The most dangerous time since the Civil War

[Galen]

(01-11-2018, 04:12 AM)Kinser79 Wrote:

(01-10-2018, 04:11 PM)pbrower2a Wrote:   Besides, GIs were teaching K-12 as late as 1990, and by 1990, Generation X had started teaching.

GIs were teaching later than that.  My Junior year of High School was 1995-1996.  My English Teacher that year, whose name is unimportant, was a 1920 cohort.  Though she retired at the end of the year.  I must admit that she reluctantly admitted that she preferred my generation in comparison to the previous one as we by that time had largely repudiated the so-called counter-culture.

I am a bit older than you are and the GI's and Silents often looked at us older Xers much like they did the Boomers.  Unless you were there its hard to understand how much the Boomers scared the crap out of everybody and the worry was the Generation X would be just like them or worse.

[Kinser79]

(01-11-2018, 04:44 AM)Galen Wrote:

(01-11-2018, 04:12 AM)Kinser79 Wrote:

(01-10-2018, 04:11 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: 2. The schools had rules. Teaching was to rigid a career to satisfy the peace-love-dope types.

Only partially true.  A surprisingly large number of my teachers were former hippies--which probably goes a long way to explain my hatred of hippies.

I encountered my share of former hippies as teachers and they weren't very good at it.  The older teachers were tended to be better unless they had gotten to the point where they were waiting for the pension check.

Even then the older teachers were still better.

I literally had a Disco Boomer teacher of mine try to convince me that Lord of the Flies was expressly about the human tendency toward brutality, never mind the fact that wars are almost always fought over resources and not out of some perverse sense of prestege--that simply put the boys in the choir simply would never have had to start with and would likely not obtain from fire hardened sticks.

Nevermind the way the island itself is, as described, unlikely to have have the requisite resources to support a breeding population of porcine creatures.  At most the children would revert to a gatherer subsistance living off a combination of fruit and shellfish.  Primitive peoples typically seek out the easy sources of food first before resorting to hunting and that means as a consequence gathering and scavenging.  And that is before we even consider that the human population of the island would likely be halved in a matter of weeks since we're speaking of a tropical island, with exotic fruits, and British children that seem to lack a general method of determining edible plants from toxic ones.

At most I would say that the book, if it describes the human condition at all, merely points out that unless someone takes on a leadership role by some means, means to fill that leadership role will be found and eventually a hierarchy will be established.

[Galen]

(01-11-2018, 05:00 AM)Kinser79 Wrote:

(01-11-2018, 04:44 AM)Galen Wrote:

(01-11-2018, 04:12 AM)Kinser79 Wrote: Only partially true.  A surprisingly large number of my teachers were former hippies--which probably goes a long way to explain my hatred of hippies.

I encountered my share of former hippies as teachers and they weren't very good at it.  The older teachers were tended to be better unless they had gotten to the point where they were waiting for the pension check.

Even then the older teachers were still better.

It was pretty hard to get worse than the Boomers manged but the few that did were put in charge of the stoners who weren't going to learn anything anyway.  Truth is, those few had their own substance abuse problems so there was a certain symmetry there since it was impossible to get rid of them anyway due to the union.

[pbrower2a]

(01-11-2018, 04:12 AM)Kinser79 Wrote:

(01-10-2018, 04:11 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: 1. Generation X did go to school.

Yes, as has every generation since the GIs.  Irrelevant to his point.

But they did go to school, I am not saying that Generation X is as qualitatively well-educated as Boomers or Millennial adults, even though they have the third-highest likelihood of any generation to get post-secondary learning of all prior generations.  Much more than the Lost, decidedly more than the GI's and Silent. They were much less likely (because they had to pay more for education than did GI, Silent, or Boom young adults for their education and were had more pressure to pay off student loans) to get liberal education which has subtle effects upon many adult tasks.  Not learning what was normal for educated adults of other generations, they have been more amenable to the popular culture... and American popular culture is now often reactionary and anti-intellectual. 

If you wonder how a solid liberal-arts education makes one more desirable on the job... one communicates better  (which makes one a better salesman or manager), one recognizes the legitimate needs of subordinates, one has some recognition of the relevance of history, one recognizes one's temporary inadequacies of knowledge when one confronts them, and one is less likely to succumb to primitive desires (material gain and excess, mass low culture, booze and dope, cheap thrills, bureaucratic power, and sexual indulgence).  Hollow people can decide that if they get an adequate bonus or get to keep a plum job that they will dump toxic waste into a stream that feeds the water supply of a city downstream.

Quote:

Quote:2. The schools had rules. Teaching was to rigid a career to satisfy the peace-love-dope types.

Only partially true.  A surprisingly large number of my teachers were former hippies--which probably goes a long way to explain my hatred of hippies.

My sympathy. I noticed a few of those as high-school teachers in the mid-1970s when I was still in high school. GI women were mostly dedicated teachers.

Quote:

Quote:  Besides, GIs were teaching K-12 as late as 1990, and by 1990, Generation X had started teaching.

GIs were teaching later than that.  My Junior year of High School was 1995-1996.  My English Teacher that year, whose name is unimportant, was a 1920 cohort.  Though she retired at the end of the year.  I must admit that she reluctantly admitted that she preferred my generation in comparison to the previous one as we by that time had largely repudiated the so-called counter-culture.

Quote:Of course many Boomers did extend their childhoods into the time in which they should have abandoned such a role (when having children).

At the least I recognize the X students that I have known as a sub teacher as more creative and practical than my Boomer peers as students.

Quote:Or their 60s when they thankfully do not have children.

Asperger's is a genetic fault, and children of people with Asperger's have an abnormally-high chance of being institutionalized for getting a double dose of genetic factors and an autistic culture. It's probably a good thing that I never have had children. I would probably do most things right as a parent.

Quote:

Quote:Teenage parents have been infamously incompetent in parental roles, and adults maintaining teenage behavior into their late 20s  could be similarly awful. As any teacher knows, someone must take the adult role in a classroom, and that is part of the informal but implicit job description.

True but this does not address the reasons why Boomers as a general rule are exceptionally incompetent in parental roles.  I don't think anyone in their right mind can lay the blame for this at the GIs--though I'm sure there are many Boomers here who will try.

"Peace, love, and dope" does not make a good parental role. Suffering for "Employer, Family, God, and Home", as my parents tried to convince me (yes -- be sure to get sentimental for a dreary hick town in the rural Midwest was part of what they tried to inculcate in me, but there are follies against which anyone must rebel) is an adult role, however distressing. But it at least promotes productivity, loyalty, and community. It's the peasant way of thought, and there are worse ways to live for getting along in an inequitable, repressive, and conformist world.

But if hippie types are ultimately inadequate in performing adult functions, Boomer economic elites have been absolutely dreadful. They created a world in which they defined human worth as being most like them -- as in never having endured real hardships in life. Thus the unusually low and rigid glass ceilings... and the treadmill of qualifications for employment in white-collar occupations. Thus the extreme economic hierarchy in American life. Generation X has done far better than Boomers by choosing blue-collar work and starting businesses. (I will fault the Silent for failing to start businesses other than professional practices which generate money but employ few people). Small business used to be commonplace in such areas as banking, retail, and manufacturing. Not only did the Silent fail to start businesses (the biggest job-creator among the Silent was Dave Thomas, founder of Wendy's, a fast-food chain) -- they preferred becoming veterinarians to keeping the small-town store intact when Wal*Mart came to town.

