- Venezuela Is An Opportunity For Russia And China To Change The World
Authored by Paul Craig Roberts,
Nothing better illustrates Washington’s opposition to democracy and self-determination than the blatantly public coup Washington has organized against the properly elected president of Venezuela.
Washington has been trying to overthrow the Venezuelan government for years. Washington wants the state owned oil company to be privatized so that it can fall into the hands of US oil companies. That would ensure Washington’s control over Venezuela. Transferring the wealth out of the country would prevent any economic development from inside the country. Every aspect of the economy would end up in the hands of US corporations. The exploitation would be ruthless and brutal.
Venezuelans understand this, which is why Washington, despite wrecking the Venezuelan economy and offering enormous bribes to the Venezuelan military, has not yet been able to turn the people and the troops against Maduro.
Moon of Alabama’s explanation of Washington’s attack on Venezuela gives you a truer picture that differs completely from the lies voiced by the American and European politicians and presstitute media, a collection of whores who are devoid of all integrity and all morality and lie for their living.
I am not as confident as Moon of Alabama that Venezuela’s effort dating back to Chavez to be a sovereign country independent of Washington’s control can survive. Washington is determined to teach all of Latin America that it is pointless to dream of self-determination. Washington simply will not permit it.
Maduro, despite being the duly elected president with the mass of the people and military behind him, apparently lacks the power to arrest the American puppet who, despite the absence of any law or election as a basis, has declared himself to be president, thus creating a Washington-backed “government” as an alternative to the elected one. The inability of Maduro to defend democracy from within is a sign of the weakness of his office. How can Maduro possibly be a dictator when he is helpless in the face of open sedition?
If Russia and China quickly established a military presence in Venezuela to protect their loans and oil investments, Venezuela could be saved, and other countries that would like to be independent would take heart that, although there is no support for self-determination anywhere in the Western World, the former authoritarian countries will support it. Other assertions of independence would arise, and the Empire would collapse.
Venezuela is an opportunity for Russia and China to assume the leadership of the world, but I doubt the Russian and Chinese governments have the vision to seize the opportunity and, thereby, fundamentally change the world.
Putin is wasting his breath when he correctly criticizes Washington for its violations of international law. In Washington’s view, law is what serves American interest.
Here is Moon of Alabama’s analysis:
The opposition in Venezuela will probably use access to that ‘frozen’ money to buy weapons and to create an army of mercenaries to fight a ‘civil’ war against the government and its followers. Like in Syria U.S. special forces or some CIA ‘contractors’ will be eager to help. The supply line for such a war would most likely run through Colombia. If, like 2011 in Syria, a war on the ground is planned it will likely begin in the cities near that border.
The U.S. is using the pretext of ‘delivering humanitarian aid’ from Columbia to Venezuela to undermine the government and to establish a supply line for further operations. It is another attempt to pull the military onto the coup plotter’s side…
- Another Big Reason Not To Buy A Chinese Smartphone
Given the constant stream of anti-China propaganda (true or not), security and privacy concerns are likely top of mind for many when considering whether a Chinese smartphone will be their next purchase. However, there is, perhaps, an even more important – health-related – reason to think twice…
For most people nowadays, their smartphone is within arm’s reach 24 hours a day. It’s in their pocket while they’re at work, it’s in their hand on the train ride home and it’s on their bedside table as they go to sleep. And, as Statista’s Martin Armstrong notes, with this level of proximity and usage, many can’t quite shake the niggling feeling that they might be risking damage to themselves in the long run.
While conclusive longitudinal research on the effects of cell phone radiation is still hard to come by, for those looking to hedge their bets, this infographic shows the phones that emit the most radiation when held to the ear while calling.
The German Federal Office for Radiation Protection (Bundesamt für Strahlenschutz) has a comprehensive database of smartphones – new and old – and the level of radiation they emit.
The current smartphone creating the highest level of radiation is the Mi A1 from Chinese vendor Xiaomi. Another Chinese phone is in second place – the OnePlus 5T. In fact, the two companies are represented heavily in this list, with 8 of the top 16 handsets being made by one of them. Premium Apple phones such as the iPhone 7 and the recently released iPhone 8 are also here to be seen, though, as are the latest Pixel handsets from Google.
