This week we bring you the first part of our annual news roundup of the past year. Don’t be too surprised at the depressing sameness of the news items, as the same things are bound to keep happening until and unless we adopt the Economic Democracy Act, and that is not yet in the cards:
January 2023
• Dangerously Kumbaya. Evidently tiring of the Great Reset, this year’s World Economic Forum at Davos, Switzerland focused on togetherness, community, and so on, This is all very well, but it reminds us of an old Peanuts cartoon in which Snoopy is shivering in the snow and two of the girls comment how cold and miserable he looks, so they go up to him, pat him on the head, and tell him to “Be of good cheer,” and leave, whereupon Snoopy has a big question mark over his head. Nothing is done to fix the underlying problem. Similarly, talking about easing conflict and so on is all very well, but the danger is that people will actually think they’ve accomplished something instead of putting off the problem for other people to solve, if ever. If they really wanted effective action, of course, they would push for the Economic Democracy Act.
• Federal Reserve Follies. It is a fixed delusion of economists who adhere to the “Currency Principle” that economic life can be manipulated by fiddling around with interest rates and the quantity of money. Since this is the exact opposite of the real case, that money and credit derive from economic activity, not the other way around, we’re not too concerned about the outcome of the latest round of Federal Reserve Follies . . . at least in the sense that we we’re worried about what the outcome will be. It’s going to be bad, no matter what. The only sensible thing to do is adopt the Economic Democracy Act, but they never think of letting economic activity determine the quantity of money.
• Re-Rethinking Retirement. First, they complain that people aren’t saving enough to live on in retirement . . . which is the wrong way to think about it in the first place, as the idea should be to accumulate wealth to generate income, not to use as income. Now they say there’s a risk that people could save so much they can’t spend it all . . . which is again contrary to what the idea should be. Of course, the whole idea of the Economic Democracy Act is to accumulate income-generating assets so that both your income and your asset stake remain about the same and you don’t have to worry about not having enough or too much.
• Are Central Banks Deliberately Causing Depressions? According to Blackrock, the world’s central banks are deliberately causing “recessions” (we’re not allowed to call them “depressions”). What they mean is that the world’s central banks are not doing things to increase Blackrock’s wealth as fast as possible. This is one of the weird results of adherence to the Currency Principle which assumes that the quantity of money determines the level of economic activity . . . which it doesn’t. Frankly, the only answer is to reorganize the financial system along the lines laid out in the Economic Democracy Act so that the level of economic activity determines the quantity of money . . . which is why commercial and central banks were invented.
• Stupid Politician Tricks. According to reports, Republicans are starting to push again on a national sales tax. This is wrongheaded, even given the incredible mess that the U.S. tax system is in today. The worst part, of course, is that a sales tax is extraordinarily regressive, falling heaviest on those least able to pay. Yes, there is always some blather about how there will be rebates for people in the lower income brackets, but exactly how do they expect to administer such a rebate program fairly? Is every transaction to be registered and recorded at time of purchase? That is certainly going to make everyone behind you in line at the grocery store extremely happy. Is everyone to save sales receipts? That means that every transaction, regardless how small, must also be recorded, and assumes that no one will make up fake receipts to claim more than they paid. There are many, many more problems with such a program, of which having multiple tax systems in place is only one major headache. Frankly, a national sales tax is a Keynesian dream come true. It’s so complicated that no one will understand it or its implementation, thereby creating thousands of jobs for people expert in manipulating such complicated systems, and it lets the rich keep their wealth untaxed. The Keynesian rationale, of course, is that the rich need to be rich to create jobs for the rest of us, which doesn’t actually happen, or the richer some people get, the more jobs would be created, but what we’re seeing is jobs disappearing as some people become ultra-rich. What’s the answer? A straightforward income tax as the only tax, with a generous exemption to meet ordinary living expenses. This is the program recommended in the Economic Democracy Act.
