Economic pressures

[Farmhand]

I am also in awe of the work you have put in, it will take me some time to read
the thread.

Thank you.

[Danny B]

Progression

Farmhand, thanks much for the kudos.
In the spring of '05, I got the last of my stuff together and moved from L.A. to Bend, Oregon. I had built a log house there to move into eventually. I left it empty for 15 years and was happy to finally move.
I spent the summer just riding my bike, swimming, lying in the sun and taking if easy. I just happened to run into sites from the gold bugs.

like everything you read, you have to decide if it is valid or not. The things written about the real estate bubble were very convincing. I read a LOT more and decided that I had better get some money together. I was completely convinced where everyone that I talked to thought "maybe".
I stocked up supplies in Bend even though I had moved back to L.A.

I expected the banks to crash in '07. When that didn't happen, I knew that it would be postponed for a while. That gave me more time to prepare but, it also meant that the final climax would be worse. The longer it was postponed, the more worried I became. I finally bought some farmland because Bend, Or has a non-existent growing season.

I had grand plans for the new place near coastal Oregon but, The State completely shut me down. I was going to set things up to where I could help a lot of people. Didn't happen.
I just kept reading and trying to save a few bucks.

If you study the response to the storms Katrina and Sandy, you see that people were given plenty of warning. Those who took the initiative to look out for themselves had a much better chance of survival,,,, GOV gave them warning.
Those who expected someone else to look out for them didn't do so well.
I suspect that this will be a pattern for the future.
There are 10,000 people a day signing up for social-security for the next 19 years. I suspect that the corporatocracy wants to cut it's non-performing assets.
They are also working on reducing the number of people with weak immune systems.
Ted Gunderson - Obama FBI CIA Stop The Death Dumps Now - Chemtrails - YouTube
That should cut down on overhead expenses.

BTW, I went to OZ several years ago and did a coach-camping tour.
Melbourne--- far North Queensland---Darwin---Red Center and back to Melbourne. Yes, I saw it raining on the Rock.
ULURU (Ayers Rock) Australia ~ "Raining On The Rock" - YouTube
No, I don't want to see any more gum trees or termite mounds.
Mt. Isa,,, Oodnadata track,,, Heartbreak Hotel,,, Mataranka hot springs, Surfer's Paradise,,,, Simpson desert,,,sailed the great barrier reef.
I even bought a bottle of XXXX beer for a horse.

[Danny B]

The business of war

Man started out with Family, clan and tribe. About 350 years ago, the Nation State was "invented". This idea attempted to "stretch" the cooperation of the clan to encompass an entire nation state. The powers-that-be wanted more centralization and power. It hasn't been a good fit in some places. Yugoslavia comes to mind.

There has been ongoing consolidation ever since then. The State created enemies to hold together unions that were unnecessary and un-natural.
The State used constant warfare to keep populations down. Religion was a good tool also to get people to kill others who were not their enemy.

"War is the health of the state," the radical writer Randolph Bourne said"
War is the health of the state
Keep in mind that this was the modus operandi BEFORE birth control.
Everybody was fighting for living space.

Truth is, the Nation-State is generally evil. It's just a bigger form of control mechanisms. The state is aware of this and must constantly provoke or invent new enemies to justify it's continuing existence. The State wants NO end to war.
Without a common enemy, the nation state would lose any reason for existence. GOV is quite clear at admitting this.

http://www.teachpeace.com/Report_from_Iron_Mountain.pdf

GOV is quite clear that peace is NOT an option.
Endless War Is a Feature – Not a Bug – of U.S. Policy | Zero Hedge

Shumpeter came up with the idea that war is great for the economy because it destroys goods that must be replaced.
Joseph Schumpeter, "Creative Destruction"
The parasites can only suck off wealth if WE continue to create it. Should the producers reach a point where they were all generally satisfied with their state in life, they wouldn't go to work every day. The fruits of our labor must be destroyed to keep us hungry and producing.