While there is no universal guideline for a ‘safe’ level of phone radiation, the German certification for environmental friendliness ‘Der Blaue Engel’ (Blue Angel) only certifies phones which have a specific absorption rate of less than 0.60 watts per kilogram. All of the phones featured here come in at more than double this benchmark.
To take a look at the other end of the scale, we also have a list of the phones emitting the least radiation…
You will find more infographics at Statista
“probably nothing”, right?
- How To Legalize Cannabis Throughout America
Authored by Senator Mike Gravel via ConsortiumNews.com,
The process that ended Prohibition provides a template…
In the interest of full disclosure, I have been on the board of Cannabis Sativa, Inc., for five years, including four years as CEO. I presently serve as CEO of THC Pharmaceuticals, Inc. My earlier professional life included being speaker of the Alaska House of Representatives and two terms representing Alaska in the U.S. Senate. These combined experiences equip me to address some of the problems caused by the U.S. anti-drug campaign.
One of the great domestic political tragedies since the last century is the war on drugs initiated by President Richard Nixon, part of which placed cannabis (marijuana) on the list of Schedule 1 drugs under the Controlled Substances Act of 1970.
U.S. Coast Guard crews in 2015 offload narcotics seized in eastern Pacific with street value of $22 million. (Chief Petty Officer Luke Pinneo)
Nixon, seeking to shore up his position opposing cannabis, appointed Raymond Shafer, the recently retired governor of Pennsylvania, to head a commission to study the negative effects of marijuana on the American populace. Nixon was incensed when the Shafer Commission’s 1972 report showed no negative effects from the use of marijuana on society and called for it to be decriminalized.
The report was promptly shelved; and Nixon, supported by his religious backers, executed his plan of drug prohibition, interdiction and punishment without the slightest medical or legal rationale, to punish young Americans protesting his continuation of the Vietnam War.
A Failed ‘War’
The war on drugs has not ended drug use or trafficking. Instead it has ravaged the lives of untold Americans and bloated our prison system. It has fostered massive illegality over the decades.
But in 1996 the citizens of California passed Proposition 215 authorizing the use of cannabis for medical purposes, finally breaching the barriers of ignorance and prejudice about cannabis.
Other states followed California’s lead, some via a grassroots initiative process and others by the vote of courageous legislatures. This state-by-state development of the cannabis industry has created inconsistencies that are further complicated by the illegality that the federal government casts over the industry. This is most obvious where the cannabis industry is denied the banking services vital to any economic enterprise for fear of federal prosecution.
On a recent visit to Sacramento to express my support for public banking, which would offer a solution, I met with Fiona Ma, California’s newly elected state treasurer. She invited me to discuss various concepts using public banking and the state’s private banking system. She asked me to critique a recent study addressing cannabis banking and public banking.
My experience with the cannabis industry and my knowledge of the Constitution led me to set aside the industry’s banking problems at this time and focus on the fundamental problem — the federal government’s war on drugs. The plan I propose to finally end it is based upon a strong precedent.
The federal government’s prohibitions of alcohol and of cannabis have both been abject failures, severely damaging American society. The prohibition of alcohol lasted 13 years, while the prohibition of cannabis has endured a little more than six decades.
The process that ended alcohol prohibition is the template for the way we can now end the prohibition of cannabis — with a constitutional amendment. Since prohibition of alcohol was put in place by the 18th Amendment, it required an amendment to repeal it. This had never been done before — repealing one amendment with another amendment.
Section of Article V
There was another first. The nation was in a hurry to repeal prohibition, so to ratify their repeal of the 18th Amendment it chose a never-before used section of Article V:
The Congress, whenever two thirds of both Houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose Amendments to this Constitution, or, on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several states, shall call a Convention for proposing Amendments, which, in either Case, shall be valid to all Intents and Purposes, as part of this Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures of three fourths of the several states, or by Conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other Mode of Ratification may be proposed by the Congress.
The section “… by Conventions in three fourths thereof …” of Article V, above, was used for the first time to repeal the 18thAmendment, which was enacted on Jan. 16, 1919, by a two-thirds majority of both Houses of Congress and “… the Legislatures of three fourths of the several states.”
(Library of Congress)
The Amendment to prohibit the sale of alcohol went into effect on Jan. 17, 1920. During the 1920s Americans increasingly came to see Prohibition as unenforceable.