Quote:

Quote:3. There were Boomers who acted 40 when they were teenagers.

So fucking what.  There are always outliers to the main body of the group.  In the main Boomers act and have acted like they were teenagers far longer than is normally acceptable.  Case in point, I often act older than my own mother.  She may have 23 years on me, but she still acts far more childlike than I did when I was a child.  But that could be that old "Old Soul" acting up.  Still not sure if there is any validity to that or if the person who told me that was making shit up on the fly.  I lean toward the latter though.

True. Donald Trump is a paragon of emotional immaturity, and this country is paying a high price for that. When we get through with this mess we will probably react by pushing more civic attitudes in public life and making people less naive about language, character, logical consistency, and economics. That will be so even if America goes in a conservative direction.

Quote:

Quote:Most Boomers took on adult roles when economic reality kicked in... if they wanted to keep participating in the consumer society or when parental support for their Voyages to the Interior came to an end.

This is true only of the working classes and the petty-bourgeoisie.  The Boomer bourgeoisie still goes on "voyages to the interior" from time to time, and do so when the time for that is long past.  Those like Eric (insult redacted) never returned from their voyage, I'm afraid.

The working class and the petty-bourgeoisie still form the majority in any generation, including Boomers. To X and Millennial generations I would have to give the warning that 'voyages to the Interior' are costly and with little payoff. One might focus on something more obviously productive, like animal husbandry or becoming a better waiter -- unglamorous, but necessary roles in any economic order that must produce food. If you hate your job as a convenience-store clerk you are far better off to become a licensed vocational nurse than to toy with Zen Buddhism. The quest for satori might bring bliss to one but to nobody else. Serving what someone considers 'the best hamburger' or 'great meat loaf' is a positive exchange at a very low level.  

But most of us are consigned to low levels in an economic order as crassly materialist as ours. Elites get indulgence, and non-elites get to compete for what the elites do not grab for themselves.

Quote:

Quote:Boomers who have endured economic hardship have been compelled to mature, even if the maturing process began with "Do you want fries with that?"

There are worse things to do with one's life than working at a fast food establishment.  For example one could whine about their parents until the day they died and then grasp at the next convenient excuse for personal failure that came along.

Many people lack the talent for suffering with a smile. Any society that demands such is sick and in need of radical reforms, if not overthrow. 

Quote:

Quote:But the elite Boomers of wealth and bureaucratic power, few of whom had an extended stay in the Voyage to the Interior, have been extremely competent at keeping competition from others at bay while bleeding society of resources that they use for their extreme indulgence.

By and large Boomers with wealth have wealth because they didn't spend extended times on their voyages into the interior.  They spent those years instead making money--which is a noble pursuit (even if I do sometimes wish those boomers would buy their hair dye and skin bronze-er at some place other than dollar general--but lately it seems that that boomer has fired his old makeup person, thank whatever gods that might exist).  Those with bureaucratic power sought elected offices over voyages into the interior.  Both are at the extreme end of competency for the generation.  Most boomers are not nearly that competent.

...Hair dye? I used to have the sort of hair color that many women would kill for -- naturally-auburn roots, but blond-frosted on top. Bronzing? I try to avoid sunburn.  I admit to my age.

The money that Boomer elites have made can be in rentier activities as Donald Trump does (he is basically a rent-collector whop exploits scarcity that he tries to keep intact) or as the executive elite, which functions much like the Soviet nomenklatura by taking what it can and ensuring that there be no competition for its privileged role in corporate, and now even government and non-profit bureaucracies. Such people do not so much create wealth as grab it. Those Boomers who have done genuine innovation or creative activity are gems.

With leadership like that of Donald Judas Trump we are at best likely to have an economic meltdown like that of 1929-1932 that rips the scabs off festering wounds. As was the case with the 1929-1932 meltdown, Americans will want something better.  That means leadership that respects people instead of elite wealth and power -- because elite wealth and power have offered no security to most people. Protection of that wealth and power at the expense of everyone else will create a pre-revolutionary scenario. Another possibility is that America morphs into an Evil Empire that seeks to expand its nastiness where such is unwelcome, much like the fascistic Axis Powers in the last Crisis Era.  It may be ironic, but Germany, Italy, and Japan now have better measures of social equity and formal democracy than the US today.  Should America become a monstrous "Evil Empire" and start wars to spread inequity and subjection... then I can imagine some Japanese general imposing a MacArthur-style regency upon much of the western United States from the finest surviving hotel in the San Francisco Bay Area (Greater LA, San Diego, Phoenix, Albuquerque, El Paso, San Antonio, and perhaps Houston revert to Mexico). I can imagine some German Feldmarschall  as an overlord with offices in the finest hotel in New York City, a city jokingly referred to at times as "New-Berlin".  Figuring that a liberal Brazil would be an occupier, I can just imagine how life changes in the American Southeast. Cities like Atlanta, Charlotte, and Memphis might have some impressive Carnivals.   Unlike Mardi Gras in New Orleans, the style will be more Brazilian than French.

The question is whether America will repudiate or consolidate an authoritarian, inequitable, ultra-nationalist order. If we repudiate the despotic style of Trump and revert to a sober liberalism, we will do fine. But let America delve into the single-party, militaristic authoritarianism that Trump and his financial backers support, and we  might have cities that resemble Hamburg, Dresden, Warsaw, Hiroshima, or Nagasaki at the end of the last Crisis Era. America becomes partitioned into strange new entities (the rest of the world could tolerate America as a Great Power so long as it was the least objectionable of Great Powers) and for a while "American" becomes a title of shame.

That is not a question. That is THE QUESTION, the only one that can matter after only personal survival. Elites culpable in crimes against humanity will endure great punishment -- at best for them, mere dispossession and impoverishment, and at worst either life imprisonment or execution.

[David Horn]

(01-11-2018, 03:44 AM)Kinser79 Wrote: I will not argue that each generation is the product of its parent generation.  Such is the very basis of S&H theory, Generational Dynamics and even my own theories.  What I was pointing out was that Boomers in particular take time out to lay blame at the GIs whereas in general Xers and Millies are far more likely to simply say "Boomers are fucking stupid lets do something different". 

Oh yeah. that's really different isn't it?

Kinser79 Wrote:The "Great Prosperity" was not helped by the oil shocks to be sure.  However, I see you're conviently forgetting LBJ's experiment in conducting an economy on the basis of both guns and butter during the 1960s which required the debacement of the currency twice (in 1965 with the withrawl of silver, and in 1973 with the closure of the gold window).  Both didn't happen because LBJ or Nixion got a strange bug up their ass--they were required because the US was running short of both gold and silver because everyone else could see the absurdity of these policies.

Aren't you the MMT guy? You should be glad that we finally cut the currency loose for good.

