Tuesday, Mar 24, 2009
The ETHICAL/Diverse economy is not far away
Market Oracle: Diverse Economy Comes After Communism and Capitalism
In 1991 communism failed. In 2008 capitalism failed us. In the space of 17 years, two great economic systems based upon very elaborate and self-convinced ideologies collapsed. Two great peoples, American and Russian, are stunned and wandering in a vacuous period of human history, in a great pause between ages. A third system is coming; it is not greedy capitalism, and it is not socialism or statism either. The next system is a “diverse economy” of diverse measures and performance goals, diverse social organization, diverse ownership, diverse firms, and a diverse market.
Posted by sold 2 rent 1 @ 10:18 AM (995 views) Add Comment
27 Comments
- If you do not have an admin password leave the password field blank.
- If you would like to request a password allowing you to add comments and blog news articles without needing each one approved manually, send an e-mail to the webmaster.
- Your email address is required so we can verify that the comment is genuine. It will not be posted anywhere on the site, will be stored confidentially by us and never given out to any third party.
- Please note that any viewpoints published here as comments are user's views and not the views of HousePriceCrash.co.uk.
- Please adhere to the Guidelines
1. last_days_of_disco said...
Otherwise known as the 18th century.
2. sold 2 rent 1 said...
I am pretty sure that this economist has never heard of Carl Calleman or the Mayan Calendar. Yet his views are aligned with Calleman's model that says ETHICS will overcome POWER in 2010.
It is going to be a rough year in 2010. The peak destruction will come around 16 April 2010 and we finally get our freedom from the corrupt bankers/politicians/corporates after 22 September 2010
Stick these 2 dates in your diary.
3. Bear said...
This is not the fall of Capitalism. Ludwig Von Mises and Heyek, etc. explain that a Corporate/Statist Central bank, with monopoly on printing money, and manipulating interest rates, rigs the market, causing distorted price signals that create the boom and bust cycle.
This is the failure of central banks, not capitalism. Accumulation of non-inflationary money, e.g. gold, would not have the same affect, as accumulation of interest bearing, inflationary fiat money.
An economy based on other measures, is a statist one, driven by state metrics, sanctioned via policy instead of the free market.
The abstract metric based system is less stable than a central bank driven fiat system, because, whilst fiat money has distorted price signals, the metric system has none, so instability will be systemic.
In short, we will return to a diverse economy, but when free markets take over from statism and central bank manipulation.
4. Dissipated said...
We're all doomed. Doomed.
5. happy mondays said...
We shall have to lever out all the crooks and conmen from powerful posistions before we can have a diverse fair economy, which will not be easy, me thinks, however eastern europe seems to be starting to wake up to the big scam! lets see if the G20 summit brings a few disenchanted people together, not sure if they will be ethical though!
6. Paul said...
Utter nonsense! The halfwit thinks that we live in a capitalist world. Capitalism is not the accumulation of wealth as socialists would like us to believe but the rights of the individual over the state. Capitalism is about freedom over control. The aspect of accumulating wealth is that you need money to trade goods, services and knowledge. What we are seeing is the destruction of a controlling system, the collapse of socialism.
In a capitalist society you will the following:
No government including no public spending, no social system, no councils, no tax, no laws, no immigration policy, no international trade agreements and especially no money creating banks! All these restrict personal freedom. Does this sound like the world we live in? No.
7. icarus said...
happy mondays -"We shall have to lever out all the crooks and conmen from powerful positions". Absolutely correct, but who's going to do the levering? Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
8. flashman said...
There are any number of people who will step forward or if you prefer;
quot homines tot sententiac
9. Moomin said...
Santa Clause for president of the New World Order, he'll enforce our ethical laws and cut pollution by ressurecting dinosaurs which we can ride to work and everyone will have a mayan temple in their back garden which will produce hot dogs and nice fresh mustard with just a smidging of ketchup.
All hail the mayans, who whilst unable to invent the toothbrush did get around to predicting the end of the world
10. icarus said...
And the powerful have a great influence over those sententiae.
11. 51ck-6-51x said...
This article seems to say that capitalism has failed and will be replaced by erm, capitalism.
Bear & Paul are correct in my opinion.
This, if anything, is the fall of centrally controlled capitalism. The replacement should be laissez-faire capitalism, but it won't happen without a fight against the central-control. We will, unfortunately, see more regulation not less, at least for the foreseeable future (until it breaks for sure, at which point it will, no doubt, come down to the beliefs of those with physical power - and the gears of human history will turn another tooth).
12. george monsoon said...
While there is still at least one power hungry idealist with no morals, ethics or concience, things will never change.
These power mondgers will adapt their public image to fit social trends and general ideals, but all in all they will always be individuals, bent on control and power.
Since before humans had opposable thumbs, the meanest ape always ruled the roost.. Its not going to change any time soon.
13. flashman said...