In 1932 Franklin Roosevelt, as a presidential candidate, called for the repeal of Prohibition. On Feb. 20, 1933, two-thirds of both Houses of Congress voted to repeal the 18th Amendment, including the repeal of certain elements of the Volstead Act, which enabled federal enforcement. However, rather than submit the resolution to three-fourths of the state legislatures, it was submitted to ratifying conventions in three-fourths of the states, a process noted in Article V: “… by Conventions in three fourths thereof …”
This process had never been used before or since and substantially shortened the time for ratification to a little more than eight months when ratified by the requisite number of state conventions on Dec. 5, 1933.
In 1932 the country had 48 states. Therefore, after two-thirds of the Congress voted for the resolution, it took three-fourths, or 35 state conventions, to ratify the 21stAmendment.
Medical marijuana Acapulco gold. (Wikimedia)
With today’s 50 states, it would require 38 states –– three-fourths –– to ratify the two-thirds resolution enacted by the Congress to repeal the designation of cannabis as a Schedule 1 drug.
Since 33 states have legalized some form of cannabis and additional states are looking at legalization, it is highly likely that five more states would join an effort to remove cannabis from Schedule 1 of the Controlled Substances Act of 1970.
I believe an amendment to repeal the war on drugs could easily secure the two-thirds vote in the House. However, if blocked by the majority leader in the Senate or if Vice President Mike Pence refused to sign the resolution, another section of Article V could be used: “… on theApplication of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several states …”
A national campaign initiated by the political leadership of California and the cannabis industry would already be securing agreements of three-fourths (38 states) to ratify the resolution. A simultaneous effort could approach the same 33 states (two-thirds) to approve the resolution.
California legislators and its officials, having led the nation in 1996 with Proposition 215, can now lead the nation in securing the ratification of an amendment to remove cannabis from Schedule 1. I am convinced that the ratification of an Amendment can be secured within a year.
- More Than Half Of Homes In These Zip Codes Are "Seriously Underwater"
Roughly 12 years after the US housing market meltdown entered its most acute phase in 2007, a shocking number of American homes are still “seriously underwater”, according to the latest US real-estate market report from ATTOM.
And with the housing market embroiled in its worst slump since the recovery began, many of those who have continued paying their mortgages month after month, even though they owe more than the value of their homes, likely won’t find any respite from this situation – at least not any time soon.
Per ATTOM‘s data, the states with the highest share of mortgages that were seriously underwater included Louisiana (20.8%), Mississippi (16.9%), Arkansas (15.9%), Illinois (15.6%) and Iowa (15.2%). And among all of the 7,590 zip codes with at least 2,500 properties examined in the report by ATTOM, there were a total of 27 where more than half of all properties with a mortgage remained seriously underwater, including zip codes in Chicago, Cleveland, Saint Louis, Atlantic City, Virginia Beach and Detroit.
(Map courtesy of Bloomberg)
Of these, the zip codes with the highest share of seriously underwater homes were: 08611 in Trenton, New Jersey (70.3%); 63137 in Saint Louis, Missouri (64.8%); 60426 in Harvey, Illinois (62.3%); 38106 in Memphis, Tennessee (60.5%); and 61104 in Rockford, Illinois (59.6%).
Meanwhile, sates with the highest share of equity rich properties – where the combined estimated amount of loans secured by the property was 50% or less of the property’s estimated market value – included California (43.6%); Hawaii (39.3%); New York (34.2%); Washington (34.2%); and Oregon (32.9%).
- Facebook: The Government’s Propaganda Arm?
Authored by Jeff Charles via Liberty Nation,
The social media giant has a disturbing number of former Obama officials in key positions of authority over content…
Imagine for a moment what it would look like if the federal government launched its own social media network. Every day, Americans could freely use the platform to express their views on everything from economic theory to the best tips for baking peanut butter cookies. They could even discuss their political views and debate the important issues of the day.
But what if the government were empowered to determine which political views are appropriate and which are too obscene for the American public? Well, it looks like this is already happening. Of course, the state has not created a social media network; they didn’t have to. It appears the government is using Facebook – the world’s largest social media company – to sway public opinion.