February 2023
• Exactly Backwards. The whole idea of the Economic Democracy Act is that money is only created in ways that, one, will turn non-owners of capital into owners of capital, and two, is only created AFTER a viable and financially feasible capital project is located. Not surprisingly, first creating money and then desperately searching for ways to spend it results in corruption, as this story about possibly fraudulent COVID-19 loans suggests. Tying money creation directly to what is being financed, whether it be existing inventories of goods or services performed, or future marketable goods and services with a reasonable present value, is the only realistic and sensible way to regulate the money supply naturally, not artificially by printing up a bunch and hoping it does something good instead of ending up in a politician’s sofa, no, really. That is why the binary economics of Louis Kelso is based on the Banking Principle, which says that the level of economic activity determines the amount of money, and not the Currency Principle, which says that money determines the level of economic activity.
• Dave Kelly and Harris Neck. CESJ friend Dave Kelly, who has been working for many years with the Gullah community in Harris Neck, Georgia, to reclaim their land that was seized and abandoned by the federal government, let us know about a special segment (Part 6: “Justice”) that will be airing on Friday, February 10th on Hulu. This is part of the controversial 1619 Project conceived of by New York Times journalist Nikole Hanna-Jones. The series examines the largely ignored or trivialized place of slavery and contributions of enslaved Americans and their descendants in the history and economy of the United States. This episode of the 6-part series that started airing in January chronicles the efforts of this unique community, which has maintained many of their African traditions and whose own history is bound up with the story of slavery, emancipation, reconciliation, and continuing struggle of descendants of American slaves to regain ownership of land given to their ancestors by their former slaveowners. Here is the trailer to the series. If you are interested in learning more about the Harris Neck community, you can contact Dave Kelly at dkelly91@hotmail.com.
• Would Nikki Haley Reform Social Security? Having gone on record making somewhat disparaging remarks about the Social Security system, possible presidential contender Nikki Haley might be open to something like the Economic Democracy Act, that might have the potential to solve many of the problems associated with the Keynesian system, but only time will tell if she sticks to her guns, or gives in to political expedience.
• Keynesian Ponzi Scheme. It turns out that we’re not the only ones who have labeled Keynesian economics a colossal Ponzi scheme, in which those who get in early get the goodies, while latecomers are saddled with the debt. In a Keynesian system, governments spend money like drunken sailors on leave, piling up debt for future generations to pay off or repudiate, neither alternative being acceptable, but at least the latter is achievable under the Economic Democracy Act.
March 2023
• Don’t Create Money to Lend. Conventional wisdom has it — meaning that Keynesian economics mandates — that first you must have money before you can finance new capital formation. This means that if a government wants to pour money into some program or other, whether for consumption or investment, it must have the money to be able to pour. This creates a paradox, for Keynesian economics assumes as a given that existing money must be used for both production and consumption, creating an automatic imbalance in supply and demand. It also creates an almost irresistible opportunities for abuse, as became evident with the COVID-19 loan program. Massive amounts of money were created, and massive amounts of money appear to have misappropriated. Is there an answer? Yes. It is possible, even preferable to create money only when there is an actual investment ready and waiting for financing, instead of creating money and desperately searching for a way to spend it. This is one of the principles behind the monetary reforms presented in the Economic Democracy Act, and would greatly reduce, possibly even eliminate that particular form of corruption (although, of course, human ingenuity can always come up with more).
• Social Security in Trouble! So, what else is new? Almost from the system’s beginning prophets have foretold disaster, and it may finally be catching up with us. Still, no one has figured out that you can’t spend what you don’t produce, but people insist upon living in a Keynesian fantasyland. They don’t realize that if Social Security was made need-based, and people could rely on the Economic Democracy Act, they wouldn’t be in the situation they are today.
• Buy Now, Pay Never? Believing that they can attain the good life without necessarily doing anything to warrant it, millennials are assuming massive amounts of debt in order to enjoy the lifestyle to which they think they are entitled. We hate to keep sounding the same note, but the Economic Democracy Act. would get them virtually everything they could reasonably want and without assuming unrepayable debt that will inevitably become the responsibility of somebody else.
