second schematics
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
picked up my diploma today
this is how i feel about having a bachelors degree.
If I am standing in my yard wearing cut off dickies, with no shirt on, sporting a pair of stupid looking sandals. I'm not white trash. I have a bachelors degree, I'm eccentric.
If I am standing in my yard wearing cut off dickies, with no shirt on, sporting a pair of stupid looking sandals. I'm not white trash. I have a bachelors degree, I'm eccentric.
Wednesday, May 25, 2011
Tuesday, May 24, 2011
High Debt and History
Here is my senior thesis, you don't have to read it. Just posting it for fun.
The point of this paper is show information regarding what the effects of high debt had on past governments. This is relevant because the United States is currently in the y
ear 2011 14 trillion dollars in debt and the debt continues to rise every day.
The paper will go over the debt crises of the past and then supply information on the debt crisis of the United States, what people are trying to do about it, what can be done about it, and what the probable implications of it are.
The claim will not be made that debt is The Cause of revolutions or political upheaval. Only that at some points in history when political upheaval occurred, debt was found at the site. The same way that a gun is found at the scene of a murder, the gun murdered the human. But the motivation and reason for the murder is not found in the gun.
Political science does not have the luxury of controlled experiments. The experiments of political science are found in history. When looking at this past high debt situations we may look at them as experiments in how the society solved their debt problems. What is also important is that when looking at past high debt situations we can see the long term effects of high debt. Currently the United States is in the short, these past experiences with high debt will provide a view into what the long term effects will be.
The debt crises selected range from antiquity to the modern times and are from Western Cultures. The Middle-Ages were omitted because as according to Marc Bloch in Feudalism volume 1 (Bloch, 1978, 66-67) said concerning money in the Middle-Ages, “The society of this age was certainly not unacquainted with either buying or selling. But it did not, like our own, live by buying and selling.” The Middle-Ages were primarily an agriculture economy and had no method of coining money. Large debt did not occur there because they did not really have money. When someone wanted more or to get a higher status in the world, instead of money they wanted land or a higher title like knight, Lord or Bishop.
Several debt crises were neglected because of time and because they are already well known. The debt crisis of Germany of in the 1920s that led to Fascism and the debt crisis of the Catholic Church in the 1500s that participated the birth of Protestantism.
The debt problems of antiquity do not concern government debt but personal debt. Antiquity did not have stock markets, huge banks and especially not foreign banks. During Roman times, Rome was the only real government. The creditors were the wealthy who could loan money on interest. They did not have corporate offices with stock holders.
Chapter 1: Solon Cancels out Debt
Chapter 2: Publius Servilius and Appius Claudius in Ancient Rome
Chapter 3: Tiberius Restores Credit
Chapter 4: Pertinax Cancels Debt and Lowers Taxes after the Reign of Commodus
Chapter 5: How Debt made the French Revolution Possible
Chapter 6: Russia, Debt and War
Chapter 7: Debt in the United States after World War 2
Chapter 8: The Current Debt and can we Learn anything from the Past
Chapter 9: Why Americans are so against Taxes being Raised?
Chapter 10: What Solutions are Possible inside the Present Paradigm?
Chapter 11: Suggestions Based off what we Learned from History
Chapter 12: Chapter 12: Domestic Implications if it’s Business as Usual
Chapter 1: Solon Cancels out Debt
According to Plutarch's Lives (1957, 44-49) there was a debt crisis in Athens. Plutarch says, “So greatly were the poor in debt to the rich that they were obliged either to pay them a sixth part of the produce of the land-whence they were called Hectemorii and Thetes- or else to engage their persons to their creditors who might seize them on failure of payment.” This means that if they could not pay, they were taken as slaves or they were forced into selling their children into slavery. Others were forced to leave the city and find another place to live because they could not pay off their loans.
This situation forced the people of Athens to find a new leader. Which was the first political upheaval, being forced to choose a new leader.
The people of Athens chose Solon. They chose Solon because he was neither rich nor poor, he was what we would call middle class. At first Solon told the poor he would divide up the lands and he told the wealthy he would secure their securities. This was a political lie. Then he told the people, “Equality causes no war,” to soften their hearts and keep them peaceful. The debt crisis was so bad that the rich and poor urged Solon to make himself king but he refused to. But this shows what large debt can do to a nation, it can lead people to the idea if they give up democracy it may lead to a better life.
Solon in the end canceled many debts and made it illegal for a creditor to take a debtor to be his slave. Solon also inflated the currency, according to Plutarch, “For Solon ordered the minas, which before went but for seventy-three drachmas, to go for a hundred so that, as they paid the same in value but much less in weight, those that had great sums to pay were relieved while such as received them were no losers.”
The new laws did not make everyone happy. The poor still wanted a division of the land and the wealthy didn't want to give up their money. But they agreed and dealt with the situation. They agreed to the point that they did a sacrifice after called the seisacthia.
After Solon fixed the debt problem he reduced the penalties for breaking laws. He actually reduced the laws made by Draco where we get the term “draconian” from. Then he gave the poor more power in government.
Athens basically had a complete reform after Solon took office.
We can see a several step process when it comes to the story of Solon and Athenian debt.
The first step was to select a new ruler.
The second was to cancel debt for the poor and change the laws of what can be done to the debtor who cannot pay.
Then a large scale reform in government occurs that allows a better quaility of life for the poor.
The main difference between the United States and ancient Athens is that the debt is personal and government. But how the Athenian government solved the problem and the effects on government still remain a factor in looking at our own situation.
Chapter 2: Publius Servilius and Appius Claudius in Ancient Rome
According to Livy (1998, 93-98) ancient Rome suffered a terrible debt crisis in 495BC. While Rome was preparing to fight the Volsci the plebeians began complaining that even though they were fighting wars for Rome. When the got home from war if they could not pay their debts promptly they or their family members were taken as slaves. Then as Livy says, “An elderly man burst into the forum displaying the marks of all his misfortunes,” and began screaming that he was once a soldier and company commander for the Roman Army, and that he had been taken prisoner by a creditor, imprisoned and then whipped by the creditor. Inspired by the elderly man crowds of soldiers and ex-soldiers started protesting in the forum. The soldiers askedd him why he was complaining the elderly man said, “That while he was serving in the war against the Sabines his crops had been ravaged, his farmhouse burned down, all possessions looted, his flocks driven off. Then at the worst moments, a war tax was levied. So he borrowed money, and as the interest piled up he first lost the land that had belonged to his father and grandfather and then all his movable goods, until the debt spread like a cancer to his very person: his creditor led him not into slavery but into a torture chamber and prison.”
While this protest was taking place the Volsci were charging to the city. The Consuls or leaders of Rome at that time were Publius Servilius and Appius Claudius. They saw the threat that was occurring the soldiers were refusing to suit up for battle until the laws were changed. The protesters screamed for the senate and consuls to convene, eventually they did. Appius Claudius thought that if they arrested some of the protesters then they were go away. But Publius Servilius who had a softer heart disagreed.
While the debate was going between the consuls the soldiers announced that they would not suit for the battle, they said, “Let the senators don their armor and fight the fight so the same group would face the peril and reap rewards!”
To get the soldiers to fight Publius Servilius announced that, “No one might keep a Roman Citizen in chains or confine him so that he could not join the military levy by the consuls: nor might anyone take possession of or sell the property of a soldier while he was on active duty, nor interfere with his children or grandchildren.” When this was announced the soldiers got prepared to fight the Volsci and eventually beat them several days later.
The steps went like this:
First the soldiers or plebeians began complaining about debt.
Second an elderly man comes into the street and begins a protest and gives a speech concerning his suffering.
We found out there was a war tax that overburdened the farmer to the point he had to take out loans but could not afford to pay those loans.
Third crowds begin surrounding him.
The Volsci were coming closer to Rome to conquer.
The senators and consuls realized that without the soldiers their Resilience Factor was lost. They would lose to the Volsci and the Volsci would conquer them and make life worse for them.
The senators and consuls realized that they needed the plebeian soldiers to survive and because of this they needed to appease them. They needed to change the laws to benefit the lives of the plebeian soldiers.
Chapter 3: Tiberius Restores Credit
According to Tacitus (1966, 201-204) n 33AD when Tiberius the Caesar of Rome they had a debt crisis. The problem started because usurers or wealthy people loaning out money began breaking the laws of Julius Caesar. Tacitus says, “Since patriotism comes second to private profits, this law had long been ignored. Money-lending is an ancient problem in Rome, and a frequent cause of disharmony and disorder.”
Tacitus explains that interest in earlier times were determined by the wealthy, then the Law of the Twelve Tables put it at 10% and then a Tribune's legislation reduced that to 5%. Then loans on compound interest was made illegal. Tacitus says though that people did not obey the law, “Fraudulence, attacked by repeated legislation, was ingeniously revived after each successive counter-measure.”
The Roman Senate decided to do an investigation of what went wrong. The Senate decided that in 18 months people had to follow the law. According to Tacitus, “The result was a shortage of money. For all debts were called in simultaneously, and the numerous convictions and sales of confiscated property had concentrated currency in the Treasury and its imperially controlled branches.” What happened was that so many wealthy people had broken the law that when the Roman government convicted them and took their possessions they ended up with most of the private capital of the held by the population. This may be surprising to a modern American to attack the upper classes in such a way, but in ancient Rome the Caesar had all the power and did not need to rely on campaign contributions or voters to maintain that power. Therefore he could do what he wanted.
To solve this problem Rome did several things, first they demanded the creditors, “invest two-thirds of their capital in Italy, and debtors immediately pay the same proportion of their debts.” This did not solve the problem though, because the, “when the capitalists received payment they hoarded it, to buy land at their own convenience.”
Tiberius decided to do a bailout, “He distributed a hundred million sesterces among specially established banks, for interest-free State loans three year State loans, against security of double the value in landed property. Credit was thus restored; and gradually private lenders, too, reappeared.”
Unlike earlier debt crises, the one of Tiberius did not involve large crowds, riots or protesters. The Roman government saw an imminent danger and decided to fix it before it became worse.
The first step was that government identified that there was debt crisis, that illegal activity and corruptions was rampant.
The second step was to arrest those who were breaking the law. The result was that Rome had a shortage of money and land capital.
The senate decided to have creditors invest in Rome.
But some of the capitalists decided not invest in Rome.
Which led to Tiberius giving a bailout of 100 million sesterces to restore credit.
This bailout is very close to our bailout, the nation needs credit to survive and thrive. The government is the only institution large enough to supply the money to restore credit. Which is what the United States did in 2008 and 2009 to restore credit.
The main difference between the bailout of Tiberius and the recent bailout of the United States is that Rome demanded that the wealthy invest in 2/3rd of the land of Rome. The United States did not demand anything in return.
Also the United States did not arrest people on a large scale.
Coincidences worth mentioning: Because of the style of ancient historians, because ancient Rome lacked newspapers and proper data collection our knowledge of correlations are scant. But we can see that something might have had to do with something else, but we cannot prove it conclusively. Two things occurred during the same year as the Tiberius debt crisis in 33AD that are troubling, first as Tacitus records in The Annuals of Rome (1966, 201) Tacitus says, “In the same year the high price of corn nearly caused riots. IN the theater, for several days, sweeping demands were shouted with a presumption rarely displayed to emperors.” We can see that there were riots concerning the price of food for the poor. Viewing that it makes sense that Tiberius would have made the creditors invest in agriculture, but the relation is not mentioned in the writings of Tacitus nor of Suetonius the only two people of Antiquity that wrote about Tiberius' Reign.
The other strange incident in 33AD is the birth of the Christian Cult. Nobody knows the exact years of Jesus or exactly when he died. When trying to gather information on the subject there were too many opinions to consider any of them completely true. But we do know that at that time a cult of people claiming to be Christians arose. The theory of the Christian cult was that “less is good. Less will bring you to God.” In a time without money and high corn prices this philosophy would have made complete sense. The reason for mentioning the Christian Cult is because the Christians in that time were considered radicals, they were rejecting Roman opulence and vanity. This is mentioned to show the possible manifestations of radicalism that could take place in our time.
It should be defined that “radicalism” does not imply good or bad. It merely implies in this text that a group of people have gathered together with extreme ideas about reality and the paradigm is considered normal.
Chapter 4: Pertinax Cancels Debt and Lowers Taxes after the Reign of Commodus
According to Edward Gibbon in The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (2005, 76-81) Rome in 192 Rome had another terrible debt and tax crisis. The problem occurred because of the Right of Commodus. Commodus had, “through every measure of injustice and extortion had been adopted which could collect the property of the subject into the coffers of the prince, the rapaciousness Commodus had been very inadequate to his extravagance that, upon his death, no more than eight thousand pounds were found in the exhausted treasury to defray the current expances of government.” Commodus had spent most of Rome's money even though he raised taxes enormously.
