Economic Growth

Is it time for the equality of wealth in America?

This post is a response to a question posed in its complete format: “After the rich gets richer and poor gets poorer, it’s telling us that capitalism is failing. Is it time for communism for equality of wealth in America?”

The period between FDR’s New Deal and Ronald Reagan proves that capitalism is an effective system for creating a thriving middle class, maximizing opportunities for upward mobility, and providing a clear path to raising people out of poverty.

That was a period in which the now-myth of the “American Dream” was real and attainable. Everyone can attain a modest life of comfortable dignity, achieve beyond minimal existence, and grow their material success solely through disciplined effort.

What happened was what always happens when public memory is short, and the hardships of previous generations are forgotten.

People forgot what life was like when employment was insecure, rife with abuses, insufficient to survive on, and barely above an enslaved existence. Weekends off did not exist. Overtime pay did not exist. Statutory holidays did not exist. Job security did not exist.

For a brief time of almost one-half of an entire century, a working life was a life of dignity.

Then, we forgot and got complacent.

We grew frustrated with union strikes when they disrupted our otherwise predictable lives.

We saw corruption within unions and began forgetting their origins as a defence mechanism protecting the working class from capitalist corruption.

We began trusting the capitalist class had our best interests at heart and cheered when Ronald Reagan betrayed the once-thriving middle class by launching the beginning of a sustained assault against our only protection against capitalist corruption and abuse.

As a result, the poor are no longer becoming richer but poorer, as we have lost out on the basic dream of home ownership and a piece of the dream we were all promised.

We have lost our ability to succeed on effort alone.

Now, we are searching for solutions to our suffering outside the solution we once had that we let slip through our fingers through apathy and disinterest.

We lost our ability to live lives of dignity in the same way we have allowed a Nazi resurgence — through disengagement, apathy, and indifference.

The rich are becoming richer, and the poor are becoming ever poorer because we have allowed this to happen.

We don’t need to adopt a new system to fix what’s broken.

We don’t need to throw out the baby with the bathwater.

We must fix ourselves first and then reassert the mechanisms of control that prevent corrupt powers from further corrupting a balanced system.

We can learn from other systems, borrow ideas from them and adapt them to our needs, but we don’t need to make radical changes — at least, not radical on the level of tearing everything down and rebuilding from scratch.

We have a solid frame for a still functional society that needs only some essential architectural revisions to restore economic justice and make life prosperous for everyone again.

Perhaps the most important lesson we can extract from this historical period is the importance of restraining power. We cannot live in a stable world that permits individuals to possess more power than nations.

In a world of equals, no human is above another, regardless of one’s skills, talents, or capabilities. We are all one as a community, and we must protect the integrity of the community if we wish to ensure individuals can achieve their potential in life. A balance between community and individuality is crucial to achieving our potential because individuals pave the way for communities to follow. In contrast, communities support and enable individuals to leap safely into the unknowns that lead us all to undiscovered territories and achieve greater heights.

Will Trump’s tariffs bring new jobs?

This post is a response to a question posed in its complete format: “Is there any way that these new tariffs by Trump will bring any new jobs in the next 5 years or will they just add more inflation and costs to the US families?”

Let’s assume the plan is to increase jobs in the U.S., such as with increasing aluminum production. That would mean Trump would now be in the middle of discussions on that issue, if not initiating plans for increased energy production through hydroelectricity. Plans would be on the table for the development of dams that can serve to replace Canada’s aluminum production.

Why has there been no discussion?

Are there even any sites in the U.S that can compete with Canadian dams?

Why have there been no feasibility studies?

Why has there been no discussion about addressing the increased costs of tariffed products?

Everything about Trump can be described as a knee-jerk response from a bully. He consistently behaves like a childish bully who is used to people capitulating to his demands.

When Canada and the European Union discuss developing their trade relationships, he threatens to escalate his tariffs.

That doesn’t sound very forward-thinking to me. Does that sound like strategic thinking to you?

How does he intend to compensate for the burdens he’s been placing on the working class?

