[Michaeluj]

. If I was arguing with a creationist I would quote the science, if I was arguing with a global warming denier I would quote the science.

Nope, you are quoting the conclusion and perception, also known as the scientist. Additionally, you are attempting to put scientific credibility on a subject that is impossible for using verifiable and repeatable experimentation that entails the very existence of science. If you quoted data and showed that as your argument, showing me how you came to those conclusions without needing to say that someone or something important agrees with that, then you would have a valid argument. Essentially, you are claiming that an authority with opinions and not facts shows that your argument is correct. Appeal. To. Authority.

Also, a creationlist could show his own "scientist", but you would only disagree with that person then, in the only way possible: Because you don't trust that authority.
Because how can you disprove someone who claims that dinosaurs are Satan's trick? It exists in complete spite of your argument, because it acts like it has your, opposing, arguments already incorporated into the creation of this argument.

The FT is a legitimate authority on economics. That's not to say that it is always right, but it is an authoritative voice of the capitalist class. The capitalists take the FT seriously.

Judging by your communist views, I'll translate this argument:
"The FT is a legitimate authority because the people who caused the world's problems, my capitalist enemies, by pushing for Neoliberalism, agree with it that Neoliberalism is a problem."
This sentence is batshit insane, so I'll try to formulate as much of a reasonable rewrite as possible:
"The FT is a legitimate authority because the people who run the economies point out that the declines are caused by theory." Yeah, scapegoating is a valid argument! (Not)
Or maybe you mean:
"The FT is a legitimate authority because people who support capitalism agree that too much capitalism is problematic. Yes, I know that these are the masses, which we really shouldn't expect to be knowledgeable about economics and history outside of talk shows and common knowledge, and I know that a lot of them are either idiots or too busy working to care, and I know that only about half of Americans and Western Europe gladly fall into this line, but I'm still saying that my argument is credible because I trust that all of the smart, knowledgeable, and beloved Western Europeans are the only demographics that agree with me, and that appeal to numbers and a generalized assumption of their qualities is enough proof for me to claim that my view of history is correct."

That's stupid.

An appeal to authority is only a fallacious argument if I state that it MUST be true. I am giving it as a piece of evidence.

1. If you're willing to admit that your source is flawed, it is not used as an argument. Ignoring the fact that you have used it as an argument to defend a view of history, I will portray how you would say it with this in mind:
"Hello, I think that Ron Paul shows that libertarianism is what's best for everyone. He has a hundred-million (joke number) followers, but, however, he is senile, wants to get high 23 hours a day and can only afford to do it 15 hours a day right now, and voted to increase the power of the Federal Reserve, so he might actually be wrong." Basically, if you're not claiming that your source is correct, you might as well not use it at all; but, if you do claim that it is correct, then it might as well 'must' be true.
2. It's a piece of evidence of what people think, and it is not evidence of what is. Use sources better.

The fact that Marxists and the authoritative representatives of capitalism say the same thing should carry some weight, we both agree that the sun rises in the west.

You associate scientific observation, actual, perfectly verifiable mathematical and telescopic evidence, with a series of non-repeatable occurances with thosands or even millions of factors that are filtered by perceptions built through layer upon layer of even more random analysis? And you are playing the numbers game?! And you're only using a proportion of the population that agrees with you!? AND YOU ARE IGNORING MY REASONED POINTS TO FOCUS ON THIS ASSAULT ON LOGIC!?

Anyway, it is a fact that the Greek economy went downhill after the first round of austerity measures, I simply stated the fact that the FT managed to admit it while calling for more cuts!

Anyone can easily see the blindingly obvious that cutting spending reduces GDP. IT'S OBVIOUS! What isn't is that, a, whether the rate and scope of transition is a factor in itself, be, what caused further instability, and, c, do other areas benefit and create more good in a holistic sense? And before you DARE to say that the second one is agreed upon by the masses, argue AGAINST the Austrian, Monetarist, and even Georgist theories of the trade cycle to SHOW me why your argument is so much better.
Additionally, ANYONE can say that someone SAID something! That fact does not make an argument stronger.

The Austrian school had its way over the last 30 years of neoliberalism.