The Government’s Fingers In Facebook
The Free Thought Project recently published a report revealing that Facebook has some troubling ties to the federal government and that this connection could be enabling former state officials to influence the content displayed. The social media provider has partnered with various think tanks which receive state funding, while hiring an alarming number of individuals who have held prominent positions in the federal government.
Facebook recently announced their partnership with the Atlantic Council – which is partly funded by tax dollars – to ensure that users are presented with quality news stories. And by “quality,” it seems that they mean “progressive.” The council is well known for promoting far-left news sources, including the Xinhua News Agency, which was founded by the Communist Party of China. Well, that’s reassuring. What red-blooded American capitalist doesn’t want to get the news from a communist regime?
But there one aspect of this story is even more troubling: the government-to-Facebook pipeline. The company has employed a significant number of former officials in positions that grant them influence over what content is allowed on the platform.
Nathaniel Gleicher, Facebook’s Head of Cybersecurity Policy, prosecuted cybercrimes at the Department of Justice under President Obama. Now, he is responsible for determining who gets banned or suspended from the network. But that’s not the worst of it. He also spearheaded the company’s initiative to scrub anti-war content and “protest” movements. In a blog post, Gleicher wrote: “Some of the Pages frequently posted about topics like anti-NATO sentiment, protest movements, and anti-corruption.” He continued, “We are constantly working to detect and stop this type of activity because we don’t want our services to be used to manipulate people.”
The company has also hired others who served in key positions in the Obama administration. Some of these include:
-
Aneesh Raman: Former speechwriter
-
Joel Benenson: Top adviser
-
Meredith Carden: Office of the First Lady
To make things more interesting, Facebook has also hired neocons to help them determine the type of content that is being published. So if you happen to be a conservative that isn’t too crazy about interventionism, your views are not as welcome on the network as others. After all, how many times have you heard of people being banned for posting pro-war or socialist propaganda?
Are Private Companies Truly Private?
The notion that government officials could be using positions of power in the private industry to advance a statist agenda is disturbing, but the fact that most Americans are unaware of this is far worse. It would be inaccurate to argue that the government is controlling Facebook’s content, but the level of the state’s involvement in the world’s biggest social media company is a disturbing development.
This is not the only case of state officials becoming involved with certain industries. This trend is rampant in the certain industries in which individuals move back and forth between private organizations and the FDA. For example, Monsanto, an agricultural and agrochemical company, has been under scrutiny for its ties to the federal government.
It is not clear if there is anything that can be done to counteract inappropriate relations between the government and certain companies – especially organizations with the level of influence enjoyed by the likes of Facebook. But it essential that the public is made aware of these relations, otherwise the state will continue to exert influence over society – with Americans none the wiser.
-
- Florida Man Charged In $100 Million Fraud, Triggered Largest Ever Bank Collapse In Puerto Rico
A pharmaceutical executive whose lavish Miami lifestyle included fancy automobiles, private jets, yachts, and luxury homes, was found guilty of federal fraud charges in connection with a $100 million scheme more than a decade ago that triggered the 2010 collapse of Westernbank, one of Puerto Rico’s most prominent banks at the time, reported the US Department of Justice Office of Public Affairs.
Jack Kachkar, 55, was convicted earlier this month of eight counts of wire fraud affecting a significant financial institution following a 21-day trial before U.S. District Judge Donald L. Graham in Miami. Kachkar is expected to serve decades behind bars; the sentencing will be held on April 30.
“Jack Kachkar’s fraud caused substantial harm to the 1,500 employees of Westernbank and the people of Puerto Rico,” said U.S. Attorney Fajardo Orshan. “The U.S. Attorney’s Office remains committed to the prosecution of those individuals and corporations that use Miami and other South Florida communities as their base to operate multinational fraud schemes.”
“Today’s verdict holds the defendant accountable for orchestrating fraudulent schemes that resulted in more than $100 million in losses to insured institutions and the FDIC as receiver,” said Inspector General Lerner. “The FDIC Office of Inspector General remains committed to investigate cases of deception and swindles that undermine the integrity of financial institutions, and we will continue to work with our law enforcement partners to bring to justice those who commit such offenses.”
