The Man in The Mirror
Some gems from a recent must read missive by Mish Thoughts on Savings Part 2. His quotes in italics and my rantings afterwards.
"Someone please tell me exactly what the US makes that anyone wants to buy?"
Off the top of my head; weapons, high tech, Harley Davidson's, Zippo lighters, fast food and Hollywood films. But mostly $$$ dollars, dollar denominated assets and dollar based financial instruments.
Nothing beats a US dollar, want proof? from Follow The Money: "When we dug up Saddam's scraggly ass, he wasn't hoarding gold, diamonds, Euros, Loonies or Francs, just 7500 crisp pictures of Benny Franklin." Wonder why? Maybe he thought no one would accept American Express?
"Saving from current income may be near zero or negative when outlays are financed by borrowing or by selling investments or other assets."
More from Follow the Money: "Nobody, and I mean nobody, makes more money out of thin air than we do. Merger, acquisition, leveraged buyout, debentures, junk bonds, spreads, arbitrage, artificial asset bubbles, all smoke and mirrors with no tangible process or end product needed."
We keep selling our assets and the foreigners keep buying our assets, our dollars, and our financial instruments and we keep revaluating and changing the rules. The USA is a big Las Vegas, which is a theme park and the theme is, yeah, we'll take your money, thanks for coming and drive careful.
"The problem is NOT a global savings glut but a hollowed out US manufacturing base, bloated auto industries, refusal to sell the only really good products we make (weapons), and consumers willing to buy million dollar homes at zero % down ultimately financed by someone from Japan or China."
From The Name of the Game IV : "The 3rd rule of monetary gravity dictates profit margin and yield with the least risk is the path of least resistance. This means the game requires risk aversion for greater profit. Productive enterprise poses greater risks than profit by arbitrage. Money shuffling generates more profit with less risk."
"Rather than exporting product, the players outsource labor at margin and environmental risk across borders. In the end, this greed is not good, for it leads advanced economies to become non self-sustaining; and in the long run, something far worse." This is "free trade" in action.
"Free trade" in quotes because like "Peak Oil" and the "Free Hand" of Adam Smith, its another urban myth cooked up by a bunch of ne'er-do-wells who have not the faintest idea of reality or an honest days work.
From The Name of the Game I: "Rule #2 Costs: Nothing in this world is free. Whether apparent or not, there is always a business cost or societal vigorish, which must be paid. This rule has been and always shall be, true." So there is no "free" in "free trade".
This is why our manufacturing base is gone and the bulk of our economy is based upon money shuffling. This is what everyone wanted globalization and "free trade" without protectionism, right??
Who needs environmental protection, trade quotas, unions, worker rights, benefits and fair pay? Just let our multi national corporate big brothers take care of us, they'll always do what's right and best, right??
The corporations have outsourced your jobs to labor at the margin, expatriated the profits, mitigated the taxes, avoided environmental restrictions, and created a corporate friendly environment through coercive legislation. Why?
Because fair wages, fair share taxation and environmental responsibility all increase overhead and reduce profit margins. As long as you and the shareholders let them, the corporations will run amok.
God knows the share holders will approve and "who" are the shareholders anyway? More on this later.
From Follow The Money : "Lets be honest, "free" trade in practice is a euphemism for global corporations raping and pillaging for profit."
As far as consumers buying million dollar homes (which are really quite worthless) with no down loans financed by foreigners, several sayings come to mind...
there's a sucker born every minute (home and foreign MBS buyers), bulls and bears make money, greedy pigs (speculators) get slaughtered and finally, If you owe the bank 100 pounds, you're the one with the problem. But if you owe a million pounds, the bank's the one with the problem - Keynes.
"($3.015 trillion) in additional debt in just four years. Not only do we have a negative personal savings rate, but we also have Republicans spending like drunken fools."
Of course they're going to spend like drunken fools, supposedly 51% of the morons in this country voted them in TWICE, and made it a unilateral majority throughout all the branches of government.
That's called Carte Blanche and appropriately they are lining their ogliarchical cronies and own pockets with your money, now and in perpetuity, what else did you expect?
David S. Broder discusses the growing national debt and more in a Washington Post article entitled A Price To Be Paid For Folly. "I think it's 1925," he said, "and we're headed for 1929." 1929 is just around the corner and its called the 2008 Summer Olympics in China.
