What is Socialism?, II: Private Property

Yesterday we looked at the question of whether private property is a natural right, and what it means for something to be a natural right.  After looking into the matter we discovered (okay, we knew all along, but we always learn a few new things each time we look at something from a different perspective) that 1) private property is a natural right, and 2) a natural right is something inherent in human nature and cannot be taken away.

What is Socialism?, I: The Natural Law

Every so often in an argument we define socialism, and almost as often we have people (with varying degrees of exasperation) inform us that we don’t know what we’re talking about, because they define socialism differently.  That, of course, makes us wrong and them right.

Climate Change and Economic Growth

Immediately after President Trump met with Pope Francis last week, we tried to find out what they talked about that was of direct interest to the Just Third Way.  All of it was of interest, of course, just not directly . . . even, we suppose, the seemingly endless discussions about people’s attire . . . although at the moment we don’t see how. . . .

News from the Network, Vol. 10, No. 21

The news this week suggests that the Just Third Way is starting to make significant progress in outreach — which means that, to sustain the effort, it needs to make more progress.  Obviously, when you’re standing still, you’re not moving forward.  People in any movement need to remind themselves constantly that they can’t rest on what they’ve done in the past, but have to keep doing things now and in the future.

Welding Irony, V: A Better, Just Third Way

We’ve been poking holes in the Keynesian paradigm that (we assume) dictated Rep. Tom Snozzi’s proposal to create jobs rebuilding infrastructure.  We’ve looked at the history of prior economic downturns and what brought them to a successful end (production of marketable goods and services in which ordinary people participated as capital owners) or an unsuccessful end (manipulation of the currency, public works funded by increases in government debt, and a world war), as well as the flawed principles that underlie bad economic and monetary policy decisions.

Welding Irony, IV: Resolving the Contradictions

In this brief series we’ve been looking at the contradictions in the Keynesian system that, regardless how plausible Keynes’s approach may sound and how hard Academia and the politicians push it, it is still a recipe for disaster.  With all due respect to Rep. Tom Snozzi’s good intentions, what he proposes — creating jobs to rebuild infrastructure — is not only not the best thing to do, but is pretty much the worst.

Welding Irony, III: A Few Bugs in the System

As we saw yesterday, disconnecting production from consumption is a sure recipe for disaster . . . if you define “disaster” as an avalanche of non-productive debt.  Spending your way out of trouble doesn’t work, even if it looks as if it does in the short run.  In the long run, of course, somebody has to pay the bill, or the system collapses.

Welding Irony, II: The Purpose of Production

Last Thursday we took a look at Representative Tom Snozzi’s proposal to restore the American Dream by creating jobs.  And how are jobs created?  By hiring people to work on massive public works projects; as infrastructure repair and maintenance has been lagging in the United States for some time, there is a great deal that needs to be done.

News from the Network, Vol. 10, No. 20

Perhaps not surprisingly, there are a couple of interesting items on the international scene that relate to the Just Third Way.  Otherwise, this has been a rather quiet week as we wind down from attending the ESOP Association conference last week, and prepare for next week’s monthly CESJ meeting.

Welding Irony, I: No Need to Bring In the State

We’ll not keep you in suspense.  The rather forced pun in the title of this blog comes from the fact that the article that suggested it, “When the Welders Came to Capitol Hill” (Wall Street Journal, A19) appeared on May 15, 2017, the one hundred and twenty sixth anniversary of the issuance of Rerum Novarum, Pope Leo XIII’s encyclical “On Labor and Capital.”

Cardinal Müller and the Just Third Way, Part II

Yesterday we reported that His Eminence Gerhard Cardinal Müller, Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, noted in his talk at St. Thomas More Cathedral in Arlington, Virginia, on Sunday, May 14, 2017, that restoring the Family, the basic unit of society, is a top priority.