“IRS Criminal Investigation will always pursue investigations like this where Mr. Kachkar, for his own personal benefit, orchestrated such a large scheme at the expense of one of Puerto Rico’s largest banks and its 1,500 employees,” said IRS-CI Special Agent in Charge Palma. “This investigation shows that the appearance of success can be a mask for a tangled financial web of lies, and we are proud to be part of the prosecution team that is bringing Mr. Kachkar to justice.”
“HSI San Juan will continue working with our local, state and federal partners to investigate and prosecute these types of cases as well as those involving violations to the more than 400 federal statutes that we investigate, “ said HSI Special Agent in Charge Arvelo. “This man was responsible for one of the largest fraud schemes ever recorded in the banking business in Puerto Rico and he will pay the consequences.”
“This defendant’s greed was powerful enough to destroy a bank, taking with it the jobs of approximately 1,500 hard working citizens of Puerto Rico,” said FBI Special Agent in Charge Leff. “The FBI thanks the US Attorney’s Office for sending an equally strong message that most fraud schemes will eventually lead to a prison cell.”
According to the trial evidence, from 2005 to 2007, Kachkar was the CEO of-of Inyx Inc., a publicly traded specialty pharmaceutical products and technologies company. The fraud began in early 2005, Kachkar entered into a series of loan agreements with Westernbank in exchange for collateral in assets of Inyx and its subsidiaries. Under the loan agreements, the bank advanced money based on Inyx’s customer invoices from “actual and bona fide” sales to Inyx customer.
However, the evidence showed that Kachkar organized a scheme to defraud Westernbank by creating dozens of fake customer invoices worth tens of millions of dollars.
During the course of the scheme, Kachkar falsified and deceived Westernbank loan officers about imminent repayments from its international lenders to continue the scheme of pumping more credit into Inyx.
Kachkar distorted additional collateral to Westernbank executives, including numerous mines in Mexico and Canada worth hundreds of millions of dollars. The evidence showed that the additional collateral was worth a fraction of that presented by Kachkar.
Westernbank lent about $142 million, primarily based on false and fraudulent customer invoices to Kachkar over the two years. The evidence showed he diverted tens of millions of dollars for his benefit, including “a private jet, luxury homes in Key Biscayne and Brickell, Miami, luxury cars, luxury hotel stays, and extravagant jewelry and clothing expenditures,” said the DOJ.
At the end of the scheme, in the summer of 2007, Westernbank declared a default on the Inyx loans, ultimately suffered losses of more than $100 million. Shortly after, the losses triggered a series of catastrophic events leading to Westernbank’s collapse.
- Apocalyptic Sounds In The Sky: No Explanation For "Mysterious Booms And Flashes Of Light" All Across America
Authored by Michael Snyder via The End of The American Dream blog,
For weeks, Americans all over the country have been rattled by extremely loud booming sounds that seem to have no explanation, and they are often accompanied by “mysterious flashes of light”.
These strange booms are shaking homes and rattling windows, and some witnesses say that they sound like cannons being fired. And even though the “mystery booms” and accompanying flashes of light have been captured on camera all across the nation, so far the authorities do not have a reasonable explanation for why they are happening. Unfortunately, it does not appear that this strange phenomenon is going to go away any time soon. In fact, the Sun is reporting that the frequency of these “mystery booms” appears “to have gathered pace over the past week”…
MYSTERY booming sounds have been shaking houses and terrifying residents after “flashes of light” were spotted across America.
Experts have been left baffled by a spate of seismic booms from Arizona to New York that appear to have gathered pace over the past week.
Over this last weekend, this mystery started to get much more national attention after an incident in Rhode Island on Saturday was followed by one in New York City on Sunday…
On Saturday, loud bangs were reported in Rhode Island, where Jeremy Braza’s doorbell captured a video and audio of a loud noise over a three minute period.
“The whole house shook,” he told TurnTo10.com. “It woke my wife up, woke up all my children.”
The following night an explosion was heard in New York, accompanied by a mysterious flash in the sky.
“What the heck was that boom or explosion in park slope Brooklyn?”, asked Matt Wasowski on Twitter.
But of course this is not just an east coast phenomenon. For example, a “loud boom” that was reported in Tennessee on January 31st was heard across three separate counties…
It began on January 31 when residents of three separate counties in Tennessee reported hearing a loud boom around 11:30 a.m. Local chemical plants were contacted but reported nothing anomalous. Authorities in Bradley, McInn, and Polk counties are still investigating what could have caused such a powerful noise.