Kinser79 Wrote:At current Saudi Arabia and most of OPEC are only passfied by keeping oil accounts in USD (just like Gulf War II was caused by Saddam Hussein wanting to price oil in Euro), but that might not always be the case.  Iran is already selling oil in gold, Rupee and RMB.  Russia is openly selling gas in Rubles or Gold taking USD as a third option only (which has essentially lifted the sanctions against them already--only the US is still maintaining them, and there import substitution is addressing the problem).  I can't really blame the Europeans either, they have a colder climate and in winter the heat being on is quite nice.

Is there a point here?

Kinser79 Wrote:That being said, I see you're ignoring the fact that baring inflating the currency, the state only can obtain money to provide social services (including war) at the expense of the private sector.  Hence why the Trump Tax Reform spells disaster for the Dims come poll time this year--and that is before we even address their baked in weaknesses and the chaos that their party is in.

Sorry, but the economy is not and never has been a zero-sum game. We just flooded the market with Trillions of dollars, and no inflation. Everything in the economic realm is situational.

Kinser79 Wrote:After all it took the entire lamestream media, focusing on a special election in Alabama to get a Dim in, and he managed to just squeak in.  The whole House and a Third of the Senate are up in the Mid-terms.  Also the national polls are skewed.  State by state polls are far more accurate.

Yeah, sure.

[Kinser79]

(01-11-2018, 04:23 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(01-11-2018, 03:44 AM)Kinser79 Wrote: I will not argue that each generation is the product of its parent generation.  Such is the very basis of S&H theory, Generational Dynamics and even my own theories.  What I was pointing out was that Boomers in particular take time out to lay blame at the GIs whereas in general Xers and Millies are far more likely to simply say "Boomers are fucking stupid lets do something different". 

Oh yeah. that's really different isn't it?

Actually it is. I don't hear either my generation or the Millies complaining about what Boomers have done. They are mostly too busy having to reinvent the wheel because you guys broke the old one. Boomers on the other hand are still living out their "fuck you dad" ideology in their 60s and it is to be quite frank, embarrassing.

Quote:

Kinser79 Wrote:The "Great Prosperity" was not helped by the oil shocks to be sure.  However, I see you're conviently forgetting LBJ's experiment in conducting an economy on the basis of both guns and butter during the 1960s which required the debacement of the currency twice (in 1965 with the withrawl of silver, and in 1973 with the closure of the gold window).  Both didn't happen because LBJ or Nixion got a strange bug up their ass--they were required because the US was running short of both gold and silver because everyone else could see the absurdity of these policies.

Aren't you the MMT guy? You should be glad that we finally cut the currency loose for good.

No, that is Playwrite (or as as I often call him Playdude). When I was in the final stages of Marxism I thought MMT might be a vehicle to "evolve" into a socialist paradigm because a combination of inflation and taxation would eradicate the bourgeoisie. However, reality seems to indicate that all MMT ultimately accomplishes is the blowing up of asset bubbles. Again proving that the Austrians have the best economic theories.

Theory is only useful to the extent that it explains reality.

Quote:

Kinser79 Wrote:At current Saudi Arabia and most of OPEC are only passfied by keeping oil accounts in USD (just like Gulf War II was caused by Saddam Hussein wanting to price oil in Euro), but that might not always be the case.  Iran is already selling oil in gold, Rupee and RMB.  Russia is openly selling gas in Rubles or Gold taking USD as a third option only (which has essentially lifted the sanctions against them already--only the US is still maintaining them, and there import substitution is addressing the problem).  I can't really blame the Europeans either, they have a colder climate and in winter the heat being on is quite nice.

Is there a point here?

Yes. Both Galin and I have mentioned numerous times that the petrodollar can, will and eventually must end.

Quote:

Kinser79 Wrote:That being said, I see you're ignoring the fact that baring inflating the currency, the state only can obtain money to provide social services (including war) at the expense of the private sector.  Hence why the Trump Tax Reform spells disaster for the Dims come poll time this year--and that is before we even address their baked in weaknesses and the chaos that their party is in.

Sorry, but the economy is not and never has been a zero-sum game. We just flooded the market with Trillions of dollars, and no inflation. Everything in the economic realm is situational.

There isn't inflation yet. Right now, most of that flood is churning around in the stock market. An increase in the money supply without an increase in the total number of goods necessitates that inflation will occur. That being said I do not expect inflation to occur until sometime around 2024 at the earliest. After all the last time dollars flooded in it took the greater part of a decade to reach the street and cause the stagflation you've indicated you feared.

Quote:

Kinser79 Wrote:After all it took the entire lamestream media, focusing on a special election in Alabama to get a Dim in, and he managed to just squeak in.  The whole House and a Third of the Senate are up in the Mid-terms.  Also the national polls are skewed.  State by state polls are far more accurate.

Yeah, sure.

[/quote]

I've made my prediction. I'm not alone in that prediction. I fully expect once the tax reform is fully implemented that the President's popularity will increase and that the GOP will reap the rewards and GOP challengers in particular will likely be Trumpites. My hope is that this announces a long term trend of the Neo-Cons migrating back to the Dimocrat Party from whence they came.

[Kinser79]

(01-11-2018, 01:05 PM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(01-11-2018, 04:12 AM)Kinser79 Wrote:

(01-10-2018, 04:11 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: 1. Generation X did go to school.

Yes, as has every generation since the GIs.  Irrelevant to his point.

But they did go to school, I am not saying that Generation X is as qualitatively well-educated as Boomers or Millennial adults, even though they have the third-highest likelihood of any generation to get post-secondary learning of all prior generations.  Much more than the Lost, decidedly more than the GI's and Silent. They were much less likely (because they had to pay more for education than did GI, Silent, or Boom young adults for their education and were had more pressure to pay off student loans) to get liberal education which has subtle effects upon many adult tasks.  Not learning what was normal for educated adults of other generations, they have been more amenable to the popular culture... and American popular culture is now often reactionary and anti-intellectual. 

I would like to know what popular culture you're consuming if you think it to be reactionary. I'll give you anti-intellectual as the Left also wants people to not think either. After all, if one actually thought about reality they would understand that BLM* is a terrorist organization, and that racism if it exists at all these days is clearly anti-white.

*Note: For those particularly dense Boomers here that BLM stands for the group that styles itself as "Black Lives Matter" which is really good at starting riots wherein black people kill each other in numbers far higher in one incident, than have been killed by police officers of other races over the course of decades. Because statistics be all rayciss and sheeit.

Quote:If you wonder how a solid liberal-arts education makes one more desirable on the job... one communicates better (which makes one a better salesman or manager) 

I take it then that you've never hired anyone in your life. I hire people every week. I see a liberal arts degree and see someone who wasted their money and time at a university.

Quote:, one recognizes the legitimate needs of subordinates, one has some recognition of the relevance of history, one recognizes one's temporary inadequacies of knowledge when one confronts them, and one is less likely to succumb to primitive desires (material gain and excess, mass low culture, booze and dope, cheap thrills, bureaucratic power, and sexual indulgence).

A liberal arts degree indicates none of that. A liberal arts degree indicates that you went to a college somewhere, and spent a bunch of money to get a degree that does not really qualify you for anything. I'm not saying that having some people so educated is undesirable, but the fact remains that for most things in the economy being educated beyond basic high school reading is unnecessary. If anything the problem with Millenials is that they are over educated and are now carrying massive loads of debt.

