diamond rings, the "latest fashions" (which, by the way, fall apart after 3 washings) and such.

In most of Europe, people are surprised at how materialistic Americans are, and the perception is that nobody here is satisfied with a financially secure life surrounded by their friends and loved ones. I would guess that at LEAST 85% of the people in my county do not aspire to become wealthy. They just want to do ok and live their lives in peace, persuing their interests and hanging out with their friends, kids, families.

[GliderGuider]

71. Would you like your children to be better off than you are?

I'm not talking about all of us wanting to be Bill Gates. The "little extra" you would like so you can, for instance. It's not a lot, and there's nothing wrong with it. However, if you multiply that $1000 desire by 6.9 billion, since each of us on the planet would like that little extra, and all of a sudden you're talking about trillions of dollars that ultimately has to be extracted from mother nature or other people.

But that's not wrong, and that's not what I'm talking about.

What I mean is that the global economic system is set up to permit that "little extra" to turn into "a lot extra" without much regulation. Similarly, all political systems in existence are set up to remove power from most people and consolidate it in the hands of a few.

This isn't an American problem, and it's not a moral failing on the part of those who want a "little extra" money or power. It's just the way the global system works, and if you're an average Joe or Jane (or an average Ahmed or Farah) it does not work in your favour.

[loudsue]

82. I agree.

I didn't understand where you were going with the previous post, but I agree with what you're getting at here.

[JDPriestly]

80. Europeans appreciate their culture. Americans don't.

Once our culture and not just our possessions are our source of pride, we will work together to make our culture more livable. Right now, we actually have the potential for a wonderful, diverse culture. But we are too focused on the things we have or don't have to think about the marvelous variety of our culture, of our real traditions of working together for civic goals.

[melody]

88. Americans are 310 million different people -- they are not all one thing of any kind

Generalizing in such a matter is impossible to support with evidence.

I do appreciate our culture and our people.

[JDPriestly]

108. Same for Europeans.

But we don't have a real knowledge or sense of our history. We have kind of a vague idea of a myth about our history. And we don't treasure our achievements in the arts as much as Europeans do. We don't have castles that remind us of the past. We look to the future much more than to the past really. It creates an imbalance in our perspective.

Generalizations do work. True they don't capture the whole spectrum of the reality being described. But they do catch the overview. And for that reason, they are valid.

[chervilant]

90. hmm...

Indisputably, most -- almost ALL -- humans accept hierarchy as our species' penultimate social construct. However, a FEW of us -- self included -- recognize hierarchy as an arbitrary social construct that is both stultifying and dehumanizing. Consequently, not ALL of us "want a little more," or "want to rise a little higher." Those of us who find hierarchy anathema tend to be 'bad' capitalists, interested more in pacifism and advocacy for others than in amassing wealth (or power of any kind). Those of us who find hierarchy anathema tend to be ridiculed or patronized by those who blithely embrace hierarchy as a given.

If you haven't read Naomi Klein's Shock Doctrine, I suggest you do so. Look closely, and you will see that this administration is continuing the disaster capitalism long touted by Uncle Miltie and his minions as THE penultimate mode of economic behavior. You will soon understand how the corporatists have usurped the IMF, the WTO, and virtually every currency on the planet, which means that they get to amass wealth -- and control of vital resources (including human resources) -- on a level heretofore unknown. Such individuals have absolutely NO qualms about the effects of disaster capitalism on the hoi polloi, many of whom have already starved to death or committed suicide rather than becoming a burden to their families. Klein's book is thoroughly researched and well-written, but too many people have given it a pass--likely because it deals with matters economic.

We MUST acknowledge the horrible monster of disaster capitalism which has spread its hedonistic and deadly tentacles throughout the world. It is THIS hydra -- birthed and fed by those who would have us believe that hierarchy is inevitable -- that we must destroy, before it destroys us--if we're not already too late.

[GliderGuider]

142. The phenomenon exists at multiple levels.

I've read Shock Doctrine, and I understand how it works in all the countries it's been tried in. I've also read the Powell Manifesto, and through that came to understand how right-wing authoritarianism has permeated American culture in the last 40 years. The rise of corporatism with its intrinsic hierarchy has been one of the main tools of global power consolidation, the hierarchic institutions of police and military have become the natural corporate enforcers, and our schools and media have eagerly spread the myth of corporate inevitability.

This has been a disaster for the world - whether for the Ogoni tribesmen in Nigeria overrun by Royal Dutch Shell and the Nigerian puppet army or the tens of millions of people being pushed into poverty in the USA by the hands of the bankers.

However, IMO these are simply various manifestations of core aspects of human nature, refined through research and transformed by technology into tools that can be wielded against us with impunity if we are not aware of them. At a deeper level, this phenomenon has been with us for thousands of years - we can see its outlines in monarchies and empires like the Pharaohs in ancient Egypt or the Chinese dynasties, or in medieval feudalism.

What this means to me is that there are inherent desires in human nature - the desire for things to be a little more comfortable, for a little more power, for a little more money - that are natural, but are easily harnessed by those who learn what buttons to push, what levers to pull. How much fear should be instilled to make people fall in line, how much wealth should the owners allow to flow downhill to make people unwilling to risk what they have, how much hope should be permitted so that people are eager to fall into place in the hierarchy, how much hope should be removed so that people understand they can't climb high enough to actually penetrate the corridors of power?

