As usual, much of this week’s news items wouldn’t be news items if the Economic Democracy Act: had been adopted. Keep that in mind as you read:
• The Housing Crisis. According to an article in the Business Insider, there is a “simple fix” to America’s housing crisis. “Many homeowners are sitting on massive paper gains after years of stellar home-price appreciation. However, the tax bill on a sale today is much higher than when some people bought their homes, leading to owners opting to stay put. This is among the factors that have led to a logjam in the housing market, keeping prices high and supply low.” Before 1997, homeowners age 55 or older could take a one-time exclusion of up to $125,000 in capital gains from the sale of their home. This was a one-time benefit. The Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997 eliminated this provision in favor of the current rules, which provide a larger and repeatable exclusion to more taxpayers, i.e., capital gains of $250,000 for single filers and $500,000 for married filing jointly. The problem is that most gains on housing are due to inflation and are thus illusory. Inflation-indexing would correct this problem . . . but why limit it to housing? ALL such gains should be inflation-indexed, which would eliminate the rules about how long someone ones anything. This is one of the reforms suggested in the Economic Democracy Act.
• How Much Should You Save? An article in BankingRates gives one expert’s opinion as to how much you should save (i.e., how much you should cut consumption) to have enough for retirement. According to Anita Kinoshita, “If you were debt free, had zero saved for retirement, and had no short-term savings planned, saving 20% of your post-tax income would mean you could retire in 37 years. Now, 20% saved (or invested) is arguably better than 0, but are you okay with being dependent on a paycheck for 37 more years?” She modifies this a bit, but it still requires massive saving . . . which means massive cuts in consumption, and a consequent massive drop in GDP and a leap into a recession or depression. Notably, those countries that have massive individual saving are also massive exporters; in other words, other countries’ consumers are making up for domestic non-consumption. The solution is to adopt the Economic Democracy Act. and turn every producer into a consumer and vice versa.
• Making It to the Other Side. There might be some questions about what “the Other Side” is, but — at least according to Fortune magazine — Doug McMillon, CEO of Walmart, has pledged he will help all Walmart employees get there in the face of the threat of replacement by AI. As he said, “‘Our goal is to create the opportunity for everybody to make it to the other side,’ McMillon said. Some jobs and tasks at Walmart will be eliminated, but others will be added, he added.” That is laudable . . . but how does he propose to do it? Vague comments about other jobs being created sound nice, but what new jobs might they be? If something needs doing, why isn’t it being done already? If it’s not really needed, then the “new jobs” won’t last very long, especially if costs must be cut in the face of future declines in consumer demand. The only real solution to AI is for the people displaced by AI to own the AI — and do so with the full rights of ownership. That is the idea behind the Economic Democracy Act?
• Another Trump Executive Order. It is a standard dogma of retirement law that retirement assets are (at least in a secular sense) to be regarded as “sacred.” This is so engrained that workers who “own” the companies that employ them only through a trust; they are “beneficial owners,” not “real” owners. The fundamental principle is that retirement assets must not be subject to unnecessary risk. Now, as related in an article in MoneyWise magazine, “An executive order signed by President Donald Trump has opened the door for certain ‘alternative assets’ — like private credit, private equity, and even cryptocurrencies — to be included in their portfolios. Proponents say this shift ‘democratizes’ access to investment opportunities traditionally reserved for institutions and the wealthy. Critics, however, warn that these assets carry complex risks that may not be properly understood by the average investor.” Frankly, the real way to “democratize” access to investment opportunities is not to increase risk, but decrease it, as proposed in the Economic Democracy Act.
• All Tied Up in Cash. There’s an old joke (and not very funny) about a beggar asking a rich man for assistance and being told the rich man can’t help him because his money is all tied up in currency, i.e., cash. That’s not much of a joke these days, if it ever was. As related in MoneyWise magazine, “High net worth individuals — typically those with $1 million or more in investable assets — held large portions of their total portfolio in cash in 2024. According to a survey conducted by Capital Group, 78% of global high-net-worth individuals around the world held relatively high cash positions. Higher market volatility and fears regarding persistently high inflation levels are a few major reasons contributing to the shift away from equities and bonds.” In other words, the stock market is so overblown and unstable that the “real money” is avoiding it at all cost — and it’s quite a cost, considering that holding cash is not a good investment. This suggests that even the ultra-wealthy would greatly benefit from adoption of the Economic Democracy Act.
• Strong Like Bull. According to an analyst quoted by Fortune magazine, possibly tongue in cheek but probably not, the U.S. economy is stronger than ever . . . it just isn’t doing anything much for ordinary people, just the wealthy. Thus, “One of Wall Street’s most closely watched voices delivered a blunt message to peers and policymakers: The U.S. economy is not faltering—it is accelerating. Torsten Sløk, chief economist at Apollo Global Management, said forecasts of an imminent slowdown have been repeatedly wrong, and the economics profession should start grappling with its track record of misjudgments.” We actually agree with Sløk, but not for the reasons he supposes. The basic fact is the economy under Keynesianism is deliberately structured to favor the wealthy in the mistaken belief that we need the wealthy to finance job creation . . . because ordinary people can only gain income from jobs, not capital ownership like the wealthy. Why? Because Keynes said so, that’s why. The solution? You guessed it. Adopt the Economic Democracy Act.
• Where’s the Beef? When was the last time you heard that tag line? No matter. Although “inflation” means “a rise in the price level,” the recent rise in the price of beef is described as being in spite of low(!) inflation. That might be possible in the weird Keynesian universe in which inflation is defined as being a rise in the price level after reaching full employment, but not in the real world. The fact is beef is rising rapidly in price due to increased consumer demand (demand-pull inflation), falling “inventories” (i.e., reduced herds due to sickness, etc., again demand-pull inflation), feed and other costs are rising (cost-push inflation), and reductions in imports due to the new tariffs (cost-push inflation). Adopting the Economic Democracy Act . . . might not solve this problem directly (unless knowing a little more about basic economics without the Keynesian twist helps), but it would make it possible for more producers to produce, and for more people to afford what is available.
• Gross or Net? Americans may have a lot of wealth in gross terms . . . but when you start factoring in the amount of debt and consider the type of things they are buying, they come up a little short at times. Still, the gross figures do help you get a handle on things, at least when comparing Americans to each other instead of to people in other countries who might have different saving and spending habits. In any event, with the large number of “Baby Boomers” now of retirement age, there has been a virtual firestorm of panic over whether people have saved enough money to be “comfortable” in retirement. In a Benzinga article, “Are You a Rich Baby Boomer or Just Average?”, there is a scale of wealth based on how much people have saved by a certain age. Evidently, if someone has saved $2,997,300 by the age of 55-74, then he or she is in the top 10% of wealth . . . assuming someone is debt-free, of course. There is a problem with cutting consumption to save, however: every cent saved is a cent not spent on consumption, and a cent that does not circulate into the economy, “requiring” the government to print more money to “stimulate consumption” (i.e., make up for income diverted from consumption to saving). And the solution? As you might expect, it is to adopt the Economic Democracy Act. so that people can “save” (i.e., invest) without having to cut consumption.
• 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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