Love is Stronger Than Debt . . for Tinker . .

Now, what news on the Rialto?
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Marcus
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Love is Stronger Than Debt . . for Tinker . .

Post by Marcus »

This one's for you, Tinker:

Love Is Stronger Than Debt by
"If the last five years of American politics have demonstrated anything, it's that Marx's dictum about the modern state couldn't be more indisputable: our government is the executive committee for the common affairs of the bourgeoisie. Now more than ever, our liberal democracy is a corporate franchise, and the stockholders are demanding an ever-higher return on their investment in America, Inc. Over the last four decades, the Plutocracy has decided to repeal the 20th century, to cancel the gains and protections won by workers, the poor, and others outside the imperial aristocracy of capital. Enough of this coddling of those Ayn Rand vilified as "moochers" and "looters." Return the country to its rightful owners: the "Job Creators," the Almighty Entrepreneurs, those anointed by Heaven to control the property interests of the American Empire. Endowed with the Divine Right of Capital, they deserve our thanksgiving and reverence, for without them we would not deserve to live, such common clay are we."

—the rest of the review here: http://www.booksandculture.com/articles ... -debt.html
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Enki
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Re: Love is Stronger Than Debt . . for Tinker . .

Post by Enki »

Heh, there was a Forbes article recently about how the Entrepeneurs are going to be turned into wage laborers working for the rentier class soon. That there is a formula for entrepeneurialism. Kind of like how during the twentieth century inventors were employed by big firms who kept the patents for themselves. It postulated that Venture Capitalists know the formula and what's more important is that they tap into the youthful enthusiasm of the young entrepeneurs.
Men often oppose a thing merely because they have had no agency in planning it, or because it may have been planned by those whom they dislike.
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noddy
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Re: Love is Stronger Than Debt . . for Tinker . .

Post by noddy »

pretty much true - so few places to live that dont have massive pools of parasite classes all deserving legal reasons to take your money for both left and right wing truths.

good luck trying to live anywhere without a strong garunteed wage that covers housing and bills - the days of living cheap are long gone in the name of progress.

however its for the common good, poor people drive old cars and live in ugly shacks that ruin the housing price of a suburb, its best if society makes them illegal.

things are much slicker looking then, god bless.
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Re: Love is Stronger Than Debt . . for Tinker . .

Post by noddy »

by which i mean - its impossible to be an entrepeneur with a sporadic income when the very structures of society make such living extremely difficult.
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Re: Love is Stronger Than Debt . . for Tinker . .

Post by noddy »

http://www.macrobusiness.com.au/2013/01 ... ng-places/
It’s a noble cause, and one that I support. Having been involved on both sides of the market for political influence – property developers on one side, and government departments and regulatory bodies on the other – I feel I have gained a certain perspective on this issue that doesn’t quite resonate with the mainstream economic view.

From the comments it is quite clear that economists generally support the idea of a ‘fair go’ for all, and to cut back rent-seeking privileges wherever possible. But unfortunately, as I have mentioned many times, mainstream economics has no accepted model of economic rents in a market economy. Rents are always a result of market failures, regulatory capture, or some kind of other favourable regulation. If the market was perfect, economic rents would evaporate.

This theoretical baggage is not helpful. Funnily enough, it leads to a focus on government as a breeding-ground of rent-seeking, since perfect markets eliminate any such activity – at least in their model.

A proper starting point would acknowledge that economic rents are generated at all times by productive activity. Each time we improve output per unit of a particular input, and that input is fixed, owners of that input gain an economic rent.

Land is the obvious focus for the study of rents. But consider the same concept in a slightly more abstract setting – time. Without saying it explicitly, when we talk about economic growth and output we usually mean per unit of time. Thus, every improvement of output per unit of time goes to those ‘owners’ of time. Which is everyone. The perfect tax is a ‘head tax’ which is in fact a time tax per person.

But since rent also accrues to land owners, owners of intellectual property and copyrights, owners of quotas and licences, and all fixed inputs into production, they may very well compete for both improvements in output per unit of their input, AND the surplus generated by increasing output per unit of time.

The distribution of rents through society ultimately depends on the legal, institutional and social arrangements of a country. It is a choice.