And during that same time frame, numerous North Carolina residents called authorities to report “unexplained loud blasts and booms”…
That same day, local news in North Carolina reported that people in Wake and Franklin counties have been calling law enforcement agencies to report unexplained loud blasts and booms that keep them awake at night. Two homeowners even reported that the booms are so powerful that they have briefly lost power as a result of the tremors. So far, the Wake County Sheriff’s Office has been unable to pinpoint the source of the booms.
A few days later, “strange explosion-like sounds” were being reported by numerous residents in New Orleans…
The mystery surrounding the strange explosion-like sounds heard by residents in the metro area continues to grow. Late Monday night, several were heard in Lakeview, one of which was caught on camera by Eyewitness News.
A story that began in Mid-City, has taken crews to Harahan, River Ridge and Wagaman. Now we go to Lakeview, where late Monday night, the mysterious ‘booms’ were heard again.
Are you starting to see a pattern?
Large booming sounds are being reported all over the nation, and often those large booming sounds are being accompanied by massive flashes of light. But in every case, the authorities have absolutely no idea what is causing this to happen.
And in case you were wondering if this was just happening in the eastern half of the country, here is a little taste of what has been going on in Tucson, Arizona…
Faye DeHoff wrote, “first it was a major rattle…like a huge truck about to plow into my home…then the boom..that shook my windows…I was sure some of them were broken but they didn’t…my dog jumped up! I’m at River & Campbell.”
Ray C. Merrill wrote, “Oracle and Roger, it was shaking pretty good, and long enough for me to watch the blinds dance around, then get up and walk to the doorway, and it was still shaking.”
There was a similar sensation last week on Thursday, Jan 31 at 8:51 a.m. The same phenomenon; a rumble causing homes to shake and windows to rattle. I felt this one too on the northwest side and once again, so did so many others on Facebook all across Tucson and surrounding areas.
Some news reports are referring to these strange sounds as “seismic booms”, but there are no corresponding seismic events to back up that claim.
At this point we have a complete and total mystery on our hands. On YouTube, Jason A has done a great job of compiling news reports about these “mystery booms” from all over America, and you can watch his video right here.
We have entered a period of time when we should expect the unexpected. Things are strange and they are going to get a whole lot stranger. We aren’t always going to be able to explain what is happening, but without a doubt our planet is becoming increasingly unstable, and that growing instability is going to cause great chaos in the months and years ahead.
I wish that I knew what was causing all of these “mystery booms”, but I don’t. Thankfully they don’t appear to be causing any serious damage, and hopefully that won’t change.
Let’s just hope that all of this “shaking” is not leading up to something much bigger, because it isn’t going to take much to push America into a state of utter chaos right now.
- Chicago Mayor Proposes Paying 1,000 Residents $1,000 A Month "With No Strings Attached"
When it comes to US cities in dire financial straits, one stands out: the one that has the nation’s leading murder rate, dreary lake-effect weather, endemic corruption and financial mismanagement. It is also the city that experienced the highest daily population exodus in the US (following by and New York and Los Angeles), losing 156 residents a day (strictly due to migration, not murder in case there is confusion) a day in 2017. We are talking of course, about Chicago.
Chicago is also the city that has the country’s bleakest retirement future, as each Chicagoan would have to pony up $140,000 to make the city’s pension system solvent.
If that wasn’t enough, Chicago is resorting to outright ponzi schemes to fund itself, proposing the issuance of $10 billion in debt to “fund” the $28 billion shortfall in the pension fund that goes toward the police, firefighters and other municipal employees.
So within this fortress of fiscal rectitude, what is Chicago’s next plan? Why to literally hand out money.
According to ABC 7 Chicago, select Chicago families could start collecting a $1,000 check every month with no strings attached, according to a new proposal from a task force created by Mayor Emanuel.
The purpose of the pilot program proposed by the “Chicago Resilient Families Task Force“, which is the latest incarnation of the “basic income”/helicopter money utopia that has gripped America’s left in recent months, despite glaring examples on the global arena that basic income simply does not work to boost overall living standards, is a noble one – to break the cycle of poverty by giving 1,000 struggling Chicagoans $1,000 a month. Supporters of the program say people could use the extra cash to cover unexpected emergencies, increase their savings and improve their health.