We should take the bus and / or drive a Prius to conserve oil. The U.S. military is the greatest user of petroleum in the world.
Imagine if the whole country lived like the Amish. NO money for the bankers.
We need ever-bigger wars to Grow the economy. But, GOV preaches conservation.... just for us.

After WW II, the Allies threw a harness onto the defeated, Japan and Germany, and had them work their tails of to produce for us. It was a very sweet arrangement because they invested their profits into U.S. treasury bonds.

Consolidation and control is the never-ending quest of the powers that be.
The destruction of the banks and the nation-state are what we really need.
America needs to revert back to a loose confederation of states.
The downfall of America began with the constitution. The Articles of Confederation were ALL that we needed. The money powers wanted to start building an empire that would be a vassal to England and London bankers.
Thomas Jefferson was sent off to France so that he couldn't stop the constitution.
One of the most intriguing might-have-beens in American History : The Colonial Williamsburg Official History Site
It's all about controlling the slaves.

[Danny B]

U.S. Constitution

I suppose that I should do more to explain my opinion of the Constitution.

"his Constitution provided for the substitution of a popularly elected parliament and president for an unelected king, but it changed nothing regarding their power to tax and legislate. To the contrary, while the English king's power to tax without consent had only been assumed rather than explicitly granted and was thus in dispute,[8] the Constitution explicitly granted this very power to Congress. Furthermore, while kings — in theory, even absolute kings — had not been considered the makers but only the interpreters and executors of preexisting and immutable law, i.e., as judges rather than legislators,[9] the Constitution explicitly vested Congress with the power of legislating, and the president and the Supreme Court with the powers of executing and interpreting such legislated law.[10]

In effect, what the American Constitution did was only this: Instead of a king who regarded colonial America as his private property and the colonists as his tenants, the Constitution put temporary and interchangeable caretakers in charge of the country's monopoly of justice and protection."

On the Impossibility of Limited Government and the Prospects for a Second American Revolution - Hans-Hermann Hoppe - Mises Daily

We revolted against king George over a 4 % tax. We now pay 40%.
The very FIRST battles of the Revolutionary war were fought over attempted gun confiscation at Lexington and concord.

[Danny B]

History of consolidation

This is a long PDF with a LOT of history in it.

http://www.gnosticliberationfront.com/Under_the_Sign_of_the_Scorpion_by_Juri_Lina.pdf

This is a good article talking about Tesla, Mass media and the global brain
The Daily Bell - James Jaeger on Gun Control, Nikola Tesla and the Inevitability of the Internet Reformation

Another article on debt.
"So there we have it, in our “creditopia” world, if debt does not expand, the economy cannot grow and jobs cannot be created"
Guest Post: The US Debt Crisis - How High Will It Go? | Zero Hedge

[Danny B]

GOV spending

ALL systems are competitive except those who can create a monopoly.
GOV is the primary monopoly and has a (mostly) monopoly on force. They would like to have a complete monopoly but, Americans are in no hurry to give up their guns. We don't even claim that guns are exclusively for hunting. We tell GOV that are guns are to be turned on them if the situation warrants.
Suzanna Gratia Hupp explains meaning of 2nd Amendment! - YouTube

The West has spent the last 150 years inventing labor-saving devices and, at the same time,,, trying to keep full employment. Since the private, non-monopoly sector is competitive, it cuts employment rolls as it becomes more efficient.

Since GOV promises to take care of everybody, it must specialize in inefficiency. That's why it must remain a monopoly.

GOV erases 50% of the burden of it's debts by inflating the currency supply.
It has to get this currency into circulation to get the required price inflation from the currency inflation. GOV tries to get equal parts of inflation in both prices and wages. This worked pretty well until the 70s. Because of global competition, GOV was not able to increase wages,,, only commodities.
We got stagflation.