At one level, regulating the corporate ability to consolidate power and wealth, to buy elections, politicians and judges, is an essential beginning. However, unless we are aware of where the urges come from within ourselves we will always be vulnerable. Ultimately, the only way to stand against these malignant forces is through acts of refusal, as the Egyptians are now demonstrating to us. Unless we recognize our true natures and accept that inside of each of us lives a little bit of Ken Lay and Hosni Mubarak as well as a bit of Gandhi, MLK, RFK and Simon Bolivar, we will remain powerless pawns trapped in a cage we have willingly helped to build.

[chervilant]

164. hmm...

In college -- lo, these many years ago -- my favorite elective was Economic Anthropology. How enlightening it was to read about the genesis of our species' contemporary economic behaviors.

Now --in my mid-fifties -- I watch as we humans struggle with the effects of overpopulation. I see how our myriad fears manifest as hatred, resentment, depression, and violence -- even as our vital resources become ever more scarce.

I listen as individuals explain our species' less savory traits as 'human nature,' as though proffering this dismissive palliative countermands our collective hubris. I've asserted hereinbefore my contention that our species is in its adolescence -- evolutionarily-speaking. I make no apologies for attempting to see this particular forest for the trees...

That each of us has shared traits is inarguable. We each fall somewhere on the spectrum of any given trait from one extreme to the other. Our social sciences assert that the vast majority of us are clustered smack dab in the middle, with only a few intriguing outliers. So, I come full circle back to our tendency to 'explain' our own behaviors, as though they are inevitable simply because we are members of the human race.

As we wallow around in the muck and the mire at the bottom of the abyss we've created through our own rigid defensiveness and externalization of personal responsibility, I dream of our species' potentialities. Hierarchy is not the social construct in my dreams.

[Enthusiast]

99. Well said. nt

[Melissa G]

15. Good Rant! n/t

[Angry Dragon]

16. Perhaps that is the only way that they will hear

It is time for all of us to rant, to rant as loud as we can,
to drown out the other side until that is all that is heard.
The rights have been doing it for years and the we have been afraid
to shout them down for fear of offending them.
It is time to offend them, to make them show the facts behind their
bald faced lies.

[FailureToCommunicate]

18. Good screed. Similar take on the issue by medical scientists...

in a study published in Britain. They looked at many countries and found as income INequality increased, a whole host of social and medical problems rose. Countries where there was less disparity between rich and poor -e.g.

Japan, Sweden - had many fewer health problems.

Needless to say America was one of the worst in their study.

link to the study:
l
http://www.equalitytrust.org.uk/resource/the-spirit-level

[TomClash]

27. I'll put that on my list to read

Thanks!

[FailureToCommunicate]

43. As is asked below WHAT CAN WE DO? Maybe some action like Michael

Moore advices:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-moore/michael-moores-action-pla_b_329664.html

AND/OR some pie-in-the-sky wishes like:

Return to Nixon Era tax rates on the wealthy...
End Corporations and super wealthy paying no tax or hiding it off shore...
Bring back (something like) Glass-Steagall...
Return good manufacturing jobs to this country...
Allow UNIONS to rise again...
Slash the obscene Pentagon budget...
And maybe give Elizabeth Warren real power over financial reform...
And...
And...
And...

(and don't forget my pony)

Or, we can get our pitch forks and torches and storm the gated communities of the Fairfield, CTs of this country...

We had such hope that things were going to get better. How naive that now seems.

[TomClash]

50. "We had such hope that things were going to get better. How naive that now seems. "

So, so true.

[Enthusiast]

100. Oh, baby! I'm with you! nt

[FreakinDJ]

20. This is why the "Free Trade - Outsourcing"

We Get It

We understand how too much money going to too few Wealthy Elitist can Destroy our Economy AND our Democracy. That is why the push to Off Shore / Outsource Policies under the guise of Free Trade had to be accomplished. If left up to 1 country - just 1 Free Democratic Society we could rise up, even rebel and change laws, change Tax Codes, even Change Politicians but definitely change the Distribution of Wealth.

When the Economy - Jobs - Manufacturing Wealth is spread out over a larger demographic of People, Countries and Forms of Government, effecting change becomes much more difficult if not impossible process altogether

[Fumesucker]

22. K&R

[Imagevision]

24. How many decades will go by before this crap is turned around? (many?)

[baldguy]

135. Three, so far.

[grahamhgreen]

29. Returning to the tax levels of 1957 would yeild over 700 billion - the first year! Closing

corporate loopholes will also help.

Let's hope Obama is serious about that.

An easy place to stop would be to end all loopholes in one bill, then re-institute the "good" ones later.

[Enthusiast]

101. "Let's hope Obama is serious about that."

:rofl:

[nolabels]

125. Exactly

:fistbump:

[Spyderama]

30. Excellent Rant

This is an excellent rant on the most pressing subject we face today, income inequality. I could not have said it any better myself, although I have tried many times.