Cardinal Müller and the Just Third Way, Part I

This past Sunday, May 14, 2017, at the Cathedral of St. Thomas More in Arlington, Virginia, we had the privilege of singing for the Mass celebrated by Gerhard Cardinal Müller, Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.  His Eminence was in the United States as the main celebrant and homilist for the Baccalaureate Mass at Christendom College in Front Royal, Virginia, on May 12.  He was also the commencement speaker for this year’s ceremonies on May 13, where he received an honorary doctorate before delivering his address.

5. Man Versus Machine

From 1934 to 1935 the Brookings Institution published a four-volume set, Distribution of Wealth and Income in Relation to Economic Progress, analyzing what needed to be done in a recovery program for the Great Depression.  Unfortunately, FDR and his “Brain Trust” listened to John Maynard Keynes and went with the New Deal, rather than with something that made sense.

News from the Network, Vol. 10, No. 19

This is the week of the annual ESOP Association Conference.  This year marks the fortieth consecutive conference.  It has come a long way from its beginnings.  Some of the top worker-owned companies and professional service providers attend the conference every year, which is often the highpoint of their efforts to build an ownership culture.

4. The Emancipation of Future Savings

In the early sixties, Louis O. Kelso and Mortimer J. Adler co-authored a book, The New Capitalists: A Proposal to Free Economic Growth from the Slavery of Savings (New York: Random House, 1961).  Drawing largely on the work of Dr. Harold G. Moulton in The Formation of Capital (1935), Kelso and Adler presented Moulton’s answer to the “economic dilemma” we noted in yesterday’s posting.

3. The Economic Dilemma

To recap yesterday’s lesson in Keynesian finance, limiting the source of financing for new capital formation to past savings not only diverts funds away from consumption (thereby nullifying Adam Smith’s first principle of economics, that production is for consumption), but in order to have production that is not intended for consumption generate the savings necessary to finance new capital and create jobs, demand must be artificially added to the economy so that goods not intended for consumption can be consumed.  Yes, we are fully aware that is a contradiction.  Keynesian economics relies on such things.

2. The Formation of Capital

One of the conundrums of a modern economy is how to restore Say’s Law of Markets so that consumption and production are in balance.  What makes the problem worse is the fact that the mainstream schools of economics, Keynesian, Monetarist/Chicago, and Austrian, take for granted an assumption that flies directly in the face of Adam Smith’s first principle of economics stated in The Wealth of Nations: “Consumption is the sole end and purpose of all production.”

1. Capital in Binary Economics

Every now and then we consider a question from a new perspective, usually because someone asks us a question that we answer . . . and then stop and wonder why someone asked the question in the first place.

News from the Network, Vol. 10, No. 18

This has been a pretty busy week for the Just Third Way.  A number of projects have made significant advances, news ones have come in over the transom as it were, and a few “non-producers” were given up.  In addition there have been some interesting meetings taking place, some of them rather surprising — after all, how often does Mark Zuckerberg drop in for dinner unexpectedly?

Filling the Bill

A couple of days ago on FaceBook we reposted a piece from a few years ago on why central bank reform is so important.  We tossed around a few specialized financial and banking terms (just to make us look important, of course), and didn’t think any more about it.  Then one of our favorite readers asked a question:

A Better Argument for a New Glass-Steagall

Yesterday we looked into the arguments for and against a new Glass-Steagall act.  We concluded that both advocates and opponents were missing the real point: that a well-designed system must include sound internal controls.

Glass-Steagall and Internal Control

Ever since the full repeal of the Glass-Steagall act, there have been calls from some quarters that it should be reinstated.  Naturally, this has sparked a number of responses from individuals and groups that were the ones to gain from the act’s repeal insisting that All Is Well.  This is made all the easier by the fact that those demanding its reinstatement have no more idea of Glass-Steagall’s purpose than those who were instrumental in its repeal.

A Just, Third Way: Capital Homesteading, Part IV

Last Thursday we started looking at some of the policy objectives of Capital Homesteading.  Today we look at some more.  Again, keep in mind that “cafeteria Capital Homesteading,” i.e., picking and choosing what to implement and what to leave out, would make the whole thing unworkable.