Oh… that’s right, he and Musk have been talking about how an allegedly short restraint would benefit the American people because they’ve become too complacent in their luxuries as their quality of life tanks and life expectancy shrinks.

The harsh reality is that the American people are being played for suckers by the wealthy class for who a bit of belt tightening isn’t a threat to their lives. Belt-tightening for them barely registers as cutting back on options for the new nested doll yacht purchase and cutting back on staff to maintain it on their behalf.

They won’t feel the pain of the inevitable recession he’s causing. Many are likely looking forward to it as an opportunity to invest in business purchases for fire sale prices.

How anyone may parse his decisions, they can’t avoid concluding that he intends to benefit the wealthy at the expense of the working class.

That’s the core goal of Project 2025 and the Dark Enlightenment group as they reduce the nation to a two-class system of rulers and serfs.

He doesn’t care about your jobs.

He already knows his buddy Elon will replace many jobs with intelligent robots. The little people will become even less substantial and be viewed as more of an unwanted burden.

The more he can eliminate from the bottom of the economic hierarchy, the more he can upgrade his toilets from gold to platinum.

How can we have infinite growth on a finite planet?

This post is a response to a question initially posed on Quora, and can also be accessed via “https://www.quora.com/How-can-we-have-infinite-growth-on-a-finite-planet/answer/Antonio-Amaral-1“

It’s not possible.

We have two options for maintaining growth, and one isn’t so much about preserving growth as it is about shifting to new growth areas through a lifecycle management strategy.

The (conceptually) simple model (but prohibitively expensive strategy) for unlimited growth is expanding to an extraterrestrial existence where we can justify an ever-expanding population and theoretical market.

This strategy, however, is not as linear as some may want to make it out to be. Sure, movies filmed on Earth will be consumed by lunar, asteroidal, and Martian colonies, theoretically supporting unlimited growth in those niches. Entirely different markets, however, will need to be created to meet the needs of off-planet living.

Massive resources will have to be shifted toward small markets, making products prohibitively expensive in ways that restrict extraterrestrial expansion.

For example, bone density loss is a dramatic medical issue for an off-planet existence. About one to two percent of bone loss occurs monthly in space, whereas that figure applies to an annual bone density loss for people of advanced age on Earth.

That’s a dramatic biological hurdle to overcome and represents a tiny issue in the vast array of issues humans would have to overcome to sustain off-planet colonies. Making matters more complicated is that colonists face different biological challenges in each environment, from asteroids to lunar to Martian to Venusian cloud colonies.

Adaptation to each environment represents significant investments in biological issues, while the simplest solution is to transition humans from biological to mechanical forms. Convert humans into cyborgs.

Suppose people struggle with tattoos and body modifications today. In that case, one can imagine the sociological implications of leaving our humanity behind to live in a desolate environment without a healing embrace of nature.

So much for option one of unlimited growth.

Option two is riding the wave of technological change and managing technology lifecycles. Unlimited market growth would be achieved by pivoting from end-of-cycle industries to emerging industries that supplant them.

It would be like planning an economy around growing an industry that creates old-style typewriters with an expected lifecycle while anticipating the advent of electronic typewriters with a finite lifecycle that anticipates computers, etc., while hopping from one end-of-cycle industry to another emerging sector.

This is problematic for two reasons, one is that it would be impossible to anticipate computers while still at the stage of an Underwood Typewriter. At that stage, anticipating IBM Selectrics might be possible because that’s a linear progression of technology.

The advent of computers, however, was an unpredictable and utterly disruptive technology.

That’s where we’re at with AI. We have no idea where it will take us, nor how its integration into other technologies like robotics will transform the marketplace.

Unpredictability is also a significant issue in the energy sector because we have many options. Many are in the early stages of implementation with evolutionary hurdles to overcome. Many are in a nascent development stage that shows promise but are still not ready for commercial applications at any scale. We also have high hopes for transformative breakthroughs like fusion energy, for which we don’t know when we will achieve viability.

All this makes planning a perpetually growing economy much like lassoing and riding a tornado like a bucking bronco.

