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Forum Post: It's the FIRE, not taxes, that ravages the economy.

Posted 5 years ago on June 10, 2018, 1:56 p.m. EST by agkaiser (2516) from Fredericksburg, TX
This content is user submitted and not an official statement

After 5 years of payments on a 30 year fixed rate $250,000 mortgage you have:

at 4% and $1193.54/month paid $47,731.07 in interest and the principal remaining is $226,118.67;

at 5% and $1342.05/month paid $60,095.11 in interest and the principal remaining is $229,572.11;

at 6% and $1498.88/month paid $72,568.46 in interest and the principal remaining is $232,635.66;

If your home has appreciated by $50,000 in 5 years, the bank has increased it's wealth substantially. That's why banks, the biggest winners, so willingly underwrite real estate inflation and developer operations. The most recent buyer is the always the biggest loser in this "creation of wealth" scheme. More and more foreign money is going into American real estate and, as with all investors, into lending to America's hopeful schmucks.

https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2018/06/chinese-investors-inflate-housing-markets-us-canada-australia-governments-try-stem-tide.html

And then there's the rest of capitalism:

"Volumes II and III of Marx's Capital describe how debt grows exponentially, burdening the economy with carrying charges. This overhead is subjecting today's Western finance-capitalist economies to austerity, shrinking living standards and capital investment while increasing their cost of living and doing business. That is the main reason why they are losing their export markets and becoming de-industrialized...."

https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2018/05/michael-hudson-creating-wealth-debt-wests-finance-capitalist-road.html

19 Comments

19 Comments


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[-] 2 points by agkaiser (2516) from Fredericksburg, TX 5 years ago

Capitalism is a failed system! That will become apparent someday, somewhere.

[-] 2 points by DKAtoday (33802) from Coon Rapids, MN 5 years ago

Capitalism is a failed system!

Every system that allows (even promotes) wealth and power to collect to the very few of any civilization Fails! Sooner (usually) or later (few last over 200 years). Doesn't matter the system or proposed ideals - it matters in the exclusion of the majority.

[-] 1 points by grapes (5232) 5 years ago

Capitalism vs. Socialism So is Socialism. Whether it's the banksters, ministers, or gangsters, it's still the same fruits of labor being stolen.

Taxes are not evil if they are going towards a good cause. Taxes are not good if they are going towards an evil cause. When the economy is expanding at 2-3% p.a. while the monetary base is expanding at 7-8% p.a., the FIRE sector ignites inflation that burns and rips off ALL producers in the economy and rewards ALL debtors. This is why the U.S.A. stays as the greatest debtor in the World. The Chinese get an orgasm every time they sell the U.S. some crap when the U.S. financial system credits their U.S. bank accounts with a larger positive number. There's absolutely no problem for the U.S. doing that as long as there is a strong enough U.S. military force to deny giving any and all real stuffs back to whoever possesses the credit ( mostly in eurodollar electronic form due to its sheer volume and lightning-fast liquidity as required of it to make compound interest.) Of course, the U.S. not honoring the U.S. Dollar probably means the collapse of the U.S. Dollar as the World's reserve currency. The monetary wealth of the U.S. populace will become worth very much less overseas. We just don't want to be caught at that time in a position like Venezuela which imports so much stuff from overseas, from food, gasoline, to toilet paper.

It's fine to cut off trade if we are largely self-sufficient. However, trade generally improves the prosperity of the trading partners because trade turns potential garbage in one place into valuable products elsewhere.

There's a very ancient and continuous correlation of trading volume with the amount of wealth. Which country trades the most right now in the World? Which country holds the most wealth right now? U.S.A., U.S.A. Which country has increased trade the most in recent decades? Which country has generated the highest wealth growth rate in recent decades? China, China. I am sure that Russia, Iran, and DPRK all know very well the economic pain of having been weaned off of trade. Yeah, they can become very strong and independent countries alright by going rogue breaking international norms of behavior. This certainly applies to the U.S. and China as well.