<http://palinbabygate.blogspot.com/2011/01/saucerful-of-secrets.html>

[BadgerKid]

31. They're likely benefitting from it

whether they understand it or not. My guess is that a subset of them does get it but don't want to rock the boat.

[Jokinomx]

32. Yes...Yess.... Yesssss!!

:toast:

[Desertrose]

33. Preach it brother...you are exactly right!!

Is it a rant if it's the truth?

[Mnemosyne]

35. Hear, hear! Excellent rant and Truth! KnR n/t

[rhett o rick]

36. So what can we do? nm

[TomClash]

47. Ironically

I was going to end my rant with "What is to be done?" like the title of Lenin's tract, but i am still scared of agent Mike. :rofl:

[rhett o rick]

146. I of course dont believe that violence is an option. It seems romantic but look at Eygpt.

After all the damage who is most apt to step in to fill the government vacuum? Not democracy.

[Shandris]

38. Well said.

I also would add that, perhaps even moreso than money going to too few people (although that IS a VERY VERY important problem, and absolutely no lower than second), is that the people in a position to gain the most money do so without any consideration for those around them or, more importantly, the community that gave rise to their ability to garner money.

So long as money earned is considered to be greater than social awareness and compassion, the world's economic problems will never right themselves. Public Service MUST outweigh a Service Public.

[Hannah Bell]

39. exactly. all the other problems stem from that & the power imbalances it creates & exacerbates.

and i mean "all".

[socialist_n_TN]

41. It's called capitalism my friend...........

EVERYTHING you mentioned in you most excellent rant, is the result of the capitalist system.

[TomClash]

45. It is

And I can no longer apologize for it or rationalize it away. It is defective. I am sick of it.

[socialist_n_TN]

67. I see it every day. We've all been brainwashed............

to think that capitalism is the greatest thing since sliced bread, but the only capitalism that most of us alive have experienced is the neutered capitalism of the New Deal. What we're seeing today is what capitalism REALLY is. When there's no competing system, then this is what we get. More and more people are awakening up to this fact.

The only reason that we got the New Deal was because of the pressure from the socialists, Marxists, and Communists of the time. So if you liked the New Deal version of capitalism, you might want to support the advocates of the competing system. Pressure is the ONLY way capitalism can be controlled. For a while. But controlling the capitalistic system is like riding the tiger. It's dangerous and your ALWAYS in danger of being eaten.

[Enthusiast]

102. You are right on the money.

Unless the abuses of capitalism are reined in, it will end, one way or another. We are watching the golden egg laying goose killed right before our eyes.

[Locrian]

136. exactly right

>>EVERYTHING you mentioned in you most excellent rant, is the result of the capitalist system.

It's the nature of how our system is DESIGNED to concentrate and hoard wealth. It allows only value to be defined by $$ whether that is good or bad for society as a whole is irrelevant. It allows money to be moved at light speed, and disassociates any responsibility.

IT IS HOW THE SYSTEM WAS DESIGNED TO WORK.

We won't change anything until we realize that, and extract the worm of "free market capitalism" from our brains.

[newspeak]

156. I call it "predatory capitalism"

When there is little or no regulation, it becomes a great feral beast always wanting more-more wealth more power no matter who or what it harms.

So, we wonder what in the world could the "new world order" be? Poppy, Kissenger and others have all publicly talked about the NWO. Could it be that countries no longer are governed by the people, that people no longer have any say or power, that corporations (and those behind these behemoth monsters) control and influence the world. Where all decisions for all lands are made by the sociopathic greedy few, at the detriment of the many.

I like capitalism with a small "c." Small businesses, cooperative businesses and those bigger corporations that actually "get it." That seem to care about their employees, communities and the environment. That's why to contain the truly ruthless, greedy we need strong regulations not less.

[socialist_n_TN]

158. Ah but, those types of small "c" capitalists..........

that you noted are mostly not capitalist. There's a difference between money that's made off of money and money that's made from effort of the principals involved. And the bigger the business the less likely they make money off of effort and more chance they make it off of exploitation.

I would also offer that you can't regulate capitalism and still call it capitalism. In that, I'm in agreement with the capitalists. Even the larger companies that "....care about their employees, communities, and the environemnt" are subject to being caught up in the greed of the overall system. They won't be able to compete with the Greed is God group by actually BEING caring. Profit that goes into "caring" won't go into the pockets of the shareholders or the greedy owners. Also, they're always subject to being bought by the Greed is God group. Regulating capitalism is like riding a tiger. It's always on the cusp of being out of control and you're always in danger of being eaten.

Now I'm not against a true small business as long as they treat their employees in a right manner. I just don't think that a big business CAN ultimately do this. Past a certain size they need to be HEAVILY regulated and any business that is national needs to be nationalized and run for the benefit of ALL the people.

But then I AM a socialist. :)

[DeSwiss]

42. K&R

"Do not waste your time on Social Questions. What is the matter with the poor is Poverty; what is the matter with the rich is Uselessness." ~George Bernard Shaw

[socialist_n_TN]

70. GREAT quote. We should ALL use this when..........

any debate gets bogged down in social issues.

[Hello_Kitty]

44. 'Zactly! eom

[AdHocSolver]

46. When billions in TARP money is given to banks to make loans, but they give out big bonuses instead:

That is way too much money going to too few people.

