Topic: The real problem behind inflation - page 3. (Read 10854 times)

Eh???  Can you think of anyone better qualified to make a scientific statement about the loss of biodiversity in the amazon that the *scientists* who have *actually studied it*  Or do you think we should just take, what, like a /vote/???  Bear in mind how susceptible public opinion is to what some barbie in the latest hollywood action-crap says.

If you really believe what you're saying, then economists have no right to speak publicly about economics, and you can shove your von mises institute where the sun don't shine.  Right?  (or if you're of the other camp, then substitute for some other appropriate institute).

Some people are more educated about some topics, and, yes, that gives them the right to speak publicly, and it /should/ oblige other people to consider their opinion.

I noted the problem with finding unbiased scientists.  Is that what's bugging you?  That's not just government - it's big Pharma, big GMO, big Oil, big Internet, big IntellectualProperty, big Whatever, and all the lobbying that goes on behind closed doors (need I make it clear, by private corporations).  You can't have unbiased scientists without unbiased funding.  Corporations will never provide unbiased funding.

+1

Quite the contrary, it makes my savings disposable (because all prices go down). It worth noting that monetary deflation is a result of economic growth (if you double the amount of stuff avalible, it halves in price).

I could just as well say:
It's no less true.

That's a cop-out. It just gives the ultimate power to those politicians who make the decision as to which scientists, sociologists and philosophers are selected as decision-makers.

I am one of those who thinks the Amazon is important to the prosperity of humans, which is why neither the government nor its pressure-groups should be involved. Government rarely looks beyond the next election. But an owner of a forest who preserves a species that might otherwise become extinct, has tremendous opportunities to profit from that in the long-term future.

OMG  Do you realy believe this?

So you'll allow people to use public force at their will, only because those people have a piece of paper called a diploma, saying they are "philosophs" or "scientists"?

We've gone *way* off topic here, so if we want to continue on this subject (anarcho-capitalism et al V govt), let's start a new thread.  I'd have more to say, but this post is huge already, and I've gotta go.

Arrrghhhhhhh WHAT question??  Stop telling me I'm not answering questions that you haven't asked.

Read the title of this thread.

Take a look at wikipedia's page on the amazon rainforest - it's about half of the world's total rainforest.  Do you truly think that's unimportant?  I'm shocked at such ignorance of science just for political ideals.  I don't know whether the destruction of the amazon would have a big effect on the world's environment, please don't be so arrogant as to say that you *do*.

anarchy & lawlessness: you should correct wikipedia's page if you think anarchy is not lawless. My understanding is that anarchy is nothing other than voluntary cooperation between individuals.  By definition, an anarchic society has no regulations.  Even the etymology of the word itself suggests an absence of hierarchy and authority.  This leaves the society vulnerable to whosoever would abuse that situation.  Are you so naive as to assume that nobody would seek to do such abuse?

There's a clear question.  Absolutely nothing. [sarcasm]Apart from moving in the army[/sarcasm].  If everybody wanted to jump off a cliff, there's little anyone could do stop them either, right?

[quote from=caveden]
I bet all these things can be done much more cheaply than the cost of not using such precious resource as all that land.
[/quote]
ok. And I'll bet we could cover greenland with some mirrors (to better reflect sunlight), start melting all the ice, bottle it, and sell it as pristine million-year old, glacial water.  Damn, you could even sell it still frozen, or even cheaper, you could melt it and then re-freeze it - imagine: "pure glacier, the way nature intended".  Given how stupid most people are, can you doubt there would be a market for it?  And why stop with Greenland?  Now don't tell me that people wouldn't pay, they already pay up to ten thousand times the price for bottled than tap water.  And please don't embarrass yourself by suggesting that the market would punish the corporation that decided to abuse Greenland's ice sheet.  Nobody would stop them 'cos Greenland is far away from everyone except about 50000 greenlanders.  People wouldn't care about Greenland, just as you don't care that the tantalum in your mobile phone comes from environmentally destructive mines in Congo controlled by armed thugs engaging in a conflict counting millions dead.  And, you know what, maybe nothing would happen.  Maybe sea-levels wouldn't rise. But if they did, you can be damn sure the profits made would be in CEO and shareholders pockets, and nobody would cough up the money required to protect endangered coastlines.  Oh wait, what am I thinking, if the only point in preserving endangered coastlines is to preserve them, well we can just forget about it.  (That bit was pure sarcasm too, folks.  I hope you got it this time.)