Our Toad projected great weakness by not defending the Constitution of the United States in Washington D.C. here in this video, leading to the slaughter of hundreds of Russians in Syria. It's dereliction of Toad's sworn duty. Pootin hacked the U.S. successfully through the Toad but it rebounded killing his own people. There are rules of engagement our troops observe. Their returning fire when they are fired upon is to be expected, especially when they have already been sensitized to expect an imminent attack due to the Toad's projecting weakness not to back them up. I'm sure that far more Russians will be killed in Russia when the autocratic Muslims expand northward to claim the lost glories of the Ottoman Empire. Toad is weak, wet, and toxic!

We don't want anyone to come who doesn't observe our laws here on our soil. Washington D.C. has NOT become a foreign embassy just because our idiotic Toad has invited you to share a meal. Stay out of our oven preheating itself if you can't take the heat. Even the Toad might have hopped here from New York by mistake. Sad...

[-] 1 points by agkaiser (2516) from Fredericksburg, TX 5 years ago

I was talking about capitalism. Why is socialism brought into the discussion at all? When enough of us realize that capitalism, the ascendance of finance, is a hopelessly failed system that worsens at the rate of compound interest, then we can start talking about alternatives. Don't jump the gun to conclusions. How's that for a well mixed metaphor?

[-] 1 points by grapes (5232) 5 years ago

"People tend to view the United States as being closer to the Capitalist principles, and countries like Canada or Norway being more Socialist in nature. In reality they are all a mix of both principles, just a little more leaning one direction or the other."

Purely capitalist systems don't exist and would collapse even if they somehow sprang into being. After the U.S. had gone through its "Roaring Twenties," it collapsed bigtime and turned sharply towards Socialism for a rescue. Of course, the only real cure was World War II's ultra-Keynesian deficit spending. War "cures!"

Or is it the deficit spending on the mobilization of the entire workforce? War helped with sealing off borders before igniting the workforce--not much different from our starting up a car-engine cylinder: seal any leaks in the cylinder's wall before igniting the fuel-air mixture.

[-] 1 points by agkaiser (2516) from Fredericksburg, TX 5 years ago

Thanks for the recap of what happened when I was two years old. It's nice to be reminded of the good old days before the neo-liberal revolution set us seemingly irrevocably on the road to hell. What I want to hear now is your description of where we are now. Maybe someone will be inspired to invent a contemporary solution.

[-] 1 points by grapes (5232) 5 years ago

My elementary school teacher taught me the rule: "look before you leap." It worked as well back then as it does now and it still will later. Do you have enough headroom? What's the landing site like? Is it safe? Does it cause a big splash towards the other puddle hoppers? Do they mind or love being splashed? How about in this social situation, a puddle-hopping party being different from a cosplaying one?

In boy scouting, we learnt to yell, "timber!" shortly before felling a tree to let people clear the impact zone first. Be anal by planning backwards from the output back to the inputs. It avoids bursting the intestines with shit from eating, should the anus become unreachable. I had this enlightenment when my brother gave me a piece of gum to chew and warned me not to swallow the chewed gum but spit it out, lest it should stick my intestines shut.

Children have died of swallowing powerful magnetic pebbles but I was a child when such magnets didn't exist. Yeah, I remember the good old days digging through the neighborhood garbage dumps! I savor that honey-glazed cracker given to me from my discovering that bicycle dynamo containing permanent magnets and handing it to the recycling pedlar. There is sweet honey in the garbage ( through trade! )

Life's pipeline is: Health, Education, Livelihood, Passion. Move people through it starting with the end first. Make hobbies into businesses. Make friends into lovers. Make the hunt for livelihood into a networked hunt ( if Google can find so many things, can't we just find livelihoods?) Make apprenticeship ( government-subsidized trial workers ) education as widely accessible as possible ( Germany beats the U.S. to a pulp on this so Germany has knowledgeable and skilled workers--there's a reason why U.S. consumers buy Mercedes-Benz or BMW { which is actually more driven by those people with a "White" mental attitudinal problem so do watch out for "Eat, Sleep, Kill" PCPs and don't get run over by Fartvernügen }; try one if not yet.) Make basic healthcare universally accessible ( most of the developed countries do it better and cheaper so it's just a piece of cake, were it not for our severely constipated corporatocracy. Our "solution" to constipation was to eat more. I asked my constipated kid why that made any sense. The answer was, "sooner or later, it will ALL come back out!" My kid had a genius-level understanding of the Law of the Conservation of Shit, definitely a renewable energy hydrogen/methane producer! )

[-] 1 points by agkaiser (2516) from Fredericksburg, TX 5 years ago

Prolix!