51ck-6-51x: "This, if anything, is the fall of centrally controlled capitalism"
I'm not sure that anything has fallen or will fall in the foreseeable future. In the context of modern history, we are doing rather well. There are no major wars, people have plenty to eat and most people still have a job. I often wonder if we haven't become so spoiled that even the mildest economic disruption is treated like a catastrophe. In three years time I'm willing to bet that we'll be wondering what all the fuss was about.
14. sold 2 rent 1 said...
flashman,
"here are no major wars, people have plenty to eat and most people still have a job"
Come back in 12-18 months and all 3 of these things will be the opposite
15. sold 2 rent 1 said...
Armstrong notes the blur between capitalism and socialism in this article heading
http://www.contrahour.com/MartinArmstrongcollapseofcapitalism12708.pdf
16. Treadmill said...
How weird. Control capitalism is the form that held sway during the Fordist/Keynesian era. Neo-liberalism is a dusted down form of laissez-faire. It is precisely this deregulated free for all that has allowed the powerful and greedy financial interest free rein to rig the game in their favour against the majority, just as they did in the 19th and early 20th century - until they were controlled due to the last debacle they created in 1929. With respect to state control, eitther the state controls capitalism in the interests of its people or contols the people in the interests of capital. The latter is what happens under so-called laissez-faire, as the unfettered financial interest (ab)uses its market power to subvert the democratic process.Therefore, to suggest that the current era marks the end of socialism, controlled capitalism in a scenario that demands a '(re)turn' to laissez-faire' demonstrates a semantic, historical and economic illiteracy that is both staggering and deluded. In fact, it makes clear how succesful the distorted ideological has been in affecting the public imagination.
17. 51ck-6-51x said...
flashman -
Yes, I agree, hence the disclaimer "if anything" :)
The geographical polarisation of savers and debtors, however, may well lead us out of this relatively peaceful time.
18. flashman said...
51ck-6-51x: yes it was the "if anything" I keyed off. During the time of the French revolution, agitators were sent to England to forment a revolution. They returned to France dispirited because they couldn't get the English excited enough. It is this English 'unflappability' that I believe will see us through without major upset.
19. flashman said...
str1: I am sure that you were making similar predictions 2 years ago about today. At least you stick your neck out but I know from personal experience that predicting events is easier than predicting time frames
20. unplugged said...
We're all familiar with monopoly. The outcome is always the same. How would laissez-faire capitalism avoid this? Plus to suggest a new way of doing things is to suggest control to some degree. As our societies are currently, I cant see how we can avoid a degree of control without creating a 'state of nature'. Its all to centralised and monopolised.
In my view the greedy and power hungry should be restrained from interfereing and exerting influence, through accumilated resources and knowledge, over the lives of those who are happy just to appreciate life now rather than all this rather purposeless striving towards an unknown destination. This idea that money can serve as capital and itself make money... its a little absurd if a rational economy and society is the aim. The main effect of money and its application, seems to be to destort reality and enable the proliferation of ideas as absurd as 'ever contining growth' and 'high house prices are beneficial'. What really happens is the 'weak and fearful'.... rely on this distortion to arrange things in their favour and accumilate wealth from the efforts of others.
21. unplugged said...
I'm sure we can agree that most if not all people, to one degree or another suffer from, among other things a tendancy towards the distortion of reality. For example, focussed attention acts like a spotlight, excluding the wider picture and breaking the world up into intellectual boxes which are served by words and concepts, creating a tracendental world. We have a tendancy to forget that concepts like ownership, money, Britain etc are just convienient arrangments and collective agreements that serve a purpose to a point but restrict our development when we get stuck on them. Another example might be how we are often effectively enslaved, personally by our pride and ego when we take a position on an issue, hold certain beliefs or express our opinions - it shows all the time here IMO and I am no doubt susceptible myself. Culture effectively reinforces all this on a social level.
Though all this may (or may not) sound obvious to some, many (e.g. working classes) have never even pondered these things and are effectively living in a delusional world constructed by entertainment, media and poor education. Furthermore I beleive that in many cases these delusions are an intended outcome of policy, leaving the individual and society less empowered and more susceptible to manipulation through 'occult' practice (propaganda, bread and circuses, devide and rule etc).
All this is an issue of conscious awareness.
22. 51ck-6-51x said...
unplugged - good posts.
My opinions:
Monopolies are generally bad (and sometimes seem almost unavoidable, e.g. trains & water supply. Yes, monopolies are currently regulated against (to varying degrees, see Coca Cola in China of late), and yes, in a laissez-faire capitalist system they could indeed evolve to be dominant, however since the market is free there is nothing to stop the monopoly position being broken by the collective action of the demand side. In theory there could even be private organisations dedicated to working directly against any monopoly and they may gain support from many, there is no limit to what services one may purchase, and no reason that no one would do anything other than what is in one's own self interests.