The reason why Commodus raised taxes and spent so much money was because he did anything he wanted and was protected by the Praetorian Guard. But while the Praetorian Guard was protecting him he also had to give money to them to make them happy.
After Commodus was murdered Pertinax was put in charge of Rome. Pertinax, according to Gibbon, “Pertinax had the generous firmness to remit all the oppressive taxes invented by Commodus and to cancel all the unjust claims of the treasury; declaring in a decree to the senate, “that he was better satisfied to administer a poor republic with innocence than to acquire riches by the ways of tyranny and dishonor.” Pertinax reduces taxes to solve the debt crisis. But he didn't solve the revenue, according to Gibbon this in when Rome began to decline. Their former glory was completely over and destabilization was the future for Rome.
Less than three months after Pertinax was killed by the Praetorian Guard because they did not like that Pertinax would let them do anything they wanted.
The steps of this crisis were that Commodus created a large deficit because of his spending habits and to make the Praetorian Guard happy. Then Commodus raised taxes to pay off his ventures. But this did not solve the debt crisis.
Pertinax came in and reduced taxes but did not solve the revenue crisis. The Praetorian Guard killed Pertinax because he did not make the Praetorian Guard happy.
The main correlation relating our debt crisis is if we replace the Praetorian Guard with multinational-corporations who fund out political campaigns. Multinational-corporations do not kill politicians like they did in ancient Rome, but they can choose who they give money to. If a politician does not want to play within the games of Multinational-corporations than the politician does not get to play at all. The point is that like in ancient Rome with the Praetorian Guard there is a small group of individuals that have a very large tug on public policy.
Another troubling aspect of this story is that Pertinax remits these high taxes even though the government badly needs revenue. Gibbon does not go into description but we can deduce it is because the people of Rome have barely any money to give. It gives a picture of a very poor republic. But it could be said that with gas prices so high and the people are already overloaded with personal debt the average American might not be able to pay their taxes and not foreclose or miss other bills at the same time.
The most terrifying thing about this story is that Rome began to decline after this debt crisis because the people could not make enough money to be taxed on. The government of Pertinax fell into a paradoxical situation. If Rome taxed highly they would cause different problems, if they taxes were low different problems would occur.
For our debt Crisis it would look like this: If the government raised taxes than millions of people might foreclose and start missing monthly bills like credit cards or their car insurance. Which will lead to a certain group of problems. If they government keeps taxes reduced the government will be forced to lesson the qualities of their services, for examples roads, schools, military, police, and the pay of public employees. A different set of problems will be reduced. For Pertinax it was to let the government quality lesson.
Chapter 5: How Debt made the French Revolution Possible
In The French Revolution by Ben R. Jones (1967, 20-22) the story of how the French government in the 1780s and 90s fell in to debt. It started with an agricultural crisis, according to Jones, “Severe drought and fodder shortage in 1785 meant less livestock and wool- this affected Eastern France especially. There was also a slump in wine sales that meant less money available in the normally profitable wine areas. Rouen had not recovered from a disastrous cotton famine resulting from the Maritime War (1778-83), and this meant less money for peasant families relying on earnings from domestic industry.” All this famine caused the price of food to rise and people could not afford to buy things other than food which led to a slump in every other market.
Then the French government made a free trade agreement with Britain called the Eden Treaty. The purpose of this was to help the wine market but it ended up hurting the textile industry.
IN 1788 the harvest was ruined because of hailstorms, then the price bread took, “there-quarters of a day laborer’s wage.”
Ben R. Jones does not state it but while all these domestic tragedies were occurring they France was fighting small conflicts all over the planet to gain more colonies. France had colonies in America (Louisiana), in the Caribbean Haiti and other islands, and had a good portion of western Africa. They were spending massive amounts of money on expansion and none on domestic.
All these catastrophes led to the French government having no money. According to Jones, “There had been serious economic crises before, but the sudden slump of 1787-9 coincided with a political crisis arising out of the government's lack of money.” Jones goes on to say, “The extended recession had sadly reduced the government's financial resources at the very time it was most seriously under pressure. Without the political crisis there would have been no revolution, for it apparent was not distress; but the prevailing economic conditions explain much of the course that revolution took.” The French government could not properly respond to the food crisis because it had no money, the Resilience Factor was gone. The French government was snapped in half because it could not fiscally afford to solve its problems which led to the Revolution of 1789.
The French financial crises followed several steps: the first major problem was that it was over expanded, they had colonies all over the world which they had to spend money on. The second problem when they kept having crops fail which led to high food prices. The high food prices led to people not purchasing non-food goods which led to economic slumps in other economic sectors. Then the French government made a free trade agreement with Britain which helped wine but hurt other sectors. This all led to low tax revenue. Which led to the people to radicalism that made revolution possible, which led to regime change and the previous rulers and leaders of that society having their heads chopped off.
The main similarities between The French Revolution and the debt crisis of The United States is that we have a free trade agreement resembling the Edna Treaty called NAFTA which has reduced wages and hurt many economic sectors in the United States. We have military forces posted all over the planet like France did, we do not call Iraq and Afghanistan a colony because the word has a bad connotation, but the fact is, Iraq and Afghanistan are colonies that we occupy and have to spend huge amounts of money on.
America does not have a food crisis, but we have a gasoline/oil crisis. The price of gasoline until 2000 with a fluctuation a few times remained around 1 dollar per gallon. It can be assumed that the United States economy was designed around 1 dollar gasoline, how we price things, how we pay people, how we generally transport ourselves and what products we use. In the last ten years the price of gasoline/oil has skyrocketed which and since all goods are shipped by vehicles that run on gasoline/oil the prices of those commodities rise with it. Food may not be scarce but if oil is scarce then the price of goods that require transportation rise with it.
The French Revolution was obviously a product of radicalism. The French people could not get food and live a worth living, they became afraid and the fear led to anger, and the anger resulted in violence.
Chapter 6: Russia, Debt and War
In The Russian Revolution by Richard Pipes (1990. 234-238) an explanation of Russian debt crisis of 1915-18 occurs: According to Pipes Russia had a reasonable economy before World War 1 Russia had a good supply of gold reserves and some money in the treasury. The problem was this in World War 1, the war concerned Germany, France, England, and Russia. Pipes said that, “It has been estimated that whereas the national per capita income of England in 1913 was $243, of France $185, and of Germany $46, Russia's was a mere $44. And yet Russia's costs would be to England's and inferior only to Germany.” This is obviously not hard math to understand. Russia was trying to spend just as much as England and France even though they did not have the money to spend. The war led to a deficit which led to them indirect taxes and taking loans out from foreign institutions.
Russia also prohibited the sell of alcohol which led to a huge decline in tax revenue. According to Pipes, “While alcoholism did not decline, the Treasury' income from alcohol taxes did, and these had formerly accounted for one-fourth of its revenues.”
Then Russia decided to print more currency which led to inflation. On July 27, 1914 the Russian suspended the gold standard and began printing notes without concern for how much gold was in the Treasury. “Paper currency declined proportionately, from 98 percent (July 1914) to 51.4 (January 1915), 28.7 percent (January 1916), and 16.2 percent (January 1914).” This led to inflation and a job in the exchange- rate.
Russia began borrowing money from England, America and Japan. Six to eight billion came from England alone.
The inflation led to high food prices but strangely the it benefited the peasant and hurt the urban dweller. The muzhik (a race of Russian peasant) got the idea not farm every piece of land which would make their food more expensive when they sold it to the urban population. What did they care, they grew their own food, they didn't have to pay for it.
This led to an urban crisis though: there were estimated between 22 to 28 million people living in the cities that depended upon food. Soon there were food shortages which led to the price of food skyrocketing,
Then Russia had a shipping crisis: The main Russian cities located in the north-west near Europe before the war were getting their coal from England even though Russia had its own coal in its southern and eastern parts of Russia. When World War 1 the sea lanes in the Baltic were closed, Russia couldn't get coal and oil which led to transportation problems, because the food was transported by trains which ran on coal at that point in history. In 1916 the transportation became even worse because the government had no money to repair the trains, so when they broke, they weren't fixed. There was one less train bringing food to the cities.
The steps of the Russian debt crisis: They joined a war that they couldn't afford to be in. Then the war cost too much. They decided to inflate their currency. The inflated currency led to the peasants not farming as much to make more money. This led to urban centers having food shortages, the supply of food went down, the price went up. The Russian government started taking out large amounts of loans from other countries. Then there was a transportation problem because they could not get British oil which led to trains and automobiles not being able to run. Then they were so out of money they couldn't even repair the trains, which meant one less train bringing food. Which led to a violent revolution that resorted in the leaders of that society being shot and a whole reworking of government.
The similarities between The United States and the Russian Debt crisis are that the United States had a deficit surplus before going to Iraq and Afghanistan which was less than ten years ago. Instead of the farmers having a food shortage because of a lack of planting, the United States has higher food prices because farmers have decided to grow corn for ethanol and not food people can eat. We also have transportation problems because of the high price of oil. The United States gets its oil from foreign countries that are thousands of miles away. And when those countries have a disruption like in Libya the price of gasoline/oil rises in America. The United States also has taken out billions in loans from foreign countries for example China.
Chapter 7: Debt in the United States after World War 2
It can been seen from this graph (usgovernmentspending.com) that America after World War 2 and The New Deal in 1944 was at over 100 percent of its GDP in debt. It was actually at a higher percent of GDP than it is currently. But there was no radicalism, no riots and no revolution. The reason is that the unemployment rate between 1944 and 1959 stayed below 6 percent (infoplease.com, 2011). The other reason concerns tax collection, the United States decided to put a heavy tax burden on the wealthiest class. In 1944 the tax burden for people making over 200,000 dollars was 94 percent and the lowest was 23% for people making $2,000 and below (taxfoundation.org). In 2011 terms $200,000 would be $2,502,534 and $2,000 is $25,148(CPI Inflation Calculator). Every one paid high taxes in 1944.
Google taxfoundation.org to find graph.
The graph displays the tax rates for 1944. As anyone can see they paid very high taxes.
It would be easy just to say, “Raise taxes like they did in 1944 but there few similarities between 2011 America and 1944 America. 1944 America a very strong economy and a freshly built infrastructure following The New Deal. We have a decaying infrastructure built in The New Deal and the 50s. America 1944 had a large supply of oil and the use of oil did not demand foreign supplies yet. 1944 America did not have an 8.9 percent unemployment rate like we have:
1944 America did not have to employee females to a large extent, they didn't have to supply African-Americans good jobs, they didn't have an influx of Latino immigrants. World War 2 was over and they didn't have to spend any more money on that, while 2011
America has two colonies to deal with. They didn't have to compete with foreign countries that do not mind paying their workers less for manufacturing jobs. After World War 2 Europe and Asia were blown to pieces and South America was still a backwater, so the United States did not have to compete with them. But currently, Europe, Russia, China, Japan, India, and several South American countries have been stabilized for along time, and have found new ways innovative ways to make their countries wealthy. Also 1944 did not global warming, excessive environmental damage leading to further problems and didn't have to worry about high gasoline/oil prices.
Most of all 1944 America did not have to worry about the cost of health care and entitlements for the elderly. What one notices after looking at the debt crises of history is that none of the aforementioned countries had health care costs problems.
The 2011 situation is not the same as the 1944 situation. The 2011 situation is much more complex and daunting.
Chapter 8: How the United States Taxes its Citizens
In America we have a progressive tax which means that the government taxes more and more the wealthier the citizen is. The idea of the progressive tax comes from Adam Smith's An Inquiry into the Wealth of Nations (1937, 793) from this paragraph:
“The necessaries of life occasion the great expense of the poor. They find it difficult to get food, and the greater part of their little revenue is spent in getting it. The luxuries and vanities of life occasion the principal expense of the rich, and a magnificent house embellishes and sets off to the best advantage all the other luxuries and vanities which they possess. A tax upon house-rents, therefore, would in general fall heaviest upon the rich; and in this sort of inequality there would not, perhaps, be anything very unreasonable. It is not very unreasonable that the rich should contribute to the public expense, not only in proportion to their revenue, but something more than in that proportion”
Smith's basic idea is that the poor cannot give to many taxes to the government, if they do they will starve. And that if the wealthy give a large proportion of their wealth to their government the government can in turn use the money to create infrastructure that will create more wealth. The more wealth there is, the wealthy everyone can become, which makes the nation wealthy and prosperous and a good nation to live in.