• Salt Problem. According to reports, Americans are killing themselves by eating too much salt, and it’s up to the government to stop people from doing so. The idea that people might be educated to be adults and learn to take care of themselves does not seem to occur to anyone.
• The Egg and Us. Again according to the experts, rising egg prices are a signal that something is wrong with the economy. Evidently, they missed all the other signs. Now, if bacon gets into trouble, we might see some action and persuade the powers-that-be to adopt the Economic Democracy Act.
• Swiss Monetary Neutrality Fails. One of the problems with the Currency Principle — that the amount of money in the system determines economic activity — is that somebody somewhere has to have something of value behind the money. If everybody is on the Currency Principle and nobody is on the Banking Principle, then one failure anywhere in the world can start a domino effect. That may have happened in Switzerland, which has always been considered the bulwark of sound finance. Putin’s war on Ukraine and the bank failures in the United States have, however, uncovered the weakness in the Currency Principle model, and a good reason for somebody, somewhere to adopt the Economic Democracy Act at the earliest possible date.
• French Retirement Protests. Facing serious financial problems, France has been attempting to adjust retirement benefits and is being met with massive protests. Evidently, the people of France are under the illusion that a government can create money out of nothing to pay them benefits that politicians promised them — promises that others were supposed to keep. Here’s an unpleasant reality” money is a derivative of production, either existing or the present value of future production, and if you create money that does not represent production, you are creating demand for something that doesn’t exist. This is consistent with the “Law of Markets” of a French economist, Jean-Baptiste Say. Just printing up money increases demand for what does exist, driving up prices and inflating the currency, meaning that the government has to create more fake money to try and catch up. Of course, all of this would be moot if France would implement the Economic Democracy Act at the earliest possible date.
• Electric Vehicles. Electric cars may be the wave of the future, but that doesn’t mean that there might not be a few problems with them . . . such as generating the electricity they run on in the first place. Then, there is the issue of how long the batteries in an electric car actually last. This is a question that cannot easily be answered, for battery technology is still developing.
• Book Buyout? Simon and Schuster, the book publisher, is up for sale if a buyer can be found. No one is considering the possibility of a worker and even author buyout of one of the “Big Five” book publishers through an ESOP or some other arrangement.
April 2023
• Sorry Swiss. Credit Suisse is very, very, very sorry for cheating its shareholders by engaging in shady financial deals.
• The “Everything Problem”. The experts are starting to see that “everything” is wrong with the U.S. economy . . . but still fail to question their basic assumptions. The situation is like someone who keeps hitting himself on the head with a hammer and is willing to do anything to stop the pain except stop hitting himself on the head with a hammer. And why not try the Economic Democracy Act? Because it’s not Keynesian, of course, and without Keynesianism, the world wouldn’t be in the shape it is today . . . oh, wait. . .
• The Wobbly Economy. In another surreal analysis, the fact that the artificially maintained stock market is starting to slow down is telling the so-called experts that the economy might not be hunky-dory. The Economic Democracy Act would solve the problem, although then we’d have other problems . . . like finding enough bad news to report.
• Better Balance Sought. In light of the information coming how of the “jobs market” the Federal Reserve is seeking a “better balance” between bad and worse. The presumed Keynesian tradeoff between inflation and employment — which only exists because Keynes declared that inflation wasn’t “real” until after full employment has been reached — has dictated economic policy since the end of World War II and means that the twin goals of reaching full employment and keeping down inflation are impossible because contradictory. All this contradictory juggling would be unnecessary if the Economic Democracy Act was enacted, but then they’d have more good news to report, and good news is bad news.
• The Old Grind Not So Bad? Many of the workers who quit their dull and boring jobs during the COVID pandemic are now wishing they had them back again. You know what we’re going to say. If we had the Economic Democracy Act, people would not worry about gaining sufficient income to live as they wanted.
• Apartment Foreclosures. As the real economy continues to spin out of control while the speculators continue to make money, many condo owners are being foreclosed on. This — like virtually every other time — is perfect to implement the Economic Democracy Act which would put the primary economy of marketable goods and services such as housing back on a solid footing.