The general rule of thumb is that rents cannot be destroyed, only reallocated. Thus, if we focus on taxi licences, pharmaceuticals, and government spending as areas to eliminate the ability to procure rents, then remaining rentiers will benefit – landowners, banks, and the like. Indeed, if eliminating these rents improves the overall productive capacity of the economy, the rents accrue to other owners of fixe factors of production may be great than those taken from the targeted sector.

If economists want to be society’s heroes, they need a fundamental market model that can be used to analyse the distribution of the economic rents generated by society.
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Re: Love is Stronger Than Debt . . for Tinker . .

Post by YMix »

noddy wrote:by which i mean - its impossible to be an entrepeneur with a sporadic income when the very structures of society make such living extremely difficult.
That's one of the things that annoy me as well.
“There are a lot of killers. We’ve got a lot of killers. What, do you think our country’s so innocent? Take a look at what we’ve done, too.” - Donald J. Trump, President of the USA
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Re: Love is Stronger Than Debt . . for Tinker . .

Post by Simple Minded »

YMix wrote:
noddy wrote:by which i mean - its impossible to be an entrepeneur with a sporadic income when the very structures of society make such living extremely difficult.
That's one of the things that annoy me as well.
Societal expectations have changed hugely since industrialization. My granparent's generation would have thought the concept of working in an environmentally controlled building, and the promise of getting paid $X for Y hours of effort to be extremely unrealistic.

Contractors of today have much the same reality/mentality as the farmers, ranchers, loggers, miners, etc. (anyone whose income/success was tied to Mother Nature) of yesteryear. They are realistic enough to know there are no guantees of income. You can bust your ass and do everything right, and still not prosper. You can't control the behavior of Mother Nature or your customers.

Promises and guarantees are external, expectations are internal. You can only blame/credit the former on others.
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Enki
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Re: Love is Stronger Than Debt . . for Tinker . .

Post by Enki »

noddy wrote:by which i mean - its impossible to be an entrepeneur with a sporadic income when the very structures of society make such living extremely difficult.
One of the big trends in my circles these days is Venture Communism. We'll see how that works. Basically the idea is having large scale resources shared communally to use as a hub to incubate ideas. i.e. You live on the commune and get your venture going. Tomorrow I'll be going up to the farm to talk to them about doing a Garden Tech hack-a-thon, I want to see what kind of cool Arduino madness we can get up to for growing food. And also, I am trying to push them into the Kale chip market. Kale chips are very popular, tasty and they sell for like $ 60 a pound retail. Grow some kale, throw some oil on there, spice it with lemon, garlic and pepper, and leave it in the dehydrator for a couple of days. Very little work, very little in terms of capital intensivity. Farmer's markets are your sales channels, and then when you get up to scale you hit the Green Grocery distributor market, which in NYC is the Korean mob.
Men often oppose a thing merely because they have had no agency in planning it, or because it may have been planned by those whom they dislike.
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Simple Minded

Re: Love is Stronger Than Debt . . for Tinker . .

Post by Simple Minded »

Tinker,

You misunderstood my post, to your credit, I should have been more clear. I was not talking about the pre-Obamacare era in terms of cause and effect at all. What I should have said is that the professed goals of Obamacare, and the unintended consequences/perverse incentives of Obamacare will have contradictory effects.

Ie: more regulation that will raise costs/lower profits for individual doctors & nurses will not increase the number of healthcare professionals that are available. The age old phenomena of price controls & regulations creating shortages will apply at least at first. 20 years out might be a different story.

My opthamalagist told me the codes he has to use to track treatable conditions are going up 1,000 fold. My chiropractor told me Medicare often refuses payment with no explanation of why or how to remedy the situation. Two doctors I know are planning to retire early now. The personal relationships between doctor and patient are being strained.

All the healthcare professionals I know have no confidence in DC to solve existing problems in the medical industry, I suspect you would feel the same regarding the computer code industry.

I do agree with you that the legislation is rife with corruption, lobbyists and politicians will be the big winners, doctors and nurses will be the big losers. Increase regulation increases the ROI from lobbying. What else would one expect from DC? The MIC of Medical Industrial Complex has joined the other two.