2011 United States Tax brackets from Taxfoundation.org:
Obviously from looking at this chart that taxes are much lower than they were in 1944.
According to USA Today, (4/15/2010) 47% of citizens do not pay taxes, it can been seen in this chart:
It can be seen that most people under the $30,000 bracket are not paying taxes. But strangely 9% come from citizens making over $100,000 a year.
There are also subsidies that the federal government gives out to oil and gas companies and to farmers:
$36.5 billion in subsidies to large oil companies.
Billions and billions in farm subsidies. Could not ascertain the exact number given to farms because the farm subsidy world is intensely bureaucratic and full of specifications. It involves subsidies to farmers to grow ethanol, subsides to people not to farm, and even subsidies
to Brazilian cotton farmers.
There are also tax refunds and loopholes for major corporations: For example in 2009 Exxon Mobil paid no taxes even though they made $19 billion in profits. Bank of America paid no taxes and got a $1.9 billion tax refund. General Electric made $26 billion in profits and paid no taxes and got a $4.1 billion refund and many more corporations have gotten out of paying taxes (sanders.senate.gov, 2011). This is obviously a problem of tax collection. The United States is failing to collect taxes; the idea that Exxon Mobil doesn’t pay any taxes is absurd. It shows a complete a failure of governance.
The United States way of collecting taxes is amazing in its complexity. But one can see that it is very easy not to pay taxes in America from the rich to the poor.
Chapter 9: Why Americans are so against Taxes being Raised?
What is important, is that we need to figure out why Americans do not have the income anymore to pay high taxes and are strongly against the raising of taxes. And even why they do have the spending money to purchase goods like they used to: What needs to be done is show the math of a normal American family. Take a married couple of two with say 2 kids whose annual income is $60,000 a year that live in Hubbard, Ohio.
Federal social security state income city
(60,000 x .15)+(60,000 x .084)+ (60,000 x .04983)+ (60,000 x .014)
9000 + 5040 + 2998 + 840
=17,878
60,000 - 17,878
42,122 left
Average cost insurance for a family according to Kaiser family foundation
13,373
42,122 -13,373
= 28,749
say the monthly mortgage is 1200 a month which equals 14,400
28,749 - 14,400
= 14,349
Then I added in the price of owning one car for one year:
insurance payments gas oil oil changes two new tires
(66 x 12)+ (200 x 12)+ (40 x 52)+ (35 x 4)+ 300
792+2400+2080+140+300
=5712 x 2 but lets say one car is paid off and they have a family insurance package, lets just add 3000.
=8,712
14,349 – 8,712
= 5637
$5,637 is the remaining amount left for a family of four. This does not include food, heating, electricity, water, Internet, cable television, or sales tax.
I admit there are some problems with the choosing of the numbers, I tried to pick them to resemble the bills of someone making 60,000. There are also other things like tax credits that I didn't include and a possible lower insurance premium.
We have to remember that in 1944 the United States was able to raise taxes and that for two decades the United States had a very high tax rate. In 1944 the lowest tax rate was 23% (Barrymore, howstuffworks.com, 2011) So what is the difference between now and then?
The two things in 1944 that Americans did not have to deal with were the extreme cost of health care and the automobile. For a family of four that has an annual income of $60,000 a year having health insurance and two automobiles literary sucks up an estimated $20,000 dollars a year. Because of these two expenses it leads to several things: on the macroeconomic side it leads to an inability to save, an inability to buy products in the economy generating wealth throughout the economy, and it leads to people using credit cards to compensate for not having
an adequate supply of spending cash. On the macroeconomic side automobiles lead to wars, massive military spending, subsidies to oil companies, oil spills, CO2 emissions, damage to the environment, and constantly needing to maintain the roadways.
The cost of health care keeps going up and up. Everyone needs health care though: everyone wants to be well and not to die. And everyone knows that if you go to a hospital for something serious and you do not have health care you will have bills for the rest of your life.
The cost of being an American and having children verges on impossible. The average American is a serf to debt, insurance companies and their car. The difference between a slave and a serf is that a slave cannot leave the plantation, but a serf can leave to do their business but they are constantly owned by outside forces that tie them down.
Chapter 10: What Solutions are Possible inside the Present Paradigm?
Cut the Budget: The future could be Senator Rand Paul's budget which cuts almost every program in the federal government including 30% decrease for Agriculture, 54% decrease for Commerce, 83% decrease for education, 100% for the Department of Energy, 100% decrease for HUD, 49% for Transportation, 29% decrease for the EPA, and many other programs. Budget cutting at this level would lead to America becoming a third world country, many of the services we enjoy would disappear: our schools, environment, highways, housing services for the poor would be terribly damaged. It would lead to America not being able to compete in the international market for jobs because our country would be in a state of inefficiency.
If the budget is cut as intensely as Rand Paul wants to cut it, then it will lead to massive outrage and instability in the society. The recent events in Wisconsin would be just the beginning of the future protests that will occur if the budgets keep getting cut. Lowering the budget on education will compromise the future of America and make it less competitive, which will lead to further decline. Rand Paul's budget is the acceptance of decline. It resembles Pertinax and could bring on Russian and French revolution style chaos in the future.
Raise taxes on the Middle-Class: Raising taxes would be difficult because the average citizen is already spending so much money on their car and health insurance. Raising taxes on the middle-class and lower-classes now would lead to the economy worsening.
Raise taxes on the wealthy: It might be possible to raise taxes on people making over 2 million a year. It would not hurt small business and only effect those who could pay it. But at the same time because we have an international market the wealthy might decide to just leave America.
Cut subsidies and tax breaks: Cutting subsidies would create more revenue but might cause the prices of fuel and food to rise.
Make Multinational Corporations Pay Taxes: The United States government instead of giving tax refunds to Bank of America and Exxon Mobil it could actually collect taxes from them.
Flat Tax: Russia implemented a flat a 13 percent flat tax for individuals and a 24 percent tax on corporations. Russia doesn't give subsidies and tax breaks like the United States does. According to an essay from “The University of Chicago Journal” by Kevin Stacey (2009) it has created more revenue for the government but has not increased wealth. And according to Stacey, the,“data is that the flat tax seems to have done little to increase real income for taxpayers. If real income had increased substantially.” But it must be noted that Russia makes a lot of revenue from their natural gas and oil exports.
Chapter 11: Suggestions Based off what we Learned from History
We have learned from the aforementioned experiences of history that great debt brings on great change. The change requires people to live differently, under new laws and new of philosophies.
Immense debt is a signal to your country, “You have been living incorrectly. The path you have chosen is not sustainable.”
Before we fix the debt we have to ask the question the Roman soldiers did in ancient Greece and in Rome during Publius Servilius' time and what the French and Russians asked during their times of crisis, “Is the government and its laws worth saving?”
The Roman soldiers answered yes, they believed in the Republic and thought it needed improvements not destruction. The Greeks responded with electing a new leader that would change the laws and framework of their government, as the French and Russians did also.
My answer would be yes, save the Constitution, the constitution is well written, provides a separation of powers and grants us rights we very much enjoy. The debt is a constitutional problem, it is a culture problem.
The steps I would take in trying to solve the debt crisis:
First Step: Creating a mixture of a flat tax and a progressive tax. People making below $20,000 do not have to pay taxes but get no tax breaks. People making between $20,000 and 2.5 million have to pay a flat tax of 13 to 16 percent and no tax breaks. People making above 2.5 million would have to pay around 50% on every dollar they made above 2.5 million and subsidies only on farms and innovation, which should be strictly monitored. The reasoning for the 2.5 million is so not to hurt small business. We have to remember that much of small business are doctors and local owners who we do not want to hurt. While people who make 2.5 million are people involved in large corporations. Perhaps if the tax was higher multinational corporations who do not concern themselves with the prosperity of the American citizen and only with reaping as much profits as possible from the American citizen will leave and they will be replaced with smaller businesses who care more about their communities and its citizens. This could have a bad effect at first but years later it could lead to a better America.
Second step: Reducing the price of health care insurance. The best way to do this would be to create a public option where people can pay into health care. If everyone pays into health care then it will be cheaper. By not allowing people to frivolously sue doctors and hospitals.
More preventive medicine and the reduction of unhealthy food in our culture.
Third Step: Bring the troops home from foreign countries. According to Professor Jules Defour from the Globalresearch.ca website the United States has based in 63 different countries (2009). Defense is costing the U.S. Tax payer almost 700 billion a year. Cutting spending on education and transportation before needless military bases is not logical. The logical thing to do would be to close many bases around the world and to bring the troops home from Iraq and Afghanistan. There is no money to fund these ventures any no longer.
Fourth Step: One of the main problems we refuse to look at is the use of cars. The United States needs to reduce the amount of car use. Owning and using cars are sucking up too much money and leading to foreign wars the United States cannot afford. It should be a high priority of the Federal, state and local governments to zone in new ways. The new types of zoning should be based on sustainability methods. The United States needs to start building up and not out. The era of urban sprawl needs to come to an end. The average person cannot actually afford to own a car when the numbers are added up. It should become law that cars that drive on less than 30 miles per gallon should be illegal to make. Then it should become law that any new building of suburbs become illegal or just not zoned. Business centers, factories and hosing should be zoned within walking or busing distance of each other. Bike paths and commuter train rails should be built. Also food should be grown more locally, instead of growing food for ethanol or soybeans for China local farmers should be given subsidies to grow locally. This would also bring back a sense of community that Americans have lost in the car boom years.
If Republicans want to go back to the time of the 50s then this is very close to that: it involves a higher tax rate for the wealthy, less car use, people living closer together, and eating local food. But without the racism and sexism the 50s contained.
The United States can either choose to implement these things and start making changes early or the changes will be forced through protest and anger, and the natural progression of history. It is wiser to make a change then to be forced to change.
Chapter 12: Domestic Implications if it’s Business as Usual
If the United States government cuts budgets, refuses to rearrange the tax brackets, keeps allowing large corporations to not pay taxes and never downsizes the military influence on the world then extreme government deterioration will occur. Budget cuts = deterioration. According to Politico (2011), “Moody’s chief economist, Mark Zandi, projected that the House proposal would cut real GDP growth by 0.5 percent in 2011 and 0.2 percent in 2012. That, in turn, would lead to 400,000 fewer jobs being created than expected by the end of this year and a total of 700,000 fewer jobs by the end of 2012.” When the budget cuts are implemented thousands are going to lose their jobs. Thousands of Americans who worked hard and got paid well will be sent home with no job. This is going to be a disaster, 100s of thousands more people and many who have college degrees will be added to the as Marx called it The Reserve Army of Labor which is large mass of people who are unemployed, all the unemployed people creates a surplus of possible workers, which lowers their demand, after their demand is lowered, then the corporations can pay them less to work. Because instead of workers getting paid well and getting good benefits, the United States citizen will have this attitude, “At least I have a job,” which will destroy the work labor unions have done since the beginning of the United States.
As The Reserve Army of Labor grows discontent will grow in the United States, now in terms of political science, discontent doesn’t need to make sense. Germany had massive amounts of debt; they tried to cure it by killing Jewish people. How killing Jewish people can cure deeply befuddles me. The new illogical discontent can be seen with the Tea Party, the founder of the Tea Party Judson Phillips’ believes that Barack Obama was not born in America and that, “The White Anglo-Saxon Protestant (WASP) population in America is headed for extinction and with it our economy, well-being and survival as a uniquely America culture.” (Devin Burghart, irehr.org, 2011). According to the Tea Party the United States government is in such debt and has so many problems because white people aren’t having enough babies, and if we could just return to white people culture then everything would be fine. This is madness. This is the very definition of a fascist ideology, where you blame the problems of your society on race and not on empirical evidence. If a Tea Party member is eventually elected to President, the United States will face grave implications.
The United States in the coming years will experience a deep decline of government services, the government will become more and more inefficient. For example there is a plan currently to cute the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). Cutting funding to the CDC is not a good idea, instead of building less aircraft or closing a few bases in foreign countries, or making Exxon Mobil pay taxes, we are going to create an inefficient institution concerning disease. These budget cuts will eventually lead to the American citizen becoming very dissatisfied with the government, which will lead to protests on a large scale.
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Plutarch. 1957. Plutarch's Lives. New York: Mentor Books.
Tacitus. 1966. The Annals of Imperial Rome. Baltimore: Penguin.
Gibbon, Edward. 2005. The Decline and Fall of The Roman Empire. New York: Random House.
Jones, Ben R. 1968. The French Revolution. U.S.A.: Minerva Press.
Pipes, Richard. 1991. The Russian Revolution. New York: Vintage.
Smith, Adam. 1937. An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. United States: Random House.