I stand corrected, but that doesn't invalidate my point.  The amazon is important, even if only because we don't yet know how important it is.

And why do you think private corporations will respect private property rights?  In a corporate world, people are rewarded with money and power. That means the people who come to power are the ones that like to have money - greedy self-obsessed people (not much different from politicians of today).  Even hugolp agrees that politicians and corporate leaders are often one and the same.  Your politicians will just become your corporate leaders, and tell me this: why should they suddenly become "nice" in an anarchist society?  I'm not saying the present political leadership is any good, or that the regulations they impose are just and correct.  I just don't think corporate anarchy will do better.

I understand the Austrian theory of debt spending causing boom-n-bust business cycles.  I just don't think it's that simple.  The latest crisis, for example, is far more complex - not least because of the rising price of energy immediately prior to the crisis.  This limited growth for reasons *external* to the economy, which is something economic theories don't consider (as far as I can tell).  Furthermore, my understanding is that the Austrian boom-bust cycle is caused by a debt-inflated economy, thanks to fractional reserve banking, controlled (in the US) by the Federal Reserve.  Guess what?  A corporation specifically designed to safeguard the interests of privately owned member banks, largely independent of the government.  http://www.federalreserve.gov/generalinfo/faq/faqfrs.htm#5

Who gets to decide what's useful?  Just their economic function?  If you start disrupting an ecology, there is no way to tell the end result.  It's a perfect complex system, with long range correlations between species and power-law extinction events.  What if those stupid pink frogs seem useless but then, after they're all dead, it turns out they were an essential dietary part of that lovely useful crocodile's prey?  Same comment for invention of new species.  GM food companies are playing a game that could have dire consequences - and nobody really knows how it could play out.  People talk alot, but nobody really knows.

Preserve it for it's potential economic utility, if nothing else.  Nobody knows what the future cost of destroying the amazon rainforest would be.

[quote from=grondilu]
In any way, what we should do about tropical forests, is not for a bunch of ecolocrats to decide.
[/quote]
[my ignorance, what's an ecolocrat? do you mean "econocrat"? if so:]  Agreed. I would have the decisions made by scientists, sociologists and philosophers - unfortunately in a pure corporate world scientists and sociologists without some funding bias would be hard to come by.

@ptd: you don't care because you have plenty of disposable income.  In a monetary deflation scenario, lots of people don't, and that chokes production.

Those debates are useless.

Nobody should decide for me how I should spend or save my money.   This is only my decision to make.

People who think that a bit of inflation is good for the economy can just use paper money.

Other people will use precious metals and cryptocurrencies.

Planified economy sucks and has always failed.

Not possible, you could live on a loaf of bread a day at a pinch (although you would suffer nasty malnutrition). The fact I choose to buy and use a computer would be considered a luxury by many.
I brought a smartphone even though I was pretty sure that I could buy an equivelent one in 8 mouths or so. But since the phone cost me £60 I really didn't care. I could live without it, but the benefits of having a smartphone for 8 months outweighed the cost.

http://www.therainforestsite.com/

-MarkM- ( have you eaten today? http://www.thehungersite.com/ )

As you correctly said earlier, the market leads towards the optimum solution.

I would like to preserve the Amazon for aesthetic reasons, and I would contribute plenty of money towards that, as would some other people. I have no doubt that the optimum amount of jungle would end up being preserved.

Undeveloped land is actually really cheap to buy. Even in the United Kingdom, you can buy farmland for £5000 per acre. If you want land that comes with permission to build, that will cost you a hundred times as much (due to the government monopoly on approving building), but if you just want to preserve land it's cheap. I'm sure the prices in Brazil will be much lower than those in the UK.

I have to agree with caveden, although I'm not that extreme.

In any way, what we should do about tropical forests, is not for a bunch of ecolocrats to decide.

hehehe, right, and governments are very longterm oriented... They plan everything they can for the next election!