According to the 50-page proposal, “guaranteed income can have powerful effects: significant reductions in poverty; ability to cover an unexpected emergency; improved school attendance; an increase in savings; and improvements to health and well-being. These are goals every Chicagoan can get behind.”
To justify the plan, the pilot program included a scatterplot chart showing historical basic income programs in the world, and how they compare to the Chicago proposal, which among others includes that of Iran and Finland.
Which brings us to the key question: where will money come from. In a nutshell, the proposal sees funds coming from a mix of city funds and philanthropic charity, although as even the pilot program points out, there is a “critical next step”:
Financial considerations rank as one of the most crucial facets of conducting a policy pilot. It is clear that funding must be secured and insulated from being diverted elsewhere before the pilot has started. Subjects must be informed well in advance as to the minimum time line for their disbursement. Funding for policy pilots generally comes from two main sources: philanthropic organizations or from a government budget. Other sources may include grant or “in-house” funding (whereby the research organization may itself finance the pilot). Policy pilots and other such experimental endeavors tend to be funded via philanthropic, grant, and in-house sources. Of course, policy pilots tend to look to several sources of funding to meet budgetary requirements.
And the punchline: “Determining who will take ownership of the pilot and lead fundraising is a critical next step.” This is an issue because as we discussed just a few hours earlier, a recent basic income program in Finland ended up being a bust from an economic standpoint as no new jobs were created, even if it was – predictably – a smashing hedonic success as participants were quite happier, as one would expect when getting money for free.
Alas, when it comes to the socioeconomic consequences, it appears that basic income, whether wrapped in an MMT, Helicopter Money, or simply charity wrapper, is a failure:
“The recipients of a basic income were no better or worse than the control group at finding employment in the open labour market”, Ohto Kanninen, research coordinator at the Labour Institute for Economic Research, said in a statement.
Give people free money for doing nothing, with no conditions, and they will be happier to sit around all day in non-productive utopia.
And some even bad news for Chicago, which was quick to point out the Finnish basic income trial as a case study: Finland’s social affairs minister, Pirkko Mattila, conceded on Friday that the government has no plans to roll out the scheme across the whole country.
As a reminder, in 2017, Swiss voters rejected a proposed universal income in a referendum after critics slammed the idea as rewarding the lazy and the feckless (and Finland just abandoned their Universal Basic Income experiment). However, in Chicago, a city so broke it needs to issue new debt just to pay interest on its existing debt, and where it is difficult to see how any economic initiative could possibly make the situation any worse, it just might work. After all, Chicago truly has nothing left to lose.
- Why MMT (Ultimately) Doesn't Matter
Authored by Peter Earle via The American Institute for Economic Research,
Last year, internet searches for Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) numbered approximately 100 per month; in the years and decades before that, the weekly total searches numbered mostly in single digits. Yet in the first few weeks of this year, searches have topped 100 per day and seem to be on an uptrend. People who’ve never heard the term “chartalism” are speaking — and acting — as if a new and groundbreaking discovery has been made; “a new kind of science” in the realm of economics, situated neatly upon the doorsill of a new decade. It’s perplexing to see a theory which holds that governments can’t really go broke because they can always create more currency capture imaginations, if still largely on the periphery of discourse.
For years, Austrian School perspectives have been taken to task for failing to “predict” (which, in fact, they have and continue to). Yet MMT not only doesn’t predict anything; it fails to explain the state of nature better than existing, prevailing models. Social science, like its physical counterpart, advances by virtue of two key determinants: phenomenological explanations which are demonstrably superior to existing ones, and funerals. Even neoclassical economists, regularly critical of Austrian, monetarist and other views, hold that — as has been demonstrated in every era, within every culture, and upon every continent — bad monetary and/or fiscal policies ultimately result in economic breakdown and destitution.
Whether the rapid decline and ultimate disappearance of the individual propensity to hold a fiat currency are purely monetary, entirely psychological, or a combination of the two, the circumstances leading to it reappears consistently throughout history. Every one of the scores of known cases of hyperinflation dating back over 700 years bears witness to a reckless, breakneck campaign of money creation preceding it.