Truthandpolitics.org. 2004. Top Marginal Income Rates, 1913 -2003. accessed 2/18/2011 fromtruthandpolitics.org/top-rates.php
usgovernment.us. 2011. Budgetted U.S. Federal Debt. Accessed 4/3/2011 from http://www.usgovernmentdebt.us/federal_debt
infoplease. 2007. United States Unemployment Rate. Accessed 2/3/2011 from http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0104719.html
Tax Foundation. 2011. State Individual Tax Rates. Accessed 3/23/2011 from http://www.taxfoundation.org/taxdata/show/228.html
Tax Foundation. U.S. Federal Income Tax Rates History, 1913-2011. Accessed 3/23/2011 from http://www.taxfoundation.org/publications/show/151.html
CPI Inflation Calculator. Accessed 3/23/2011 from http://www.compuquotes.com/average-costs-of-insurance.html
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USA Today. 2010. Our View on Financing the Government. When 47% don't pay income tax. Its not Healthy for the U.S.. 2010. Accessed 4/23/2011 from http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/editorials/2010-04-16-editorial16_ST_N.htm
Reuters. 2010. Obama budget seeks to End Oil, Gas Subsidies. Accessed 3/15/2011 from http://www.reuters.com/article/2010/02/01/us-obama-budget-oil-idUSTRE6103RM20100201?feedType=RSS&feedName=environmentNews&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+reuters%2Fenvironment+%28News+%2F+US+%2F+Environment%29
Dan Morgan, Gilbert M Gaul and Sarah Cohen. Farm Program pays out 1.3 Billion to People who Don't Farm. The Washington Post. Accessed 3/15/2011 from http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/01/AR2006070100962.html
Michael Grunwald. Why the U.S. Is also Giving Brazallian Farm Subidies. Time. Accessed 4/23/2011 from http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1978963,00.html
Kevin Stacey. 2009. Study Separates Russian Flat Tax Rate Myth from Fact. University of Chicago Press Journals. Accessed 4/15/2011 from http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2009-06/uocp-ssr061609.php
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sanders.senate.gov. 2011. Accessed 4/4/2011 from http://sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/news/?id=A25567FF-02C0-4730-A6DF-BF1F0039AC78
Devin Burghar. 2011. Tea Party Warns of White Anglo Saxon Protestant Extinction. irehr.org. Accessed 4/3/2011 from http://www.irehr.org/issue-areas/tea-parties/19-news/76-tea-party-nation-warns-of-white-anglo-saxon-protestant-extinction
The point of this paper is show information regarding what the effects of high debt had on past governments. This is relevant because the United States is currently in the y
ear 2011 14 trillion dollars in debt and the debt continues to rise every day.
The paper will go over the debt crises of the past and then supply information on the debt crisis of the United States, what people are trying to do about it, what can be done about it, and what the probable implications of it are.
The claim will not be made that debt is The Cause of revolutions or political upheaval. Only that at some points in history when political upheaval occurred, debt was found at the site. The same way that a gun is found at the scene of a murder, the gun murdered the human. But the motivation and reason for the murder is not found in the gun.
Political science does not have the luxury of controlled experiments. The experiments of political science are found in history. When looking at this past high debt situations we may look at them as experiments in how the society solved their debt problems. What is also important is that when looking at past high debt situations we can see the long term effects of high debt. Currently the United States is in the short, these past experiences with high debt will provide a view into what the long term effects will be.
The debt crises selected range from antiquity to the modern times and are from Western Cultures. The Middle-Ages were omitted because as according to Marc Bloch in Feudalism volume 1 (Bloch, 1978, 66-67) said concerning money in the Middle-Ages, “The society of this age was certainly not unacquainted with either buying or selling. But it did not, like our own, live by buying and selling.” The Middle-Ages were primarily an agriculture economy and had no method of coining money. Large debt did not occur there because they did not really have money. When someone wanted more or to get a higher status in the world, instead of money they wanted land or a higher title like knight, Lord or Bishop.
Several debt crises were neglected because of time and because they are already well known. The debt crisis of Germany of in the 1920s that led to Fascism and the debt crisis of the Catholic Church in the 1500s that participated the birth of Protestantism.
The debt problems of antiquity do not concern government debt but personal debt. Antiquity did not have stock markets, huge banks and especially not foreign banks. During Roman times, Rome was the only real government. The creditors were the wealthy who could loan money on interest. They did not have corporate offices with stock holders.
Chapter 1: Solon Cancels out Debt
Chapter 2: Publius Servilius and Appius Claudius in Ancient Rome
Chapter 3: Tiberius Restores Credit
Chapter 4: Pertinax Cancels Debt and Lowers Taxes after the Reign of Commodus
Chapter 5: How Debt made the French Revolution Possible
Chapter 6: Russia, Debt and War
Chapter 7: Debt in the United States after World War 2
Chapter 8: The Current Debt and can we Learn anything from the Past
Chapter 9: Why Americans are so against Taxes being Raised?
Chapter 10: What Solutions are Possible inside the Present Paradigm?
Chapter 11: Suggestions Based off what we Learned from History
Chapter 12: Chapter 12: Domestic Implications if it’s Business as Usual
Chapter 1: Solon Cancels out Debt
According to Plutarch's Lives (1957, 44-49) there was a debt crisis in Athens. Plutarch says, “So greatly were the poor in debt to the rich that they were obliged either to pay them a sixth part of the produce of the land-whence they were called Hectemorii and Thetes- or else to engage their persons to their creditors who might seize them on failure of payment.” This means that if they could not pay, they were taken as slaves or they were forced into selling their children into slavery. Others were forced to leave the city and find another place to live because they could not pay off their loans.
This situation forced the people of Athens to find a new leader. Which was the first political upheaval, being forced to choose a new leader.
The people of Athens chose Solon. They chose Solon because he was neither rich nor poor, he was what we would call middle class. At first Solon told the poor he would divide up the lands and he told the wealthy he would secure their securities. This was a political lie. Then he told the people, “Equality causes no war,” to soften their hearts and keep them peaceful. The debt crisis was so bad that the rich and poor urged Solon to make himself king but he refused to. But this shows what large debt can do to a nation, it can lead people to the idea if they give up democracy it may lead to a better life.
Solon in the end canceled many debts and made it illegal for a creditor to take a debtor to be his slave. Solon also inflated the currency, according to Plutarch, “For Solon ordered the minas, which before went but for seventy-three drachmas, to go for a hundred so that, as they paid the same in value but much less in weight, those that had great sums to pay were relieved while such as received them were no losers.”
The new laws did not make everyone happy. The poor still wanted a division of the land and the wealthy didn't want to give up their money. But they agreed and dealt with the situation. They agreed to the point that they did a sacrifice after called the seisacthia.
After Solon fixed the debt problem he reduced the penalties for breaking laws. He actually reduced the laws made by Draco where we get the term “draconian” from. Then he gave the poor more power in government.
Athens basically had a complete reform after Solon took office.
We can see a several step process when it comes to the story of Solon and Athenian debt.
The first step was to select a new ruler.
The second was to cancel debt for the poor and change the laws of what can be done to the debtor who cannot pay.
Then a large scale reform in government occurs that allows a better quaility of life for the poor.
The main difference between the United States and ancient Athens is that the debt is personal and government. But how the Athenian government solved the problem and the effects on government still remain a factor in looking at our own situation.
Chapter 2: Publius Servilius and Appius Claudius in Ancient Rome
According to Livy (1998, 93-98) ancient Rome suffered a terrible debt crisis in 495BC. While Rome was preparing to fight the Volsci the plebeians began complaining that even though they were fighting wars for Rome. When the got home from war if they could not pay their debts promptly they or their family members were taken as slaves. Then as Livy says, “An elderly man burst into the forum displaying the marks of all his misfortunes,” and began screaming that he was once a soldier and company commander for the Roman Army, and that he had been taken prisoner by a creditor, imprisoned and then whipped by the creditor. Inspired by the elderly man crowds of soldiers and ex-soldiers started protesting in the forum. The soldiers askedd him why he was complaining the elderly man said, “That while he was serving in the war against the Sabines his crops had been ravaged, his farmhouse burned down, all possessions looted, his flocks driven off. Then at the worst moments, a war tax was levied. So he borrowed money, and as the interest piled up he first lost the land that had belonged to his father and grandfather and then all his movable goods, until the debt spread like a cancer to his very person: his creditor led him not into slavery but into a torture chamber and prison.”
While this protest was taking place the Volsci were charging to the city. The Consuls or leaders of Rome at that time were Publius Servilius and Appius Claudius. They saw the threat that was occurring the soldiers were refusing to suit up for battle until the laws were changed. The protesters screamed for the senate and consuls to convene, eventually they did. Appius Claudius thought that if they arrested some of the protesters then they were go away. But Publius Servilius who had a softer heart disagreed.
While the debate was going between the consuls the soldiers announced that they would not suit for the battle, they said, “Let the senators don their armor and fight the fight so the same group would face the peril and reap rewards!”
To get the soldiers to fight Publius Servilius announced that, “No one might keep a Roman Citizen in chains or confine him so that he could not join the military levy by the consuls: nor might anyone take possession of or sell the property of a soldier while he was on active duty, nor interfere with his children or grandchildren.” When this was announced the soldiers got prepared to fight the Volsci and eventually beat them several days later.
The steps went like this:
First the soldiers or plebeians began complaining about debt.
Second an elderly man comes into the street and begins a protest and gives a speech concerning his suffering.
We found out there was a war tax that overburdened the farmer to the point he had to take out loans but could not afford to pay those loans.
Third crowds begin surrounding him.
The Volsci were coming closer to Rome to conquer.
The senators and consuls realized that without the soldiers their Resilience Factor was lost. They would lose to the Volsci and the Volsci would conquer them and make life worse for them.
The senators and consuls realized that they needed the plebeian soldiers to survive and because of this they needed to appease them. They needed to change the laws to benefit the lives of the plebeian soldiers.
Chapter 3: Tiberius Restores Credit
According to Tacitus (1966, 201-204) n 33AD when Tiberius the Caesar of Rome they had a debt crisis. The problem started because usurers or wealthy people loaning out money began breaking the laws of Julius Caesar. Tacitus says, “Since patriotism comes second to private profits, this law had long been ignored. Money-lending is an ancient problem in Rome, and a frequent cause of disharmony and disorder.”
Tacitus explains that interest in earlier times were determined by the wealthy, then the Law of the Twelve Tables put it at 10% and then a Tribune's legislation reduced that to 5%. Then loans on compound interest was made illegal. Tacitus says though that people did not obey the law, “Fraudulence, attacked by repeated legislation, was ingeniously revived after each successive counter-measure.”
The Roman Senate decided to do an investigation of what went wrong. The Senate decided that in 18 months people had to follow the law. According to Tacitus, “The result was a shortage of money. For all debts were called in simultaneously, and the numerous convictions and sales of confiscated property had concentrated currency in the Treasury and its imperially controlled branches.” What happened was that so many wealthy people had broken the law that when the Roman government convicted them and took their possessions they ended up with most of the private capital of the held by the population. This may be surprising to a modern American to attack the upper classes in such a way, but in ancient Rome the Caesar had all the power and did not need to rely on campaign contributions or voters to maintain that power. Therefore he could do what he wanted.
To solve this problem Rome did several things, first they demanded the creditors, “invest two-thirds of their capital in Italy, and debtors immediately pay the same proportion of their debts.” This did not solve the problem though, because the, “when the capitalists received payment they hoarded it, to buy land at their own convenience.”
Tiberius decided to do a bailout, “He distributed a hundred million sesterces among specially established banks, for interest-free State loans three year State loans, against security of double the value in landed property. Credit was thus restored; and gradually private lenders, too, reappeared.”
Unlike earlier debt crises, the one of Tiberius did not involve large crowds, riots or protesters. The Roman government saw an imminent danger and decided to fix it before it became worse.
The first step was that government identified that there was debt crisis, that illegal activity and corruptions was rampant.
The second step was to arrest those who were breaking the law. The result was that Rome had a shortage of money and land capital.
The senate decided to have creditors invest in Rome.
But some of the capitalists decided not invest in Rome.
Which led to Tiberius giving a bailout of 100 million sesterces to restore credit.
This bailout is very close to our bailout, the nation needs credit to survive and thrive. The government is the only institution large enough to supply the money to restore credit. Which is what the United States did in 2008 and 2009 to restore credit.
The main difference between the bailout of Tiberius and the recent bailout of the United States is that Rome demanded that the wealthy invest in 2/3rd of the land of Rome. The United States did not demand anything in return.
