I blame Bush and his attitude because it was the philosophy he
supported that removed the necessary controls from the credit market.
There is nothing mysterious or difficult to understand about what
will happen when children are allowed to do anything they want. Many
people pointed out that such a system could not last. The outcome was
so obvious that a person had to wonder about the sanity and honesty of
the players. However, the no-nothing ideologues and the people who
made money fought any change. Now they and the rest of us will pay
the price of this ignorance and greed. The situation is very simple
and does not require deep analysis now that the predicted consequences
have been made clear.
Ed
On Sep 25, 2008, at 2:47 PM, Mike Carrell wrote:
Credit and confidence are essential for the creation of wealth. As
Ed points out credit is needed to buy the menas for future
production, whether of crops or goods. Confidence, or trust, is
essential that the loan will be repaid. Whether implemented by
barter, money, or credit cards, the essential structure is the same.
Wealth is not in the tokensof exchange but in the created goods --
that the farmer can get seed and machinery to harvest the crops
before the harvest occurs. The trap is that money itself can become
a commodity, to be bought and sold without actual labor. One is
again playing with confidence and its opposite, risk. The bank takes
a risk that the loan will not be repaid, and carges a fee, called
interest, for assuming the risk.
In a way we all play the "confidence" game. As FDR said we only need
to fear itself, the loss of confidence, which disrupts the mutual
trust on which commerce depends. The finger of greed points in every
direction. We want more than we give. Wealth is not a matter of how
much we have, but how little we need. A gift of the industrial age
is that essentials for many can be produced by labor of fewer and
fewer. A curse of the industrial age is that fewer and fewer
havethe satisfaction of meaningful contributions to others. Then the
human urges for status play out in trivia.
The global credit system should not be blamed on Bush. It is created
by us all. The system dynamics is so complex that we individually
and collectively do not really understand it, like the weather,
climate, or a Mandelbrot Set. We get aircraft safety by analyzing
crashes. Adjustments and controls will be necessary to recover fromt
the present situation without choking off the dynamics of the
creation of wealth.
Fundmentally, it depends on energy, the energy of human
intelligence, and the physical energy to do work of all kinds.
Mike Carrell
----- Original Message ----- From: "Edmund Storms" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
To: <vortex-l@eskimo.com>
Cc: "Edmund Storms" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Thursday, September 25, 2008 2:51 PM
Subject: Re: [Vo]:Do do do doo. Do do do doo...
Actually, credit is essential in an active economy. For example,
suppose I want to start a business making widgets. Before I can
get any income from their sale, I have to buy the machinery and
hire people. This takes money up front, which must be borrowed.
Once again, this is not rocket science. The problem is not the use
of credit, it is the use of too much credit of the wrong kind.
Normally the system is self regulating based on a bank taking
responsibility for the loan and its repayment. This system broke
down because a corrupt system was allow to grow in the US, mainly
by the Bush administration. Again, this is a matter of fact, not
opinion or liberal propaganda. Unless people acknowledge reality,
there is no hope for a correction.
Ed
On Sep 25, 2008, at 12:17 PM, Remi Cornwall wrote:
I asked a friend once: "How do things get their price?"
"The price of something is whatever someone is prepared to pay
for it."
A false economy of credit is a house of cards. To me, in my
simple way of
thinking, money must ultimately come down to some form of barter
for labour
or resources.
I just have the feeling that there are too many parasites,
speculators,
lifestyle gurus, interior designers, flim-flam and not enough
people being
rewarded for real work such as manufacture or agriculture - too
much service
sector.
That bartering provides a means of living on the planet, right,
at its most
fundamental level? I break a leg then I need a medic, I need some
food then
I need a farmer, I need a house then I need a builder. I give
something in
return they decide if they need it or not.
What happens when two pop music starlets need each other? - on a
cruise ship
imagine the cry, "someone is about to suffer a major rhythm
defect, is there
a pop musician in the house?"
In times of economic collapse people barter skills or cigarettes.
There's then a whole level of life's luxuries that we are willing
to pay for
- trans fatty acid cream buns, big SUVS, keeping up with the
neighbours,
sports stars or movie stars that inherently have no value.
Therein lies the problem of credit card applications dropping on the
doormat.
-----Original Message-----
From: OrionWorks [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: 25 September 2008 18:52
To: vortex-l@eskimo.com
Subject: Re: [Vo]:Do do do doo. Do do do doo...
Sobering and provoking thoughts from Remi, Ed, and Terry. Gives me
the
shudders.
I find it curious that the consumer credit card industry doesn't
seem
to have been mentioned in this mess, or perhaps I missed that
aspect.
Considering the huge credit card debt load that our population has
accumulated over the years, the practice of enticing customers to
borrow more and more money to the point that a significant portion
of
the population is now barely capable of making payments on the
principal, I can't help but wonder if that isn't a significant
contributing factor to the mess we are in. I'm constantly receiving
credit card offers in the mail, typically two or three a week. They
only have one goal: To get me in debt with them. Unfortunately, too
many people have done just that. It's absolutely disgusting. I wish
there was better regulation of the industry.
We will pay for this mess.
Answering Remi's prior question, I hold no position in industry or
academia. Walking the talk is a highly subjective matter. Having
done
anything worth recognizing is also a highly subjective matter. And
what good works have I personally done? Also highly subjective. It
would seem that the older I've gotten, the more I've come to a
personal realization that there is so much I don't know, or
understand. But it's a start.
Regards
Steven Vincent Johnson
www.OrionWorks.com
www.zazzle.com/orionworks
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