I also agree that what others often view as cause, I often view as effect and vice versa (a source of pride for me actually), and both labels are dependent on timeframe of observation, 5 years or 15 years of observation is a hell of a difference.

Repubs would have done the same, GWB was on the same track. When in power, both parties seek to increase it, Obamacare was the nuclear option.

This will be interesting to see it play out. Always is.
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Re: Love is Stronger Than Debt . . for Tinker . .

Post by Enki »

Simple Minded wrote:Tinker,

You misunderstood my post, to your credit, I should have been more clear. I was not talking about the pre-Obamacare era in terms of cause and effect at all. What I should have said is that the professed goals of Obamacare, and the unintended consequences/perverse incentives of Obamacare will have contradictory effects.
I don't know what it will do, I didn't read it, and I probably wouldn't understand what i was looking at if I did. A friend of mine in the healthcare industry here in NY said that an administrator that he works with went to the Obamacare training hating it and came away saying, "Obamacare is amazing."
Ie: more regulation that will raise costs/lower profits for individual doctors & nurses will not increase the number of healthcare professionals that are available. The age old phenomena of price controls & regulations creating shortages will apply at least at first. 20 years out might be a different story.
It could adjust the different aspects. I really don't know. We'll see. If I needed a serious expensive procedure, I'd probably go to India. Being in the global 1% has its privileges.
My opthamalagist told me the codes he has to use to track treatable conditions are going up 1,000 fold. My chiropractor told me Medicare often refuses payment with no explanation of why or how to remedy the situation. Two doctors I know are planning to retire early now. The personal relationships between doctor and patient are being strained.
Yea, it's nutty.
All the healthcare professionals I know have no confidence in DC to solve existing problems in the medical industry, I suspect you would feel the same regarding the computer code industry.
Confidence in DC, what's that? And yes, in terms of the internet, I only assume DC can genuflect it up. I had a conversation last year with Bre Pettis the CEO of Maker Industries (Makerbot) and talked to him about 3D printer policy, and his position was essentially that he wanted them to wait as long as possible to craft policy. My view on it was that the industry itself should be working on crafting policy prior to the DC lobbyists getting a hold on it.
I do agree with you that the legislation is rife with corruption, lobbyists and politicians will be the big winners, doctors and nurses will be the big losers. Increase regulation increases the ROI from lobbying. What else would one expect from DC? The MIC of Medical Industrial Complex has joined the other two.
Of course, that's the nature of 'industries' under corporatism. Industries are becoming uber corporations all in some form of regulatory collusion, rather than disparate producers trying to vie for the same market.
I also agree that what others often view as cause, I often view as effect and vice versa (a source of pride for me actually), and both labels are dependent on timeframe of observation, 5 years or 15 years of observation is a hell of a difference.
Absolutely.
Repubs would have done the same, GWB was on the same track. When in power, both parties seek to increase it, Obamacare was the nuclear option.
I still think it's a path toward Single Payer. And honestly, Single Payer would be the best thing for business of any size. Why should a carpenter be providing healthcare? Why should Intel be providing healthcare? Save every business anywhere from thousands to billions a year in healthcare costs. The employer mandate is the reason why healthcare burdens create perverse incentives and changes in the regulatory structure can cause layoffs.
This will be interesting to see it play out. Always is.
Yep.
Men often oppose a thing merely because they have had no agency in planning it, or because it may have been planned by those whom they dislike.
-Alexander Hamilton
Simple Minded

Re: Love is Stronger Than Debt . . for Tinker . .

Post by Simple Minded »

Enki wrote: I still think it's a path toward Single Payer. And honestly, Single Payer would be the best thing for business of any size. Why should a carpenter be providing healthcare? Why should Intel be providing healthcare? Save every business anywhere from thousands to billions a year in healthcare costs. The employer mandate is the reason why healthcare burdens create perverse incentives and changes in the regulatory structure can cause layoffs.
I agree that if the employer is not removed from costs of health care transactions, costs will never fall. End users never conserving nor acting wisely regarding the use of resouces they percieve as free is the very definition of a perverse incentive.

Some form of catastrophic insurance for the poor seems compassionate, but creating a system that will not be abused or an incubator for corruption and/or political control/controlled human evolution will be the challenge.