Authentic "economist" here -- B.A. in economics.

Any economy is a circulation system. Money is the circulating medium in an economy. Money has the same function as coolant in the cooling system in a car or blood in the circulatory system in a living creature.

In an automobile, coolant travels from an operating engine where the coolant absorbs heat, and then travels through a radiator hose to the radiator where the heat is dissipated to the atmosphere. From the radiator. the coolant is then sucked back into the engine by the water pump where it absorbs more heat and the cycle is repeated. The cooling system is a closed system. It works fine so long as the system does not lose coolant and the drive belt keeps turning the water pump.

If a hole develops in the radiator or its hoses and the coolant leaks out, or if the drive belt breaks and the water pump stops circulating the coolant, then the engine will overheat and eventually seize up and quit working.

A similar situation occurs in the circulatory system of a living creature. Blood carries oxygen and nutrients to all the cells of the creature. If its heart stops pumping (heart attack) or it is injured and loses blood, without medical intervention to fix the problem, the creature will die.

An economy works in the same way in which case money is the circulating medium. Stop the flow of money and the economy starts to die. The U.S. economy is hemorrhaging money and, at the same time, the water pump--economic heart is not functioning properly.

The U.S. economy is hemorrhaging money in two ways. First, too much money is being siphoned from the population to a handful of wealthy elites. This is the "Too much money going to too few people" part. The second way the economy is hemorrhaging money is through the importing of most of the goods that we buy. That is, the money is leaving the U.S. economy and going to foreign countries. In effect, the U.S. economy is bleeding to death.

The TARP money was given to the banks with the intention that they circulate the money through loans which would "prime the economic pump". The bankers merely kept it in the banks to cover their losses and give themselves big bonuses. They were able to do this because there were no conditions requiring them to loEconomy_explained_circulation_system.txtan the money. The result is phony "profits" boosting the stock market, but few jobs actually created, and the economy remaining stagnant. In other words, the money "transfusion" failed, because of greedy bankers.

The main way that the U.S. economy is hemorrhaging money is caused by the trade imbalance between the U.S. and other countries. Instead of money circulating within the U.S. to sustain Americans, most of the money is flowing out of the country to foreigners. The major part of what we spend that remains in the U.S. is being siphoned off for the already wealthy.

Up to now, the U.S. has been getting continuous transfusions of money from our creditors in the form of "loans" to the U.S. government which, in turn, uses it to "print" more money (TARP and stimulus money).

The U.S. economy is going to eventually collapse because its "blood" is being loaned to it by its creditors, and eventually they are going to quit lending the U.S. the money. In other words, the "blood bank" is going to run dry.

The only way to save the U.S. economy is to take the "profit" out of outsourcing jobs. This means rewriting corporate tax laws that make it profitable to avoid taxes by importing goods rather than manufacturing them here. It means applying import quotas and tariffs to counteract the "cheapening" of their currencies by foreign countries. It means getting rid of trade agreements like NAFTA that make offshoring jobs profitable. It means reinstating the Glass-Steagall Act to separate Wall Street "investment" companies from controlling commercial banks that normally would loan money to businesses and individuals, instead of packaging and selling blocks of bad mortgages. It means reregulating the stock market to make it more difficult to promote the Ponzi schemes.

Don't hold your breath waiting for any of these corrections to occur. The last time the U.S. economy was headed for a cliff required the economy to collapse before corrective action was actually taken under FDR's direction. FDR had supporters who knew what needed to be done, and the U.S. back then didn't have the competition from huge economies such as China's.

One more myth to debunk. It is long past the time that the U.S. could grow exports to eliminate the trade deficit. That might have worked ten years ago when the trade deficit was still manageable. Today the amount of imports is so huge compared to domestic production that the only way to correct the trade imbalance is to create an environment that will replace imports with domestically produced goods.

[Enthusiast]

103. Again, to simplify,

we have watched the PTB kill the golden egg laying goose, right before our eyes.

[canetoad]

48. Well said...err ranted

K&R

[Doctor_J]

49. Nice cogent rant

A rare vanity thread rec from Doctor_J

[datasuspect]

52. what is a vanity thread?

[Doctor_J]

54. A thread started for the sole purpose of getting rec's

It is usually titled, "I support the president!!!!!" or "I stand behind Dennis Kucinich" or "Money nust be taken out of politics" or something like that.

[lastone]

76. your too cynical brah

stfu or siuya

[Enthusiast]

104. Buzz kill. nt

[TomClash]

84. Maybe so

But the message is what every Democrat should stand for.

[Daemonaquila]

51. K&R!

:toast:

Now, what to do about it... Americans have been bought off by the promise of cheap flat screen TVs at WalMart. Until they realize it's all a scam, the people who are being hurt most will still support the status quo.

[TomClash]

62. They realize it

They don't know what to do about it.

[Raksha]

53. K & R

[defendandprotect]

56. CRIME is the word -- and we have criminals running government now ...

[WillyT]

59. HUGE K & R !!!

:yourock:

:patriot:

:kick:

:hi:

[TomClash]

64. Not me

But what I said. :thumbsup:

[SnowCritter]

60. Bravo! Bravo!

K & R

[DWilliamsamh]

61. I'd like your permission to repost to FB.

This is a VERY good encapsulation of the problem. More People should see it. Can I repost as an attributed note to my FB page?