Also the United States did not arrest people on a large scale.
Coincidences worth mentioning: Because of the style of ancient historians, because ancient Rome lacked newspapers and proper data collection our knowledge of correlations are scant. But we can see that something might have had to do with something else, but we cannot prove it conclusively. Two things occurred during the same year as the Tiberius debt crisis in 33AD that are troubling, first as Tacitus records in The Annuals of Rome (1966, 201) Tacitus says, “In the same year the high price of corn nearly caused riots. IN the theater, for several days, sweeping demands were shouted with a presumption rarely displayed to emperors.” We can see that there were riots concerning the price of food for the poor. Viewing that it makes sense that Tiberius would have made the creditors invest in agriculture, but the relation is not mentioned in the writings of Tacitus nor of Suetonius the only two people of Antiquity that wrote about Tiberius' Reign.
The other strange incident in 33AD is the birth of the Christian Cult. Nobody knows the exact years of Jesus or exactly when he died. When trying to gather information on the subject there were too many opinions to consider any of them completely true. But we do know that at that time a cult of people claiming to be Christians arose. The theory of the Christian cult was that “less is good. Less will bring you to God.” In a time without money and high corn prices this philosophy would have made complete sense. The reason for mentioning the Christian Cult is because the Christians in that time were considered radicals, they were rejecting Roman opulence and vanity. This is mentioned to show the possible manifestations of radicalism that could take place in our time.
It should be defined that “radicalism” does not imply good or bad. It merely implies in this text that a group of people have gathered together with extreme ideas about reality and the paradigm is considered normal.
Chapter 4: Pertinax Cancels Debt and Lowers Taxes after the Reign of Commodus
According to Edward Gibbon in The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (2005, 76-81) Rome in 192 Rome had another terrible debt and tax crisis. The problem occurred because of the Right of Commodus. Commodus had, “through every measure of injustice and extortion had been adopted which could collect the property of the subject into the coffers of the prince, the rapaciousness Commodus had been very inadequate to his extravagance that, upon his death, no more than eight thousand pounds were found in the exhausted treasury to defray the current expances of government.” Commodus had spent most of Rome's money even though he raised taxes enormously.
The reason why Commodus raised taxes and spent so much money was because he did anything he wanted and was protected by the Praetorian Guard. But while the Praetorian Guard was protecting him he also had to give money to them to make them happy.
After Commodus was murdered Pertinax was put in charge of Rome. Pertinax, according to Gibbon, “Pertinax had the generous firmness to remit all the oppressive taxes invented by Commodus and to cancel all the unjust claims of the treasury; declaring in a decree to the senate, “that he was better satisfied to administer a poor republic with innocence than to acquire riches by the ways of tyranny and dishonor.” Pertinax reduces taxes to solve the debt crisis. But he didn't solve the revenue, according to Gibbon this in when Rome began to decline. Their former glory was completely over and destabilization was the future for Rome.
Less than three months after Pertinax was killed by the Praetorian Guard because they did not like that Pertinax would let them do anything they wanted.
The steps of this crisis were that Commodus created a large deficit because of his spending habits and to make the Praetorian Guard happy. Then Commodus raised taxes to pay off his ventures. But this did not solve the debt crisis.
Pertinax came in and reduced taxes but did not solve the revenue crisis. The Praetorian Guard killed Pertinax because he did not make the Praetorian Guard happy.
The main correlation relating our debt crisis is if we replace the Praetorian Guard with multinational-corporations who fund out political campaigns. Multinational-corporations do not kill politicians like they did in ancient Rome, but they can choose who they give money to. If a politician does not want to play within the games of Multinational-corporations than the politician does not get to play at all. The point is that like in ancient Rome with the Praetorian Guard there is a small group of individuals that have a very large tug on public policy.
Another troubling aspect of this story is that Pertinax remits these high taxes even though the government badly needs revenue. Gibbon does not go into description but we can deduce it is because the people of Rome have barely any money to give. It gives a picture of a very poor republic. But it could be said that with gas prices so high and the people are already overloaded with personal debt the average American might not be able to pay their taxes and not foreclose or miss other bills at the same time.
The most terrifying thing about this story is that Rome began to decline after this debt crisis because the people could not make enough money to be taxed on. The government of Pertinax fell into a paradoxical situation. If Rome taxed highly they would cause different problems, if they taxes were low different problems would occur.
For our debt Crisis it would look like this: If the government raised taxes than millions of people might foreclose and start missing monthly bills like credit cards or their car insurance. Which will lead to a certain group of problems. If they government keeps taxes reduced the government will be forced to lesson the qualities of their services, for examples roads, schools, military, police, and the pay of public employees. A different set of problems will be reduced. For Pertinax it was to let the government quality lesson.
Chapter 5: How Debt made the French Revolution Possible
In The French Revolution by Ben R. Jones (1967, 20-22) the story of how the French government in the 1780s and 90s fell in to debt. It started with an agricultural crisis, according to Jones, “Severe drought and fodder shortage in 1785 meant less livestock and wool- this affected Eastern France especially. There was also a slump in wine sales that meant less money available in the normally profitable wine areas. Rouen had not recovered from a disastrous cotton famine resulting from the Maritime War (1778-83), and this meant less money for peasant families relying on earnings from domestic industry.” All this famine caused the price of food to rise and people could not afford to buy things other than food which led to a slump in every other market.
Then the French government made a free trade agreement with Britain called the Eden Treaty. The purpose of this was to help the wine market but it ended up hurting the textile industry.
IN 1788 the harvest was ruined because of hailstorms, then the price bread took, “there-quarters of a day laborer’s wage.”
Ben R. Jones does not state it but while all these domestic tragedies were occurring they France was fighting small conflicts all over the planet to gain more colonies. France had colonies in America (Louisiana), in the Caribbean Haiti and other islands, and had a good portion of western Africa. They were spending massive amounts of money on expansion and none on domestic.
All these catastrophes led to the French government having no money. According to Jones, “There had been serious economic crises before, but the sudden slump of 1787-9 coincided with a political crisis arising out of the government's lack of money.” Jones goes on to say, “The extended recession had sadly reduced the government's financial resources at the very time it was most seriously under pressure. Without the political crisis there would have been no revolution, for it apparent was not distress; but the prevailing economic conditions explain much of the course that revolution took.” The French government could not properly respond to the food crisis because it had no money, the Resilience Factor was gone. The French government was snapped in half because it could not fiscally afford to solve its problems which led to the Revolution of 1789.
The French financial crises followed several steps: the first major problem was that it was over expanded, they had colonies all over the world which they had to spend money on. The second problem when they kept having crops fail which led to high food prices. The high food prices led to people not purchasing non-food goods which led to economic slumps in other economic sectors. Then the French government made a free trade agreement with Britain which helped wine but hurt other sectors. This all led to low tax revenue. Which led to the people to radicalism that made revolution possible, which led to regime change and the previous rulers and leaders of that society having their heads chopped off.
The main similarities between The French Revolution and the debt crisis of The United States is that we have a free trade agreement resembling the Edna Treaty called NAFTA which has reduced wages and hurt many economic sectors in the United States. We have military forces posted all over the planet like France did, we do not call Iraq and Afghanistan a colony because the word has a bad connotation, but the fact is, Iraq and Afghanistan are colonies that we occupy and have to spend huge amounts of money on.
America does not have a food crisis, but we have a gasoline/oil crisis. The price of gasoline until 2000 with a fluctuation a few times remained around 1 dollar per gallon. It can be assumed that the United States economy was designed around 1 dollar gasoline, how we price things, how we pay people, how we generally transport ourselves and what products we use. In the last ten years the price of gasoline/oil has skyrocketed which and since all goods are shipped by vehicles that run on gasoline/oil the prices of those commodities rise with it. Food may not be scarce but if oil is scarce then the price of goods that require transportation rise with it.
The French Revolution was obviously a product of radicalism. The French people could not get food and live a worth living, they became afraid and the fear led to anger, and the anger resulted in violence.
Chapter 6: Russia, Debt and War
In The Russian Revolution by Richard Pipes (1990. 234-238) an explanation of Russian debt crisis of 1915-18 occurs: According to Pipes Russia had a reasonable economy before World War 1 Russia had a good supply of gold reserves and some money in the treasury. The problem was this in World War 1, the war concerned Germany, France, England, and Russia. Pipes said that, “It has been estimated that whereas the national per capita income of England in 1913 was $243, of France $185, and of Germany $46, Russia's was a mere $44. And yet Russia's costs would be to England's and inferior only to Germany.” This is obviously not hard math to understand. Russia was trying to spend just as much as England and France even though they did not have the money to spend. The war led to a deficit which led to them indirect taxes and taking loans out from foreign institutions.
Russia also prohibited the sell of alcohol which led to a huge decline in tax revenue. According to Pipes, “While alcoholism did not decline, the Treasury' income from alcohol taxes did, and these had formerly accounted for one-fourth of its revenues.”
Then Russia decided to print more currency which led to inflation. On July 27, 1914 the Russian suspended the gold standard and began printing notes without concern for how much gold was in the Treasury. “Paper currency declined proportionately, from 98 percent (July 1914) to 51.4 (January 1915), 28.7 percent (January 1916), and 16.2 percent (January 1914).” This led to inflation and a job in the exchange- rate.
Russia began borrowing money from England, America and Japan. Six to eight billion came from England alone.
The inflation led to high food prices but strangely the it benefited the peasant and hurt the urban dweller. The muzhik (a race of Russian peasant) got the idea not farm every piece of land which would make their food more expensive when they sold it to the urban population. What did they care, they grew their own food, they didn't have to pay for it.
This led to an urban crisis though: there were estimated between 22 to 28 million people living in the cities that depended upon food. Soon there were food shortages which led to the price of food skyrocketing,
Then Russia had a shipping crisis: The main Russian cities located in the north-west near Europe before the war were getting their coal from England even though Russia had its own coal in its southern and eastern parts of Russia. When World War 1 the sea lanes in the Baltic were closed, Russia couldn't get coal and oil which led to transportation problems, because the food was transported by trains which ran on coal at that point in history. In 1916 the transportation became even worse because the government had no money to repair the trains, so when they broke, they weren't fixed. There was one less train bringing food to the cities.
The steps of the Russian debt crisis: They joined a war that they couldn't afford to be in. Then the war cost too much. They decided to inflate their currency. The inflated currency led to the peasants not farming as much to make more money. This led to urban centers having food shortages, the supply of food went down, the price went up. The Russian government started taking out large amounts of loans from other countries. Then there was a transportation problem because they could not get British oil which led to trains and automobiles not being able to run. Then they were so out of money they couldn't even repair the trains, which meant one less train bringing food. Which led to a violent revolution that resorted in the leaders of that society being shot and a whole reworking of government.
The similarities between The United States and the Russian Debt crisis are that the United States had a deficit surplus before going to Iraq and Afghanistan which was less than ten years ago. Instead of the farmers having a food shortage because of a lack of planting, the United States has higher food prices because farmers have decided to grow corn for ethanol and not food people can eat. We also have transportation problems because of the high price of oil. The United States gets its oil from foreign countries that are thousands of miles away. And when those countries have a disruption like in Libya the price of gasoline/oil rises in America. The United States also has taken out billions in loans from foreign countries for example China.
Chapter 7: Debt in the United States after World War 2
It can been seen from this graph (usgovernmentspending.com) that America after World War 2 and The New Deal in 1944 was at over 100 percent of its GDP in debt. It was actually at a higher percent of GDP than it is currently. But there was no radicalism, no riots and no revolution. The reason is that the unemployment rate between 1944 and 1959 stayed below 6 percent (infoplease.com, 2011). The other reason concerns tax collection, the United States decided to put a heavy tax burden on the wealthiest class. In 1944 the tax burden for people making over 200,000 dollars was 94 percent and the lowest was 23% for people making $2,000 and below (taxfoundation.org). In 2011 terms $200,000 would be $2,502,534 and $2,000 is $25,148(CPI Inflation Calculator). Every one paid high taxes in 1944.
Google taxfoundation.org to find graph.
The graph displays the tax rates for 1944. As anyone can see they paid very high taxes.