I suspect that in the long run, the effects of health care reform will be similar to the effects of creating the IRS. Last I read, the Internal Revenue code was 50,000+ pages, some "experts" have stated they expect Obamacare to eventually create 80,000 pages of regulation.

Lots of money will be spent in compliance and enforcement, that can not be spent on end users, research, training, R&D, capital investment, etc. Can't recall the last time I heard anyone stating "If only the tax code were more complicated, if only I could get more help from the government in my area of expertise, things would be better."

On the plus side, there will be fortunes made in the compliance/coaching/data management modes. Data miners and lawyers will also be the big winners.

If you become the H&R Block of ACA compliance, more power to ya! If there was not a need, there would be no customers.
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Re: Love is Stronger Than Debt . . for Tinker . .

Post by noddy »

Simple Minded wrote:
YMix wrote:
noddy wrote:by which i mean - its impossible to be an entrepeneur with a sporadic income when the very structures of society make such living extremely difficult.
That's one of the things that annoy me as well.
Societal expectations have changed hugely since industrialization. My granparent's generation would have thought the concept of working in an environmentally controlled building, and the promise of getting paid $X for Y hours of effort to be extremely unrealistic.

Contractors of today have much the same reality/mentality as the farmers, ranchers, loggers, miners, etc. (anyone whose income/success was tied to Mother Nature) of yesteryear. They are realistic enough to know there are no guantees of income. You can bust your ass and do everything right, and still not prosper. You can't control the behavior of Mother Nature or your customers.

Promises and guarantees are external, expectations are internal. You can only blame/credit the former on others.
my grandad and even my dad for most of their lives were allowed to live in a sh*tshack if money got tight and also drive barely recognisable vehicles to get to work without fear.

it also predates the rise in training requirements and licensing so they could both work all sorts of jobs just by showing up and being reliable without having to invest many thousands in getting the appropriate paperwork for a specific role.

after all that they could also afford to purchase a nicer house than the basic ch*shack for 3 times the average single wage - currently my country is running at 7 times the average wage so all loan payments and rent payments take away about 2/3 of the average income leaving people desperate and week to week.

in the modern world there are police hunting the streets for any car that isnt a late model and non standard housing is destroyed and .. sigh.

radically different conditions between then and now in terms of muddling along between paychecks and living it poor, radically different conditions to take the risks of doing a small business startup in.
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noddy
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Re: Love is Stronger Than Debt . . for Tinker . .

Post by noddy »

Enki wrote:
noddy wrote:by which i mean - its impossible to be an entrepeneur with a sporadic income when the very structures of society make such living extremely difficult.
One of the big trends in my circles these days is Venture Communism. We'll see how that works. Basically the idea is having large scale resources shared communally to use as a hub to incubate ideas. i.e. You live on the commune and get your venture going. Tomorrow I'll be going up to the farm to talk to them about doing a Garden Tech hack-a-thon, I want to see what kind of cool Arduino madness we can get up to for growing food. And also, I am trying to push them into the Kale chip market. Kale chips are very popular, tasty and they sell for like $ 60 a pound retail. Grow some kale, throw some oil on there, spice it with lemon, garlic and pepper, and leave it in the dehydrator for a couple of days. Very little work, very little in terms of capital intensivity. Farmer's markets are your sales channels, and then when you get up to scale you hit the Green Grocery distributor market, which in NYC is the Korean mob.
sounds good - the ways things are going ill be doing simmilar here soon enough... provided i can get access to land or maintain my own.

first step is going to be challenging the local councils and governments about many absurd rules from the middle class picket fence era.
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Simple Minded

Re: Love is Stronger Than Debt . . for Tinker . .

Post by Simple Minded »

noddy wrote: my grandad and even my dad for most of their lives were allowed to live in a sh*tshack if money got tight and also drive barely recognisable vehicles to get to work without fear.

it also predates the rise in training requirements and licensing so they could both work all sorts of jobs just by showing up and being reliable without having to invest many thousands in getting the appropriate paperwork for a specific role.

after all that they could also afford to purchase a nicer house than the basic ch*shack for 3 times the average single wage - currently my country is running at 7 times the average wage so all loan payments and rent payments take away about 2/3 of the average income leaving people desperate and week to week.

in the modern world there are police hunting the streets for any car that isnt a late model and non standard housing is destroyed and .. sigh.

radically different conditions between then and now in terms of muddling along between paychecks and living it poor, radically different conditions to take the risks of doing a small business startup in.
Wow! Not only does then and now sound different, also sounds like radically different between here and there! I forgot all about local zoning requirements designed to "maintain" property values (fools were wrong about that too!) and keep riffraff like me out of those nice neighborhoods.