The second and more challenging reason this is problematic is that it doesn’t involve logistics but politics. We can see how that dysfunctionality fails to work in today’s world. The fossil fuel industry is well aware of the environmental damage it does, and how much of a threat it is to biological life on this planet. Yet, no significant energy organizations are spearheading incubation efforts to fund alternative energy initiatives.

They all maximize profits with existing (and predictable) methods while offloading risk to smaller operations they can assess for leveraging a predatory appropriation strategy.

They won’t invest in breakthrough technologies until someone else can achieve market success on their initiative.

Taking this risk put Elon Musk on the global radar of being perceived as a real-life Tony Stark with Tesla Motors.

The reality of today’s world is somewhat predictable on a macro scale in that society is undergoing a massive transformation on fundamental levels.

Dark factories are already springing up where all the production work is automated. On-site work like construction is well on its way to being performed by humanoid and other specialized function robots.

Transportation and delivery industries will also be shedding human labour. Stores and shopping malls may continue existing, but fewer humans will be available for assistance while technological solutions replace humans, even at the cashier level. Shoppers will be able to walk into a store because they’re bored and feel like going for a walk to pick up some coffee and snacks from shelves and walk straight out the door with their products in hand as the store sensors record product information and deduct the cost of the products automatically from one’s account.

All necessary physical services will be performed through automation solutions.

This will radically transform the economy in ways where people will create trade relationships for customized products and services on a more minor scale that focus on developing interpersonal relationships rather than supplying generic consumables.

This will become an era of transformative creativity. People will choose to purchase highly unique rather than mass-produced products for market niches that can be addressed through small-scale production processes.

We will transform from a market economy relying on endless growth into one that balances high-volume generic production and customized artisanal products.

We will have more time to focus on social interaction and community development initiatives (which will positively affect our self-governance efforts). Because survival will no longer depend on a servant relationship with an employer, we will see a more egalitarian society based on a much more valid basis of merit than the subjective favouritism characterizing today’s corrupt autocratic corporate culture.

The notion of infinite growth will naturally recede from priority status to an antiquated model of unsustainable development corroding our social fabric.

Infinite growth will eventually become irrelevant, while sustainability and balance will become priority values.

Why shouldn’t the factory of money just make money to stop poverty?

This post is a response to a question posed in its complete format: “Why shouldn’t the factory of money just make money and deposit a fixed amount into everyone’s account around the world to stop poverty and see what’s going to happen on this Earth?”

There is no “factory of money.”

There is a means of adding value to a raw state measured by money.

Even though we have money printing systems, money doesn’t magically appear from nowhere.

Money isn’t a magical piece of paper without any connection to the reality in which it operates.

Money is a token representing effort.

At its most basic level, money is a metric that determines labour volume, quality, and output.

Each person’s labour adds value to society and is supposed to be reflected in the amount of money each person has.

Money as a concept works exceptionally well as a store of value and a medium of value exchange.

What is screwed up in our economies is that we determine the value of each person’s contributions on largely subjective bases.

For example, there is no way that any executive on the planet works one thousand times harder than their front-line staff. It can be argued that the value of an executive’s labour is higher than that of the janitor, but it is also not one thousand times more valuable per hour.

That’s where the disconnect occurs in society and why poverty is not being solved as a problem even though we produce more than we can consume.

The problem we have been suffering from is due to a deliberate strategy for upward wealth redistribution. We have been lied to when told that the billionaires among us are the job creators. We have been lied to when our economies are structured around a “trickle-down” (and parasitic) economy that shuts down economic growth in favour of growing hoards by the few.

The problem, if the economy were a human circulatory system, is that we have allowed massive deposits of plaque to gum up the works, and it’s now threatening the entire body with systemic shutdown.

We need to clear up the plaque buildup and restore our circulatory system to full functionality — and that’s referred to as “speed of money” in economic terms.

The best way to accomplish that is to provide for the basic needs of all members of a society so that each is empowered to negotiate fair treatment in an environment characterized by abusive mistreatment by employers.

