Halloween Horror Special: Marxism

We’re still reeling in disbelief here at CESJ global headquarters . . . and we’re almost out of fish line.  And as for the pole . . . well, we’re talking to him next week, and we’ll see what he has to say.  But enough of bad fake Marx Brothers jokes.  On to the point of today’s Horror Special . . . the wage system!

The Significance of the Frontier

A week or so ago in a posting on how to make tax reform even worse, we noted that when the State starts to take over more and more control over people’s lives, not only the State becomes overburdened with duties, but the citizens become overburdened with taxes.  Somebody, after all, has to pay for such things, such as universal basic incomes; money just doesn’t appear out of nowhere.

News from the Network, Vol. 10, No. 43

The Just Third Way continues to make steady progress.  Interestingly, more and more of the postings on this blog are getting “shared” and “liked” than ever before on FaceBook, and at least one individual has requested a formatted version of a blog for use in a class lecture.  He was having trouble downloading for some reason, so we made a special version in .pdf.  By the way, if you want to use a posting in a class or something, go ahead and print out as many as you want, just give us credit so that people will know where you got it (and if you’re quoting, don’t change any words except to correct spelling or grammar errors):

Focus on the Fed: The Slavery of Savings

It’s gotten so predictable that we forgot to predict it.  We kept telling people that binary economics and the Just Third Way are based on something called “the Banking Principle.”  As we’ve repeated ad nauseam, the Banking Principle is that the amount of money in the system depends on the velocity of money, the price level, and the number of transactions, not the other way around.

Focus on the Fed: Let Us Assume

As all good Keynesians, neo and otherwise, learn in Economics 101, there is a tradeoff between employment and inflation.  The theory is that if you want low inflation, you’ll have to put up with high unemployment, and if you want low unemployment, you’ll have to accept inflation.

Non-Productive Money? Are You Serious?

If you read yesterday’s blog posting, you know that Say’s Law of Markets and money creation go together.  In a very real sense, production is money, and money is production . . . if the system is arranged the right way.  “Money” — defined as anything that can be accepted in settlement of a debt (“all things transferred in commerce”) — is the means by which I exchange what I produce, for what you produce, so that every producer is a consumer, and every consumer is a producer; supply and demand are in balance.  That is why money is usually defined as “the medium of exchange.”

How to Make Profits Work for People

. . . instead of making people work for profits.  Which, frankly, is a bad way of putting it, for there is no reason to work at all if there is no profit in it.  What we mean (after titling this blog in a way we hope will catch your eye and keep you glued to the screen), is that — consistent with Say’s Law of Markets — production and consumption should be in balance.

News from the Network, Vol. 10, No. 42

A number of projects have made great progress over the past week, from the proposed re-launch of The Just Third Way Hour to the final editing and review of Red Star Over Bethlehem.  Perhaps it won’t be too much longer before world leaders start catching on to the fact that there is a viable alternative to the sad condition of today’s society:

How to Make Tax Reform Even Worse

All the recent talk about tax reform, good, better, and worst, has focused on the debate as to which philosophy of taxation, and which specific tweaks to the existing system, will best stimulate an acceptable rate of economic growth.  Commentary has ranged from the sublime to the ridiculous, with the usual barrage of inane and erudite remarks, interspersed with more or less veiled attacks on the intelligence, motives, and fashion sense of anyone on the other side, but no one has raised the real issue here:

Nothing Succeeds Like Secess!

Secessionism, according to a piece in the Wall Street Journal yesterday (“Secessionism’s Dangerous Return,” 10/17/17, A15), is big, it’s bad, and it’s back.  The way things are going, it’s 1914 all over again, with the big powers and little people squaring off for a final showdown.  As the author, Walter Russell Mead, a fellow of the Hudson Institute and Professor of Foreign Affairs at Bard College, opines,

Austria’s Shift Right . . . or Left

The Königsee in Austria

Both the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post commented on Austria’s recent election that there was a shift to the right.  Both papers cited gains by the “Freedom Party,” Freiheitliche Partei Österreichs, founded in 1956 as a right-wing populist and national-conservative political party originally led by a former National Socialist and SS officer opposed to socialism and Catholic “clericalism.”  The party’s advance to the number two spot in the number of seats in the legislature is attributed to growing sentiment against immigrants.

A Few Thoughts on Mondragon

Last week we came across an article on the Mondragon Cooperatives in Spain.  And what are the Mondragon Cooperatives, you ask?  (People who are not familiar with them tend to get blank looks, even outrage, when they admit they never heard of them so we’ll spare you the humiliation if you don’t know.  And the sense of superiority if you do. . . .)