Luckily, in the US, a lot of the really crazy zoning ordinances are still local and voluntary (people buy into neighborhoods for status/investment/exclusivity, etc.). Although it is getting worse everywhere regarding what one can do with "their" property. People who have been in the building/farming busines for 30+ years have hours of horror stories describing their dealings with bureaucracy.

Regarding your listing of prices, are you saying that average house pricein Stralia is now 7 times the average annual gross income? Sound like the bubble has not burst there yet. I would not be surprised if real estate falls 50-80% from current levels.

Amazing how stiffling attempting to implement the promises of "success" or "fairness" can be.

Almost seems like the natural laws of the universe oppose such violations....
noddy
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Re: Love is Stronger Than Debt . . for Tinker . .

Post by noddy »

Simple Minded wrote:
noddy wrote: my grandad and even my dad for most of their lives were allowed to live in a sh*tshack if money got tight and also drive barely recognisable vehicles to get to work without fear.

it also predates the rise in training requirements and licensing so they could both work all sorts of jobs just by showing up and being reliable without having to invest many thousands in getting the appropriate paperwork for a specific role.

after all that they could also afford to purchase a nicer house than the basic ch*shack for 3 times the average single wage - currently my country is running at 7 times the average wage so all loan payments and rent payments take away about 2/3 of the average income leaving people desperate and week to week.

in the modern world there are police hunting the streets for any car that isnt a late model and non standard housing is destroyed and .. sigh.

radically different conditions between then and now in terms of muddling along between paychecks and living it poor, radically different conditions to take the risks of doing a small business startup in.
Wow! Not only does then and now sound different, also sounds like radically different between here and there! I forgot all about local zoning requirements designed to "maintain" property values (fools were wrong about that too!) and keep riffraff like me out of those nice neighborhoods.

Luckily, in the US, a lot of the really crazy zoning ordinances are still local and voluntary (people buy into neighborhoods for status/investment/exclusivity, etc.). Although it is getting worse everywhere regarding what one can do with "their" property. People who have been in the building/farming busines for 30+ years have hours of horror stories describing their dealings with bureaucracy.

Regarding your listing of prices, are you saying that average house pricein Stralia is now 7 times the average annual gross income? Sound like the bubble has not burst there yet. I would not be surprised if real estate falls 50-80% from current levels.

Amazing how stiffling attempting to implement the promises of "success" or "fairness" can be.

Almost seems like the natural laws of the universe oppose such violations....
america has one thing im jealous of and thats the middle bits of highly variant flyover country - in australia these bits are all what you call "death valley".

you are quite right it will correct and long term adjust, i just needed to rant and the 10 years or so of correction is going to be a relevant to me personally :)
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Simple Minded

Re: Love is Stronger Than Debt . . for Tinker . .

Post by Simple Minded »

noddy wrote: america has one thing im jealous of and thats the middle bits of highly variant flyover country - in australia these bits are all what you call "death valley".

you are quite right it will correct and long term adjust, i just needed to rant and the 10 years or so of correction is going to be a relevant to me personally :)
One thing I hope is that Merika never becomes as homogenous as the utopians desire, that would really suck. Seems to me local culture varies by decades or even centuries within a few hundred miles. Seems to have evolved that way for good reason..... I remember when the intellectuals among us craved diversity...... and the non-intellectuals craved apathy/indifference/ignorance on the part of the intellectuals......

Luckily for you (and the rest of us), the internet is taylor made for ranting!!! the ultimate megaphone!!! :D

The continuous ever changing flux that is life is relevant to all of us personally! The desire for a stable status quo is unrealistic..... once attained, most would start bitchin for either the new "new" or the "good ole days"... ;)

Humans don't seem to do well with being well feed and stable.
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