Tag Archives: Central Planning

Robert Wenzel on the Global Riots

Robert Wenzel writes:

The world is exploding with protests, riots and in some cases revolutions. Behind this disruption of the status quo is the reaction against government attempts to force people against the natural order. In Egypt, Tunisia, Libya, and the like, it is pure revolt against totalitarian control. In Greece, Ireland and Wisconsin it is protests against the fact that governments can’t do the impossible, i.e. pay out more plunder than they take in (in one form or another). In Greece, Ireland and Wisconsin, the protesters clearly want the impossible. They want the plunder that isn’t there.

But at the core, the fundamental problem with all these upheavals is there is no indication that the people in any of these situations understand what makes for a growing prosperous society. In Greece, Ireland and Wisconsin, the protesters are clearly self-centered, who have no clue that they would live in a much better society if the governments simply ended their positions and stopped taxing the people. This would result in the people hiring the government employees in the private sector, where the incentives would result in a growing society.

In the revolutions of Egypt, Tunisia and Libya it is not clear what will replace the totalitarians. There is no indication that the masses understand the destructive nature of government control.

From Wisconsin to Libya, the teachings of Hayek, Mises and Rothbard are still not generally understood. Until they are, protests, riots and revolutions may simply just set the stage for future protests, riots and revolutions, as one government plan is replaced by some other government plan that won’t work in the long run. Nothing will really change until the people truly understand the importance of the rule of law, private property and free markets. Until Hayek, Mises and Rothbard are on the lips of revolutionaries the way Marx and Guevera and are now, the revolutions shall continue.

Social Network Surveillance and Anarchist Activism

Read the article by clicking here.

Bob Wenzel on the State of the Union

Via EPJ:

From last night’s SOTU:

The first step in winning the future is encouraging American innovation. None of us can predict with certainty what the next big industry will be or where the new jobs will come from. Thirty years ago, we couldn’t know that something called the Internet would lead to an economic revolution. What we can do — what America does better than anyone else — is spark the creativity and imagination of our people. We’re the nation that put cars in driveways and computers in offices; the nation of Edison and the Wright brothers; of Google and Facebook. In America, innovation doesn’t just change our lives. It is how we make our living.

Our free enterprise system is what drives innovation. But because it’s not always profitable for companies to invest in basic research, throughout our history, our government has provided cutting-edge scientists and inventors with the support that they need.

Why should government determine in what direction research money is headed? If firms choose not to do research in a certain sector, it’s because they don’t see the payoff down the road, i.e., consumers aren’t willing to spend enough on the new potential research created product to justify the research expenditure. This isn’t a flaw of free markets. It is a part of the foundation of free markets: You don’t spend money on projects that consumers don’t want. Thus, any government spending on research is wasteful. It puts research through a bureaucratic approval system. It takes money from individuals through taxes or deficit spending that would otherwise be directed in a different direction, chosen by the individuals, not the bureaucracy. It opens about a new avenue for cronyism.

Bottom line: This isn’t a recipe for advancement, but for distortion, suffocation, cronyism and coercion.

How We Get To A Voluntary Society – Marc Stevens

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To watch the video click here

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10 Things That Would Be Different If The Federal Reserve Had Never Been Created

From EconomicCollapseBlog.com:

The vast majority of Americans, including many of those who believe that they are “educated” about the Federal Reserve, do not really understand how the Federal Reserve really makes money for the international banking elite.  Many of those opposed to the Federal Reserve will point to the record $80.9 billion in profits that the Federal Reserve made last year as evidence that they are robbing the American people blind.  But then those defending the Federal Reserve will point out that the Fed returned $78.4 billion to the U.S. Treasury.  As a result, the Fed only made a couple billion dollars last year.  Pretty harmless, eh?  Well, actually no.  You see, the money that the Federal Reserve directly makes is not the issue.  Rather, the “magic” of the Federal Reserve system is that it took the power of money creation away from the U.S. government and gave it to the bankers.  Now, the only way that the U.S. government can inject more money into the economy is by going into more debt.  But when new government debt is created, the amount of money to pay the interest on that debt is not also created.  In this way, it was intended by the international bankers that U.S. government debt would expand indefinitely and the U.S. money supply would also expand indefinitely.  In the process, the international bankers would become insanely wealthy by lending money to the U.S. government.

Every single year, hundreds of billions of dollars in profits are made lending money to the U.S. government.