Regarding living in a delusional world which has been created by policy - I think this is an argument against central control and for liberalisation. The more autonomous we become the more everyone has to face up to the reality that we live in a world that is driven by the forces of nature, and the quicker we collectively gain the heavenly awareness of which you speak.
23. 51ck-6-51x said...
oops re-read my post...
"and no reason that no one would do anything other than what is in one's own self interests."
should be
"and no reason that anyone would do only what is in their own self interests."
24. Bear said...
"We're all familiar with monopoly. The outcome is always the same. How would laissez-faire capitalism avoid this?"
- Corporate monopolies are funded by fractional reserve banking, primarily. When you have a monopoly of money printing in a couple of financial institutions and the central bank, money tends to funnel towards corporate monopolies. This is rational, because why would an institution want to lend to millions of customers, why not just target Tesco's, which will be predictable and manageable.
- When you have sound money, with lending based on 100% reserve saving accounts, in a diverse range of savings and loans banks, with local bank managers of local banks, you will get local bank managers who lend to local businesses, because it is rational for them to lend to businesses they know and have contact with.
25. unplugged said...
Thanks 51ck-6-51x.
Agree with your first point. In theory, and as is often said, the people have the power potentially to create positive changes by choosing which companies products to purchase and perhaps through political participation. Unfortunately we are susceptable to that most insideous of thoughts 'what difference will I alone make, I'll just put myself at a disadvantage or waste my time' - I'm sure we've heard it a thousand times and fallen for it ourselves. That being the case along with other issues, restraints are justifiable.
On your second point, to clarify, I'm saying that its seems that delusion is a general human tendancy, exploited and exacerbated (and often well understood) by some including policy makers but also media and marketing men. Although equally they might well suffer their own. No one thinks they are deluded. We exploit it ourselves when we brush the dust under the carpet craeating false impressions.
The empiracle world is indeed driven by apparently blind forces to which we are subject but the extrapolation of this idea to justify policy is a mistake IMO. Plenty about Darwin on TV lately. Dawkins likes this stuff too. Humanity, in general has struggled and continues to struggle with this. It raises those big, scary questions... which happen to be personal favourites. It implies that we are all flukes with no purpose and effectively amounts to nihilism. In which case good happenings, bad happenings... they are all of no true value. We are suffering the ultimate delusion. Even your thoughts are automated - the expression of a fluke that occurred 16 billion years ago. If that is indeed the case, then whats all the trouble about? We die and thats it, there's no one to care. We might as well have fun - equally we might as well push that button.
I'm open to it, but for whatever reason I don't tend towards this view. Why would I? Its of no value whatsoever, literally! LOL. Making a case for the fluke theory is, in a way the highest degree of contradiction. I personally suspect that there is more to it than that and I think there is knowledge beyond contemporay science. I suspect this knowledge is purposely kept hidden - possibly, though not neccessarily for malevololent reasons. Ultimately you cannot concieve what is beyond experience, or confirm experience that cant be shared, so knowledge of 'God' would be like trying to imagine - or explain - a new colour. Maybe thats the point? Laying everthing out for you would effectively rot your brain. Still this view raises the question of whether your actions will have implications beyond this life? Is it a test? Developmental process? A game? Or like a far out movie or act? Has something gone wrong in our case? Should you care for your soul? If you act with care for your soul then are you not only serving you own selfish interests?... is it OK to support Man U just because they win?... do you therefore think 'God' is a mug? Anyway the most significant philosophical question is, I think: 'is it serious?'
In this day and age the above gets little consideration in the mainstream. Our culture is firmly grounded in the material world, albeit abstractly (LOL).
I'm facinated by our predicament and think that its extremely healthy, though sometimes uncomfortable for individuals to consider and discuss these things. So far, the best I can make out is that freedom of thought is the only real truth. Maybe its not for everyone... but that is to accept that you need 'parenting' a the establishment seems far to keen to parent us as it is.
26. unplugged said...
Glad to get that off my chest!
27. shipbuilder said...
There is no capitalism just as there was no communism, just two labels conveniently applied to different levels of elite control. Control of the economy by large corporations is no different from control of the economy by states, just that for some reason some prefer one over the other - I prefer neither. I think many get stuck defending 'socialism' or 'capitalism' when in reality we have neither - the fact that both sides can suggest the death of the other tells us as much.
Socialism is not state control and neither is capitalism 'evil'. It's possible to have a mixture of both that benefits us all, but at the moment we have the mix that benefits some more than others, whilst keeping the others happy or controlled.
The argument that people seem to think they are making is one of individualism (free market) vs collectivism (communism), but again, neither are the natural state of human beings that they claim to be and base their systems on and hence neither will work exclusively. We are individuals AND part of a community and to ignore one or the other is nonsense. The most important thing we can work towards is a democratic system that effectively excludes power-hungry psychopaths and an efficient economic system that gives genuine equal opportunity and rewards the talents that benefit us all.