Since we have an increasing exposure to global competition from low-wage producers, GOV can't seem to cause a wage-price spiral. Wages have been flat since about 1970. The one area where GOV can affect wages is in the public sector. At the federal level, GOV overpays millions of lawyers and bureaucrats. America has 4% of the world's population and 50% of the world's lawyers.
51% of Americans rely on a check from GOV. Everyone from welfare people to defense contractors. Those not in the loop are losing ground. Currently, 35% of the income in America is from transfer payments like SS and welfare.
GOV pushes the money into the economy any way it can.

It pushes enormous amounts to the states too. Consider this;

In the state of New Jersey, it costs $ 1,102,235 dollars every year to maintain ONE MILE of 2 lane state highway.
In California, it costs $ 989,472 for every mile of highway.
$440,675 of this is just for administration costs. That is for every mile of 2 lane highway.
In Arkansas, it costs $ 36,489 to maintain one mile of 2 lane state highway.
Yep, the states get federal highway funds.

GOV is able to pump lots of money into the system. BUT, once you start down the credit highway, you have to increase the pile of credit NONSTOP.
That is why GOV is throwing money at wars and boondoggles.
One of the cardinal rules of lending is that you never lend money to be used for basic consumption. GOV is borrowing and printing to pass out money for consumption.

The situation in Europe is somewhat different. The Eurozone bureaucracy was an "overlay" on top of the bloated state bureaucracy. It reduced the GDP of the member countries by 20%. It also made a lot of bureaucrats happy.

In it's efforts to inflate away the debt, increase it's size and pay off as many people as possible, GOV pumps currency into mostly NON-PRODUCTIVE sectors.
Because of regulatory-capture, the non-productive sectors of banks and GOV are awash in capital. The producing sector is starving for capital. The consumer is starving for consumptive power. GOV is busily printing bonds that can only be repaid by taxes from the (almost defunct) productive sector. GOV/banks are starving the goose that lays the golden eggs.

[Danny B]

2 currencies

This is an article about the period of time that America was on the gold standard. The dollar was 42% gold backed but, this proved to be adequate.
This ended in 1914 because the PTB needed a flexible currency to get WW I rolling.

http://www.24hgold.com/english/news-gold-silver-the-world-gold-standard-of-1870-1914-the-most-perfect-monetary-system-ever-created.aspx?article=4174024084G10020&redirect=false&contributor=Nathan+Lewis

This article shows that all the distorted statistics from GOV have distorted the true state of the economy. Investors are starting to catch on and have refused to invest.
Gordon T Long : Global Macro Economic Research

This is a good article talking about all the various leeches who attach themselves to GOV in order to collect a paycheck that they don't deserve.
All the various functionaries, bureaucrats and court-jesters.
Zombie Nation

Automation and low-wage competition have wiped out the job market.
GOV is printing like crazy to keep the economy going. War and war industries are the only thing that is "selling" right now. So, WAR it will be.

There is lots of talk about inflation and hyperinflation. The economy is actually in deflation. The amount printed by the FED is far less that the notional amount that people lost in the previous crash.
The problem at the moment is that the world is shunning the dollar.
After 1944, the dollar was the reserve currency.
After the Korean war, the war-profiteers and the empire builders fired up a war in Viet-Nam. The over-printing that was required to make war destroyed the value of the dollar.

Various countries shunned the dollar.
Since the dollar was no longer a gold currency, Kissinger managed to make it the next best thing. He tied it to oil. All oil had to be purchased with U.S. dollars. This extended the life of the dollar onward from 1971.
Once again, various countries are shunning the dollar. China has set itself up as the oil broker for the world. Most other countries have joined some kind of trade union to get away from dollar trade.