We can’t end poverty by printing magic money. If we try that, we ensure a global collapse due to the stable value of money becoming entirely destabilized. Doing that would send the world’s economies into a tailspin.

We need to reverse the effects of the upward wealth redistribution schemes we’ve allowed ourselves to be conned into adopting, as we have proved we learned nothing from history.

We’ve been here before, and our naivety cost us a world war to learn why making the rich richer at the expense of the poor was terrible.

The best way to make the rich richer is to concentrate on helping the poor become rich through their efforts to better themselves and their lives as they are so motivated. The rich will always benefit, but their benefits are long-term and stable if they invest in the people who make them rich instead of scheming to rip off the little people and pit us all against each other.

This is not rocket science. None of this is a mystery. We have had over a century of direct experience creating the economic problems we are dealing with today and solving these problems.

We could take the long-term route of making unions mandatory. We could restore economic equity in a few decades and start seeing the middle class grow again.

Or, we can institute UBI and dramatically change the dynamics of abuse between those with power and those without almost literally overnight. The additional bonus is that we save a lot of money when dealing with social issues by providing a comprehensive social safety net. We become far more successful in enriching the rich because hundreds of millions of people worldwide can pursue their initiatives and supercharge the capitalist economy with unprecedented levels of innovation, adding an immeasurable amount of value to the economy that would wipe out poverty across the globe much faster than re-empowering unions alone could accomplish.

Temet Nosce

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Why doesn’t the government give everyone 1 million each to save people from poverty?

This post is a response to a question initially posed on Quora, and can also be accessed via “https://www.quora.com/Why-doesn-t-the-government-just-give-everyone-1-million-each-to-save-people-from-poverty/answer/Antonio-Amaral-1“

That’s an utterly ridiculous idea for many reasons. Probably the best example for showing how utterly absurd this idea is is not the devastating impact it would have on the economy.

The best example of why this idea represents a monolithic level of naivety is what happens when people win lotteries.

Massive lifelong windfalls are often mismanaged because people have no experience managing large sums and overestimate how far that will take them.

It’s much better to adopt the approach the wealthy class adopted with their children.

Providing people with enough to meet their needs until they can manage their affairs intelligently.

If they are responsible and resourceful, they will find they won’t need to rely on their entire inheritance to survive when it becomes available.

We are all part of a system into which we were born and collectively form a social contract by which our cumulative efforts guarantee the health of the whole.

Since we produce more than we consume, society is accountable to all its members to ensure everyone benefits enough to meet their basic needs.

The government should not participate in and create upward wealth redistribution schemes but spread the cumulative wealth to ensure people can survive with dignity.

We are at a point where it is not only feasible but inherently a superior form of economic management than we have in place now.

It will become ever more clear to ever more people as we march headlong in our transition to a fully automated society and entire classes of jobs vanish to be replaced by robots and AI.

Creating a sustainable lifeline gives people the space to be innovative because people are naturally creative problem solvers. Allowing people to determine their life course based on their interests is the quickest and most effective way to motivate them to invent new solutions to innumerable problems we all collectively face daily.

The solution is not a windfall because that is entirely counterproductive and a short-lived benefit with dramatically adverse effects on our economy that would radically increase poverty.

The solution to our economic and social issues is to provide for the basic survival needs determined by Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs.

Food, shelter, clothing, security, and the ability to invest in oneself to build a future with dignity for oneself and one’s family.

Most people’s needs are modest and don’t require a radical sum of money to transform their lives without effort magically.

Most people rise to the challenge of building a better life if they can access systems instead of being barred from access because of prohibitive costs.

For example, instead of giving away money to drain into a sinkhole, provide free access to education, and people will take advantage of that to create better opportunities for themselves on their own and without any prodding.

The difference between thinking of supportive solutions and cynical solutions like this question is between a disparagingly misanthropic view of humanity and one’s neighbours and a caring and supportive view of one’s fellow citizens as human beings simply trying to live their best lives.

The sooner we can cure ourselves of this wholly destructive attitude toward each other that we have allowed to fester and grow in society, the sooner we can progress in making this a better world for everyone.