As for "succumbing to primitive desires" you're simply wrong. I've met people who had no connection to those desires who hadn't finished the eighth grade, and persons who had PHDs who actively pursued all of those. Having a piece of paper from this or that educational institution tells me nothing about a person's moral fiber. At one point in time having a degree could tell me something about a person's intellect--since IQ tests were banned as a method of applicant screening. I am allowed to use personality tests to screen applicants but I find that most that are used by employers are easily manipulated by someone with an average intelligence to come off on the tests as being like someone they are not. This is a unintended consequence of a decision by the courts in the 1970s.

Quote:  Hollow people can decide that if they get an adequate bonus or get to keep a plum job that they will dump toxic waste into a stream that feeds the water supply of a city downstream.

Well read people would do the same in a situation wherein they have a plum job. Some may even convince themselves that doing so is actually improving the health of others. After all fluoridation of public drinking water supplies, in the localities that still do that bullshit, typically use Hydrofluoric Acid instead of fluoridated calcium. Hydrofluoric Acid is generally understood to be a toxic substance.

The number and types of degrees a person has, nor their intellect tells us anything about their moral fiber. In fact the higher the intelligence, the more likely one is able to fool themselves that doing something that is objectively wrong, is subjectively right. Why? Because persons with higher intelligence have a tendency to be able to make rational sounding arguments for their point of view.

Quote:I would probably do most things right as a parent.

I would say that that is a groundless assertion. By and large there are two strategies that neuro-typical adults apply when rasing their own children. 1. They copy the behavior that their parents used with them with situational modifications, 2. They do the inverse of the behavior that their parents used on them with situational modifications. In neither case is that doing "most things right as a parent".

Children unfortunately do not come with a user manual, are incredibly easy to mess up, and eventually will have the physical strength to attack you. Kind of like a super smart American Staffordshire Terrier puppy that will live on average 70 years. Since I know you have a fear of dogs I picked that example to drive my point home.

Quote:But if hippie types are ultimately inadequate in performing adult functions, Boomer economic elites have been absolutely dreadful. They created a world in which they defined human worth as being most like them -- as in never having endured real hardships in life. Thus the unusually low and rigid glass ceilings... and the treadmill of qualifications for employment in white-collar occupations. Thus the extreme economic hierarchy in American life. Generation X has done far better than Boomers by choosing blue-collar work and starting businesses.

I'm not going to debate with you over your grievances (if there are any real grievances) with your parents. I've done so elsewhere and my positions have not changed as no new information has been presented.

The hippie types if they are employed at all typically end up working for the state. Teaching is a popular choice for them, and they are by and large dreadful at it. I will of course admit that I'm biased having had former hippie teachers myself and being acquainted with the various persons with whom my husband works. (I inevitably get roped into periodic social functions with these people as he has to attend them as well for some reason. I believe it is to save face or something along those lines--he's as miserable around these people as I am and would rather spend an evening grading papers [a task he hates--and one of the reasons he never assigns homework grading based on tests and quizes instead] or smashing his fingers in a car door than be around them longer than absolutely necessary.)

The treadmill of qualifications is an unfortunate consequence of a court ruling that prohibited IQ testing in hiring. Over the course of time the elites of all generations (not just Boomers but they implemented it to the fullest extent lacking by and large experience from before that ruling) it was determined--wrongly--that collections of degrees from educational institutions was the best method by which to determine if someone had the required intelligence to perform a task. It is an understatement to say that this system is imperfect.

I would say that Xers by and large in that they pursued other avenues of success such as the trades, skilled labor (like myself) or entrepreneurship have been successful to escape the rat maze that was constructed for them. Millennials have been less successful in this, but they also largely had Boomer parents who were and still are largely ignorant of the world preferring their own opinions derived from their voyage to the interior. Zeds with Xer parents seem to be more inclined toward the trades, skilled labor and entrepreneurship finding that university degrees and that rat race require either spending most of their life in debt serfdom or having rich parents.

Quote:(I will fault the Silent for failing to start businesses other than professional practices which generate money but employ few people). Small business used to be commonplace in such areas as banking, retail, and manufacturing. Not only did the Silent fail to start businesses (the biggest job-creator among the Silent was Dave Thomas, founder of Wendy's, a fast-food chain) -- they preferred becoming veterinarians to keeping the small-town store intact when Wal*Mart came to town.

I would say that the Silents faced a social situation that is unlike what is faced today. During the last 4T if you had a job at the local factory you could support the family, during the 1T one could support a family on just about any job. They didn't feel the need to start their own businesses when they could be comfortable enough working for others.

That said, I do like Wendy's. I'm a big fan of their salads.

Quote:True. Donald Trump is a paragon of emotional immaturity, and this country is paying a high price for that.

A roaring stock market, rising bitcoin and gold prices, and full employment are acceptable prices to pay for the president having a bad haircut and wearing cheap bronzer. As to his emotional immaturity--I'm convinced that is fake news. No one ever mentioned it before he decided to run for president and I've not noticed him being substantially different now than he was say ten years ago. (Which is hardly surprising for a man in his 70s.)

Indeed the latest job figures have the unemployment rate ticking up but a lot of that is people leaving current jobs for better jobs. I say further restrictions on immigration and we can get everyone off welfare and have unemployment at rates that haven't been seen since the Great Prosperity.

Quote: When we get through with this mess we will probably react by pushing more civic attitudes in public life and making people less naive about language, character, logical consistency, and economics. That will be so even if America goes in a conservative direction.

When we are "through with this mess", Boomer neo-liberalism and Neo-conservatism will both be dead. PC culture will be dead. There will be a more civic attitude but it will be driven by nationalism and people will be less ignorant about the fact that nations live and die on the basis of Borders, Language, and Culture. The right will be ascendant until the next 2T at least. I'm hoping for a nice long 1T to enjoy my old age in.

Quote:The working class and the petty-bourgeoisie still form the majority in any generation, including Boomers. To X and Millennial generations I would have to give the warning that 'voyages to the Interior' are costly and with little payoff.

As to point one, that is not an argument. As to point two, X already understands that intimately. In general unless one is part of an adaptive generation people don't go on such voyages in middle age. Hence why I'm warning my son, my niece and nephew about those things now. While there is debate as to if my son is a Zed my niece and nephew certainly are.

Idealist generations have the luxury of having a 2T in their youth and thus can have such a voyage while the stakes of having one are relatively low. That being said, I have no hope of having an influence on the generation that comes after Zed.

Quote: One might focus on something more obviously productive, like animal husbandry or becoming a better waiter -- unglamorous, but necessary roles in any economic order that must produce food.

There is a movement of some Millies and Xers to a lesser extent away from the cities and to rural environments. Some of it is crunchy environmental clap-trap, some of it is just being tired of the rat race.

http://www.returnofkings.com/139722/youn...o-the-land

Quote:Serving what someone considers 'the best hamburger' or 'great meat loaf' is a positive exchange at a very low level.

Hence why my Dunkin makes more money than any of the others in the local franchise. I push serving the freshest sandwiches, the most perfectly brewed coffee, and the presentation of the donuts must be exquisite (one of the reason why most of my overnight finishers are Aspies).  