• Dropping Like Flies. Somehow, in spite of the booming stock market and a strong jobs market, companies are starting to go bankrupt at an alarming rate. Apparently the high inflation which is supposed to guarantee a thriving economy with high wages, high prices and reduced consumption (no, really: Keynesian economics relies on the idea of “forced savings,” which allows producers to accumulate more savings by selling the consumer fewer goods at higher prices, thereby creating the environment within which labor can be productive and produce more goods that people can’t buy except at even higher prices . . .) Adopting the Economic Democracy Act would go a long way toward solving the problem, but nobody seems to think of that.
• The Frontline with Joe and Joe. Not to toot our own horn . . . okay, to toot our own horn, Dawn K. Brohawn recently appeared on The Frontline with Joe and Joe speaking on the subject of Economic Independence. Check it out.
• Outsider Trading. We wouldn’t want to accuse members of Congress of using inside information, so we’ll call it outside information. During the buildup to the latest banking crisis, members of Congress got rid of their banking shares. This is not a bit suspicious. Of course, all this would be moot — and there would be fewer banking crises to worry about — if everyone had equal opportunity and access to the means to become capital owners, such as proposed in the Economic Democracy Act.
• Getting Rich the Hoard Way. Every now and then there is a news story about someone in what is usually considered a low-paying, menial position amassing a fortune, thereby presumably proving that anyone, with the exercise of a little heroic financial virtue, can die wealthy . . . which sort of misses the whole point of getting rich in the first place. As Aristotle pointed out 2,500 years ago, the purpose of money is to be spent in order to obtain your economic wants and needs. All you have to do is live like a pauper, never spend a cent on anything other than the barest necessities, invest prudently, and never do anything that makes life worth living. Of course, if everyone did this, there would be no point to doing it, because the economy would implode due to lack of consumer demand. Think about it: if every person saved half of his or her income instead of spending it, half the economy would disappear after suffering a fifty percent decline. When you consider how the experts go into hysterics over a two percent decline, you can imagine the effects of twenty-five times that. Fortunately, however, there is a better way: the Economic Democracy Act would allow people to save by increasing production in the future instead of cutting consumption in the past. The economy would grow instead of shrink . . . and people could enjoy their income instead of hoarding it to fondle and kiss on their deathbeds before they leave it to someone who will spend it.
Another Housing Crash. One of the things you don’t have to worry about in modern economic thinking is common sense. As long as the stock market is doing well and the government is creating lots and lots of money so that the rich get richer and the poor get welfare, everybody is happy . . . even though inflation is eating up everything, jobs are disappearing, and people are being priced out of just about everything, including housing. The difference in this housing crash, however, is that instead of individual private “investors”, it’s the big investors . . . which makes it more likely that the government will bail them out. What people should be looking at instead is the Homeowners Equity Corporation, which is a part of the Economic Democracy Act, but so far that doesn’t seem to have occurred to them.
• Time to Bring It Home? Given the huge amount of consumer goods sold in the U.S. that are made in China, the prediction that China’s economy could collapse in the next ten years is a little worrying. Of course, whether or not China’s economy does collapse, the United States should be bringing jobs — and economic growth — “back home” by adopting the Economic Democracy Act.
• Misunderstanding Banking (Again). The recent bank failures or crises (however you want to put it) have been blamed on uninsured depositors having too much money in the bank, and losses on band investments. Nobody stops to think that maybe it might have something to do with banks not bothering to do what they’re supposed to do: provide money and credit for private sector economic growth and development, not speculation and savings. This would be taken care of with the Economic Democracy Act.