The dollar is being shunned in world trade. This rejection contributes to inflation in America as all those dollars come back.

http://www.24hgold.com/english/news-gold-silver-modern-monetary-theory-and-its-requisite-toolbox.aspx?article=4156415472G10020&redirect=false&contributor=Jesse

At some point the R.O.W. will reject U.S. dollars and America will be forced to use a gold backed currency. The probable outcome is that America will use a gold-backed dollar for foreign trade and a domestic fiat dollar at home. Adrian Salbuchi already wrote about the likelihood of this.
There is much talk about gold confiscation. If GOV can print endless quantities of the domestic currency to buy gold, it doesn't make sense to confiscate gold.
You can bet that there will be laws against exporting gold.

[Danny B]

Understanding Interest

Academia refuses to teach about money. They prefer to leave everybody ignorant. I'll start with the basics.
Rule # 1 to remember;
ALL MONEY STAYS IN THE BANK
A bank does NOT loan out savings. It conjures the money from YOUR signature.
On a good day, A bank conjures $ 10,000 and you pay it back?? with interest.
You're repaying them for a loan of money they never had. This is pretty straightforward to understand.

Suppose that I have 6 fish and you have none. You want to feed your family but the weather is too bad to go out and fish. You need the fish NOW. You want to eat NOW. I give you 3 of my fish on your promise to repay me 4 fish later. I give up on selling or eating me other 3 fish.
I merit the 4th fish because I renounced the profit or nourishment on my original 3. You desperately need my 3 fish. You need them NOW.

This is referred to as a Time Preference I merit the interest because of the time factor. Simple barter rarely involves a time preference. There is no interest. Deferred consumption or deferred profit merits interest.

Back to the banker. He "loans" you money that never existed. It was created by your promise to pay. There is NO time preference on this money.
He did NOT take someone's savings and loan it to you.
This money that he loaned to you at compound interest does NOT carry a time preference. There is no fiscal justification for an interest charge.

There is no real risk factor because the loan is secured by the tangible property that you pledge. As long as the appraisal is correct, the bank can't justify an interest charge to offset possible risk.
A loan from savings could justify an interest charge because of the time preference. A loan from a bank can not justify anything more than a filing fee.

Peer-to-peer lending and crowd-funding use actual savings to fund projects.
Islamic banking is forbidden to charge interest (riba). The bank goes partner with you. They provide the funds and business expertise. You provide ideas and work. You split the profits.
With Islamic banking, the bank is motivated to see you succeed. With Western banking, they are motivated by greed. If you pay off the loan, they gain from the interest. If you fail, they foreclose on the tangible property that secured the loan. They have more to gain when you fail.

You could take out as home loan for $ 100,000 for 30 years. You could pay off about $ 305,000 over a 29 1/2 year period and then go broke. The bank gets your $ 305,000 and they get the home too.

The sub-prime crisis was a push towards socialism.
GOV forced banks to loan to un-qualified people.
This drove the home price way up.
The formation of the sub-prime loans was a guarantee of default.
The forced price inflation was a guarantee of more default.
GOV bought all the loans from the banks.
GOV now owns the mortgages
97% of All U.S. Mortgages are Backed by the Government | Zero Hedge
This was the desired result where GOV owns all the housing.
It's easy when you own a printing press

[Danny B]

Political / economic system

Our economic system is completely dependent on our political system.
If the management is corrupt, the system is corrupt.
The financial powers that run the country have gradually taken over and given us their version of "Brave new world".

"The ruling oligarchs correctly chose the painless, amusement saturated, soft totalitarianism of Huxley’s Brave New World over the fearful, pain inflicting, surveillance state, house of horrors detailed in Orwell’s 1984."

"There is too little cash, too few jobs, too much debt, too many takers, too few makers, too many bankers, too much delusion, and too few resources to sustain the unsustainable. We have entered the end stages of a ravenous locust swarm. The fields have been stripped barren."

"When the men in smoke filled rooms realized their soft totalitarianism was losing its grip on the oblivious, submissive, egoistical, distracted masses, they began phase two of their effort to retain their wealth, power and control. They began to institute Orwellian measures to strike fear into the populace. Their illusion of control is dissipating and they are resorting to force in order to maintain hegemony."