Quote:But most of us are consigned to low levels in an economic order as crassly materialist as ours. Elites get indulgence, and non-elites get to compete for what the elites do not grab for themselves.

Only if one insists on working within the system as it exists. Going around it, one even at a low level in the economic order can find a modicum of happiness. I certainly find enjoyment in my economic role, so does my son. We are both blue collar though. My husband does not but I don't think he'd be happier doing anything else. He'd miss the kids--his misery is related to incompetent colleagues and bureaucracy but such is the nature of being employed by the state.

Quote:Many people lack the talent for suffering with a smile. Any society that demands such is sick and in need of radical reforms, if not overthrow. 

Or they could get a job at a warehouse where smiling whilst "suffering" is not required. I think that Boomers in particular suffer from a delusion that people are supposed to have fun at their place of work. Such, if it occurs at all, is a bonus not a requirement. Hence why work is called "work" and not called "happy fun-time". But I think letting Red Foreman handle this is appropate.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aXrwjLahUdw

Quote:...Hair dye? I used to have the sort of hair color that many women would kill for

Key phrase there, used to. As I'm graying now if I didn't shave that hair off, I'd probably dye it. As it stands shaving makes more sense since I have more than a little male pattern baldness, and the health department prefers males in the food service industry clean shaven.

Quote:Bronzing? I try to avoid sunburn.

Well at least I know for a fact now that you are heterosexual. I you had claimed otherwise I'd have to pull your fag card for not knowing that bronzer is a cosmetic used to make lighter skinned people appear more tanned and has nothing to do with radiation burns caused by excessive UV light (AKA sunburn).

Being black it is hard for me to get sunburned, but I have before. It is not an experience I wish to repeat.

Quote:  I admit to my age.

Good for you. I do too--mostly because I don't bother to lie about it..

Quote:The money that Boomer elites have made can be in rentier activities as Donald Trump does (he is basically a rent-collector whop exploits scarcity that he tries to keep intact) or as the executive elite, which functions much like the Soviet nomenklatura by taking what it can and ensuring that there be no competition for its privileged role in corporate, and now even government and non-profit bureaucracies. Such people do not so much create wealth as grab it. Those Boomers who have done genuine innovation or creative activity are gems.

This merely demonstrates that you don't understand what Donald Trump did in the private sector. As a real estate developer he built and owned many buildings. Did he have renters? Sure. Renting property for others to use is a net positive for society and the economy. Also if people who rented from Trump didn't like his rents, they could go and rent from somewhere else. There is no monopoly on rental property in the US.

The boomers ho have caused genuine innovation or creative activity are about as rare as gems I agree...they are common place if you know where to look.

I'm not going to bother with the rest of your post because it is the same canned nonsense you've been spouting for years and I've already debunked that elsewhere. A lot of it when I was still a Marxist which indicates you need new material.

[pbrower2a]

(01-12-2018, 10:14 AM)Kinser79 Wrote:

(01-11-2018, 04:23 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(01-11-2018, 03:44 AM)Kinser79 Wrote: I will not argue that each generation is the product of its parent generation.  Such is the very basis of S&H theory, Generational Dynamics and even my own theories.  What I was pointing out was that Boomers in particular take time out to lay blame at the GIs whereas in general Xers and Millies are far more likely to simply say "Boomers are fucking stupid lets do something different". 

Oh yeah. that's really different isn't it?  

Actually it is.  I don't hear either my generation or the Millies complaining about what Boomers have done.  They are mostly too busy having to reinvent the wheel because you guys broke the old one.  Boomers on the other hand are still living out their "fuck you dad" ideology in their 60s and it is to be quite frank, embarrassing.

Because elite Boomers have great power through ownership of assets (inherited from GI and Silent parents) and continue to control the apices of bureaucratic power in bureaucracies of all kinds, and can effectively determine whether people work or starve, they have overwhelming power over anyone low in the hierarchy. To characterize the ethos of the worst generation of heirs and executives ever as "Suffer for my profit, my power, and my privilege, you peon!" is to recognize that they can get away with such. Generation X will not get away with such. Such is the difference between an Idealist and a Reactive generation.

Real progress from the depravity of the Boomer elite will come as people find ways in which to evade the power of Boomer elites. The best thing that those elites can do for America is to fade from power. America will do well enough without them.

Quote:

Quote:

Kinser79 Wrote:The "Great Prosperity" was not helped by the oil shocks to be sure.  However, I see you're conviently forgetting LBJ's experiment in conducting an economy on the basis of both guns and butter during the 1960s which required the debacement of the currency twice (in 1965 with the withrawl of silver, and in 1973 with the closure of the gold window).  Both didn't happen because LBJ or Nixion got a strange bug up their ass--they were required because the US was running short of both gold and silver because everyone else could see the absurdity of these policies.

Aren't you the MMT guy?  You should be glad that we finally cut the currency loose for good.

No, that is Playwrite (or as as I often call him Playdude).  When I was in the final stages of Marxism I thought MMT might be a vehicle to "evolve" into a socialist paradigm because a combination of inflation and taxation would eradicate the bourgeoisie.  However, reality seems to indicate that all MMT ultimately accomplishes is the blowing up of asset bubbles.  Again proving that the Austrians have the best economic theories.

Theory is only useful to the extent that it explains reality.

Sure -- all for the Few, and charity is cruelty. Make the world a jungle, and let the elites, individually each as the tiger who sorts out the least adept deer at escaping his voracious appetite as his prey, make life Hell for anyone not in the elite.

All that surprises me about the Austrian school is that it doesn't revive the idea that people suffer with complete compliance in This World for delights in the Next World or be damned to Hell for any shortcomings.

Quote:

Quote:

Kinser79 Wrote:That being said, I see you're ignoring the fact that baring inflating the currency, the state only can obtain money to provide social services (including war) at the expense of the private sector.  Hence why the Trump Tax Reform spells disaster for the Dims come poll time this year--and that is before we even address their baked in weaknesses and the chaos that their party is in.

Sorry, but the economy is not and never has been a zero-sum game.  We just flooded the market with Trillions of dollars, and no inflation.  Everything in the economic realm is situational.

There isn't inflation yet.  Right now, most of that flood is churning around in the stock market.  An increase in the money supply without an increase in the total number of goods necessitates that inflation will occur.  That being said I do not expect inflation to occur until sometime around 2024 at the earliest.  After all the last time dollars flooded in it took the greater part of a decade to reach the street and cause the stagflation you've indicated you feared.

But there is no shortage of goods. All anyone needs to do to get a consumer cornucopia on the cheap is to go to a Goodwill, Salvation Army, or Society of St. Vincent DePaul to buy the wares of the early-electronic era (except for televisions and computers which they no longer accept). Sure, you will have '90s or '80s stuff... but it is wise to be a late-adopter of technology unless your job depends upon modern technology. 

The flood of money going into the stock market looks like bubble behavior. Bubbles devout assets and turn them into feces. Let's put it this way: I would not be surprised if the reprise of the 1929-1932 meltdown that Obama and Democrats stalled comes back hard and long. Hard and long, as in 1929-1932 as opposed to hard and short as in late 2007 - early 2009 could force Americans to act as if it were the 1930s again in politics (except of course on race and gender).