"There certainly will not be a voluntary redistribution of wealth from creditors to debtors. Given that resistance, a slow deflationary torture like Japan endured would appear to be a more likely possibility than a sudden massive purge of debts via bankruptcies." Slow and very painful, kinda like Chinese water torture.
"Something will give. That something is some combination of a lower standard of living, a higher savings rate, a falling US dollar, and lower equity prices."
Something will give, and its going to be John Q. Public. You might as well sit back and enjoy the ride, replete with outsourcing, McJobs, lower wages, no benefits, a devaluation of your assets and debauching of your currency and savings, and along with it a lower standard of living.
Why? Because according to the academics and supposed intelligentsia this is all part of the globalization and "free-trade" evolution. This is the bill of goods you were sold by the academic think tanks and politicians, incidentally, if you haven't checked lately, both are corporate sponsored. "Free" Thinking is not encouraged and is in fact frowned upon.
And if you don't think so, just check with a politician or academian who did not tow the "party" line and had their funding or grant's cut. Your naivete, gullibility and social programming in the form of faith in institutions (governmental, corporate and educational) were and are being played to the max.
Now, now, you didn't expect to get a "free" lunch on foreign labor or have your cake and eat it too? If all these lower boats are to rise, the higher ones must come down to the lowest common denominator.
That's right, for all those poor people living under the despotism of COMMUNISM and otherwise; to enjoy a higher standard of living, you have to give up the majority of your higher standard.
In closing, I digress to "who" are the shareholders anyway? Well, the shareholders are the same people complaining about the fine mess we are in. These are the people who want their cake and want to eat it too.
The type of people who don't check the label to see where the item is made, or if the item is union made. They don't care as long as the price is right, they have "faith" in market forces, and the invisible hand you know and trust.
They don't care if the independent grocer or local businessman goes under while they shop at WalMart, Home Depot, Lowe's or Target, all the while buying Chinese goods at the cheapest price possible.
You need look no further than the Man in the Mirror to see who the shareholders are. These are the shareholders who want their equities to rise on greater profit margins, which are purchased with a mortgage on theirs and their children's very future. It's a Mad World...
Updated from 09/17/05
"Someone please tell me exactly what the US makes that anyone wants to buy?"
Off the top of my head; weapons, high tech, Harley Davidson's, Zippo lighters, fast food and Hollywood films. But mostly $$$ dollars, dollar denominated assets and dollar based financial instruments.
Nothing beats a US dollar, want proof? from Follow The Money: "When we dug up Saddam's scraggly ass, he wasn't hoarding gold, diamonds, Euros, Loonies or Francs, just 7500 crisp pictures of Benny Franklin." Wonder why? Maybe he thought no one would accept American Express?
"Saving from current income may be near zero or negative when outlays are financed by borrowing or by selling investments or other assets."
More from Follow the Money: "Nobody, and I mean nobody, makes more money out of thin air than we do. Merger, acquisition, leveraged buyout, debentures, junk bonds, spreads, arbitrage, artificial asset bubbles, all smoke and mirrors with no tangible process or end product needed."
We keep selling our assets and the foreigners keep buying our assets, our dollars, and our financial instruments and we keep revaluating and changing the rules. The USA is a big Las Vegas, which is a theme park and the theme is, yeah, we'll take your money, thanks for coming and drive careful.
"The problem is NOT a global savings glut but a hollowed out US manufacturing base, bloated auto industries, refusal to sell the only really good products we make (weapons), and consumers willing to buy million dollar homes at zero % down ultimately financed by someone from Japan or China."
From The Name of the Game IV : "The 3rd rule of monetary gravity dictates profit margin and yield with the least risk is the path of least resistance. This means the game requires risk aversion for greater profit. Productive enterprise poses greater risks than profit by arbitrage. Money shuffling generates more profit with less risk."
"Rather than exporting product, the players outsource labor at margin and environmental risk across borders. In the end, this greed is not good, for it leads advanced economies to become non self-sustaining; and in the long run, something far worse." This is "free trade" in action.
"Free trade" in quotes because like "Peak Oil" and the "Free Hand" of Adam Smith, its another urban myth cooked up by a bunch of ne'er-do-wells who have not the faintest idea of reality or an honest days work.