• Good, Old Fashioned Bank Run. The Federal Reserve was intended in part to prevent “runs” on banks, i.e., sudden demands by depositors for their money or too many obligations presented for payment at one time. The idea was that when this happened to a bank, the bank could immediately apply for additional reserves to keep the bank from failing. That’s why it’s called “the Federal Reserve System.” Perhaps not surprisingly, given the hijacking of modern central banking into a financing source for government, The First Republic Bank was not rescued by the Federal Reserve, but by other banks . . . the very thing the Federal Reserve was supposed to make unnecessary. This was the whole point of the “Pujo Report” of 1913, which in part led to the formation of the Federal Reserve System. The only way to solve this is to pass the Economic Democracy Act which would retore the original purposes of both the Federal Reserve and the tax system.
May 2023
• Misunderstanding Money (Again). The experts are in a panic as M2 — the supply of money presumably devoted to investing in new capital formation — is being depleted for consumption purposes, that is, used as if it were M1. In other words, people are using their savings for consumption instead of investment, causing the experts to demand the government create more, more, more money for investment . . . meaning to pour into Wall Street to drive up the price of existing capital to benefit the speculators, while neglecting the needs of the private sector by raising interest rates to make new capital formation more expensive and thus less feasible. Of course, if the experts ever realized that existing savings are best used for consumption and future savings are best used for new capital formation, as proposed in the Economic Democracy Act, the problem would solve itself, but nobody seems to realize that.
• How Do Banks Work? Not Like This. At the same time that people are complaining that banks are failing because they have too much money and then not enough, the claim is also made that at least half of America’s banks are already insolvent. All this proves is that the so-called expert have no idea what the categories of banks are. They think that all banks are “banks of deposit,” that can only lend what has been deposited. No, the banks that are in trouble are commercial and mercantile banks, which are combinations of banks of issue and banks of discount, and which should never have to worry about not enough or too much money as long as the loans they make — and thus the money they create — is for good loans that are adequately collateralized. And what is the best form of collateral for a modern economy? Capital credit insurance and reinsurance. When a loan goes bad, it is reimbursed in cash instead of having to seize collateral and sell it, usually at a loss. That is one of the reforms proposed in the Economic Democracy Act.
• Ignore the Debt and It Will Go Away. Apparently, at least according to economist Paul Krugman, the best way to stave off bankruptcy is to go deeper into debt; if you can’t pay your current, debts, well, then incur more! All of this is based on the Keynesian assumption that only past savings can be used to finance economic growth, and that the only way to generate past savings is to redistribute savings by inflating the currency, a process Keynes called “forced savings” because it forces the poor to pay more and get less, while allowing the rich to get higher prices for fewer goods and service. Is, however, incurring more debt when you can’t pay what you already owe the only solution? No, there is the Economic Democracy Act, which would finance economic growth using future savings, and do it in such a way tht capital ownership is widespread.
• Need a Light? Once upon a time, it was mistakenly believed that the customer is always right. Nowadays, of course, we know that the customer is never right, and must take whatever the powers-that-be choose to dish out. After all, when the sleer and two groups of customers disagree, then obviously both groups of customers are wrong, and the seller is right. That seems to be the case in which the manufacturer (we no longer use the outdated term “brewer”) of “Bud Light,” formerly the single largest selling beer brand in the world, ticked off customers at both ends of the ideological aisle. Of course, if customers were also producers, they could decide for themselves which products to patronize of their own free will without having to worry about who they’re offending or failing to offend by purchasing a particular product. That, however, will only be possible by adopting the Economic Democracy Act, which will mean that the powers-that-be won’t have all that much power any more . . . just lots of cases of beer they might not be able to sell.
• Not Saving Enough for Retirement? According to yet another Harvard study, Americans who take “early retirement” are making a big mistake, mainly because they haven’t saved enough for the Great Change, i.e., to shift from productive worker to useless eater. According to conventional wisdom, if Americans don’t save enough to keep themselves above the poverty line, then other people won’t have enough of other people’s money to get rich. The possibility that everyone can invest using future savings instead of past savings is completely alien to this mindset. That is why the Economic Democracy Act which is not being adopted. The powers-that-be don’t understand that 1 + 1 = 2, not 0.
• Creepiest Story of the Year. Forget about Putler and his goons, at least for a while. We found something almost as weird and sickening: a social media influencer has “cloned” herself via AI so that her millions of admiring male fans and followers can have individual attention from her and the right to create an exclusive girlfriend that acts and talks just like her over the internet. Not creepy enough? How about having your very own Stepford Wife, a robot with AI that will do anything for its owner . . . maybe even paint the house!
• A Few Questions About Reparations. Yet another proposal is being bruited about to make reparation payments to descendants of Black slaves. The price tag is expected to be in the rather exclusive neighborhood of $14 trillion. Aside from the obvious question as to where this money is supposed to come from, and who gets it — for example, if being Black means you have suffered from the systemic effects of slavery even if you personally were not a slave, does that include everyone who is Black, even if they came to the United States six years ago from Africa and just became a citizen? Does a single payment cover the reparations for all time, or would this just be the first installment? Will it come due every twenty years? Every year? What about descendants? Are they due reparations if their parents fritter away the payment? Who defines “Black”? Who defines “slave”? Who defines “effects of slavery”? One possible way out of this seeming dilemma is to repair the system by passing the Economic Democracy Act, make everyone eligible, and stop worrying about who qualifies: everybody qualifies, and it won’t cost money, it will make money.
• Krugman and Fun with Numbers. According to Paul Krugman, government debt isn’t like real debt that you have to pay. It’s money we owe ourselves, and no government pays its debts anyway, so it’s okay not to pay. If this sounds a little fatuous to you, then you obviously don’t understand high finance à la John Maynard Keynes. Of course, neither did Dr. Harold G. Moulton, then president of the Brookings Institution, when he published The New Philosophy of Public Debt in 1943, which demolished all of Krugman’s arguments before he made them. It’s a short piece, and copies can still be found, although they’re very rare. That’s because today’s politicians are terrified of anything that would take away their power, and that’s what Moulton and the Economic Democracy Act would do.
June 2023
• Sheering v. Slaughtering. Lawlessness is so bad in San Francisco that more and more stores are simply pulling out or closing up altogether. The authorities are baffled, although the causes shouldn’t be too hard to find when the law makes being an outlaw fun and profitable. By making major theft only a misdemeanor, law enforcement can’t afford to waste its limited resources prosecuting small offenders who loot stores and kill and maim anyone who tries to defend himself or stop the looting. It’s far more important to protect abortion clinics from protestors praying the rosary, guard parades of naked cyclists, and arrest children who make a gun with their hands and shout “bang-bang” while playing cops and robbers or cowpersons and indigenous oppressed personnel. Of course, adopting the Economic Democracy Act might put a stop to such knavish imbecility, but who wants to do that?
• Moonlighting Mania. As economic conditions worsen, workers are finding it less and less attractive to work harder and get less. Constantly being urged to take one for the team doesn’t do much good when all the benefits for doing so go to others. Consequently, many people are taking on part time and even full time second and third jobs to make more money and get some satisfaction and reward for their efforts . . . and employers are complaining, of course. They want to control others for their personal benefit, not be a part of the team whose virtues they extol for others. The obvious solution, of course, is to adopt the Economic Democracy Act, but apparently people who are power mad and consumed by greed don’t think in those terms.
• “Cardboard Box” Recession. In a dramatic demonstration of the bifurcation of the official economy from the real economy, the experts are pointing to the development of a “cardboard box” recession, meaning that demand for cardboard containers and other packaging materials is dropping, signifying a drop in real demand for marketable goods and services . . . yet the stock market is booming, and government debt is at an all-time high, and money is being siphoned out of savings and used for consumption. The experts, of course, are baffled, but all it shows is that the massive amounts of money backed with its own debt the government has been pouring into the economy has not stimulated consumer demand — which always drives demand for new capital and growth of jobs — but gone directly into stock market speculation. The Dow is a hundred times higher than it was in the 1930s, but is everyone a hundred times richer? It could be — and has been — argued that people are much worse off now than they were in the late 1930s and th 1950s when the Dow was in three digits instead of five. Is there a way to put the official economy and the real economy back together? Yes, through the Economic Democracy Act, and it doesn’t have to come packaged in a cardboard box.