Only by respecting private property rights you'll get people to worry about the future consequences of their acts, as the rightful owners will care about what happens to their property. Currently most of the amazon is owned by the Brazilian government. What do they care?
Had you understood what I tried to explain about how governments stimulate consumption, producing short term booms at the expense of long term recessions, you'd understand who's really shortsighted...


Seriously, the "world lung" hoax?? You still fall for it??
Try to remember the basic chemistry behind photosynthesis and you might realize how this is nonsense... the Amazon doesn't provide oxygen to the world.


I bet all these things can be done much more cheaply than the cost of not using such precious resource as all that land.

About biodiversity, what's the point, preserving just to preserve? Useful species will be preserved, you bet. Soon we'll even be inventing new species, DNA synthesis is a reality already.
You should watch this George Carlin video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xjfiIow-eW0

I insist that it's probably useless to preserve such a huge jungle just for the sake of preserving it. It's pointless. Preserving small parts of it might be interesting, but not all.

I dont understand why you started discussing about monetary deflation when nobody supports a system based on monetary deflation. But hey, at least we agree. Btw, the fact that people dont buy what they dont need is a good thing.


No. Really no. The internet does not transmit all the information a voice conversation does, and I have heard heavy facists stuff coming from interventionist, so I am not surprised anymore. Im glad you were joking though.


Yep, all true. Still dodging the question. The collectivist system, the government, is violating individual rights (the property of the natives) to destroy the amazon. Collectivism always promises the moon and delivers destruction and poverty.

So many misconceptions in this (and I couldnt but to smile while reading because I use to belive most of it):


Its not that a person in charge of a company cares more for you. The same person can be in government and in a private company during his/her live, and he cares for you the same. Its not that the people in government care more or the people in the private companies care more. Its stupid to believe any of those. That is not the point. The important point is that the private sector is designed to focus the incentives towards pleasing the consumer because it can not use violence, it has to get the agreement of the buyer, while the government is a monopoly that uses force to acomplish its goals. Even if a good person gets to be dictator it would probably fuck up big time because there is no way anyone can know the necessities and desires of so many people. This is why voluntary exchange works and violence does not.


"Old times were always better"... There is a psycological study somewhere proving that the mind tends to focus on the good memories and tries to forget the bad ones, which is why people tend to think that the past is always better.

In the past people died everyday, there was rampant malnutrition, slavery, rape, etc... and the leaders did not give a fuck. This idea that old times were better is just fictional. I am glad I dont live in the past seriously, specially because the lower classes had it really tough compared to this days.


"If you all dont obey ME there will be caos"... Mubarak just used that line in Egypt. When it has been proven again and again that self-organization and spontaneous order always beats central planing, people still believe in the old idea. You know, Im fine with it as long as I get to be in power. Leaders will always attribute themselves the achievements of a society (and blame the faults on others), when in reality is the people working and cooperating that makes anything possible.

Anarchy is order, government is chaos. If it was possible for the government to take control of every aspect there would be caos. Absolute caos and discordination. People would starve. This society only works because there are still some sort of self-organization and spontaneous order in the middle of all the government meddling.


Anarchy is not lawless. In fact, laws are respected more in an anarchic system than when there is a centralized system. Everything you said is possible under a non-government system.


Yes, definitevely government spending will create a statistical boom. Its just that it wont be a real recovery because the capital created wont be the addecuate to satisfiy the consumer needs and will collapse again.


Im not a capitalist, at least not in the popular sense. Im a market anarchists and I share some ideas with some self-proclaimed socialists and some other with some self-proclaimed capitalists. I really think the distinction is bullshit.

You seem to imply again that without the government there would be destruction or caos, and therefore anyone that wants to get rid of government is short sighed and crazy. What if what it is short sighted and crazy is believing that without government there would be destruction and caos?. You know, its funny because you see governments helping and enabling the destruction of nature, yet you keep hoping government will do something to stop it. Tell me this: if the majority of the people really wanted to destroy the Amazon to create agricultural land, how is a democratic government going to do anything else than destroying the Amazon?