From The Name of the Game I: "Rule #2 Costs: Nothing in this world is free. Whether apparent or not, there is always a business cost or societal vigorish, which must be paid. This rule has been and always shall be, true." So there is no "free" in "free trade".
This is why our manufacturing base is gone and the bulk of our economy is based upon money shuffling. This is what everyone wanted globalization and "free trade" without protectionism, right??
Who needs environmental protection, trade quotas, unions, worker rights, benefits and fair pay? Just let our multi national corporate big brothers take care of us, they'll always do what's right and best, right??
The corporations have outsourced your jobs to labor at the margin, expatriated the profits, mitigated the taxes, avoided environmental restrictions, and created a corporate friendly environment through coercive legislation. Why?
Because fair wages, fair share taxation and environmental responsibility all increase overhead and reduce profit margins. As long as you and the shareholders let them, the corporations will run amok.
God knows the share holders will approve and "who" are the shareholders anyway? More on this later.
From Follow The Money : "Lets be honest, "free" trade in practice is a euphemism for global corporations raping and pillaging for profit."
As far as consumers buying million dollar homes (which are really quite worthless) with no down loans financed by foreigners, several sayings come to mind...
there's a sucker born every minute (home and foreign MBS buyers), bulls and bears make money, greedy pigs (speculators) get slaughtered and finally, If you owe the bank 100 pounds, you're the one with the problem. But if you owe a million pounds, the bank's the one with the problem - Keynes.
"($3.015 trillion) in additional debt in just four years. Not only do we have a negative personal savings rate, but we also have Republicans spending like drunken fools."
Of course they're going to spend like drunken fools, supposedly 51% of the morons in this country voted them in TWICE, and made it a unilateral majority throughout all the branches of government.
That's called Carte Blanche and appropriately they are lining their ogliarchical cronies and own pockets with your money, now and in perpetuity, what else did you expect?
David S. Broder discusses the growing national debt and more in a Washington Post article entitled A Price To Be Paid For Folly. "I think it's 1925," he said, "and we're headed for 1929." 1929 is just around the corner and its called the 2008 Summer Olympics in China.
"There certainly will not be a voluntary redistribution of wealth from creditors to debtors. Given that resistance, a slow deflationary torture like Japan endured would appear to be a more likely possibility than a sudden massive purge of debts via bankruptcies." Slow and very painful, kinda like Chinese water torture.
"Something will give. That something is some combination of a lower standard of living, a higher savings rate, a falling US dollar, and lower equity prices."
Something will give, and its going to be John Q. Public. You might as well sit back and enjoy the ride, replete with outsourcing, McJobs, lower wages, no benefits, a devaluation of your assets and debauching of your currency and savings, and along with it a lower standard of living.
Why? Because according to the academics and supposed intelligentsia this is all part of the globalization and "free-trade" evolution. This is the bill of goods you were sold by the academic think tanks and politicians, incidentally, if you haven't checked lately, both are corporate sponsored. "Free" Thinking is not encouraged and is in fact frowned upon.
And if you don't think so, just check with a politician or academian who did not tow the "party" line and had their funding or grant's cut. Your naivete, gullibility and social programming in the form of faith in institutions (governmental, corporate and educational) were and are being played to the max.
Now, now, you didn't expect to get a "free" lunch on foreign labor or have your cake and eat it too? If all these lower boats are to rise, the higher ones must come down to the lowest common denominator.
That's right, for all those poor people living under the despotism of COMMUNISM and otherwise; to enjoy a higher standard of living, you have to give up the majority of your higher standard.
In closing, I digress to "who" are the shareholders anyway? Well, the shareholders are the same people complaining about the fine mess we are in. These are the people who want their cake and want to eat it too.
The type of people who don't check the label to see where the item is made, or if the item is union made. They don't care as long as the price is right, they have "faith" in market forces, and the invisible hand you know and trust.
They don't care if the independent grocer or local businessman goes under while they shop at WalMart, Home Depot, Lowe's or Target, all the while buying Chinese goods at the cheapest price possible.
You need look no further than the Man in the Mirror to see who the shareholders are. These are the shareholders who want their equities to rise on greater profit margins, which are purchased with a mortgage on theirs and their children's very future. It's a Mad World...
Updated from 09/17/05
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