[TomClash]

66. Go for it

It's a all step in the right direction.

[DWilliamsamh]

149. THANKS! (N/T)

[Tanelorn]

65. WOW

:cry:   :applause:   :cry: 

[BobbyBoring]

69. K and fucking R!

And.............. If it wasn't so obvious. Yet many continue to blame the poor and illegal immigrants. We have witnessed the biggest heist of all time and people are too fucking stupid to see it.

There is only so much money and a greedy few have taken it all. THAT FUCKING SIMPLE!

It's not Franklin Raines, Dodd, SEIU thugs, etc. It's John Thain, Jeff Immelt, Angelo Mozillo, Carl Ichan, Ken Lewis, and others of their ilk.

I want my money back. I'm about ready to come looking for it. Anyone want to come along??

[socialist_n_TN]

72. It's good to see some folks are FINALLY confronting the ............

actual PEOPLE who are responsible for all of this trouble. See the Sheet Metal Workers confronting the Pulte Group and this thing in Palm Springs this weekend RE: the Koch brothers. THOSE are the people who NEED to be confronted. The bosses, the moneyied interests, the actual rich. They need to see that SOME of us aren't fooled by the bullshit dividers they put between the have nots. They need to KNOW that we ARE watching! And THEY are the ones WE ARE WATCHING.

[lastone]

73. nicely said - -

We live in the new Gilded Age.
Sad fact is - too many people will cower and take what meager crumbs are given them and keep their mouths tightly shut to avoid the ax. Everyday that goes by there is yet another story of the tremendous inequality that exists in the corporate world vs. the common man and nearly all of them should outrage even the most comfortable of the working class because it's all about cheap labor, and we've become too organized, concerned about our environment, audacious enough to ask for a fair god damn stake in our own future in turn for trading what amounts to 4/5's of your life. Fuck it - the Chinese are all so pathetically poor they'll work for a few yen a day - India, same thing - and the list goes on.
Both parties in our ridiculous system are at fault here - we need to start over.
the rejuvenation party is what we need. start over with the peoples interest put first.

[Enthusiast]

107. I'll tell ya what.

When we make this country over to where a politician is afraid to utter a single word against organized labor we will be where we need to be,

[newspeak]

160. yes, the gilded age revisited

even in our own RW rag, there are stories of public employees who make too much and unions demanding more. It's all of those greedy workers who are part of the problem, oh and immigrants taking good American jobs. Nothing or little about wealth disparity, deregulation, outsourcing or plain corruption.

Which reminds me of one of my college history classes where we discussed how the industrialists pitted groups against each other. German immigrants against the american worker, then Irish against the african americans. Always it was one group will take less than the other or work under lousy conditions than the other. "If you don't like it, I'll get another group." And who did these groups go against? Was it the owners? No, they went against their fellow laborers.

[Prometheus Bound]

74. In a word: BANKERS

[Raster]

75. Preach on, Tom!!! You've nailed it!

TOO MUCH MONEY GOING TO TOO FEW PEOPLE!

[rucky]

77. FTW

[Agony]

78. Hey! Thanks for so eloquently depressing me!

Cheers anyway...
Agony

[leftstreet]

79. K&R

[wiggs]

81. There it is. Nicely put. nt

[wiggs]

83. Food supply is a related issue with similar problem. The world produces

more than enough food for everyone. the problem is distribution and waste. Many people consume and/or waste much more than they need while many hundreds of millions barely reach subsistence level. This is tragic and worse than immoral.

[Quixote1818]

85. Most of the wealth is in the hands of juse a few thousand people while Six Billion

have very little.

[2QT2BSTR8]

87. Bravo good sir! Bravo!

[joentokyo]

89. Don't aplogize for telling the truth.

Your analysis is spot on.

[sam sarrha]

91. THE RICHEST 1% HOLDS 42% OF FINANCIAL WEALTH 6 TIMES WHAT THE BOTTOM 80% HOLD AT 7%, TOP 20% HAS 93%

http://sociology.ucsc.edu/whorulesamerica/power/wealth.html

that is why there is a recession.. no money in the economy.,

it is all about Dominionism, wealth and power are proof of gods favor of a man so its a sin to tax a rich man, and the poor are being punished so it is a sin to help them.., all about the Christian Mafia, 30% of red states have been taken over by Dominionists
the C st type.. the kind Hillery Clinton revere as most godly and spiritual. both sides are being taken over by a Shadow government

http://doggo.tripod.com/doggchrisdomin.html
Leo Strauss was born in 1899 and died in 1973. ... He is most famous for resuscitating Machiavelli and introducing his principles as the guiding philosophy of the neo-conservative movement. ... More than any other man, Strauss breathed upon conservatism, inspiring it to rise from its atrophied condition and its natural dislike of change and to embrace an unbounded new political ideology that rides on the back of a revolutionary steed, hailing even radical change; hence the name Neo-Conservatives.