It would be easy just to say, “Raise taxes like they did in 1944 but there few similarities between 2011 America and 1944 America. 1944 America a very strong economy and a freshly built infrastructure following The New Deal. We have a decaying infrastructure built in The New Deal and the 50s. America 1944 had a large supply of oil and the use of oil did not demand foreign supplies yet. 1944 America did not have an 8.9 percent unemployment rate like we have:
1944 America did not have to employee females to a large extent, they didn't have to supply African-Americans good jobs, they didn't have an influx of Latino immigrants. World War 2 was over and they didn't have to spend any more money on that, while 2011
America has two colonies to deal with. They didn't have to compete with foreign countries that do not mind paying their workers less for manufacturing jobs. After World War 2 Europe and Asia were blown to pieces and South America was still a backwater, so the United States did not have to compete with them. But currently, Europe, Russia, China, Japan, India, and several South American countries have been stabilized for along time, and have found new ways innovative ways to make their countries wealthy. Also 1944 did not global warming, excessive environmental damage leading to further problems and didn't have to worry about high gasoline/oil prices.
Most of all 1944 America did not have to worry about the cost of health care and entitlements for the elderly. What one notices after looking at the debt crises of history is that none of the aforementioned countries had health care costs problems.
The 2011 situation is not the same as the 1944 situation. The 2011 situation is much more complex and daunting.
Chapter 8: How the United States Taxes its Citizens
In America we have a progressive tax which means that the government taxes more and more the wealthier the citizen is. The idea of the progressive tax comes from Adam Smith's An Inquiry into the Wealth of Nations (1937, 793) from this paragraph:
“The necessaries of life occasion the great expense of the poor. They find it difficult to get food, and the greater part of their little revenue is spent in getting it. The luxuries and vanities of life occasion the principal expense of the rich, and a magnificent house embellishes and sets off to the best advantage all the other luxuries and vanities which they possess. A tax upon house-rents, therefore, would in general fall heaviest upon the rich; and in this sort of inequality there would not, perhaps, be anything very unreasonable. It is not very unreasonable that the rich should contribute to the public expense, not only in proportion to their revenue, but something more than in that proportion”
Smith's basic idea is that the poor cannot give to many taxes to the government, if they do they will starve. And that if the wealthy give a large proportion of their wealth to their government the government can in turn use the money to create infrastructure that will create more wealth. The more wealth there is, the wealthy everyone can become, which makes the nation wealthy and prosperous and a good nation to live in.
2011 United States Tax brackets from Taxfoundation.org:
Obviously from looking at this chart that taxes are much lower than they were in 1944.
According to USA Today, (4/15/2010) 47% of citizens do not pay taxes, it can been seen in this chart:
It can be seen that most people under the $30,000 bracket are not paying taxes. But strangely 9% come from citizens making over $100,000 a year.
There are also subsidies that the federal government gives out to oil and gas companies and to farmers:
$36.5 billion in subsidies to large oil companies.
Billions and billions in farm subsidies. Could not ascertain the exact number given to farms because the farm subsidy world is intensely bureaucratic and full of specifications. It involves subsidies to farmers to grow ethanol, subsides to people not to farm, and even subsidies
to Brazilian cotton farmers.
There are also tax refunds and loopholes for major corporations: For example in 2009 Exxon Mobil paid no taxes even though they made $19 billion in profits. Bank of America paid no taxes and got a $1.9 billion tax refund. General Electric made $26 billion in profits and paid no taxes and got a $4.1 billion refund and many more corporations have gotten out of paying taxes (sanders.senate.gov, 2011). This is obviously a problem of tax collection. The United States is failing to collect taxes; the idea that Exxon Mobil doesn’t pay any taxes is absurd. It shows a complete a failure of governance.
The United States way of collecting taxes is amazing in its complexity. But one can see that it is very easy not to pay taxes in America from the rich to the poor.
Chapter 9: Why Americans are so against Taxes being Raised?
What is important, is that we need to figure out why Americans do not have the income anymore to pay high taxes and are strongly against the raising of taxes. And even why they do have the spending money to purchase goods like they used to: What needs to be done is show the math of a normal American family. Take a married couple of two with say 2 kids whose annual income is $60,000 a year that live in Hubbard, Ohio.
Federal social security state income city
(60,000 x .15)+(60,000 x .084)+ (60,000 x .04983)+ (60,000 x .014)
9000 + 5040 + 2998 + 840
=17,878
60,000 - 17,878
42,122 left
Average cost insurance for a family according to Kaiser family foundation
13,373
42,122 -13,373
= 28,749
say the monthly mortgage is 1200 a month which equals 14,400
28,749 - 14,400
= 14,349
Then I added in the price of owning one car for one year:
insurance payments gas oil oil changes two new tires
(66 x 12)+ (200 x 12)+ (40 x 52)+ (35 x 4)+ 300
792+2400+2080+140+300
=5712 x 2 but lets say one car is paid off and they have a family insurance package, lets just add 3000.
=8,712
14,349 – 8,712
= 5637
$5,637 is the remaining amount left for a family of four. This does not include food, heating, electricity, water, Internet, cable television, or sales tax.
I admit there are some problems with the choosing of the numbers, I tried to pick them to resemble the bills of someone making 60,000. There are also other things like tax credits that I didn't include and a possible lower insurance premium.
We have to remember that in 1944 the United States was able to raise taxes and that for two decades the United States had a very high tax rate. In 1944 the lowest tax rate was 23% (Barrymore, howstuffworks.com, 2011) So what is the difference between now and then?
The two things in 1944 that Americans did not have to deal with were the extreme cost of health care and the automobile. For a family of four that has an annual income of $60,000 a year having health insurance and two automobiles literary sucks up an estimated $20,000 dollars a year. Because of these two expenses it leads to several things: on the macroeconomic side it leads to an inability to save, an inability to buy products in the economy generating wealth throughout the economy, and it leads to people using credit cards to compensate for not having
an adequate supply of spending cash. On the macroeconomic side automobiles lead to wars, massive military spending, subsidies to oil companies, oil spills, CO2 emissions, damage to the environment, and constantly needing to maintain the roadways.
The cost of health care keeps going up and up. Everyone needs health care though: everyone wants to be well and not to die. And everyone knows that if you go to a hospital for something serious and you do not have health care you will have bills for the rest of your life.
The cost of being an American and having children verges on impossible. The average American is a serf to debt, insurance companies and their car. The difference between a slave and a serf is that a slave cannot leave the plantation, but a serf can leave to do their business but they are constantly owned by outside forces that tie them down.
Chapter 10: What Solutions are Possible inside the Present Paradigm?
Cut the Budget: The future could be Senator Rand Paul's budget which cuts almost every program in the federal government including 30% decrease for Agriculture, 54% decrease for Commerce, 83% decrease for education, 100% for the Department of Energy, 100% decrease for HUD, 49% for Transportation, 29% decrease for the EPA, and many other programs. Budget cutting at this level would lead to America becoming a third world country, many of the services we enjoy would disappear: our schools, environment, highways, housing services for the poor would be terribly damaged. It would lead to America not being able to compete in the international market for jobs because our country would be in a state of inefficiency.
If the budget is cut as intensely as Rand Paul wants to cut it, then it will lead to massive outrage and instability in the society. The recent events in Wisconsin would be just the beginning of the future protests that will occur if the budgets keep getting cut. Lowering the budget on education will compromise the future of America and make it less competitive, which will lead to further decline. Rand Paul's budget is the acceptance of decline. It resembles Pertinax and could bring on Russian and French revolution style chaos in the future.
Raise taxes on the Middle-Class: Raising taxes would be difficult because the average citizen is already spending so much money on their car and health insurance. Raising taxes on the middle-class and lower-classes now would lead to the economy worsening.
Raise taxes on the wealthy: It might be possible to raise taxes on people making over 2 million a year. It would not hurt small business and only effect those who could pay it. But at the same time because we have an international market the wealthy might decide to just leave America.
Cut subsidies and tax breaks: Cutting subsidies would create more revenue but might cause the prices of fuel and food to rise.
Make Multinational Corporations Pay Taxes: The United States government instead of giving tax refunds to Bank of America and Exxon Mobil it could actually collect taxes from them.
Flat Tax: Russia implemented a flat a 13 percent flat tax for individuals and a 24 percent tax on corporations. Russia doesn't give subsidies and tax breaks like the United States does. According to an essay from “The University of Chicago Journal” by Kevin Stacey (2009) it has created more revenue for the government but has not increased wealth. And according to Stacey, the,“data is that the flat tax seems to have done little to increase real income for taxpayers. If real income had increased substantially.” But it must be noted that Russia makes a lot of revenue from their natural gas and oil exports.
Chapter 11: Suggestions Based off what we Learned from History
We have learned from the aforementioned experiences of history that great debt brings on great change. The change requires people to live differently, under new laws and new of philosophies.
Immense debt is a signal to your country, “You have been living incorrectly. The path you have chosen is not sustainable.”
Before we fix the debt we have to ask the question the Roman soldiers did in ancient Greece and in Rome during Publius Servilius' time and what the French and Russians asked during their times of crisis, “Is the government and its laws worth saving?”
The Roman soldiers answered yes, they believed in the Republic and thought it needed improvements not destruction. The Greeks responded with electing a new leader that would change the laws and framework of their government, as the French and Russians did also.
My answer would be yes, save the Constitution, the constitution is well written, provides a separation of powers and grants us rights we very much enjoy. The debt is a constitutional problem, it is a culture problem.
The steps I would take in trying to solve the debt crisis:
First Step: Creating a mixture of a flat tax and a progressive tax. People making below $20,000 do not have to pay taxes but get no tax breaks. People making between $20,000 and 2.5 million have to pay a flat tax of 13 to 16 percent and no tax breaks. People making above 2.5 million would have to pay around 50% on every dollar they made above 2.5 million and subsidies only on farms and innovation, which should be strictly monitored. The reasoning for the 2.5 million is so not to hurt small business. We have to remember that much of small business are doctors and local owners who we do not want to hurt. While people who make 2.5 million are people involved in large corporations. Perhaps if the tax was higher multinational corporations who do not concern themselves with the prosperity of the American citizen and only with reaping as much profits as possible from the American citizen will leave and they will be replaced with smaller businesses who care more about their communities and its citizens. This could have a bad effect at first but years later it could lead to a better America.
Second step: Reducing the price of health care insurance. The best way to do this would be to create a public option where people can pay into health care. If everyone pays into health care then it will be cheaper. By not allowing people to frivolously sue doctors and hospitals.
More preventive medicine and the reduction of unhealthy food in our culture.
Third Step: Bring the troops home from foreign countries. According to Professor Jules Defour from the Globalresearch.ca website the United States has based in 63 different countries (2009). Defense is costing the U.S. Tax payer almost 700 billion a year. Cutting spending on education and transportation before needless military bases is not logical. The logical thing to do would be to close many bases around the world and to bring the troops home from Iraq and Afghanistan. There is no money to fund these ventures any no longer.
Fourth Step: One of the main problems we refuse to look at is the use of cars. The United States needs to reduce the amount of car use. Owning and using cars are sucking up too much money and leading to foreign wars the United States cannot afford. It should be a high priority of the Federal, state and local governments to zone in new ways. The new types of zoning should be based on sustainability methods. The United States needs to start building up and not out. The era of urban sprawl needs to come to an end. The average person cannot actually afford to own a car when the numbers are added up. It should become law that cars that drive on less than 30 miles per gallon should be illegal to make. Then it should become law that any new building of suburbs become illegal or just not zoned. Business centers, factories and hosing should be zoned within walking or busing distance of each other. Bike paths and commuter train rails should be built. Also food should be grown more locally, instead of growing food for ethanol or soybeans for China local farmers should be given subsidies to grow locally. This would also bring back a sense of community that Americans have lost in the car boom years.
If Republicans want to go back to the time of the 50s then this is very close to that: it involves a higher tax rate for the wealthy, less car use, people living closer together, and eating local food. But without the racism and sexism the 50s contained.
The United States can either choose to implement these things and start making changes early or the changes will be forced through protest and anger, and the natural progression of history. It is wiser to make a change then to be forced to change.
Chapter 12: Domestic Implications if it’s Business as Usual
If the United States government cuts budgets, refuses to rearrange the tax brackets, keeps allowing large corporations to not pay taxes and never downsizes the military influence on the world then extreme government deterioration will occur. Budget cuts = deterioration. According to Politico (2011), “Moody’s chief economist, Mark Zandi, projected that the House proposal would cut real GDP growth by 0.5 percent in 2011 and 0.2 percent in 2012. That, in turn, would lead to 400,000 fewer jobs being created than expected by the end of this year and a total of 700,000 fewer jobs by the end of 2012.” When the budget cuts are implemented thousands are going to lose their jobs. Thousands of Americans who worked hard and got paid well will be sent home with no job. This is going to be a disaster, 100s of thousands more people and many who have college degrees will be added to the as Marx called it The Reserve Army of Labor which is large mass of people who are unemployed, all the unemployed people creates a surplus of possible workers, which lowers their demand, after their demand is lowered, then the corporations can pay them less to work. Because instead of workers getting paid well and getting good benefits, the United States citizen will have this attitude, “At least I have a job,” which will destroy the work labor unions have done since the beginning of the United States.