But why in the world should the U.S. government be going into debt to anyone?

Why can’t the U.S. government just print more money whenever it wants?

Well, that is not the way our system works.  The U.S. government has given the power of money creation over to a consortium of international private bankers.

Not only is this unconstitutional, but it is also one of the greatest ripoffs in human history.

In 1922, Henry Ford wrote the following….

“The people must be helped to think naturally about money. They must be told what it is, and what makes it money, and what are the possible tricks of the present system which put nations and peoples under control of the few.”

It is important to try to understand how the international banking elite became so fabulously wealthy.  One of the primary ways that this was accomplished was by gaining control over the issuance of national currencies and by trapping large national governments in colossal debt spirals.

The U.S. national debt problem simply cannot be fixed under the current system.  U.S. government debt has been mathematically designed to expand forever.  It is a trap from which there is no escape.

Many liberals won’t listen because they don’t really care about ever paying off the debt, and most conservatives won’t listen because they are convinced we can solve the national debt problem if we just get a bunch of “good conservatives” into positions of power, but the truth is that we have such a horrific debt problem because it was designed to be this way from the beginning.

So how would America be different if we could go back to 1913 and keep the Federal Reserve Act from ever being passed?  Well, the following are 10 things that would be different if the Federal Reserve had never been created….

#1 If the U.S. government had been issuing debt-free money all this time, the U.S. government could conceivably have a national debt of zero dollars.  Instead, we currently have a national debt that is over 14 trillion dollars.

#2 If the U.S. government had been issuing debt-free money all this time, the U.S. government would likely not be spending one penny on interest payments.  Instead, the U.S. government spent over 413 billion dollars on interest on the national debt during fiscal 2010.  This is money that belonged to U.S. taxpayers that was transferred to the U.S. government which in turn was transferred to wealthy international bankers and other foreign governments.  It is being projected that the U.S. government will be paying 900 billion dollars just in interest on the national debt by the year 2019.

#3 If the U.S. government could issue debt-free money, there would not even have to be a debate about raising “the debt ceiling”, because such a debate would not even be necessary.

#4 If the U.S. government could issue debt-free money, it is conceivable that we would not even need the IRS.  You doubt this?  Well, the truth is that the United States did just fine for well over a hundred years without a national income tax.  But about the same time the Federal Reserve was created a national income tax was instituted as well.  The whole idea was that the wealth of the American people would be transferred to the U.S. government by force and then transferred into the hands of the ultra-wealthy in the form of interest payments.

#5 If the Federal Reserve did not exist, we would not be on the verge of national insolvency.  The Congressional Budget Office is projecting that U.S. government debt held by the public will reach a staggering 716 percent of GDP by the year 2080.  Remember when I used the term “debt spiral” earlier?  Well, this is what a debt spiral looks like….

#6 If the Federal Reserve did not exist, the big Wall Street banks would not have such an overwhelming advantage.  Most Americans simply have no idea that over the last several years the Federal Reserve has been giving gigantic piles of nearly interest-free money to the big Wall Street banks which they turned right around and started lending to the federal government at a much higher rate of return.  I don’t know about you, but if I was allowed to do that I could make a whole bunch of money very quickly.  In fact, it has come out that the Federal Reserve made over $9 trillion in overnight loans to major banks, large financial institutions and other “friends” during the financial crisis of 2008 and 2009.

#7 If the Federal Reserve did not exist, it is theoretically conceivable that we would have an economy with little to no inflation.  Of course that would greatly depend on the discipline of our government officials (which is not very great at this point), but the sad truth is that our current system is always going to produce inflation.  In fact, the Federal Reserve system was originally designed to be inflationary.  Just check out the inflation chart posted below.  The U.S. never had ongoing problems with inflation before the Fed was created, but now it is just wildly out of control….

#8 If the Federal Reserve had never been created, the U.S. dollar would not be a dying currency.  Since the Federal Reserve was created, the U.S. dollar has lost well over 95 percent of its purchasing power.  By constantly inflating the currency, it transfers financial power away from those already holding the wealth (the American people) to those that are able to create more currency and more government debt.  Back in 1913, the total U.S. national debt was just under 3 billion dollars.  Today, the U.S. government is spending approximately 6.85 million dollars per minute, and the U.S. national debt is increasing by over 4 billion dollars per day.

