ok -- On Tue, 28 Jan 2003 17:38:21 OAssoci508 wrote: >DEAR BILL, > >I JUST NOW PRINTED OFF YOUR NOTE AND HAVEN'T LOOKED AT IT YET. I HAVE ONE >LITTLE GRIEVANCE, THOUGH. I DON'T MIND YOUR SHARING THIS WITH THE LIST, BUT >I WOULD LIKE IT SENT INTACT AS I WROTE IT, NOT IN PIECES WITH YOUR ANALYSIS >INTERSPERSED. COULD YOU PLEASE RESEND IT THAT WAY? THANKS. > >ALSO, I HAD ASKED FOR YOUR MAILING ADDRESS, AS I WANTED TO SEND YOU >SOMETHING. DON'T FORGET. > >MICHAEL > ------------------------------------------
Date: Mon, 27 Jan 2003 16:38:29 EST From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [add to address book] Subject: MICHAELLANE To: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] Dear Wally, Vic, and Bill: While I am waiting for Rodney Shakespeare to make a response, I thought I'd write to you three alone. I offered to Wally to help back him up in the discussion group, and he said that what was needed was to clarify the national dividend of social credit from the "second basic income" of Shakespeare's version of binary economics. I believe I did that. In the course of this, two matters came up that I wanted to address just to you three. One was Bill's statement that Douglas's essential observation (i.e., the A+B Theorem) was about the fact the people do not spend all of their income but save and/or invest it. While it is a true observation, I think I can confidently appeal to both Wally and Vic that this is not what gives us the A+B Theorem. The other was the question of setting profit margins. In "The Use of Money" Douglas says that if you just issue more tickets to make up the lack between the purchasing power available and the prices of the goods for same, . . . you get a rise in the prices of articles, . . . because there is nothing to prevent the prices being raised when the sellers find there is more money about. But you can produce exactly the same result by, let us say, halving the price of everything. That is to say, instead of doubling the amount of money on one side, if you halve the price of everything for sale on the other side, you will produce exactly the same result as if you had doubled the money without raising the prices. (p. 15) Now you cannot confidently speak about "halving the price of everything" if at the same time sellers can set the "pre-halved" price at whatever they want. In fact, it makes a mockery of the whole argument, because it would be just as vulnerable to sellers' raising prices as would issuing more tickets. This realization was a breakthrough in my understanding of Douglas, though you might say it should really have been obvious that the "compensated price" and "halving the price" are an abandonment of market prices. The seller gives up his right to charge what the market will bear in return for the advantage of participating in the program. It is a perfectly fair arrangement. Finally, I want to say that if social credit is compatible with market prices, then my entire approach to Rodney Shakespeare was in error. Indeed, I would then have to admit that he is right and that there IS no difference between what he calls a "second basic income" and a national dividend. After I feel I have concluded my assignment with Rodney, I will be unsubscribing to the list. It is an awfully mixed group and seems to scatter my energies too much. In addition, I am online only at work and am becoming uncomfortable receiving so many personal e-mails. I am sure the three of us will continue to correspond. MICHAEL LANE _____________________________________________________________ Get 25MB, POP3, Spam Filtering with LYCOS MAIL PLUS for $19.95/year. http://login.mail.lycos.com/brandPage.shtml?pageId=plus&ref=lmtplus ==^================================================================ This email was sent to: archive@mail-archive.com EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84IaC.bcVIgP.YXJjaGl2 Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] TOPICA - Start your own email discussion group. FREE! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/create/index2.html ==^================================================================