As The Reserve Army of Labor grows discontent will grow in the United States, now in terms of political science, discontent doesn’t need to make sense. Germany had massive amounts of debt; they tried to cure it by killing Jewish people. How killing Jewish people can cure deeply befuddles me. The new illogical discontent can be seen with the Tea Party, the founder of the Tea Party Judson Phillips’ believes that Barack Obama was not born in America and that, “The White Anglo-Saxon Protestant (WASP) population in America is headed for extinction and with it our economy, well-being and survival as a uniquely America culture.” (Devin Burghart, irehr.org, 2011). According to the Tea Party the United States government is in such debt and has so many problems because white people aren’t having enough babies, and if we could just return to white people culture then everything would be fine. This is madness. This is the very definition of a fascist ideology, where you blame the problems of your society on race and not on empirical evidence. If a Tea Party member is eventually elected to President, the United States will face grave implications.
The United States in the coming years will experience a deep decline of government services, the government will become more and more inefficient. For example there is a plan currently to cute the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). Cutting funding to the CDC is not a good idea, instead of building less aircraft or closing a few bases in foreign countries, or making Exxon Mobil pay taxes, we are going to create an inefficient institution concerning disease. These budget cuts will eventually lead to the American citizen becoming very dissatisfied with the government, which will lead to protests on a large scale.
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Gibbon, Edward. 2005. The Decline and Fall of The Roman Empire. New York: Random House.
Jones, Ben R. 1968. The French Revolution. U.S.A.: Minerva Press.
Pipes, Richard. 1991. The Russian Revolution. New York: Vintage.
Smith, Adam. 1937. An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. United States: Random House.
Truthandpolitics.org. 2004. Top Marginal Income Rates, 1913 -2003. accessed 2/18/2011 fromtruthandpolitics.org/top-rates.php
usgovernment.us. 2011. Budgetted U.S. Federal Debt. Accessed 4/3/2011 from http://www.usgovernmentdebt.us/federal_debt
infoplease. 2007. United States Unemployment Rate. Accessed 2/3/2011 from http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0104719.html
Tax Foundation. 2011. State Individual Tax Rates. Accessed 3/23/2011 from http://www.taxfoundation.org/taxdata/show/228.html
Tax Foundation. U.S. Federal Income Tax Rates History, 1913-2011. Accessed 3/23/2011 from http://www.taxfoundation.org/publications/show/151.html
CPI Inflation Calculator. Accessed 3/23/2011 from http://www.compuquotes.com/average-costs-of-insurance.html
Compu Quotes. 2011. Average Insurance Costs for Auto, Home, Renters Health. Accessed 4/25/2011 from http://www.compuquotes.com/average-costs-of-insurance.html
USA Today. 2010. Our View on Financing the Government. When 47% don't pay income tax. Its not Healthy for the U.S.. 2010. Accessed 4/23/2011 from http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/editorials/2010-04-16-editorial16_ST_N.htm
Reuters. 2010. Obama budget seeks to End Oil, Gas Subsidies. Accessed 3/15/2011 from http://www.reuters.com/article/2010/02/01/us-obama-budget-oil-idUSTRE6103RM20100201?feedType=RSS&feedName=environmentNews&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+reuters%2Fenvironment+%28News+%2F+US+%2F+Environment%29
Dan Morgan, Gilbert M Gaul and Sarah Cohen. Farm Program pays out 1.3 Billion to People who Don't Farm. The Washington Post. Accessed 3/15/2011 from http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/01/AR2006070100962.html
Michael Grunwald. Why the U.S. Is also Giving Brazallian Farm Subidies. Time. Accessed 4/23/2011 from http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1978963,00.html
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Devin Burghar. 2011. Tea Party Warns of White Anglo Saxon Protestant Extinction. irehr.org. Accessed 4/3/2011 from http://www.irehr.org/issue-areas/tea-parties/19-news/76-tea-party-nation-warns-of-white-anglo-saxon-protestant-extinction
Monday, May 23, 2011
Interview for Rumpus by Ani Smith
here is the interview
I continued to write today, it felt food.
the words starting flowing easily.
It was like I rembered how to write.
the fingers were moving.
last night I sat next to my book shelf, picked up Ezra Pound and read random poems from Personae, Pound always notifies me of what needs to be done, Pound is always there, I go and sit with Pound at he kitchen table, before he became a nazi, and he talks to me about writing, about beauty, how to drink it, how to find it, how to succumb to it, the sounds, he tells me about how the oldest known language is the songs that Brahmans sing, and that no one knows what the words mean, and that when scientists put them through a machine, the sounds resembled the algorithms of birds, he says I must find the algorithm.
I continued to write today, it felt food.
the words starting flowing easily.
It was like I rembered how to write.
the fingers were moving.
last night I sat next to my book shelf, picked up Ezra Pound and read random poems from Personae, Pound always notifies me of what needs to be done, Pound is always there, I go and sit with Pound at he kitchen table, before he became a nazi, and he talks to me about writing, about beauty, how to drink it, how to find it, how to succumb to it, the sounds, he tells me about how the oldest known language is the songs that Brahmans sing, and that no one knows what the words mean, and that when scientists put them through a machine, the sounds resembled the algorithms of birds, he says I must find the algorithm.
Sunday, May 22, 2011
started another novel today
I don't know why I've started another novel.
I should write a book of poetry or philosophy or something.
But another novel
It is a young adult novel.
I asked Ned Vizzini in LA if I should write a young adult novel. He told me I should. He told me to remember that teenagers have total emotions. They are not hindered by bills, long term romantic relationships, children or long term dreams.
I spent several days with Jordan Castro and Bebe Zeva who are both graduating high school this week. Congrats to them, good luck.
Both of them, are like, super intelligent and very weird, and interesting. I think I will be basing a lot of the thoughts and feelings of the characters on those two. It won't be impossible to base a book of them, because I know very little about their real actual lives, or what it means to be them.
Both of them still have this, "Don't tell me what to do" thing going on. Which I have lost. Most of the time, I wish someone would just fucking tell me what to do.
But I know I had it.
So I will try to go back to it.
And it will be fun to pretend that I still have that, when I write alone in my house.
I think I will be able to write this book because the book is about going into 9th grade, which is a huge transition. And right now in my life, I am inside of a huge transition period, I just graduated and plan on moving to Santa Fe, New Mexico. I am in a committed relationship. I am committed man.
A strange thing that is going on, that might influence the novel, is that all I'm reading is experimental literature, Ofelia Hunt's new book Today and Yesterday, Michael Seidlinger's new novel that hasn't come out yet, and Chris Higgs' novel The Complete Works of Marvin K. Mooney.
I am not writing as fast as I did when I was yong. I can't drink coffee because of the psoriasis, so I'm typing with the power of Yogi detox tea.
I'm writing this book with a healthy mind and body.
What is hardest, is to know what I didn't then. Because I've analyzed my childhood a lot, but the trick is, figuring how to display what I know now in a way that still pretends that the lead character knows nothing.
Because the person in high school, is so narcissistic, the world is completely located within themselves, not the other around.
The world eventually grinds you into knowing that you are very alone and that the only way you are going to get anything is by working and struggling, and that money is really important.
But when I write about these characters, I have to recognize money isn't important, money is like a bag of weed or cigarettes, money is like fun, not something one thinks about with a sense of dread and a generalized feeling of hate.
I should write a book of poetry or philosophy or something.
But another novel
It is a young adult novel.
I asked Ned Vizzini in LA if I should write a young adult novel. He told me I should. He told me to remember that teenagers have total emotions. They are not hindered by bills, long term romantic relationships, children or long term dreams.
I spent several days with Jordan Castro and Bebe Zeva who are both graduating high school this week. Congrats to them, good luck.
Both of them, are like, super intelligent and very weird, and interesting. I think I will be basing a lot of the thoughts and feelings of the characters on those two. It won't be impossible to base a book of them, because I know very little about their real actual lives, or what it means to be them.
Both of them still have this, "Don't tell me what to do" thing going on. Which I have lost. Most of the time, I wish someone would just fucking tell me what to do.
But I know I had it.
So I will try to go back to it.
And it will be fun to pretend that I still have that, when I write alone in my house.
I think I will be able to write this book because the book is about going into 9th grade, which is a huge transition. And right now in my life, I am inside of a huge transition period, I just graduated and plan on moving to Santa Fe, New Mexico. I am in a committed relationship. I am committed man.
A strange thing that is going on, that might influence the novel, is that all I'm reading is experimental literature, Ofelia Hunt's new book Today and Yesterday, Michael Seidlinger's new novel that hasn't come out yet, and Chris Higgs' novel The Complete Works of Marvin K. Mooney.
I am not writing as fast as I did when I was yong. I can't drink coffee because of the psoriasis, so I'm typing with the power of Yogi detox tea.
I'm writing this book with a healthy mind and body.
What is hardest, is to know what I didn't then. Because I've analyzed my childhood a lot, but the trick is, figuring how to display what I know now in a way that still pretends that the lead character knows nothing.
Because the person in high school, is so narcissistic, the world is completely located within themselves, not the other around.
The world eventually grinds you into knowing that you are very alone and that the only way you are going to get anything is by working and struggling, and that money is really important.
But when I write about these characters, I have to recognize money isn't important, money is like a bag of weed or cigarettes, money is like fun, not something one thinks about with a sense of dread and a generalized feeling of hate.
Thursday, May 19, 2011
LA post
I think what I learned from LA was this: everyone must find a place in the division of labor, if you are writing a script for a tv show, an actor on a cable television network, an indie writer, a boom mike operator, a homeland security guard at an airport, an owner of a burrito joint, an airplane pilot, everyone must choose a job, and then they need to choose to do it well, and if every works hard, then everything goes smoothly, and strangely how much everyone fucking needs everyone else.
Here is a blog post about the trip by Brad Warner
Here is a blog post about the trip by Brad Warner
Sunday, May 15, 2011
In LA
Here is a new interview
I have been in LA for several days.
It has been pretty intense.
I am done shooting and will get to relax for the next couple days, and return to Ohio.
I have been in LA for several days.
It has been pretty intense.
I am done shooting and will get to relax for the next couple days, and return to Ohio.
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
Saturday, May 07, 2011
Thursday, May 05, 2011
Osama Update, Che Guevara
Che Guevara was executed on the second day after being captured.
According to wikipedia, "Today, some of these belongings, including his flashlight, are on display at the CIA.[201] After a military doctor amputated his hands, Bolivian army officers transferred Guevara's body to an undisclosed location and refused to reveal whether his remains had been buried or cremated. The hands were preserved in formaldehyde to be sent to Buenos Aires for fingerprint identification. (His fingerprints were on file with the Argentine police.) They were later sent to Cuba."
So this is the protocol:
Leaders of international political organizations that commit violence to achieve its end, when captured must be executed and their remains hidden.
Tuesday, May 03, 2011
Ana C. wrote a poem about Best Behavior
Ana Carrete is awesome, i love her so much. Go to the other section of her links, and read her until you get horny.
i put ‘best behavior’ on the driver’s seat
opened the trunk
put my backpack there
closed the trunk
kissed my dad goodbye and he said
do you know how to pronounce cicero
and he pronounced it and said it was italian
and i was like oh
and got in the car but moved best behavior
and placed it on the passenger seat
and waved goodbye and blew him kisses and drove away
i read some chapters while waiting at the border
and i accidentally read
‘the rabble worked the low paying jobs, trying to feed themselves and their children’
while a man that was selling fruit
stood next to my window
and while i wrote this note down another man asked if i wanted to buy the newspaper
and i read
‘but she rationalized that electricity and heat are important things and must be maintained to live a good life’
and then they played this song on the radio:
i put ‘best behavior’ on the driver’s seat
opened the trunk
put my backpack there
closed the trunk
kissed my dad goodbye and he said
do you know how to pronounce cicero
and he pronounced it and said it was italian
and i was like oh
and got in the car but moved best behavior
and placed it on the passenger seat
and waved goodbye and blew him kisses and drove away
i read some chapters while waiting at the border
and i accidentally read
‘the rabble worked the low paying jobs, trying to feed themselves and their children’
while a man that was selling fruit
stood next to my window
and while i wrote this note down another man asked if i wanted to buy the newspaper
and i read
‘but she rationalized that electricity and heat are important things and must be maintained to live a good life’
and then they played this song on the radio:
Rod Stewart
I don't know who Rod Stewart is
But I'll let him save me.
I keep listening to The Young Turks.
I feel very tired.