News from the Network, Vol. 10, No. 41

Yet another week filled with outreach and information.  The Big Event this week, of course, has been the National Cooperative Business Association Conference, with a number of CESJ representatives interacting with some of the “higher ups” in the organization and discussing the complementarity of the Just Third Way and the coop movement.  There have been a few other things, as well:

Solidarismo Costariccense: The Solidarity Movement in Costa Rica

With so many members of the CESJ core group in town who knew and worked with Don Alberto Martén Chavarría, founder of the solidarity movement in Costa Rica, we thought we’d let people know a little bit more about it, especially as it provides a core organization that might provide a core organization around which to put together the rebuilding of the entire region.  There can obviously be improvements to make it more consistent with the Just Third Way, but the solidarity movement is a great advance over previous arrangements:

Puerto Rico: A Few Suggestions

It’s unverified (by us), but we’ve heard that the “Jones Act Waiver” for Puerto Rico is going to expire and won’t be renewed.  And what, exactly, does that mean?  The “Jones Act,” which dates from the 1920s, stipulates that cargoes going from one U.S. Port to another must be carried on U.S. flag vessels.  This presumably helps the struggling U.S. Merchant Marine by providing employment . . . and greatly increases prices in Puerto Rico. . . .

Project Economic Justice: President Reagan’s Speech, II

What with everything else that has happened, Puerto Rico seems to have disappeared from public attention . . . that is, until people start wondering how to rebuild without bankrupting the rest of the United States.  Oddly enough, a possible program for rebuilding that will make money instead of costing money is ready to hand, and only needs to be implemented.  Today we look at the second part of President Ronald Reagan’s speech to the Presidential Task Force on Project Economic Justice that presented the plan.  This is a follow-up to the extract from the strategy paper, “Project Economic Justice: A Beachhead for Regional Infrastructural Reform,” which led up to the work of the Task Force.  For those interested in seeing and hearing rather than (or in addition to) reading, here is the video of the speech:

Project Economic Justice: President Reagan’s Speech, I

Today we post the first half of President Ronald Reagan’s speech to the Presidential Task Force on Project Economic Justice on August 3, 1987.  This is a follow-up to the extract from the strategy paper, “Project Economic Justice: A Beachhead for Regional Infrastructural Reform,” which led up to the work of the Task Force.  For those interested in seeing and hearing rather than reading, here is the video of the speech:

News from the Network, Vol. 10, No. 40

Things continue to move forward on the expanded ownership front, although the powers-that-be don’t seem to have glommed on to the potential of the Just Third Way for solving a rather large number of problems that otherwise seem insoluble.  Perhaps if those of you reading this would send the links for the Project Economic Justice strategy paper extract or the text of President Reagan’s speech to a politician or two, we might see some action. . . . In the meantime:

Project Economic Justice: The Role of the Corporation

Today we conclude our posting of the “strategy paper” that led to the Presidential Task Force on Project Economic Justice, “Project Economic Justice: A Beachhead for Regional Infrastructural Reform,” which will be followed on Monday by the first part of President Reagan’s speech to the Task Force:

Project Economic Justice: Two-Tiered Capital Credit System, II

Continuing our examination of a program that could be instituted to rebuild Puerto Rico and the rest of the Caribbean, today we continue looking at Part II of the “strategy paper” that led to the Presidential Task Force on Project Economic Justice, “Project Economic Justice: A Beachhead for Regional Infrastructural Reform,” to be followed by President Reagan’s speech to the Task Force.  Today we post the first part of the second section of Part II, along with the introductory section from yesterday that will be repeated for each section as it is posted:

Project Economic Justice: Two-Tiered Capital Credit System, I

Continuing our examination of a program that could be instituted to rebuild Puerto Rico and the rest of the Caribbean, today we continue looking at Part II of the “strategy paper” that led to the Presidential Task Force on Project Economic Justice, “Project Economic Justice: A Beachhead for Regional Infrastructural Reform,” to be followed by President Reagan’s speech to the Task Force.  Today we post the first part of the second section of Part II, along with the introductory section from yesterday that will be repeated for each section as it is posted:

Project Economic Justice: A New Social Contract

Continuing our examination of a program that could be instituted to rebuild Puerto Rico and the rest of the Caribbean, today we begin looking at Part II of the “strategy paper” that led to the Presidential Task Force on Project Economic Justice, “Project Economic Justice: A Beachhead for Regional Infrastructural Reform,” to be followed by President Reagan’s speech to the Task Force.  Today we post the first section of Part II, along with an introductory section that will be repeated for each section as it is posted: