It appears that the somewhat delayed effect of the Terrible Trump Tariffs will soon be kicking in, and “the average American” — despite all the promises made — will soon be kicked in the teeth by rising prices and disappearing jobs, neither of which will be fixed by trying to change reality. The only real solution is to adopt the Economic Democracy Act as soon as possible:
• Inflation is Accelerating. Perhaps not surprisingly considering the havoc being spread through the global economy by incoherent economic and tax policies, the Russian war against Ukraine, and President Trump’s reliance on utter chaos as a political weapon of choice, inflation — defined here as a rise in the price level — has continued to increase. The chief culprit seems to be Trump’s tariffs, at least according to an article in Yahoo! Finance: “Economists and consumers alike are on high alert for signs of President Trump's sweeping global tariffs showing up at the cash register. "Core" inflation, which excludes volatile food and energy costs, marked the largest gain in six months, a potential sign that imported, tariffed goods are driving the story.” A possible solution to this surreal situation is to adopt the Economic Democracy Act., which proposes a far more rational tax system than President Trump seems willing to consider on his own initiative.
• More on the Surreal Tariff Situation. According to a report from NBC News, at the same time President Trump’s tariffs are getting set to finish stomping on the economy with spiked boots after clubbing it to the ground, the gamblers on Wall Street are having a field day as stock prices continue to soar to previously unheard-of levels. As the thinking goes, “Trump’s focus on tariffs hasn’t abated — but he has dialed back the more maximalist tariff levels he initially outlined. Combined with signs of a shakier labor market, investors are more convinced that the Fed will err on the side of supporting the economy by lowering interest rates to support overall business activity.” Consequently, “When markets expect the Federal Reserve to loosen financial conditions and make it easier for businesses to borrow money, stocks tend to rise because firms will have to pay less money in interest.” In other words, the stock market has nothing to do with the real economy, just how much it will cost the gamblers to obtain massive amounts of new money to bid up the prices of shares on the secondary market. Of course, if the powers-that-be wanted the stock market to reflect the real economy, they would immediately adopt the Economic Democracy Act.
• Meet Robby the Robot Chef. Robochefs have been a standard of science fiction for generations now, but now they seem to be more than a few steps closer to reality, at least for some commis chef tasks, according to an article in Food and Wine magazine. This is fine . . . except for those at the lowest rung of the chef ladder who might not get the standard training they need to advance up the hierarchy and have an adequate understanding of what they might be supervising. That’s a minor quibble, however . . . so long as those who are being done out of jobs by the robots own the robots that are displacing them, as Louis Kelso proposed. If robots are doing the work, the owner of the robots gets the benefits, and the displaced workers don’t own the robots. The solution? As Kelso pointed out in an editorial in Life magazine in 1964, “If the machine wants our job, let’s buy it.” This could be done by adopting the Economic Democracy Act.
• Or You Could Own It. According to CNN, “Geoffrey Hinton, known as the ‘godfather of AI,’ fears the technology he helped build could wipe out humanity — and ‘tech bros’ are taking the wrong approach to stop it.” Hinton thinks there is a good chance AI will wipe out the human race. His solution? “Instead of forcing AI to submit to humans, Hinton presented an intriguing solution: building ‘maternal instincts’ into AI models, so ‘they really care about people’ even once the technology becomes more powerful and smarter than humans. AI systems ‘will very quickly develop two subgoals, if they’re smart: One is to stay alive… (and) the other subgoal is to get more control,’ Hinton said. ‘There is good reason to believe that any kind of agentic AI will try to stay alive.’” Or (crazy idea) instead of AI controlling humanity, humanity could control AI by owning it, as would be the case with the Economic Democracy Act.
• Trump’s Tariffs “Bad.” According to an article in Fortune magazine, Goldman-Sachs has “doubled down” on their insistence that tariffs are not good for the economy as “two-thirds of the cost” will be borne by “average Americans,” meaning the rest of us. This isn’t entirely disinterested on the part of Goldman-Sachs, of course. They understand that economic growth (which funds their profits) is driven by consumption, just as Adam Smith’s first principle of economics states: “Consumption is the sole end and purpose of all production.” Since “the average American” consumes the vast bulk of production, if “they” stop consuming, then Goldman-Sachs won’t make profits. Annoying President Trump, “Goldman’s latest report, published on Sunday, maintains that while U.S. businesses have so far shouldered most of the financial pain from tariffs, the share picked up by everyday Americans is set to rise sharply. As of June, consumers had absorbed 22% of total tariff costs, [chief economist Jan] Hatzius calculated, adding the number is projected to leap to 67% by October if the pattern seen in early rounds of Trump’s trade actions continues. For businesses, the burden will shrink from 64% down to 8%, while foreign suppliers will see a modest uptick from 14% to 25% of the tariff impact.” A solution? Adopt the Economic Democracy Act.
• Inflation Baffles Experts. Although interest on business loans is a cost of production and interest on consumer loans is a cost of, well, consumption, and although tariffs are an incredibly regressive form of tax that hammers the lower income brackets which spend the bulk of their income on consumption, the so-called experts profess themselves utterly baffled by the rising inflation that is increasing faster than anticipated, and are “scratching their heads” at this conundrum. As reported in Yahoo! Finance: “Producer prices in July rose faster than forecast across the board, giving investors and the Federal Reserve an inflation surprise just over a week out from Fed Chair Jay Powell's crucial Jackson Hole speech.” Of course, if Congress would adopt the Economic Democracy Act, all this reliance on contradictory Keynesian nonsense would stop and the economy would stabilize . . . but the elites would lose a lot of power.
• 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 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 (now with an imprimatur), 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., 52 or more copies) at the wholesale price, send an email to info@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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