[-] 1 points by grapes (5232) 5 years ago

My renewable energy producer at home suggests the "solution here" while occupying the throne room. A fugu specialist can foreskin the Toad and it will taste as crispy as an oven-baked frog.

Wow! We may even get a big turkey, too. Watch and learn from the turkey steaming in realtime as Allah takes control.

Hmm, why do they ALL taste like chicken?

The U.S. is the exceptional one amongst the developed countries in increasing its debt-to-GDP ratio to 118% in 2023. Since the Retards forego building up a reserve in financial fair weather, the trillions of dollars of tax cut may well "cut you like a knife." Welder is coming.

[-] 1 points by agkaiser (2516) from Fredericksburg, TX 5 years ago

read Mark Twain's critique of James Fenimore Cooper's prose style.

excerpt from rules section of "Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offenses"

by Mark Twain

"...

  1. Say what he is proposing to say, not merely come near it.

  2. Use the right word, not its second cousin.

  3. Eschew surplusage.

  4. Not omit necessary details.

..."

http://twain.lib.virginia.edu/projects/rissetto/offense.html

[-] 1 points by gsw (3406) from Woodbridge Township, NJ 5 years ago

We can’t afford to live here. More senior citizens homeless. Greatest wealth gap.health care equal to Cuba, education results too.

https://nypost.com/2018/06/23/why-the-middle-class-cant-afford-life-in-america-anymore/?utm_campaign=partnerfeed&utm_medium=syndicated&utm_source=flipboard

[-] 1 points by agkaiser (2516) from Fredericksburg, TX 5 years ago

Cuba's health care and pharmaceutical industries are among the highest quality and lowest cost on Earth! They train doctors and send them abroad to help others. When some of those high quality no cost educated physicians defect because they want to get rich in a "free" country, they talk up the horrors of Cuba as the price of admission to the economic/political elite club that oppress and enslave with debt 90% of the populations of "free" countries. We're free to be ass-holes or the 90% who eat the shit that comes from ass-holes.

[-] 1 points by beautifulworld (23767) 5 years ago

I've done the mortgage thing twice to no avail.

I never understood how it was li'l ole me taking all the risk and how the big bank took none of the risk.

I would never buy a house again without paying in full cash and owning it outright. Home ownership through mortgage is the biggest scam ever.

[-] 1 points by grapes (5232) 5 years ago

Risk = No Control. Mortgage came from the word for Death. Banks rig our government. This is the Golden Rule of wealth and power: One who makes the rules gets the gold ( why politicians become rich after their stints in government.) One who has the gold makes the rules ( why we have at least ten gold-grubbing lobbyists to work on each member of our Congress ).

Here are some ways to climb up the socioeconomic ladder for the people who have started near the bottom rungs. In a very expensive real estate locale, someone was renting an apartment converted from a prior garage and lamented how high the rent was. They also complained of the rather big piece of dusty desert scape with a few unsightly dead plants strewn here and there behind their apartment that came with the rented apartment. The lady I was with went outside of the apartment building to look at how many floors it had to estimate how many rental units there were. She said to me, "Wow! I couldn't believe that this building could fetch so much rent every single month." All apartments above the former garage were surely rented for more than the converted garage. Then she looked at the big dusty backyard and muttered, "Wow! I can grow A LOT of fruits, vegetables, and flowers in this beautiful garden."

The lady had a farming family background so she was hallucinating ( with good factual basis though ) the desert-scape backyard. She had previously managed and owned apartment buildings so she was imagining what a great piece of real estate investment it would be for her. Obstacles = Opportunities in a new perspective.

Was she rich or was she poor? She was high on imagination and hallucination so she was RICH ( or becoming rich.) Beauty is in the mindset of the beholder--the renter's "big ugly backyard" and the lady's "beautiful garden" are one and the same piece of land !

Some Pennsylvanians had been cursing at the crude oil polluting their water wells before the age of automobiles made oil so valuable. Thinking of the oil-polluted water wells as being hints at the great oil wealth lurking nearby made them far more tolerable. In those days, whale oil was more preferable than crude oil for home-lighting because it could burn without smoke but once automobiles arrived in large numbers using oil products, crude oil changed from a pollutant to a eagerly sough-after commodity. Yeah, sniff at the fragrant scent of money gushing up or being pumped up from the ground ! Texass brown tea.