Significantly, Dominionism is a form of Social Darwinism.<48> It inherently includes the religious belief that wealth-power is a sign of God’s election. That is, out of the masses of people and the multitude of nations, wealth, in and of itself, is thought to indicate God’s approval on men and nations whereas poverty and sickness reflect God’s disapproval.

(It was not until I read this article that I realized that this is a fundamental tenet of Dominionists.

Worldly wealth and power are signs of God's favor -- to attempt to limit or decrease one's wealth and power is to disrespect God.

On the contrary, God's elect on Earth are called upon to increase their wealth and power.

It is not sufficient for a man to be a millionaire, or for a country to have sovereignty within its borders -- a man must strive to increase his wealth as much as possible, and a Dominionist government's behavior toward its neighbors must be "invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity".

Furthermore, any attempt to decrease a person's or a country's wealth and power -- to take from the rich to give to the poor, to reduce military spending and power -- is a direct attack on God.)

If “Secular Humanists are the greatest threat to Christianity the world has ever known,” as theologian Francis Schaeffer claimed, then who are the Humanists? According to Dominionists, humanists are the folks who allow or encourage licentious behavior in America. They are the undisciplined revelers.

Put all the enemies of the Dominionists together, boil them down to liquid and bake them into the one single most highly derided and contaminated individual known to man, and you will have before you an image of the quintessential “liberal” -- one of those folks who wants to give liberally to the poor and needy -- who desires the welfare and happiness of all Americans -- who insists on safety regulations for your protection and who desires the preservation of your values -- those damnable people are the folks that must be reduced to powerlessness -- or worse: extinction.

What would a “reconstructed” America look like under the Dominionists? K.L. Gentry, a Dominionist himself, suggests the following “elements of a theonomic approach to civic order,” which I strongly suggest should be compared to the Texas GOP platform of 2002, which reveals that we are not just talking about imaginary ideas but some things are already proposed on Republican agendas.<60> Dominionism’s concept of government according to Gentry is as follows:

“1. It obligates government to maintain just monetary policies ... fiat money, fractional reserve banking, and deficit spending.

“2. It provides a moral basis for elective government officials. ...

“3. It forbids undue, abusive taxation of the rich. ...

“4. It calls for the abolishing of the prison system and establishing a system of just restitution. *...

“5. A theonomic approach also forbids the release, pardoning, and paroling of murderers by requiring their execution. ...

“6. It forbids industrial pollution that destroys the value of property. ...

“7. It punishes malicious, frivolous malpractice suits. ...

“8. It forbids abortion rights. ... Abortion is not only a sin, but a crime, and, indeed, a capital crime.”<61>
. . .

* Gary North describes the ‘just restitution’ system of the bible, which happens to reinstitute slavery,
like this:


“At the other end of the curve, the poor man who steals is eventually caught and sold into bondage under a successful person. His victim receives payment; he receives training; his buyer receives a stream of labor services. If the servant is successful and buys his way out of bondage, he re-enters society as a disciplined man, and presumably a self-disciplined man. He begins to accumulate wealth.”

[stockholmer]

131. good call, here are more links backing you up

http://www.slate.com/id/2268872

in all the developed world, only the UK has worse upward mobilty than the USA, and this is a pre-crash report

http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2006/04/b1579981.html

[Hawkowl]

92. Nicely done.

Income distribution. That is the reason why the economy sucks and why it won't improve even with all of Obama's lofty speeches. Tax the fuck out of these greedy bastards. Roosevelt knew it.

[hfojvt]

93. your last line sort of implies

that too many words are going to too few people :P

knr

[Enthusiast]

94. Kicked and Recommended

Anyone that disagrees with the OP just isn't in tune with our national dilemma.

[DesertDiamond]

105. Thank you for this totally EXCELLENT rant!

[Turborama]

106. Talking of champagne, I think it's well overdue that these graphs were pulled out....

Champagne Glass Distribution from Conley (2008) You May Ask Yourself

I found a much earlier 1992 version of the champagne glass distribution of wealth graphic and wanted to give credit where credit is due. It came from the UNDP 1992 “Human Development Report” and was republished in chapter 7 of http://books.google.com/books?id=G738BK-Ur-kC&pg=RA1-PA107&lpg=RA1-PA107&dq=%22illusions+of+the+cloud+minders%22&source=bl&ots=Uuv0wtdD3x&sig=3L9SWf0Ej5VAwaaM6I1nPfqWRgg&hl=en&ei=ZE0mS6LxLdGVtgfa4sjnCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CAgQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=%22illusions%20of%20the%20cloud%20minders%22&f=false">When Corporations Rule the World by David Korten.

Source: http://thesocietypages.org/graphicsociology/2009/05/27/champagne-glass-distribution-of-wealth/

[Enthusiast]

109. Want to fix it?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFUSs9g_wn4

Our primary focus must be directed toward media reform.

[Tripod]

110. That is a great post. n/t

[nxylas]

111. This sentence needs to be on a billboard somewhere

Sadly, the people who can afford billboard advertising space would rather spend their money on one of those stupid "Miss me yet?" posters.

[lafayettelonewolf]

112. Ex-f'n-actly

Well aimed, well put, well said!