#9 If the Federal Reserve did not exist, we would not have an unelected, unaccountable “fourth branch of government” running around that has gotten completely and totally out of control.  Even some members of Congress are now openly complaining about how much power the Fed has.  For example, Ron Paul told MSNBC last year that he believes that the Federal Reserve is now more powerful than Congress…..

“The regulations should be on the Federal Reserve. We should have transparency of the Federal Reserve. They can create trillions of dollars to bail out their friends, and we don’t even have any transparency of this. They’re more powerful than the Congress.”

#10 If the Federal Reserve had never been created, the American people would be much more free.  We would not be enslaved to this horrific national debt.  Our politicians would not have to run around the globe begging people to lend us money.  Representatives that we directly elect would be the ones setting national monetary policy.  Our politicians would be much less under the influence of the international banking elite.  We would not be at the mercy of the financial bubbles that the Fed has constantly been creating.

There is a reason why so many of the most prominent politicians from the early years of the United States were so passionately against a central bank.  The following is a February 1834 quote by President Andrew Jackson about the evils of central banking….

I too have been a close observer of the doings of the Bank of the United States. I have had men watching you for a long time, and am convinced that you have used the funds of the bank to speculate in the breadstuffs of the country. When you won, you divided the profits amongst you, and when you lost, you charged it to the Bank. You tell me that if I take the deposits from the Bank and annul its charter I shall ruin ten thousand families. That may be true, gentlemen, but that is your sin! Should I let you go on, you will ruin fifty thousand families, and that would be my sin! You are a den of vipers and thieves. I have determined to rout you out and, by the Eternal, (bringing his fist down on the table) I will rout you out.

But we didn’t listen to men like Andrew Jackson.

We allowed the Federal Reserve to be created in 1913 and we have allowed it to develop into an absolute monstrosity over the past century.

Now we are drowning in debt and we are on the verge of national bankruptcy.

Will the American people wake up before it is too late?

Lew Rockwell on the (il)legitimacy of the state

Questioning the Legitimacy of the State

Posted by Lew Rockwell on January 11, 2011 12:34 PM

Jacob Weisberg of Slate knows who’s really to blame for the attempted murder of a congresswoman:

At the core of the far right’s culpability is its ongoing attack on the legitimacy of U.S. government—a venomous campaign not so different from the backdrop to the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995. Then it was focused on “government bureaucrats” and the ATF. This time it has been more about Obama’s birth certificate and health care reform. In either case, it expresses the dangerous idea that the federal government lacks valid authority. It is this, rather than violent rhetoric per se, that is the most dangerous aspect of right-wing extremism.

So, if you do not accept the asserted right of a socially parastic group of officials, tax collectors, money-printers, redistributors, spies, regulators, planners, soldiers, jailers, capital punishers, and police–the US government–to rule and spy on every aspect of your life, to seize whatever amount of your property it deems proper, to send you and your children to kill in foreign lands, to read your emails and listen to your phone calls, to run your family, your business, your community: you foment murder. Does this mean, by the way, that those who promoted the recent aggressive wars of the US government, which have built a mountain of Muslim skulls under the Bushes, Clinton, and Obama, are accessories to murder? Of course not. Anyone killed by the US government deserves it. Anyone seized in secret, renditioned to a federal torture facility, abused and and held in secret or even killed in secret, deserves it. To doubt the validity of such actions by the US government makes you no better than a government-trained bomber who bombed a government building.

In other words, we are to believe that what Murray Rothbard correctly called “a gang of thieves writ large,” the State, owns us. We refuse to be owned. And all over America and the world, more and more people, young people, especially, are coming to understand the anatomy of the State, and its filthiest activity, mass murder. It is the job of anarcho-capitalists and our allies precisely to delegitmatize that locus of aggressive violence, the State. Even our Austrian economics seeks peace and social cooperation above all else. We understand that government harms both, and prosperity, too.

Everyone knows that private criminality is wrong. The far-vaster public criminality, which gave the world more than 100 million murders in just the last century, remains enshrined in too many minds.  Of course, the delegitmization process is, of necessity, non-violent, and not only for religious and other ethical reasons. It is the US government that has the atom bombs, the chemical and biological weapons, the armies, the spies, the secret police, the black ops, the CIA assassins, the mercenaries–a million and one instruments of horror. Even if we wanted to, and we do not, we could not possibly compete on those grounds. However, we have the truth, and when that truth is known and understood, the edifice of aggression can topple over, without violence. Freedom and peace: that is our hope, that is our prayer, that is our goal.