The U.S. corollary to the Golden Rule of wealth and power is: The "family-value and deficit-hawk" brown nosers close to the ear-raping TeraAfter 日本の残虐行為 can suck as much Texass brown tea as the Teapot can spew. The U.S. exercised rearguard leadership to "broaden the base."

[-] 1 points by grapes (5232) 5 years ago

Don't be suspected as being a dope dealer hoarding cash though. Being White and living in the "proper" zipcode district is the best as the police don't expect "colored people" to have large cash stashes. They can confiscate cash "without cause" for their revenue enhancement program without any redress of grievance. Property is NOT protected under the U.S. Constitution.

Of course, one can exercise one's First Amendment right to gripe and if need be to back it up with one's Second Amendment right. Speeding bullets from a disgruntled person in a mass shooting are free speech the U.S. gets nearly every day like a one-a-day vitamin pill. Since the Columbine mass shooting, ( have you wondered why so much gun violence had started in a White zone?) we have become aware that school "children should get lots of vitamin A and calcium," so we have included them because we are an "inclusive society" integrating ALL people for eating the bullets. Being generous people, we share our daily bled with everyone.

It's no longer a White monopoly although White supremacist Aryan ideology did jumpstart a Big One with a daycare center in the middle of it. It happened during the administration of the first non-Black "Black" President. Was that a coincidence?

No, women rising to power in a patriarchy must be supra-patriarchal to defeat the male contenders. Males' business ever since ancient times is to procure resources, often through wars. It's to be expected that the supra-patriarchal females must kill more than the males to attain power.

[-] 1 points by gsw (3406) from Woodbridge Township, NJ 5 years ago

till the next big financial shake out tips over the boat, we will eek along for the ride.

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/why-many-americans-arent-benefiting-from-robust-u-s-economy

[-] 1 points by ImNotMe (1488) 5 years ago

''Is the global economy just a giant debt scam? Here’s what the financial elite doesn’t want you to know.'' by Andrew O'Hehir:

radix omnium malorum est cupiditas ...

[-] 2 points by beautifulworld (23767) 5 years ago

Varoufakis sums it up and WOW!:

"Democracy has been undermined by the “financialization” of both the economy and politics. What Varoufakis means here is that during the development of capitalism, first economic power became more important than political power, and then bankers and venture capitalists became more important than old-style business tycoons. “It became more profitable, and a greater source of power, to be a financier than to be Henry Ford,” as he put it.This change placed politicians in a new relationship to money and power: “Even progressives, like the Democrats in this country or social democrats in Europe, struck a Faustian bargain with financiers instead of playing the role of mediating between labor and capital,” Varoufakis said."

The financialization of everything down to our DNA."

He then goes on to explain why he argues that this economic system that is failing most of us is not actually capitalism anymore, it's something beyond that.

He argues, "Capitalism collapsed in 2008, just as communism had collapsed in 1991 — the system we have now is something else.

This is an argument Varoufakis has made many times, including in his 2011 book “The Global Minotaur.” As he expressed it to me, the financial crisis of 2008 led to “a wholesale collapse of what used to be called capitalism,” which has not recovered nearly as much as most people believe. What we have instead is an almost galactic-scale system of moving debt around to conceal the various flaws and shortfalls in the system. Varoufakis calls it “bankrupt-ocracy,” in which enormous but endangered or bankrupt financial institutions wield enormous power over the rest of society. “That’s not capitalism.”

THAT'S NOT CAPITALISM, we're in an economic system now that is beyond capitalism. WOW. What an epiphany!

That is very powerful and I see his point. It makes sense and this is why what we're dealing with is so very hard to beat. We haven't really defined what we are dealing with.

[-] 1 points by ImNotMe (1488) 5 years ago

''Big Money As Private Immigrant Jails Boom'', by John Burnett:

Thanx for excerpt and summary. Yannis Varoufakis is ahead of the curve ... as this link shows:

What tRUMP is doing to Migrants & Immigrant Children .. now speaks volumes about the U$A:

respice; adspice; prospice ...