• Is AI a Danger? There is a great deal of discussion and rightly so about the danger that Artificial Intelligence (AI) holds for the future of the human race . . . if we let it. Experts are divided. If people allow AI to start making decisions, it might start running the world to suit itself. Other experts say that since human beings program AI, it’s only necessary to build in safeguards. Of course, the biggest safeguard is ownership, which as Louis Kelso pointed out, means control in every code of law. If we don’t want AI to control us, we must control AI. Human beings — and not just one human being — must have the final say-so on decisions made by AI, and AI cannot be allowed to override a human decision on its own initiative. For example, if an owner tells an AI to murder someone, another human will — we hope! — have programmed the AI to ignore all such orders except to report it to the authorities. There will need to be special arrangements for students of criminology and mystery writers, but thee can be dealt with. The bottom line is that people must own and control AI or AI will own and control them. There is no middle ground, and the best way to do that is with the Economic Democracy Act.
• What is Inflation? To anyone who knows basic economic theory . . . or at least what passes for it these days, “inflation” means a rise in the price level caused either by too much money in the system (demand-pull inflation) or a rise in prices due to the natural scarcity of some product (cost-push inflation). The different schools of economics change this basic definition and confuse things, but that’s the definition in common use. Now the experts have noted that the stock market is rising but prices are down, so inflation is under control . . . right? Wrong. Inflation is not under control. All that’s happened is that inflation has shifted from the productive sector of the economy to the speculative sector of the economy, where it has the potential to be just as harmful but in a different way. How can this be straightened out so that inflation is genuinely controlled, even completely eliminated (at least demand-pull type inflation)? Simple, although certainly not easy: adopt the Economic Democracy Act.
• Cleveland Federal Reserve Conference. Yesterday and today the Cleveland Federal Reserve Cleveland is holding a conference and some members of the CESJ core group are attending both in-person and virtually. So far it’s interesting, but completely devoted to the same old thing: more intensive (and expensive) applications of programs that aren’t really working. Despite several questions and comments directing them to the Economic Democracy Act., speakers have carefully avoided mention of expanded ownership as a possible solution.
• “Not Cutting It.” As if it is news, the experts are now reporting that the average American income is insufficient to meet common domestic needs adequately. They can blame what they will — and they do — but the simple fact remains that today’s economic analysis takes for granted that only labor is productive when it is becoming increasingly evident each passing day that capital in all its forms is far surpassing labor as an input to production. What’s the answer? Making as many as possible of the people owners of capital so they can be productive and generate sufficient income to meet their needs. This can be done through the Economic Democracy Act.
• Chocopalpse Now. The world supply of cocoa has been in trouble and danger was near. Now it appears that the final chapter of the tragedy is here. No, we’re not mocking the magnitude of the disaster. Just the magnitude of the stupidity of the experts who insist on doing all the wrong things to try and make things right. As we noted sometime back, a significant part of the problem is how cocoa production (and cocoa processing) is financed, a problem that could be solved by adopting the Economic Democracy Act.
• Retiring Millionaires. Evidently quite a few Americans are retiring with a million dollars in savings. The problem is that they view this not as investment in income-generating assets, but as the stored-up demand itself. Conservative estimates and projections of the accumulations under the Economic Democracy Act, suggest that this million could be well-exceeded, and will consist of income-generating assets that continue to work for you, leaving the accumulation not only intact, but growing.
• Obsessed with Saving. People have evidently become so used to the assumption that you must cut consumption in order to save and have enough to live on for retirement that they can’t break the habit of underconsumption, even when they have more money than they can ever use. That is why, for their own sake, people need to learn that the better way to save is not to cut consumption in the past, but to increase production in the future. The purpose of consumption income is not to refrain from consumption so you accumulate a surplus, but to use it for its intended purpose. That is one of the principles behind the Economic Democracy Act?, and it would help rid the world of the notion that you must do without something so that somebody else can have fun spending your money.