The Purchasing Power of the Dollar Since 1914

Chubby’s Ice Cream

The Fallacy of Central Planning – Chinese Style

Click on the link below to see the satellite images of entire cities built in China – notice that they have no inhabitants!  Central Planners (Socialists) cannot possibly know the needs, wants, and desires of the individual not to mention the needs, wants, and desires of millions of individuals.    Because of this they create tremendous wasted resources (stolen from the individual) on these uninformed projects:

Satellite Photos

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Freer Is Better

Freer Is Better

By John Stossel

The 2010 Index of Economic Freedom lowers the ranking of the United States to eighth out of 179 nations — behind Canada! A year ago, it ranked sixth, ahead of Canada.

Don’t say it’s Barack Obama’s fault. Half the data used in the index is from George W. Bush’s final six months in office. This is a bipartisan problem.

For the past 16 years, the index has ranked the world’s countries on the basis of their economic freedom — or lack thereof. Ten criteria are used: freedoms related to business, trade, fiscal matters, monetary matters, investment, finance, labor, government spending, property rights and freedom from corruption.

The top 10 countries are: Hong Kong, Singapore, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, Switzerland, Canada, the United States, Denmark and Chile.

The bottom 10: Republic of Congo, Solomon Islands, Turkmenistan, Democratic Republic of Congo, Libya, Venezuela, Burma, Eritrea, Cuba, Zimbabwe and North Korea.

The index demonstrates what we libertarians have long said: Economic freedom leads to prosperity. Also, the best places to live and fastest-growing economies are among the freest, and vice versa. A society will be materially well off to the extent its people have the liberty to acquire property, start businesses, and trade in a secure legal and political environment.

Bill Beach, director of the Heritage Foundation’s Center for Data Analysis, which compiles the index with The Wall Street Journal, says the index defines “economic freedom” to mean: “You can follow your dreams, express yourself, create a business, do whatever job you want. Government doesn’t run labor markets, or plan what business you can open, or over-regulate you.”

We asked Beech about the U.S. ranking. “For first time in 16 years, the United States fell from the ‘totally free’ to ‘mostly free’ group. That’s a terrible development,” he said. He fears that if this continues, productive people will leave the United States for freer pastures.

“The United States has been this magnet for three centuries. But today money and people can move quickly, and in less than a lifetime a great country can go by the wayside.”

Why is the United States falling behind? “Our spending has been excessive. … We have the highest corporate tax rate in the world. (Government) takeovers of industries, subsidizing industries … these are the kinds of moves that happen in Third World countries. …”

Beach adds that the rule of law declined when the Obama administration declared some contracts to be null and void. For example, bondholders in the auto industry were forced to the back of the creditor line during bankruptcy. And there’s more regulation of business, such as the Dodd-Frank law for the financial industry and the new credit-card law. But how could the United States place behind Canada? Isn’t Canada practically a socialist country?

“Canada might do health care the wrong way,” Beach said, “but by and large they do things the right way.” Lately, Canada has lowered tax rates and reduced spending.

China is an interesting case. It ranks 140th out of 179, but its economy is on fire. How can this be?

“They have a complex economy,” Beach says. “Around the edges of the mainland are rapidly growing city-states, like Hong Kong, which are pockets of enormous prosperity (and) economic freedom. But within the mainland is a very different economy. It’s heavily controlled by the state. If you look at the growth rates of these two regions, you’ll see one hardly growing.”

And look at France. It ranks 64th, behind Mexico, Peru and Latvia! Yet France is a much wealthier country.

“France is doing their best to fall out of the index,” Beach explained. “That’s a country that says, ‘We’d rather not be economically free if we can be economically secure.’”

Which countries should we keep an eye on in the future? Beach says parts of Central and South America are awakening. “Brazil has pretty much broken through after years of doing the right thing and is on the verge of serious sustained economic growth.”

And Mexico is improving: “If Mexico could fix its drug war problem, we’d see the good things happening there.”

If we want to reverse America’s decline, we’d better get to work. There’s a lot of government to cut.

John Stossel is host of “Stossel” on the Fox Business Network. He’s the author of “Give Me a Break” and of “Myth, Lies, and Downright Stupidity.” To find out more about John Stossel, visit his site at <a href=”http://www.johnstossel.com” <http://www.johnstossel.com>>johnstossel.com</a>. To read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.

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