Quote:

Quote:

Kinser79 Wrote:After all it took the entire lamestream media, focusing on a special election in Alabama to get a Dim in, and he managed to just squeak in.  The whole House and a Third of the Senate are up in the Mid-terms.  Also the national polls are skewed.  State by state polls are far more accurate.

Yeah, sure.

I've made my prediction.  I'm not alone in that prediction.  I fully expect once the tax reform is fully implemented that the President's popularity will increase and that the GOP will reap the rewards and GOP challengers in particular will likely be Trumpites.  My hope is that this announces a long term trend of the Neo-Cons migrating back to the Dimocrat Party from whence they came.
[/quote]

Yes, the election of Doug Jones was something of a freak. Roy Moore was messing around with pretty, underage white girls around the 1970s and 1980s when he was a Democrat. (I am surprised that more people forget that Moore was a Democrat when he was messing with underage girls). He also lamented the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments as having been imposed by force (never mind that the United States imposed major changes in the political systems of Italy, Germany, and Japan by force, too, and few Americans -- or even Germans, Italians, or Japanese -- regret such change). But this is no longer the 1970s and 1980s.

The sexual mores of the middle-to-late 2010s accept homosexuality but now repudiate underage sex and sexual harassment. That contributed to the defeat of a man of sexual evil who ran on 'family values'. But those are not the family values of Southern blacks who are just as conservative on 'family values' as Southern whites. Yes, white evangelicals voted with Moore, largely on issues of identity.

America is becoming more conservative on sexuality. Gays and lesbians gained respectability by repudiating the perverts as vociferously as anyone. By 2030 the norm for Americans will be to marry early and stay married even if it is in a same-sex relationship. That conservative standard will be then seen as progress, or at least decency.

On the other side about Doug Jones -- Donald Trump has lost much of his appeal in the South. He has shown himself as an uncaring d@mnyankee city-slicker, and that is not how to win in the South. I saw patterns in the 2017 Senate election, and Alabama started showing a pattern more typical of North Carolina in recent years than of Alabama in recent years. Jones did well in the more educated, suburban areas even among white people. That is an ill portent for the GOP in such states as Arizona, Georgia, and Texas. With an Obama-like candidate in ideology and temperament, Democrats can finish the job of winning over educated suburbanites in the Deep South, the Mountain South, and the Southwest and win a landslide for President -- and turn some Senate and House seats from R to D.

Donald Trump is indeed uniting America -- in contempt for him. The tax 'reform' (actually a giveaway to the super-rich, with at most transitory benefits to the middle class) will be seen for what it is.

Herbert Hoover had his faults, but it took an economic meltdown to make Americans turn away from him and the Republican ethos of social darwinism of the Gilded Age (the 1920s were the last hurrah of the ethos of the Gilded Age). But Hoover at least had a sane foreign policy and didn't foster bigotry. Donald Trump has shown what a deplorable person he is.

[Galen]

(01-12-2018, 10:14 AM)Kinser79 Wrote:

(01-11-2018, 04:23 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(01-11-2018, 03:44 AM)Kinser79 Wrote: At current Saudi Arabia and most of OPEC are only passfied by keeping oil accounts in USD (just like Gulf War II was caused by Saddam Hussein wanting to price oil in Euro), but that might not always be the case.  Iran is already selling oil in gold, Rupee and RMB.  Russia is openly selling gas in Rubles or Gold taking USD as a third option only (which has essentially lifted the sanctions against them already--only the US is still maintaining them, and there import substitution is addressing the problem).  I can't really blame the Europeans either, they have a colder climate and in winter the heat being on is quite nice.

Is there a point here?

Yes.  Both Galen and I have mentioned numerous times that the petrodollar can, will and eventually must end.

I would also add that it means the end of Pax Americana because it will no longer be possible to print or borrow enough money to cover the Federal Governments obligations.  It remains to be seen if there will be a formal default since there wasn't one in 1971 even though that is effectively what Nixon did in terms of the Bretton-Woods agreement.  Gary North refers to the upcoming event as the Great Default.

[Kinser79]

I don't know that a formal default would even be necessary. Simply removing the oil-dollar link would suffice in constraining governmental spending. Europeans don't need dollars except to buy oil and things from other people who also want to buy oil. The Japanese don't need dollars except to buy oil and buy things from other people who want to buy oil. The same is true of the Chinese, and every other people on the planet.

Thus, if just a few major oil exporters unlink their oil to the dollar, or accept other forms of payment (say Yen or Euro or gold or bitcoin or anything else) then the petrodollar is inevitably weakened. Should this happen in a death by a thousand cuts it could take as long as 20 years to happen (which would fit nicely with my Mega-Crisis saeculum theory) and by which time US bonds backed up by the FED printing press would essentially be downgraded to junk status.

When that happens, unless the US suddenly becomes a major manufacturing center again then there will be no reason for anyone to want to hold dollars if they can buy oil in something else. Indeed such a situation would lead to sanction breakdowns, and of course the end of Pax Americana which is primarily backed up by the USN and the US nuclear arsenal.

Suffice it to say that a federal government unable to sell bonds is going to have difficulty paying for the Navy let alone giving a universal basic income as the regressive left has been floating around these days.

If we are lucky we'll have a Soviet Style collapse once most people realize that the system can't and won't provide for them in the manner we are accustomed to. But then again I prefer hard and fast to slow and drawn out.

[Galen]

(01-12-2018, 08:34 PM)Kinser79 Wrote: I don't know that a formal default would even be necessary.  Simply removing the oil-dollar link would suffice in constraining governmental spending.  Europeans don't need dollars except to buy oil and things from other people who also want to buy oil.  The Japanese don't need dollars except to buy oil and buy things from other people who want to buy oil.  The same is true of the Chinese, and every other people on the planet.

Thus, if just a few major oil exporters unlink their oil to the dollar, or accept other forms of payment (say Yen or Euro or gold or bitcoin or anything else) then the petrodollar is inevitably weakened.  Should this happen in a death by a thousand cuts it could take as long as 20 years to happen (which would fit nicely with my Mega-Crisis saeculum theory) and by which time US bonds backed up by the FED printing press would essentially be downgraded to junk status.

Nixon closing the gold window in 1971 was and never has been acknowledged as a default but it was.  The Boomers here were alive and probably had and still have no idea what it all meant.  In fact, the law fixing the price of gold at about $40 per oz is still on the books but the market feels rather differently about it.  It looks like China is introducing a yuan-gold backed oil futures contract which may do the job ending the dollar hegemony since redeeming the contracts in gold takes trust in the yuan out of the equation.

The real question is will DC accept the and of Pax Americana and given recent behavior the answer would appear to be no.  In that case an attempt will be made to inflate the debt away given Trump's Goldman-Sachs appointments to the Fed board.  I do not expect the government to admit to defaulting when it does default.

