This past week has
been somewhat quiet with respect to the Just Third Way, but a number of
important initiatives are moving forward, notably the project in Wayne County,
Michigan. This “slowdown” always occurs
around major holidays as people divert their attention (as they should) to
friends and family:
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| Senator Russell Long (left) and Norman Kurland (right). |
• Wayne County, Michigan. As
part of the preparation for a presentation on the Just Third Way in April to
selected notables in Wayne County, Michigan, Norman Kurland recently had a
telephone conversation with Rashid Tlaib, who is running for the U.S. House of
Representatives as a Democrat in Michigan’s thirteenth Congressional district. Norm introduced Ms. Tlaib to some key
concepts of the Just Third Way, focusing on the need for sustainable and just
tax and monetary reform. Norm reported
that the conversation was very positive.
Ultimate, the idea of the initiative is to make Wayne County and Detroit a model for
the country.
• Not a Peep? According to today’s Washington Post, the manufacturer of “peeps” marshmallow treats,
Just Born Quality Confections, is seeking permission to deny participation in
its multiemployer defined benefit pension plan to new employees without paying
the otherwise required $60 million fine on the grounds that it would drive the
company into bankruptcy. This, of course,
would not be an issue with a defined contribution plan such as a 401(k) or an
ESOP, in which Participants are vested only in what is actually in the accounts
established in their names. A number of
defined benefit pension plans have gone bankrupt in recent years, with assets
being turned over to the Pension Benefits Guarantee Corporation and the
obligations generally being settled for less than the defined benefit with
taxpayer dollars.
• Bitcoin and the Federal Reserve.
In today’s Wall Street Journal an adjunct professor of law opines that the
governors of the Federal Reserve could learn a lesson from the “Bitcoin”
people. The argument is that under
current Federal Reserve policy the rate of inflation is presumed to be some
kind of policy tool and varies according to whatever target some bureaucrat
decides is the “right” amount of inflation.
Bitcoin inflation, however, is strictly regulated since there can only
be 21 million Bitcoins, and the rate of inflation is limited to what can be “mined”
each year. Of course, the entire
argument avoids addressing the real issue, which is why should inflation or
deflation be used as a tool of monetary and fiscal policy at all? If the powers that be understood money, they
would realize that the legal definition of money — anything that can be
accepted in settlement of a debt (all things transferred in commerce) —
precludes inflation except in response to actual price increases or decrease in
supply, and completely removes the danger of deflation, or a fall in the price
level due to an insufficient money supply.
It would be far better to implement a monetary policy that links the
quantity of money directly to the needs of the economy, rather than have
someone try and guess how much money will be needed.
• CESJ Newsletter. Work is
proceeding on the CESJ newsletter.
Discussion is currently focused on a name and a logo. Anyone who has a (serious) idea about either
is urged to make contact with CESJ.
• Hartford Connecticut Chapter in Formation. The people in Hartford have been talking with someone at the
Boston Federal Reserve and moving forward with getting 501(c)(3) status and
giving presentations and raising funds. There
is some discussion about a pilot project of turning the outmoded Hartford community center into a citizen-owned
development project.
• CESJ Annual Meeting and Celebration. A decision was made to downscale the CESJ
annual celebration due to a conflict with the Wayne County initiative, and the
fact that some individuals were not able to follow through on proposals for the
celebration.
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| "Hi. Did you sign up for Smile?" |
• Shop online and support CESJ’s work! Did you know that by making
your purchases through the Amazon Smile
program, Amazon will make a contribution to CESJ? Here’s how: First, go to https://smile.amazon.com/. Next, sign in to your Amazon account. (If you don’t have an account with Amazon,
you can create one by clicking on the tiny little link below the “Sign in using
our secure server” button.) Once you
have signed into your account, you need to select CESJ as your charity — and
you have to be careful to do it exactly this way: in the
space provided for “Or select your own charitable organization” type “Center for Economic and Social Justice
Arlington.” If you type anything
else, you will either get no results or more than you want to sift through. Once you’ve typed (or copied and pasted) “Center for Economic and Social Justice
Arlington” into the space provided, hit “Select” — and you will be taken to
the Amazon shopping site, all ready to go.
• Blog Readership. We have had visitors from 33 different countries
and 48 states and provinces in the United States and Canada to this blog over
the past week. Most visitors are from the United States, Canada, the United
Kingdom, Peru, and India. The most
popular postings this past week in descending order were, “Thomas
Hobbes on Private Property,” “News
from the Network, Vol. 11, No. 12,” “2.
Is Distributism a Parody of Christianity?” “A
More Just Tax, II: Tax Reform,” and “Aristotle
on Private Property.”
Those are the happenings for this
week, at least those that we know about.
If you have an accomplishment that you think should be listed, send us a
note about it at mgreaney [at] cesj [dot] org, and we’ll see that it gets into
the next “issue.” If you have a short
(250-400 word) comment on a specific posting, please enter your comments in the
blog — do not send them to us to post for you.
All comments are moderated, so we’ll see it before it goes up.
#30#