[rainy]

113. Fantastic. Can I post it on my facebook?

[sandyj999]

114. Bravo! n/t

[rasputin1952]

115. Ford was vilified by his contemporaries...

for paying $5 a day for his base workers, (pretty damn good wages for the time!). But he knew, that if his workers were going to be able to buy his product, they have got to be able to afford it.

He made a lot of mistakes and was pretty bullheaded, but he had a keen mind when it came to the economics of the working class. He felt he was being more generous than the Unions, (he wasn't, but that's another story), what he did though was create a dedicated workforce that took great pride in what they did...hence, success.

On a slightly different level, Edison surrounded himself with the smartest people he could find to develop new ideas, then claimed credit and raked in profits from those ideas. Edison got rich, but Tesla, (who didn't), was light years ahead of Edison in his thinking.

[Yuugal]

116. K&R for the truth

[4dsc]

117. But it will trickle down won't it??

30 years of failed conservative economic policies is coming home to roost.

[HughBeaumont]

122. 'Twon't be rain.

K & R.

[Smarmie Doofus]

118. That's a keeper. K and R and Bookmarked.

[Kablooie]

119. Saint Reagan disagrees. We are all living in heaven on earth and just don't know it.

The big problem is that taxes are too high for the rich and government is too big.


Fix that, eliminate taxes for the rich, and America will have no more problems for eternity.

Oh, and eliminate the government too. Egypt gets it, why don't we?







:sarcasm:

(of course)

[druidity33]

120. My one sentence: "Too much war". nt.

[malaise]

121. Tax the rich or face the poor

It's that simple.

[The Wizard]

123. winner

they can do an equitable redistribution and walk away peacefully or justify a larger gap through media manipulation and suffer the inherent consequences.

[WinkyDink]

124. Six. ;-)

[stockholmer]

126. money = debt, and forever seeks growing rate of return, all else is tangential

What you see now is not a lack of aggregate demand (a failed Keynesian notion). It is globalization as expressed through the nature of the actual global financial system. Globalization is something that most really do not understand, due to the lies that the governments, especially the USA, told the citizens to sell it. The people were told that they could safely remove their industrial manufacturing base, because all these great new information-age jobs would replace them.

I even have seen old American telly programmes from the mid 1990's where 55 year old drill press operators in the Rust Belt of the USA were told not to panic after the factory they had worked at for 35 years was shuttered, because all they had to do was go to a few part-time classes at the local community college, and they could become IT junior managers or software designers for fortune 500 firms, lololol.

With 90% of global financial pools controlled by less than 25 huge banks, people are delusional to think that well-paying jobs FOR THE SAME LABOUR TYPE will all of a sudden come flowing back from a place where workers make one dollar per hour to a place where workers make 20 times that, once a government has allowed these infrastructures to be removed in the first place. The demanded rate of return by the financiers on these multi-national firms would instantly wipe them out of existence.

Money = debt, from the first dollar onwards, and that debt must grow exponentially, it is the very intrinsic nature of the system that has the world by the throat, after 300 years of cold, plodding, scientific build-up.



here are 2 links


Global Empire and the International Banking Cartel

http://csper.wordpress.com/2010/08/20/global-empire-and-the-international-banking-cartel-part-2/

"Since WWII, their desired framework has been to fuel global empire by milking the US population through the debt-dollar system centered around the Fed. Now that the US has been milked dry, things are shifting to a new milking center for the 21st century–China. Behind the scenes will be the senior capital pools currently in London and New York and the banking establishment in Switzerland, but on the surface Asia will emerge with profound power as China becomes the operational center of a new global empire based on a new global currency. At that point, the key dealers will simply plug into that new system. The world will think this represents the end of the US empire. But a US empire never really existed. More accurately the US was simply the latest host of the parasitic international banking empire that leeches off countries and plays them against each other. The parasite will quietly slither into Asia while using its media to blame the US host for the damage it has done."

and

"Both political parties serve the cartel. It controls and profits from the private sector corporate system (typically championed by the political right) and the government welfare system (typically championed by the political left). Choosing between Democrats and Republicans changes nothing.

- Finally, it means conventional wisdom about money is false. The problem isn’t that our money isn’t gold-backed. The problem isn’t fiat money. The problem is that all money is hierarchically controlled as an asset to private sector institutions and elite capital holders who have the ability to call-in their chips, i.e. your bank digits, whereas it’s an interest-bearing debt to governments and the people. This has immense ramifications I don’t have room to address here. Government neither prints money nor causes inflation in this system (if it would like the original colonies did to escape British banker austerity and usury, some of the current unemployed would have jobs and those losing their homes in foreclosure might find some relief). Rather, the cartel controls all money and drives inflation/deflation cycles. It has driven consistent inflation for 60+ years. So we are now facing painful deflation, or hyperinflation if the government makes a key mistake, as the senior capital pools attempt to bring about the new banking/currency framework. If the money system isn’t changed, the emergence of the 21st century global empire mentioned above is only a matter of time. "

link to part one

http://csper.wordpress.com/2010/08/12/monopoly-money-and-the-international-banking-cartel/

[Locrian]

137. excellent.