[David Horn]

(01-12-2018, 04:38 PM)Galen Wrote:

(01-12-2018, 10:14 AM)Kinser79 Wrote:

(01-11-2018, 04:23 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(01-11-2018, 03:44 AM)Kinser79 Wrote: At current Saudi Arabia and most of OPEC are only passfied by keeping oil accounts in USD (just like Gulf War II was caused by Saddam Hussein wanting to price oil in Euro), but that might not always be the case.  Iran is already selling oil in gold, Rupee and RMB.  Russia is openly selling gas in Rubles or Gold taking USD as a third option only (which has essentially lifted the sanctions against them already--only the US is still maintaining them, and there import substitution is addressing the problem).  I can't really blame the Europeans either, they have a colder climate and in winter the heat being on is quite nice.

Is there a point here?

Yes.  Both Galen and I have mentioned numerous times that the petrodollar can, will and eventually must end.

I would also add that it means the end of Pax Americana because it will no longer be possible to print or borrow enough money to cover the Federal Governments obligations.  It remains to be seen if there will be a formal default since there wasn't one in 1971 even though that is effectively what Nixon did in terms of the Bretton-Woods agreement.  Gary North refers to the upcoming event as the Great Default.

The USD is as powerful as it is because it's reliable.  Everyone needs a reserve currency to have for trade and a store of value.  Eventually, it may be the Renmimbi rather than the USD, but not now or soon.

[Kinser79]

(01-13-2018, 04:21 AM)Galen Wrote: Nixon closing the gold window in 1971 was and never has been acknowledged as a default but it was.  The Boomers here were alive and probably had and still have no idea what it all meant.  In fact, the law fixing the price of gold at about $40 per oz is still on the books but the market feels rather differently about it.  It looks like China is introducing a yuan-gold backed oil futures contract which may do the job ending the dollar hegemony since redeeming the contracts in gold takes trust in the yuan out of the equation.

The real question is will DC accept the and of Pax Americana and given recent behavior the answer would appear to be no.  In that case an attempt will be made to inflate the debt away given Trump's Goldman-Sachs appointments to the Fed board.  I do not expect the government to admit to defaulting when it does default.

A failure to understand what Nixon did with closing the gold window is not limited to Boomers. By and large I think most people not versed in economic theory fail to understand what he did. Indeed it is possible that Nixon himself didn't understand what he was doing. In my view Nixon made two very grave mistakes...1. He closed the gold window, 2. he made tapes of his skullduggery in the West Wing. Neither are excusable in my view. And I like Nixon, though that could be because his immediate predecessor was warmongering racist, and the two who followed him were utter morons.

Dying empires rarely accept their fate with grace. There will almost certainly be an attempt to inflate away debt. It might work on the domestic population but foreigners are under no obligation to accept paper for real money that they laid out. The only reason that the petrodollar works is because oil is sold in USD and everyone needs oil. Boomers have a tendency to forget that a barrel of oil has more than gasoline or diesel fuel in it. It has asphalt for paving and waterproofing, the base resins used in making plastics, precursors for fertilizers and pesticides. Indeed as I've pointed out elsewhere, even turning the entire car fleet over to electrics would not end oil dependence. It takes seven barrels of oil to produce the plastics that would be used in these electric cars.

(01-13-2018, 07:41 AM)David Horn Wrote: The USD is as powerful as it is because it's reliable.  Everyone needs a reserve currency to have for trade and a store of value.  Eventually, it may be the Renmimbi rather than the USD, but not now or soon.

The reserve of choice for the past several thousand years has been gold and suplimented with silver. The use of a fiat currency as reserves is an adoration of those economic norms. If the Chinese manage to make RMB fully convertable to gold the USD will lose that "reliability" over night. But then again fiat currencies are reliable in only one thing...failing eventually.

[David Horn]

(01-13-2018, 09:09 AM)Kinser79 Wrote:

(01-13-2018, 07:41 AM)David Horn Wrote: The USD is as powerful as it is because it's reliable.  Everyone needs a reserve currency to have for trade and a store of value.  Eventually, it may be the Renmimbi rather than the USD, but not now or soon.

The reserve of choice for the past several thousand years has been gold and suplimented with silver.  The use of a fiat currency as reserves is an adoration of those economic norms.  If the Chinese manage to make RMB fully convertable to gold the USD will lose that "reliability" over night.  But then again fiat currencies are reliable in only one thing...failing eventually.

There aren't enough precious metals in the world to act effectively as a reserve. Currencies -- all currencies -- act as transactional lubricants and short term stores of value. Note: they are not intended to provide long term store of value, because that defeats their function as trade enablers. In fact, they need to decline in value slowly over time: fast enough to motivate trade but slowly enough to maintain discipline.

You were into MMT, that takes this idea to its extreme, yet now you pretend it's toxic or something. The truth is in the middle, as it usually is.

[pbrower2a]

(01-12-2018, 04:38 PM)Galen Wrote:

(01-12-2018, 10:14 AM)Kinser79 Wrote:

(01-11-2018, 04:23 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(01-11-2018, 03:44 AM)Kinser79 Wrote: At current Saudi Arabia and most of OPEC are only passfied by keeping oil accounts in USD (just like Gulf War II was caused by Saddam Hussein wanting to price oil in Euro), but that might not always be the case.  Iran is already selling oil in gold, Rupee and RMB.  Russia is openly selling gas in Rubles or Gold taking USD as a third option only (which has essentially lifted the sanctions against them already--only the US is still maintaining them, and there import substitution is addressing the problem).  I can't really blame the Europeans either, they have a colder climate and in winter the heat being on is quite nice.

Is there a point here?

Yes.  Both Galen and I have mentioned numerous times that the petrodollar can, will and eventually must end.

I would also add that it means the end of Pax Americana because it will no longer be possible to print or borrow enough money to cover the Federal Governments obligations.  It remains to be seen if there will be a formal default since there wasn't one in 1971 even though that is effectively what Nixon did in terms of the Bretton-Woods agreement.  Gary North refers to the upcoming event as the Great Default.

Resumption of the gold standard would imply a hyper-deflation. One would need a "new dollar" to reflect the current $1339.50 per ounce value of gold. That would require almost a 20-to-one revaluation to have a dollar 'worth' what it was in 1970 at the value of gold at the official exchange rate. That would make a mess of banking.

Gold fluctuates wildly in value, often reflecting political instability (people in political orders at risk of overthrow  tend to invest in gold) and stability (people selling gold after the revolutions). Supply spikes are always possible.

[Galen]

(01-13-2018, 09:09 AM)Kinser79 Wrote:

(01-13-2018, 07:41 AM)David Horn Wrote: The USD is as powerful as it is because it's reliable.  Everyone needs a reserve currency to have for trade and a store of value.  Eventually, it may be the Renmimbi rather than the USD, but not now or soon.

The reserve of choice for the past several thousand years has been gold and suplimented with silver.  The use of a fiat currency as reserves is an adoration of those economic norms.  If the Chinese manage to make RMB fully convertable to gold the USD will lose that "reliability" over night.  But then again fiat currencies are reliable in only one thing...failing eventually.

Give the the tendency of the US to cut nations off from SWIFT at the drop of a hat increases the incentives for other nations to look to get out from under the dollar.  As a result trade between Russia and China has increased dramatically and soon there will be another oil market completely independent of the dollar that the US can not bomb into oblivion like it has been doing for the last fifteen years.  This is what the wars are really all about.

