| WHY ECONOMIC CRISIS ACTION PLANS ARE INADEQUATE |
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| Robert Morpheal, Bob Ezergailis, Morphealism (morpheal@yahoo.com) |
2008/11/26 07:39 |
WHY ECONOMIC CRISIS ACTION PLANS ARE INADEQUATE
Economic crisis action plans in most nations do not go far enough, nor
do they show indications of moving ahead fast enough. There is a
reluctance, based on belief in the free enterprise, free market,
capitalist system being an adequately self correcting process. This is
driven by the false belief in human nature, which is based on the
dialectic of good and evil. Largely that dialectic argument is the
argument whether people are essentially good or evil by their inherent
nature. With the end of the Cold War, the Capitalist, American led,
argument won out and came out on top, as a consequence of that
conflict being won, not as a result of convincing rational
consideration of scientific facts. Since then the tendency has been to
believe America in this regard, as in many other matters. We now see
how high a price American Cold War victory brings, in purely
ideological terms. Unopposed, the often baseless beliefs, of a nation
religion. Science can settle the question of good or evil nature. It
is neither. The dispute was a Cold War illusion, meant to increase the
hatred and conflict between two warring sides. Of course education
becomes education for war, not peace. The false ideas are taught,
regardless of science, to maintain conflict at its maximum level. That
is the monstrous legacy we are seeing today. We see what are
unscientific, irrational, often baseless beliefs, held by one side in
a military and propaganda oriented conflict, continuing to bring ruin
and destruction. In war the ability to question propagandized beliefs
is severely impaired if not totally destroyed. In victory of one side
against another that ability does not return easily if at all. Not
until another opponent wins, or until events prove it incontrovertibly
wrong despite the deeply inculcated blind reluctance to accept that
fact. War propaganda, ideological foundations for war, are most
similar to religion. Reason has little role in it. The truth is always
the first casualty. In the current economic crisis the truth, in that
those are being suppressed by those responsible for the cause of
death.
(We need not go into how religion and economics have become
intertwined and how religious systems typically deal with issues of
belief and proof. That is a worthwhile subject to explore, but far too
complex. Let us simply say that religiosity in economics has been and
remains a mainstay of both capitalist and communist systems as they
manifest during the Cold War and as Capitalism continues today. A true
science of economics, and the purely rational regulation of economic
systems is one of the victims. We might add that the American position
in the dialectic with communism, distorted and forced the communist
and socialist positions into extremes of opposition to capitalist
economics due to the extremism of the American led side. In war that
is to be expected. You dehumanize and discredit your enemy,
exaggerating the differences, to enable conflict, including killing
by warfare.)
American led globalization failed to recognize that investment abroad,
in hopes of quick big profit, does not provide for and build a good
society at home. We are referring to unregulated, free market, free
enterprise, globalization where the profit motive proves to be the
only governing motive. At least the belief in quicker, larger,
profits. Forgetting that the capital to gain those profits, taking on
the risk, is no longer invested in the society from where it was
generated. It is now invested elsewhere. The portion of the economic
anymore.
Neither is the business tax base that existed previously. This is a
very important point. You then have a massive erosion of traditional
tax revenues from various municipal and state coffers and ultimately
from the national purse. This growing failure of government revenue
generation leads to bankruptcy of governments. They can no longer pick
up the shortfall in terms of that portion of the economic pie that
needed to go back into benefitting local society. The spiral of
deterioration simply becomes worse as budgets are increasingly cut to
save taxpayer dollars for both political gain and to avoid losing
remaining enterprises.
In a completely free enterprise, free market, system, enterprises that
find that their costs, including taxation, are rising, are free to
leave and go elsewhere. Either that or simply to close down, refusing
to pay. This black mail tends to force governments to have to avoid
raising revenues by means that might cause a worsening of the already
worsening situation. As the situation progresses the tax base, as to
where revenues can be obtained, grows smaller and smaller until the
government is in total crisis (essentially bankrupt).
Globalization is a massive bleeding wound. That dissipation calls for
rethinking nationalization of some endeavors, and indicates the need
for massive and unprecedented emphasis on public sector involvement
rather than private "free enterprise". Blind belief in capitalism's
self-regulating for the sake of true good will not suffice. While
human nature is neither good nor evil we do not live in a society that
is so well educated and enlightened that it looks after the common
good first before it seeks quick personal profit by any means that any
within it can hope to possibly get away with in terms of the limits of
the existing law and its enforcement. Entirely free enterprise and a
free market capitalism are anarchic by nature, and those within the
system tend to make up their own rules as they go, largely unfettered
by legislative regulation. If they become more fettered, again, they
simply go elsewhere. Another black mail strangle hold on government.
Another reason why there has to be a rethinking of basic principles as
to how to build a functional economy that provides that portion of the
pie that is to benefit society, and provide for its needs as to the
common good. Not to mention sufficient work, and income as another big
part of that same pie.
Nationalization is likely to be the only significant method of
regaining adequate revenues for governments, to replace taxation. That
is, to raise adequate revenues, without increasing taxation, and
bringing about further deterioration in the taxation base from which
revenue is expected. Remember that you cannot truly count on having
what you really need in a completely free enterprise, unconstrained,
globalization, and if you do then the other side of the coin is that
what you pay for it is very often being paid out such that nothing
much really returns to provide for that piece of the economic pie that
This also leads to some additional constraints on how money moves. It
is different as to how money moves when it is in the public rather
than in the private sector. This is extremely true in a free
enterprise capitalist system where, as we now know, too much money
tends to leave without really benefitting society at home. Some of the
pie is restored to its much needed purpose. Also, some additional
stability of jobs and income is gained that otherwise defied
regulation and proved largely impossible to attain. Particularly with
globalization and its total failure of moral and ethical consideration
as to the needs of government and society at home.
What has stood in the way of reason, of rational answers and rational
clarity of vision as to the problems that should have been foreseen
and remedied long before they reached crisis, is the continued blind
belief in the rightness, trueness, essential goodness, of American
led, originated, and war propagandized Capitalism. That made in
America system, along with various forms of systemic abuse derived
from Cold War obstinacy and extremism, having added to it the false
justification that always comes from military victory, remains
inadequately questioned. Remember that brute force does not make
served by the ideological fallout that comes from war. What we need is
a resurgence of open minded, clear thinking, economic science. That is
something quite different from blindly relgious belief in the idol of
American Capitalism. Capitalism too is neither good nor evil, as such.
It is a toolbox full of economic tools. You can use them for good or
for evil, as is the case with any tools, but you have to consider them
tools, not ends in themselves, only means to other ends, defined by an
ethics that is based on reason, rationality, fact, not belief.
Robert Morpheal
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