Also read "Life Inc" by Douglas Ruskoff about how corporations and the money system evolved.

http://rushkoff.com/books/life-incorporated/


• Money is not a part of nature, to be studied by a science like economics, but an invention with a specific purpose.
• Centralized currency is just one kind of money – one not intended to promote transactions but to promote the accumulation of capital by the wealthy.
• Banking is our society’s biggest industry, and debt is our biggest product.
• Corporations were never intended to promote commerce, but to prevent it.
• The development of chartered corporations and centralized currency caused the plague; the economic devastation ended Europe’s most prosperous centuries, and led to the deaths of half of its population.
• The more money we make, the more debt we have actually created.

Most importantly, Rushkoff shows how this moment of financial crisis is actually an opportunity to reinstate commerce and communities based in creating value for one another, rather than continuing to extract it for the benefit of institutions that no longer exist.

[Maineman]

127. When a high proportion of the money is going to 1% of the population,

you have a clear sign of corruption.

[tomp]

128. rec'd for being undeniably true. now what do we do about it?

i suggest we SERIOUSLY consider the role the democratic party has played in this scenario.

[Carolina]

129. K&R Thank you!

[Highway61]

130. Perfect!

I'll never forget the time (2007, I believe) I happened to have the TV on CNBC and heard Erin Burnett say "There are more billionaires in this country than ever before...and that's a GOOD thing. (Then she giggled)

I thought, here is a girl who knows jack shit about economics on my TV spewing this crap. Man, if I were her boss I would have showed her the door right then and there.

Sad thing is a lot of people think that someday they will be one of the rich. These people's aspirational reality trumps their actual reality; they're totally delusional. DR = Delusional Reality.

[baldguy]

132. It's a new Gilded Age.

With all the superficial ostentation, political corruption & raging poverty that implies.

[Starry Messenger]

138. Let's see if we can get this fine thread above 300 recs.

kick!

[patrice]

139. Right! On! & Thank you!

[patrice]

140. Even my (dearly departed) Libertarian-from-the-womb national corp attorney spouse agrees with you.

[GeorgeGist]

141. Excellent diagnosis of the disease.

The cure is generosity; aka Socialism.

[SalviaBlue]

143. Wow! Super Excellent Rant!!

[Fire1]

144. Nail on the head. n/t

[TxVietVet]

145. I agree with your rant .

I'll use your statement as one of my signatures. Maybe it will get some idiots to thinking.

[RoccoR5955]

147. DING DING DING... We have a WINNAH!

That's it... Redistribution of wealth... UPWARD!
It's that dreaded socialism for the upper class.

[OhioChick]

151. K&R n/t

[yellerpup]

152. Thanks for your clearly stated conclusion:

Too much money going to too few people. I'd kick this 1,000,000 times if I could. :kick: & Rec.

[elzenmahn]

153. In regards to Henry Ford...

...even the Chinese government recognizes the benefits of a working class with a decent wage, as Henry Ford did all those many years ago. That's why they raised their minimum wage twice within the last year.

It's not about altruism. It's just good business.

[bvar22]

154. If the lower 98% had a political party that represented them,

we could "change" that equation.

Sadly, we don't.

When the Working Class & The Poor realize we have more in common with each other
than we have in common with the Ruling Elite (Ownership Class) of BOTH parties,
we can demand "change".
WE outnumber THEM.

As long as "they" can keep us divided with wedge issues,
and keep the national debate framed between the very narrow bookends of Democrat vs Republican, with conservative Democrats defined as the "Liberal" edge,
the Status Quo will be maintained.

[bobbolink]

155. Beautifully done! Please do NOT apologize!

If more people had your understanding and your passion, we poor folk wouldn't be suffering as much!

[dotymed]

157. You pin pointed it.

Almost every American (except maybe the top %5) will acknowledge this.
That is why I am hoping that the revolutions going on in the M.E. that have already benefited much of South America, will come here.
We must demand an end to profits before people. Return our society (at least) to pre-Reagan regulations and tax structure.
I am not advocating disbanding our government, but re-structuring it to benefit the people. Corporations are not people.
Of course, I stupidly expected an FDR when I worked for Obama to become President. Afterward, I realized that both parties were corporate subsidiaries and the average person did not stand a chance.
We have to change this and to not take advantage of the recent revolutions would be a missed opportunity of epic proportions, IMO.
Complaining is getting us no where. We must act. No "armed revolution", just a peoples movement that can not be dismissed.

[JackDragna]

159. It's the driving force behind most every political conflict.

The haves will take as much as they can get, rigging the system to the point where they endanger even their own existence. Their greed has no boundaries, no rules. It is the struggle of the masses everywhere to ensure the resources of the world are fairly distributed.

[mistertrickster]

161. Right. I'm coming to the inescapable conclusion that more socialism is the only answer.

It's the dreaded S word . . . worse even than "liberal."

But the CONs had it right: Social Security is socialism, Medicare is socialism.

And we need a lot more of it.

[James48]

162. K&R

[James48]

163. Classic

and the best explanation I've heard in years.

Mind if I steal it and use it when debating friends?

[alp227]

165. wow I didn't know that about Henry Ford!

A strong middle class=a stronger economic base for the nation.