That is where we now find ourselves. "Brave new world" has run it's course.
"1984" is the new operating system.
The Burning Platform

[Danny B]

Gold and leverage

The financial wizards have been piling on leverage on top of leverage in financial instruments. They keep inventing new words to describe the towering, wobbly constructs. CDO squared and re-hypothecation are two of the new creatures. They have tried to do the same with gold and silver.
It's not working so well because gold-bugs catch on too fast.

Gold is supposed to be sold like commodities, NOT like financial instruments.
One of the bullion banks, CME Group admitted at a CFTC hearing that they sell every ounce of gold 100 times.
Since "everybody" doesn't go to the bank and take out all their money, the bullion banks just assumed that "everybody" wouldn't come and take all their gold. It's not working out that way.

"Royal Mint of Canada sold in 2008,,,, over $1 billion worth of gold."
Today, they have a total of $ 100 million on hand. They are the only bullion bank in Canada. They aren't alone in gold ripoffs.
"class action lawsuit filed against Morgan Stanley, which was settled out of court, in which it was alleged that Morgan Stanley told clients it was selling
them precious metals that they would own in full and that the company
would store, yet even despite charging storage fees was not in actual possession of the bullion."
The Latest Gold Fraud Bombshell: Canada's Only Bullion Bank Gold Vault Is Practically Empty | Zero Hedge

Bankers and the state HATE gold because it forces discipline. The London Gold Pool was formed years ago to suppress the price of gold. It failed when everybody took their gold away.
There has been a second gold "Pool" formed and it too is failing because people are taking delivery of the gold,,, rather than trusting the banks.
Guest Post: The Failure of the Second London Gold Pool | Zero Hedge

The question of gold confiscation is always in the background. It wouldn't seem likely because GOV can just print currency to buy up the gold.
The gold that the U.S. claims to have on hand is valued at $42.42 an ounce. GOV could easily force people to sell their gold to GOV. GOV could set the price where they want it. They could also outlaw the export of gold. It wouldn't be a big surprise if GOV mandated that everyone sell their gold to GOV for??? $ 100 an ounce.

http://www.24hgold.com/english/news-gold-silver-confiscation-of-gold--then-what-part-5.aspx?article=4176872392G10020&redirect=false&contributor=Julian+D.+W.+Phillips&mk=1

It wouldn't be difficult to install gold/metal detectors in every airport and dock. The best detectors can discriminate and detect from 300 ft. away.
Logan airport already has cash-sniffing dogs.

The central banks tried to completely rid the financial system of gold. They referred to it as a "barbaric relic". Big, Bad, Bald, Ben Bernanke said that America holds on to gold just out of tradition.
The CBs sold off all the gold trying to expunge it from the financial system.
This didn't work and now several are trying to buy it back.
The bullion banks sold every ounce of gold 100 times. Now that people are taking delivery, they are going to run out of gold. This will cause catastrophic losses to 99% of the people who think that they own gold.
This could cause enough of a ripple to crash the system.

The CBs refer to gold as a barbaric relic. The central bank to the central bankers does ALL account settlements in GOLD. The BIS settles all accounts in gold,,, only. This gives you an idea of the actual value that is assigned to gold.
A crash in the precious metals market could bring down the whole system.

[MonsieurM]

Academia refuses to teach about money. They prefer to leave everybody ignorant. I'll start with the basics.


Peer-to-peer lending and crowd-funding use actual savings to fund projects.
Islamic banking is forbidden to charge interest (riba). The bank goes partner with you. They provide the funds and business expertise. You provide ideas and work. You split the profits.
With Islamic banking, the bank is motivated to see you succeed. With Western banking, they are motivated by greed. If you pay off the loan, they gain from the interest. If you fail, they foreclose on the tangible property that secured the loan. They have more to gain when you fail.

you know if you dig a bit deeper , you'll find out that the islamic bank is the remnant of a banking system that existed before the rise of Islam ... and today .... why do you think all the effort is made to tarnish the word Islam .... the subconscious of a nation is a fine tool for The Power that were

“Banks are an almost irresistible attraction for that element of our society which seeks unearned money.”