• Georgism in Action. Back in the nineteenth century, the agrarian economist Henry George claimed that all land and natural resources belong to humanity, not to individual people, using a rather specious argument based on the assumption that an abstraction created by people (the concept of “humanity”) has an existence independent of the minds that created it and could therefor do something that its creator cannot, viz., own land and natural resources. That being the case, George argued, all profits from land use should be paid to the government as a “single tax,” which would solve all the world’s economic problems by making the State the universal landlord. Slight problem: George said tenants should get the use of the land for free, thereby yielding no profit to the nomal owner . . . but the nominal owner was still liable for the full amount that would have been paid if rent was being charged! This, of course, would result in landlords simply abandoning land as it would only cost them money without yielding them any benefit unless they were prevented from doing so . . . as is the case right now, where a ban on evictions means that tenants can live for free in dwellings owned by others who still must pay taxes and utility bills for the non-paying tenants! Of course, the Economic Democracy Act could solve the problem but nobody seems to be thinking of that.
• Greater Reset “Book Trailers”. We have produced two ninety-second “Book Trailers” for distribution (by whoever wants to distribute them), essentially minute and a half commercials for The Greater Reset. There are two versions of the videos, one for “general audiences” and the other for “Catholic audiences”. Take your pick.
• The Greater Reset. CESJ’s new book by members of CESJ’s core group, The Greater Reset: Reclaiming Personal Sovereignty Under Natural Law is, of course, available from the publisher, TAN Books, an imprint of Saint Benedict Press, and has already gotten a top review on that website. It can also be obtained from Barnes and Noble, as well as Amazon, or by special order from your local “bricks and mortar” bookstore. The Greater Reset is the only book of which we’re aware on “the Great Reset” that presents an alternative instead of simply warning of the dangers inherent in a proposal that is contrary to natural law. It describes reality, rather than a Keynesian fantasy world. Please note that The Greater Reset is NOT a CESJ publication as such, and enquiries about quantity discounts and wholesale orders for resale must be sent to the publisher, Saint Benedict Press, NOT to CESJ.
• Economic Personalism Landing Page. A landing page for CESJ’s latest publication, Economic Personalism: Property, Power and Justice for Every Person, has been created and can be accessed by clicking on this link. Everyone is encouraged to visit the page and send the link out to their networks.
• Economic Personalism. When you purchase a copy of Economic Personalism: Property, Power and Justice for Every Person, be sure you post a review after you’ve read it. It is available on both Amazon and Barnes and Noble at the cover price of $10 per copy. You can also download the free copy in .pdf available from the CESJ website. If you’d like to order in bulk (i.e., ten or more copies) at the wholesale price, send an email to publications@cesj.org for details. CESJ members get a $2 rebate per copy on submission of proof of purchase. Wholesale case lots of 52 copies are available at $350, plus shipping (whole case lots ONLY). Prices are in U.S. dollars.
• Sensus Fidelium Videos, Update. CESJ’s series of videos for Sensus Fidelium are doing very well, with over 155,000 total views. The latest Sensus Fidelium video is “The Five Levers of Change.” The video is part of the series on the book, Economic Personalism. The latest completed series on “the Great Reset” can be found on the “Playlist” for the series. The previous series of sixteen videos on socialism is available by clicking on the link: “Socialism, Modernism, and the New Age,” along with some book reviews and other selected topics. For “interfaith” presentations to a Catholic audience they’ve proved to be popular, edging up to 150,000 views to date. They aren’t really “Just Third Way videos,” but they do incorporate a Just Third Way perspective. You can access the playlist for the entire series. The point of the videos is to explain how socialism and socialist assumptions got such a stranglehold on the understanding of the role of the State and thus the interpretation of Catholic social teaching, and even the way non-Catholics and even non-Christians understand the roles of Church, State, and Family, and the human persons place in society.
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 well see that it gets into the next “issue.” Due to imprudent and intemperate language on the part of some commentators, we removed temptation and disabled comments.
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