Blaming psychology for hyperinflationary episodes also, and far more ominously, hints at the same conclusion which virtually all collectivist governments come to after their starry-eyed schemes initially fail: that human nature, not the hubris that attends attempts to overthrow the fundamentals of supply and demand, is at fault. And thus that human beings, and not policy, needforceful readjustment.
Holding that inflation — of either the ‘vanilla’ or hyper- varieties — is overwhelmingly the product of wars or exogenous events is also wholly misleading. It is always and only the political reaction to exogenous events which determines economic outcomes.
Such an approach also bypasses the issue of the garden variety of inflationary outbreak. To be sure, while it would surely not be as ruinous nor as fast-acting as classic hyperinflation, a rise in inflation to a “mere” 8%, 15%, or 20% per annum would have a sizably adverse impact upon individuals living on fixed incomes, financial markets, and general economic calculation: the functioning of firms, markets for goods and services, and the financial choices of families, communities, and organizations.
Furthermore, MMT is invariably (and almost exclusively) invoked proximate to incomprehensibly expensive government program proposals: a so-called Jobs Guarantee (estimated cost approaching, and likely exceeding, $1T per year), “Medicare for All” (estimated cost: $32T over ten years), and a “Green New Deal” (estimated costs ranging from $7T to $13T to $49T to implement).
(Also: considering that MMT contemplates a “closed loop” whereby money is created and later taxed away, it is likely that any practical implementation will necessarily subsume cashlesseconomy diktats.)
Add to all of this the bunker mentality of many MMT proponents, who frequently refuse to discuss the assumptions upon which MMT operates by dismissing those who question them as disingenuous – and there is more than enough reason to suspect that MMT is not new, far from scientific, and explains nothing. It is at best a scientistic vehicle that exists only to provide an academic imprimatur for unlimited government spending.
Yet I’m not worried about MMT.
Actually, I am – a little. History demonstrates that betting against the willingness of people – Americans, specifically, who have the greatest record of fawning over political and economic views which defenestrate the very basis of the prosperity which gives both the leisure time and technological reach to permit intellectual flights of fancy – to embrace that which flies in the face of demonstrable evidence, is a sucker’s bet.
One of the major dangers of powerful states – indeed, states in general – is that with a single vote or the stroke of a pen a lot of damage can be done. But any pain will only be temporary.
It comes down to one word: Bitcoin. Actually, I should be more specific: crypto.
At this very moment, there are hundreds of independent teams of developers in dorm rooms, garages, basements, apartments, rented offices, and other such locations working on both subtle tweaks to existing cryptocurrency issues and wholly new coins and assets: thousands, maybe tens of thousands of individuals, all over the world, silently but inexorably expanding the bounds within which individuals can extricate and divorce their personal lives from the inimical policy implementations of expanding states.
At ten years old, the list of places where Bitcoin — and crypto more generally — has been the single bulwark between people and utter ruin grows annually. As long ago as 2013, Bitcoin (then less than $100) surged as individuals banked in Cyprus used it to escape the bank levy — a ploy in which politicians explicitly sought to seize private deposits in order to paper over their policy errors and banks’ losses owing to them.
All across Africa, South America, and Asia — and regardless of Bitcoin’s exchange rate at the time — the unbanked have, owing to the ubiquity of mobile and cell phone ownership, been able to engage in saving, consuming, remittances and entrepreneurialism despite previously insurmountable sanctions, financial surveillance, and fees associated with transfers, banking, etc.
In Zimbabwe, Venezuela, Turkey, and anywhere else that economic hardships have surfaced — over time, or overnight — Bitcoin and crypto more generally have given individuals the opportunity to safeguard their economic liberty and in some cases their very lives. In places where economic life is viable but burdensome, cryptocurrency access provides an outlet.
Time may prove this incorrect, but at present MMT seems to be little more than a pernicious, academically-garbed attempt to overcome the unwelcome (and repeatedly evinced) fact that governments are as tied to economic limits as firms and individuals are. But a more fundamental truth precedes this: if implemented, and whether at that time Bitcoin, another crypto issue, or another, yet-undiscovered innovation has surfaced, liberty will always find a way to triumph — even when the utopian plans of authoritarian regimes are briefly in control.
Digest powered by RSS Digest
Saving...