J. Edgar Hoover

on a side note :

The bank goes partner with you. They provide the funds and business expertise.

the impact of such a policy ...... proximity + job creation + growth of a real productive economy .... as it motivates the bank to help more small businesses rather than just large dinosaur like corporations ..... simple logic no one wants to put all their eggs in the same basket

the irony is that people created the concept of Bank .... today the bank thinks it can do without the People .... typical attitude of tyrants ..... they have learned nothing from history

[Danny B]

Production--consumption cycle

Monsieur M, you make a good point.
The main value-added industries are Manufacturing, agriculture and mining.
Look closely and you'll see one thing in common. They are all "productive".
Now, look at China, India, Brazil and several other emerging countries.
Their economies are centered around EXPORT and not domestic consumption.
That means that there are several hundred million newly employed people producing for the export market. (The West)

Because of global-wage-arbitrage, they undercut the prices in the West.
That means that there are several hundred million newly unemployed people in the West.
The end point for all production is consumption. Both jobs and manufacturing have departed from the West.Rosenberg: Core CapEx Orders Signal Recession - Business Insider
By The Numbers: 20 Facts About The Collapse Of Europe That Everyone Should Know

There are several hundred million wanna-be consumers in the West who are no longer employed producers.
Worldwide productive capacity is going way up. Western consumption is going way down. Investors and industrialists have take note of this.
They refuse to invest in growth when the consumer has lost purchasing power.
Rosenberg: Core CapEx Orders Signal Recession - Business Insider

Seems the bankers have forgotten that all productivity is for the sake of consumption.

There are varying figures but;
It is generally agreed that finance is responsible for 49% of the cost of the average item.
That is 19% for trash collection and 78% for public housing. Average 49%
So, finance charges cause a 100% markup.
Taxes add a heavy burden also.
So, for some other country to compete in our markets, they just need to keep the bankers under control.

The original purpose of banks was to facilitate the productive economy.
Today, the banks control and destroy the productive economy.

[Danny B]

Economic terms

This has good definitions.
Catallactics (Austrian Economics) | IntentionalWorldView.com

Catherine Austin Fitts on the list of current problems, both economic and legal.
Solari | Coming Clean Beyond the Fiscal Cliff

[MonsieurM]

I think the following might interest you :

http://www.sho.com/sho/oliver-stones-untold-history-of-the-united-states/home

ep 2 a commentary by VP Wallace about England

[Danny B]

Eurozone

It didn't play for me. There's always Katie Goodman;
I Didn't F*ck It Up - Katie Goodman of Broad Comedy - YouTube

The CAPEX index shows $ 2 trillion sitting on the sidelines. The bankers are going into overdrive to project happy thoughts to get this money to where they can steal it. Draghi is being deified as the super hero who saved the Eurozone. He did alright,,, he saved the rich.
He told the poor that they were out of luck;
Mario Draghi has saved the rich, now he must save the poor - Telegraph

The Bundesbank is going to announce that they want their gold back. The gold is gone and they are pissed off.
Bundesbank to pull gold from New York and Paris in watershed moment - Telegraph

Manufacturing and employment have died but, that's OK. The bankers are doing alright.
By The Numbers: 20 Facts About The Collapse Of Europe That Everyone Should Know
The Greek stock market has doubled for 2012. Who cares if many are starving?

""Professor Barron has put forward the idea that the only route out of the ongoing euro crisis for Germany is an initial return to the Deutschmark, followed preferably by a subsequent move to a golden Deutschmark." "
Patrick Barron on the eurozone’s future

Employment moved EAST. Changing the money isn't going to fix anything.