But I'll let him save me.
I keep listening to The Young Turks.
I feel very tired.
Monday, May 02, 2011
Osama Bin Laden (UPDATED)
After The Civil War we did not kill Jefferson Davis and throw him into the ocean.
After World War 1 we did not kill Kaiser Wilhelm and throw him into the ocean.
After World War 2 we did not kill Hirohito and throw and him into the ocean.
At the Beginning of the Operation Iraqi Freedom we did not kill Saddam Hussian and throw him in the ocean.
It doesn't seem that throwing foreign leaders dead bodies into the ocean is protocol.
There are two things you can assume from this story.
1. It is made up, a beautiful noble lie for the masses, to distract them from the fact that gas rose 30 cents today. Or perhaps to help Obama's election strategy or just to give some vague hope that are country isn't pathetic.
2. America is now a murdering pile of shit. Instead of doing the normal protocol of getting the foreign leader, bringing him back to face an international trial. We just kill them and throw them into the ocean.
This second might make sense: considering that right now America is killing people with tax payer money in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Lybia and Iraq all at the same time.
I want everyone to imagine this scenario:
The CIA and the Navy Seals call the president Barack Obama and say, "We know where Osama Bin Laden is, we can get him. What would you like us to do with him, when we capture him."
Barack Obama responds, "Kill him and throw him into the ocean."
Now before anyone makes up a scenario where, American troops were forced to kill Osama Bin Laden in a firefight.
There are machines that are being used to fight pirates in the Indian Ocean, that can send a sound wave that will cause everyone in its way, basically to fall over in pain because of the sound. We could not have shot that at the house?
UPDATE
But perhaps since Osama Bin Laden led no foreign nation, he was considered under the status of William Wallace and Vercingetorix but they were both captured and held for awhile before being executed.
Someone made this point on some forum, "Because in actuality, they did not kill him, but captured him to extract information. Obviously, they would employ any means to achieve this. Leading everyone to believe he is dead is the best way to prevent public curiosity and interest. And of course the Geneva convention agreement for the treatment of prisoners does not apply to dead people, or does it? Just my personal opinion."
That the Navy Seals extracted information by doing some heinous ass shit and didn't want anyone to see his body. Sounds plausible.
I don't know.
If this helps Obama beat the Republican candidate, and gets the democrats a majority in the House again, whatever.
TO MORE SERIOUS NEWS:
James Howard Kunstler on his blog has proposed this amendment to the constiution, "Therefore, the remedy is a constitutional amendment re-defining corporate personhood as something less than, and apart from, citizenship. Who is the elected official out there who might take up this proposal?"
The Energy Information Agency, the agency that does the data on natural gas and oil reserves at home and abroad has had major cuts and no longer has the ability to collect the data needed, to understand why gas prices are rising.
According to the article, "For example, the agency will not conduct its annual report on U.S. proved oil and natural gas reserves, an issue of major interest in Congress as lawmakers debate bills to expand domestic oil and gas production."
That is great.
I am like, are you serious? I have childlike confusion right now.
So this is the state of my country
it kills people and throws them into the ocean and defunds agencies that collects the data on the liquids that give us heat and propel the vehicles that bring us food.
Oh my gucking god.
I feel like, William S. Burroughs was right, The Naked Lunch was true and a great prophecy.
After World War 1 we did not kill Kaiser Wilhelm and throw him into the ocean.
After World War 2 we did not kill Hirohito and throw and him into the ocean.
At the Beginning of the Operation Iraqi Freedom we did not kill Saddam Hussian and throw him in the ocean.
It doesn't seem that throwing foreign leaders dead bodies into the ocean is protocol.
There are two things you can assume from this story.
1. It is made up, a beautiful noble lie for the masses, to distract them from the fact that gas rose 30 cents today. Or perhaps to help Obama's election strategy or just to give some vague hope that are country isn't pathetic.
2. America is now a murdering pile of shit. Instead of doing the normal protocol of getting the foreign leader, bringing him back to face an international trial. We just kill them and throw them into the ocean.
This second might make sense: considering that right now America is killing people with tax payer money in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Lybia and Iraq all at the same time.
I want everyone to imagine this scenario:
The CIA and the Navy Seals call the president Barack Obama and say, "We know where Osama Bin Laden is, we can get him. What would you like us to do with him, when we capture him."
Barack Obama responds, "Kill him and throw him into the ocean."
Now before anyone makes up a scenario where, American troops were forced to kill Osama Bin Laden in a firefight.
There are machines that are being used to fight pirates in the Indian Ocean, that can send a sound wave that will cause everyone in its way, basically to fall over in pain because of the sound. We could not have shot that at the house?
UPDATE
But perhaps since Osama Bin Laden led no foreign nation, he was considered under the status of William Wallace and Vercingetorix but they were both captured and held for awhile before being executed.
Someone made this point on some forum, "Because in actuality, they did not kill him, but captured him to extract information. Obviously, they would employ any means to achieve this. Leading everyone to believe he is dead is the best way to prevent public curiosity and interest. And of course the Geneva convention agreement for the treatment of prisoners does not apply to dead people, or does it? Just my personal opinion."
That the Navy Seals extracted information by doing some heinous ass shit and didn't want anyone to see his body. Sounds plausible.
I don't know.
If this helps Obama beat the Republican candidate, and gets the democrats a majority in the House again, whatever.
TO MORE SERIOUS NEWS:
James Howard Kunstler on his blog has proposed this amendment to the constiution, "Therefore, the remedy is a constitutional amendment re-defining corporate personhood as something less than, and apart from, citizenship. Who is the elected official out there who might take up this proposal?"
The Energy Information Agency, the agency that does the data on natural gas and oil reserves at home and abroad has had major cuts and no longer has the ability to collect the data needed, to understand why gas prices are rising.
According to the article, "For example, the agency will not conduct its annual report on U.S. proved oil and natural gas reserves, an issue of major interest in Congress as lawmakers debate bills to expand domestic oil and gas production."
That is great.
I am like, are you serious? I have childlike confusion right now.
So this is the state of my country
it kills people and throws them into the ocean and defunds agencies that collects the data on the liquids that give us heat and propel the vehicles that bring us food.
Oh my gucking god.
I feel like, William S. Burroughs was right, The Naked Lunch was true and a great prophecy.
Sunday, May 01, 2011
People keep telling me the government sucks
I think in the last month I have heard someone say at a sentence that implies, "The government sucks."
According to Aristotle the best government is one with just laws, an aristocracy and the society has a strong middle class.
Well, going by Aristotle we don't have these things:
When no one got arrested after the banking crisis, the government basically said, "The Rule of Law does not apply to banker, stock brokers, and people who work at insurance companies. Laws only apply to poor people."
So the laws are not just.
The middle class in America has basically died, if a family of four doesn't have an annual income over $70,000 a year they are still behind.
We don't have an aristocracy but an oligarchy.
Definitions first:
An aristocracy is where the best rule. The best do not rule in America. The structure of campaign donations has created a system where those who love power for power's sake and will kiss anyone's ass who gives them money become the leaders.
An oligarchy is a government where those with the most money have an incredible amount of influence on public policy as opposed to the people with normal amounts of money relative to that society have very little influence on public policy.
So I guess it makes sense when people say, "The government sucks."
In 2006 people concluded that the government might suck and decided to vote in Democrats, then Democrats again 2008. Nothing happened that made them happy so they voted for Republicans in 2010, The Republicans decided to bust public unions and attempt to defund Planned Parenthood. So that isn't working either.
Now the gas prices are rising again, and when it reaches 4 dollars a gallon Americans get mad.
The reason gas prices are going up is because the world has reached peak production of oil, the world can only produce a certain amount of oil a day. A lot of countries want that oil so the demand goes up supply goes down, which leads to higher prices. The gas prices are not the fault of the U.S. politicians. The gas prices are the fault of urban sprawl which is the fault of the American people. Someone complained to me the other day that gas prices were high, I looked at his vehicle, it was a giant van. I looked at mine, a small Saturn. The next time you think the thought, "Gas prices are high." Imagine a horse, imagine you riding a horse, imagine how long it would take for you to get there, imagine how much your ass would hurt from the saddle, imagine there being no radio on the horse's head playing your favorite CD. Imagine it and thank God you get to drive a car.
Here are my current suggestions to start fixing problems:
1. A constitutional amendment stating a way for campaign donations to be just between all economic classes.
If there were justice in campaign donations probably all of our current politicians would disappear. The politician would have to choose different methods of getting elected. The politician would be forced to listen to their constituents and think differently about how to solve problems.
I'm not going to add any more because if this problem was fixed, then in theory many other problems would have the possibility to be fixed.
If this problem is not fixed, things will just get worse and worse.
The other thing that needs to be mentioned is that if you are mad that the rich keep getting richer and are not accountable for their actions. Then you don't believe in The Constitution, The Takings Clause states, "Private property shall not be taken for a public use, without just compensation." The Constitution comes from Locke, who believed that the protection of private property is the reason we left The State of Nature.
Now here is the question:
Do you believe that protection of private property is the reason we left The State of Nature?
Or so you believe we left The State of Nature because they realized that a monopoly on violence was required to attain a life worth living. And that is the only reason.
Or do you believe that we left The State of Nature because we humans are genetically prone to work in groups to attain food and shelter and when the work is done to supply entertainment for each other?
Or do you believe that we left The State of Nature because the wealthiest farmers forced the poorest farmers to be their slaves?
Or do you believe something else?
If you do not believe in the Lockean, the whole crux of America collapses. You know that right?
According to Aristotle the best government is one with just laws, an aristocracy and the society has a strong middle class.
Well, going by Aristotle we don't have these things:
When no one got arrested after the banking crisis, the government basically said, "The Rule of Law does not apply to banker, stock brokers, and people who work at insurance companies. Laws only apply to poor people."
So the laws are not just.
The middle class in America has basically died, if a family of four doesn't have an annual income over $70,000 a year they are still behind.
We don't have an aristocracy but an oligarchy.
Definitions first:
An aristocracy is where the best rule. The best do not rule in America. The structure of campaign donations has created a system where those who love power for power's sake and will kiss anyone's ass who gives them money become the leaders.
An oligarchy is a government where those with the most money have an incredible amount of influence on public policy as opposed to the people with normal amounts of money relative to that society have very little influence on public policy.
So I guess it makes sense when people say, "The government sucks."
In 2006 people concluded that the government might suck and decided to vote in Democrats, then Democrats again 2008. Nothing happened that made them happy so they voted for Republicans in 2010, The Republicans decided to bust public unions and attempt to defund Planned Parenthood. So that isn't working either.
Now the gas prices are rising again, and when it reaches 4 dollars a gallon Americans get mad.
The reason gas prices are going up is because the world has reached peak production of oil, the world can only produce a certain amount of oil a day. A lot of countries want that oil so the demand goes up supply goes down, which leads to higher prices. The gas prices are not the fault of the U.S. politicians. The gas prices are the fault of urban sprawl which is the fault of the American people. Someone complained to me the other day that gas prices were high, I looked at his vehicle, it was a giant van. I looked at mine, a small Saturn. The next time you think the thought, "Gas prices are high." Imagine a horse, imagine you riding a horse, imagine how long it would take for you to get there, imagine how much your ass would hurt from the saddle, imagine there being no radio on the horse's head playing your favorite CD. Imagine it and thank God you get to drive a car.
Here are my current suggestions to start fixing problems:
1. A constitutional amendment stating a way for campaign donations to be just between all economic classes.
If there were justice in campaign donations probably all of our current politicians would disappear. The politician would have to choose different methods of getting elected. The politician would be forced to listen to their constituents and think differently about how to solve problems.
I'm not going to add any more because if this problem was fixed, then in theory many other problems would have the possibility to be fixed.
If this problem is not fixed, things will just get worse and worse.
The other thing that needs to be mentioned is that if you are mad that the rich keep getting richer and are not accountable for their actions. Then you don't believe in The Constitution, The Takings Clause states, "Private property shall not be taken for a public use, without just compensation." The Constitution comes from Locke, who believed that the protection of private property is the reason we left The State of Nature.
Now here is the question:
Do you believe that protection of private property is the reason we left The State of Nature?
Or so you believe we left The State of Nature because they realized that a monopoly on violence was required to attain a life worth living. And that is the only reason.
Or do you believe that we left The State of Nature because we humans are genetically prone to work in groups to attain food and shelter and when the work is done to supply entertainment for each other?
Or do you believe that we left The State of Nature because the wealthiest farmers forced the poorest farmers to be their slaves?
Or do you believe something else?
If you do not believe in the Lockean, the whole crux of America collapses. You know that right?
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