Please differentiate between NECESSITIES and LUXURIES.  I never said people don't buy stuff when prices go down, I said people don't buy UNNECCESSARY stuff during periods of MONETARY DEFLATION - and everyone has a different idea of what's "necessary" (I might not have been clear about the "monetary deflation" bit in my first posts, confusing it with price deflation).  If my phone breaks, then I'll buy a new one regardless of whether prices are going up or down, because I NEED one.  But if there is monetary deflation, then I definitely won't buy that new computer game, because I DON'T NEED it.  What about you?  If your money is deflating, would you concentrate your purchases more on necessities, or would you splash out on a new pair of $250 shoes (for you, or your GF) just because they're nice, or would you wait until next month when you can buy the same shoes AND a burger&fries for $250?  What if you lost your job at the same time?  What then?  Now think about people who are investing $millions.  Even low deflation could mean they can afford to buy a new luxury car for their children if they just wait one month before investing.

We did?  Good, I'm glad too.

I'm sure you realised I was being sarcastic when I wrote about invading Brazil??? I didn't know some of those things you wrote, but they wouldn't be so surprising.  I'll bet the amazon was never destroyed for many years because the population density (of humans) was simply too low.  A few hundred tribes living in and around it would never do more damage than regrowth - you'd need big, terrible, fast machines to do significant damage, and that didn't come about until, how long ago, maybe 40 or 60 years ago? (see youtube)

More than private enterprise cares for me, I think (see below).  I'm a big skeptic of modern government though - I have the feeling that once upon a time, politicians were driven by ideals, not greed and personal gain.  I'll tell you what, if I could only live 1000 years to collect, I'd bet that having no govt would eventually reduce mankind to Hobbes' "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short" life.  And by "govt" I mean any persistent authority, even e.g. tribal chiefs.  My opinion, therefore, is that it's more important to have some set of laws by which all people can expect some guaranteed living standard, than that the set of laws be "the right ones", whatever that might be.  It's like driving, yeah?  Who knows, maybe driving on the left /is/ better than driving on the right, but it's much more important that everybody agrees which side to drive on, than that their choice be the "correct" one.

govt spending: what you say is right.  In short, those that perform services do not increase overall wealth.  Only the production of goods can do that.  And most of govt's work is services.  However, services do help money to circulate, allowing more people to demand produced goods.  I feel like we're almost coming to an agreement here too...

This, for me, is the biggest drawback to pure capitalism.  It's shortsighted.  Destroying the amazon rainforest would bring great benefits to human society for a while.  Then, after many years, it would be clear that the amazon had a crucial role to play in keeping the atmosphere oxygenated (the lungs of the planet, anyone?), keeping floods under control, maintaining biodiversity, heck, I don't know what else.  Now I may well be wrong, and an oxygen-depleted atmosphere might well improve humanity's state somehow.  It just seems a bit risky to me, that's all.

You said people dont buy stuff when prices go down. I said they do. Now you say that you buy stuff you need even when prices go down. You are disagreeing with yourself. This is getting a bit ridiculous. Either people buy stuff (for whatever reasons) when prices go down or they dont.


We have been talking of prices going down all the time. If you realize I have been trying to avoid the word "deflation" and always used the expression "prices going down" to avoid confusion. Again you are agreeing with me, people buy stuff when prices go down.

Nobody here is advocating persistent monetary deflation as monetary system (at least not me). Anyways, I am glad we came to an agreement.


Expreading democracy around the world... Is there anyone that stills believes this bullshit? Havent we seen enough damage and deads in the name of expreading democracy? In case you are interested the expression was coined by the early progressive movement that was a creation of big companies, specially the Rockefeller and the Morgans to create a moral justification to regulate the market and gain competitive advantage through political means. This has been extremely well documented. In fact, the first meeting towards creating the progressive party was full of Rockefeller and Morgan men.

There is a saying, that I never remember who said it, but its brilliant and it goes something like this: The more beautiful and utopic the promises from a politician are, the more darker his intentions. This really describes well the idea of "Expreading democracy around the world" that is nothing more than USA imperialism. In fact, its funny because the early progressive economists justified invading other countries by saying that business in the USA was too developed (late XIX century) and the USA government needed to invade other countries to guarantee new markets for the USA industries.