All fiat currencies have failed and the dollar will be no different than any other.  It is entirely possible that the new futures contracts are a step toward making the RMB fully convertible.

[Galen]

(01-13-2018, 09:09 AM)Kinser79 Wrote:

(01-13-2018, 04:21 AM)Galen Wrote: Nixon closing the gold window in 1971 was and never has been acknowledged as a default but it was.  The Boomers here were alive and probably had and still have no idea what it all meant.  In fact, the law fixing the price of gold at about $40 per oz is still on the books but the market feels rather differently about it.  It looks like China is introducing a yuan-gold backed oil futures contract which may do the job ending the dollar hegemony since redeeming the contracts in gold takes trust in the yuan out of the equation.

A failure to understand what Nixon did with closing the gold window is not limited to Boomers.  By and large I think most people not versed in economic theory fail to understand what he did.  Indeed it is possible that Nixon himself didn't understand what he was doing.  In my view Nixon made two very grave mistakes...1.  He closed the gold window, 2.  he made tapes of his skullduggery in the West Wing.  Neither are excusable in my view.  And I like Nixon, though that could be because his immediate predecessor was warmongering racist, and the two who followed him were utter morons.

The Boomers were there when Nixon closed the gold window and never did figure out what it means.  Most of the Millies don't even know that it happened and so expecting them to understand about an event they don't know about is unreasonable.  I find the Boomer willful ignorance to be more contemptible.

Nixon probably did understand that he was preventing an immediate dollar crisis.  It is unlikely that he thought through the long term implications of initiating the petrodollar.  Many people are mystified by why the 28 pages of the 9/11 report were classified and why the US doesn't never seemed to care about Saudi government funding of terrorism.  Those of us with an actual understanding of the economics involved are not the least bit surprised.

As for Nixon's successors, it is true that they were idiots.  Ford was simply a placeholder and that was all that anyone at that time could be.  Carter was a well-intentioned idiot but at least his brother was quite amusing at the time.

[Galen]

(01-14-2018, 06:22 PM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(01-12-2018, 04:38 PM)Galen Wrote:

(01-12-2018, 10:14 AM)Kinser79 Wrote: Yes.  Both Galen and I have mentioned numerous times that the petrodollar can, will and eventually must end.

I would also add that it means the end of Pax Americana because it will no longer be possible to print or borrow enough money to cover the Federal Governments obligations.  It remains to be seen if there will be a formal default since there wasn't one in 1971 even though that is effectively what Nixon did in terms of the Bretton-Woods agreement.  Gary North refers to the upcoming event as the Great Default.

Resumption of the gold standard would imply a hyper-deflation. One would need a "new dollar" to reflect the current $1339.50 per ounce value of gold. That would require almost a 20-to-one revaluation to have a dollar 'worth' what it was in 1970 at the value of gold at the official exchange rate. That would make a mess of banking.

Gold fluctuates wildly in value, often reflecting political instability (people in political orders at risk of overthrow  tend to invest in gold) and stability (people selling gold after the revolutions). Supply spikes are always possible.

Prices always fluctuate during political instability.  So what?

Banking is already a mess which is hardly news.  The current price in gold reflects the steady devaluation of the dollar since 1971.  Nixon didn't want to fix the Federal Government budget then and now we have an even bigger problem than he had.  In the end all fiat currencies revert to their intrinsic value which is zero and the dollar is well on its way.

[Kinser79]

(01-14-2018, 02:51 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(01-13-2018, 09:09 AM)Kinser79 Wrote:

(01-13-2018, 07:41 AM)David Horn Wrote: The USD is as powerful as it is because it's reliable.  Everyone needs a reserve currency to have for trade and a store of value.  Eventually, it may be the Renmimbi rather than the USD, but not now or soon.

The reserve of choice for the past several thousand years has been gold and suplimented with silver.  The use of a fiat currency as reserves is an adoration of those economic norms.  If the Chinese manage to make RMB fully convertable to gold the USD will lose that "reliability" over night.  But then again fiat currencies are reliable in only one thing...failing eventually.

There aren't enough precious metals in the world to act effectively as a reserve.

Actually the scarcity of precious metals make them almost perfect as a reserve. Even better as a backing for a represetational currency which for the majority of history all various monies were.

Quote:Currencies -- all currencies -- act as transactional lubricants and short term stores of value. Note: they are not intended to provide long term store of value, because that defeats their function as trade enablers. In fact, they need to decline in value slowly over time: fast enough to motivate trade but slowly enough to maintain discipline.

Central banks have proved that they do not have the capacity to enforce discipline economically. Since 1914 the USD has lost almost 94% of its value. A currency system that does not maintain a relatively stable store of value is essentially useless in lubiricating transactions, unless the goal is to speed up the accumulation of goods. After all if a dollar today will be worth 75 cents tomorrow I may as well buy up as many things as I can as those goods will maintain their value in the main.

I'm not opposed to backing currency in other things besides precious metals. The RMB is for example essentially backed up by the fact that China essentially produces just about everything. For example I recently bought new leather boots (OSHA requires non-slip "restaurant shoes" and I prefer work boot styles) directly from China. The US primarily exports lumber, grain, and soybeans with some technological and military hardware. In effect the US is a third world country except for the fact that oil is priced in our currency.

When a dollar today is worth a dollar tomorrow then then it can act as a lubricant. Inflation is an invisible tax on every transaction, and like all taxes it rests as a dead weight on economic activity.

Quote:You were into MMT, that takes this idea to its extreme, yet now you pretend it's toxic or something. The truth is in the middle, as it usually is.

I was never "into MMT". Rather I thought MMT could be used as a means to an end. Since the material conditions required for a Marxist style revolution do not exist now, and probably cannot exist in the future there is no reason for me to "cling" to MMT. Unlike Playdude I don't need to attempt to convince myself that my economic prescriptions are the only means to the end of mass prosperity. Do I think that the US could scrap the fed and issue debt free fiat currency? Absolutely. We have before they were called US Notes and rested on the Treasury's ability to collect taxes to cover their value. Believing that this is a possibility does not necessitate me to subscribe to MMT. US notes were issued for a century, a century that far preceded the very first stirrings of anything remotely resembling MMT.

[Galen]

(01-15-2018, 12:21 AM)Kinser79 Wrote:

(01-14-2018, 02:51 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(01-13-2018, 09:09 AM)Kinser79 Wrote:

(01-13-2018, 07:41 AM)David Horn Wrote: The USD is as powerful as it is because it's reliable.  Everyone needs a reserve currency to have for trade and a store of value.  Eventually, it may be the Renmimbi rather than the USD, but not now or soon.

The reserve of choice for the past several thousand years has been gold and suplimented with silver.  The use of a fiat currency as reserves is an adoration of those economic norms.  If the Chinese manage to make RMB fully convertable to gold the USD will lose that "reliability" over night.  But then again fiat currencies are reliable in only one thing...failing eventually.

There aren't enough precious metals in the world to act effectively as a reserve.

Actually the scarcity of precious metals make them almost perfect as a reserve.  Even better as a backing for a represetational currency which for the majority of history all various monies were.

It is this fact that makes a gold and silver so useful as money.  It tends to limit government spending and debt.