This wholly cynical view of humanity is cultivated mainly within the MAGAt crowd. It is deliberately cultivated by a small percentage of sociopathic billionaires who routinely dehumanize people and pit us all against each other so they can continue stripping us all of our dignity while ripping us off by the tens of trillions of dollars to send us into poverty and destitution while they laugh at our misery.

Why has the UK’s economy grown so slowly under the Tories?

This post is a response to a question initially posed on Quora.

lol… but not lol

It’s sad.

It’s frustrating.

It’s maddening.

It’s a bang your head against the wall to relieve the pain of blind ignorance kind of thing.

It seems that no matter where one travels on this tiny blue pearl adrift in a lightless ocean, one universal constant that science does not accommodate is the obliviousness demonstrated toward a long and less than venerated history of fiscal incompetence by those branding themselves as fiscally competent by virtue of their propensity for preservation.

As the old adage goes, “It takes money to make money,” while the CONs among us lack the spine to explore beyond their survival instincts, which favour hoarding among the favoured class.

It’s always the little people who get stuck with the honourable burden of austerity, never the luxury recliner class. They deserve their effetes, after all, because they are superior to the little people. That’s why they’re considered “royalty,” and by God’s good graces, they have a divine Reich to rule.

They should not be expected to lift heavy fingers to make manifest a reality catering to their sensibilities. That’s what the little people are for.

The little people are the beasts of burden by divine decree, and no one should ever question that wizdumb.

Conservatives are fiscally conservative, and that makes them better money managers than the swarthy class, which demands to be paid for the value they contribute to society and the luxuries of the pampered class.

If the uncouth class manages power, then debts and deficits will be deemed horrendous failures in leadership. If they hold the keys to the halls of power, then debts and deficits are a feature, not a bug.

If the tree-hugging barbarians wish to spread the wealth around to their peers, that’s a grievous violation of overreach for which they must be punished. The trillions in wealth generated by the sweat of hundreds of millions of brows rightfully belongs to their natural rulers.

When they Reichfully sit upon their thrones, then they are empowered by the lard almighty to share it with their peers, and if it so happens that one of them over-indulges, they are permitted to trickle down the excess to the wanton waifs beneath them. They must be careful, however, not to release too much of a flood because that would embarrass their peers by revealing the extent of their gluttonous obscenities.

They cannot afford that sort of smear to their optics because that would incite the little people into another of their tizzies to make heads literally roll.

No one wants any more cake. It’s too disruptive to their digestion.

At any rate, their inability to peer past their navels and acknowledge themselves as members of the same species as the rabble they exploit into early graves makes it impossible for them to notice opportunity when it knocks on their over-filled bladders.

They would rather piss into their chamber pots than allow any of their precious golden treasure to be used to elevate the lot of humanity.

If they did that, they would soon run out of heads to trod upon and lose track of who was a worthy peer by birth or an anomaly by self-made fortune.

If this seems a bit cynical, it’s because it is quite cynical toward a movement that has steadily reversed the course of capitalism to raise a world out of poverty by weaponizing it as a means of establishing power. The economy belongs to everyone while our systems undergo a consolidation of power that has historically been the cause of systemic collapse and widespread chaos.

In the words of economist Dean Baker,

The market is just a tool, and in fact a very useful one. It makes no more sense to lash out against markets than to lash out against the wheel. The reality is that conservatives have been quite actively using the power of the government to shape market outcomes in ways that redistribute income upward. However, conservatives have been clever enough to not own up to their role in this process, pretending all along that everything is just the natural working of the market. And, progressives have been foolish enough to go along with this view.

The economy should serve the social contract, not subjugate it while Conservative politics the world around have never quite accepted the reality that we are, all of us, in this together. A successful and prosperous future requires a mindset that accommodates all needs, not just those one can personally benefit from. The fundamental difference between the conservative “me” mentality versus the liberal “we” mentality is the cause of poor economic performance. It always has been and it always will be because it constitutes myopic and self-serving thinking favouring power to the few, and not the people at large.