About the question, no, I would not justify invading a foreign country to impose any system. We should have learnt by now that the reasons for war are never charitable. The charitable part are just excuses for the mases.

Btw, I understand if you dont take my word for all this historic points I made and you can ask for references if you are interested in knowing the origins of the USA progressive movement.


The fact that the Amazon was there and its owners did not cut it down should tell you something about it. It took an organized government to do it.

I understand you have been educated to believe government cares for you and the environment. I was educated the same way (socialdemocrat parents and socialdemocrat myself until I was 27). Its not that way. Men get together and organize a monopolistic entity only to have control and profit violating other peoples rights.


Ok. I understand what you say. Let me make some points.

1. Money as debt is not the best source of economic theory. They explain very well how the fractional system works under a central bank, but they never mention the incentives the central bank creates to provoque that behaviour in banks, and they dont explain that without a central bank fractional reserve is very different.

2. Now to the point. Government spending can keep the GDP numbers going up. That does not mean economic growth. If you go on debt and start paying people to dig a whole and then cover it back the GDP will go up, but you have not improved the economic situation, in fact you are worse, because you have the same goods (filling and covering wholes produced nothing) and you have more debt.

So yes, government spending can create a statistic boom in the economic indicators, but, as I explained before, the government does not know how to satisfy the people, mainly because it does not operate under the price mechanism, so the government spending its just mainly waste (and you can litterally check that with the Obama stimulus and how it was used). It does not lead to recovery. Just for the record, right now its not the time to reduce basic welfare spending like food stamps and stuff like that. The poor people has been hit enough by government regulations, and there is no need to make them pay. There are a lot of places to reduce first. But as government are always an agent for the big interests the reductions are always towards the people.

As an example, you have the crisis at the beginning of the 1920's, caused when the bubble created by the Fed to pay for IWW went bust. The president then reduced taxes, reduced spending and the Fed did not had power to inflate until 1922 (it got special powers during the war that were removed when it ended). The crisis started worst than the Great Depression, but it was over in year and a half. Why? Because government reducing taxes and spending allowed room for the market to coordinate itself again. Entrepeneurs created the industries that produced what people wanted (not just government silly spending) and real wealth appeared.

The macroeconomic mentallity that any spending is good is totally wrong. You can not pretend that just spending in anything is going to produce real wealth. If you spend in useless stuff in fact you are squandering wealth, and becoming poorer. Yes, spending a lot boosts economic indicators but its not a real recovery, its not sustainable. It will prolong the depression. Yes, reducing government spending will make the economic indicators go down a lot more, but it will lead to a quick recovery.

Just a post about this particular subject. It seems both of you are mislead in your arguing. It's the same kind of mistake I see often when people talk about smoke-free environments. The pro-market people try to argue how a free market would create all sort of smoke-free and non-smoke-free environments for all tastes, and the other side remains skeptical. Same thing here with "how would the free market preserve the Amazon".

The first thing that is important to remember is: the free market pushes towards the best resource allocation humanly possible. That's what it does, always. The definition of what is the best allocation is where you both might be mistaken there. Who says the Amazon has to be preserved in the first place?

The free market "criterion" is utility to mankind. We have to remember that everything has a cost. Maybe having lots of smoke-free environments is not the best resource allocation due to high costs and reduced benefits.
Same thing for the amazon. I strongly doubt that preserving that huge forest as is is the best resource allocation to mankind. It's really a huge amount of land that could be much better used than just let it there for monkeys and snakes. Of course, in a true free market, some would acquire land in the amazon to preserve it, either for tourism, or for science researches, or whatever reason these owners decide to give to their land. But I bet that most of the forest would be destroyed to give place to something more useful to human beings, like agriculture and livestock for example.
Am I wrong? Maybe. The only way to really know is to let people free and see what they prefer to do.

Sorry, I must have missed exactly the questions.  I thought I was answering, but maybe I didn't fully understand.  Could you repeat the specific questions I didn't answer please?

That is exactly my point and proves what you said before wrong. When prices go down people keep buying.