So, shock therapy did not occur, and central banking was utterly wiped away? And currency was inflated, at the very most, and only to pander to the monetarists and not the Austrians, to match GDP growth?
HELL NO! In fact, the Federal Funds Target Rate became more prone to sharp changes after the Reagan years, and the average value was getting progressively lower as well, culminating in financial instability for obvious reasons.
I would say that the financial system is the most important, with the structure of changes made for it and other features of economies as equally important for maintaining a stable foundation. Simply because the Iron Curtain fell and some countries went from 150% tariffs to 5% and also coincidentally suffered debt, and it was selective across so many countries, does not in hell mean that either Austrian economics or Neoliberalism occurred.
Your numbers for privatization mean nothing: Chinese government lost half of its government control of industries, but, by looking at this fact alone, you would assume that Neoliberalism likely occurred, just like in your Japan example, despite this not being what I assume your view is. privatization is a small part of what constitutes Neoliberalism and Austrian. If I say that, after a socialist revolution, a dictator takes power, would you defend that as true socialism? Nope. You would say that it is missing crucial elements.

It is true that public sector employment in America has not dropped vastly despite the wishes the the politicians. I think one reason was the growth in the military during the 1980s.

I will get to employment, but you completely forgot about social spending as a proportion of the economy, which did increase.

In fact the number of federal workers in America has dropped from 6.4 million in 1967 to 4.44 million in 2010, sspite population growth.

I notice that the only drop occurred with Uniformed Military Personnel. Do those represent government social influence? Also, this does not show members of government as a proportion of the population and it does not show the number of rules and regulations.

Why do they use oil to grow food? Because it means in the short term they can get high yields with low labour power. It is not sustainable. And it is no use to poor farmers in the third world who need to be more self sufficient.

So, you see, based on currently available resources, we have the most efficient produce, permitting others to find more useful endeavors.
I assume you also argue against this for the reason to provide a perfectly acceptable alternative that is affordable to those poor people, one that doesn't use oil. Why can't that method be used later?
How does the existence of oil prevent others from growing food? Yes, it's cheaper, but that's only bad in the sense that you simply want to be fixated on the 'horrors' of every contingency that could possibly happen in the short-run. You would have to expect people to buy more expensive food for long-term interests against accidents, which would happen if they were smart enough to agree on something as so correct as the idea that Neoliberalism took over the world. (shrug)

Ancient Egypt socialist? You are having a giraffe.

Whatever you want to call it. It certainly wasn't capitalism, as you say, nor proto-capitalism.

As for capitalism, it started to surface in the 1200s and first became the dominant system in 3 bourgeois revolutions - England 1940, Holland about the same time, and France 100 years later. Germany was late on the scene and America didnt need one as such but it did have its own version, in two parts, the war of independence and then the civil war.

Let's pretend that the 9 is a 6 or lower--- and how do these facts disprove anything I said? I already know these facts.

[daft punk]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority

The appeal to authority may take several forms. As a statistical syllogism, it will have the following basic structure:[1]

Most of what authority a has to say on subject matter S is correct.
a says p about S.
Therefore, p is correct.

The strength of this argument depends upon two factors:[1][2]

The authority is a legitimate expert on the subject.
A consensus exists among legitimate experts on the matter under discussion.

These conditions may also simply be incorporated into the structure of the argument itself, in which case the form may look like this:[2]

X holds that A is true
X is a legitimate expert on the subject.
The consensus of experts agrees with X.
Therefore, there's a presumption that A is true.


Fallacious appeals to authority

Fallacious arguments from authority often are the result of failing to meet at least one of the two conditions from the previous section

So, yes I appealed to authority but no it was not fallacious.

Anyway, it's totally irrelevant as we could see Greece go down the toilet after the first cuts. Wages were cut and unemployment rose. The Economist also agreed that the new cuts “will almost certainly condemn Greece to recession, strife and an eventual debt default”.

"Wolfgang Münchau commented in the British Financial Times (27/06/11), before the Greek parliament vote: “The EU’s strategy reduces the choice of the Greeks to defaulting either next month, or next year.” "
http://www.socialistworld.net/doc/5170

wikipedia says:
"Despite the long range of austerity measures, the government deficit has not been reduced accordingly, mainly, according to many economists, due to the subsequent recession[69][70][71][72][73]. Consequently, the country's debt to GDP continues to rapidly exacerbate.
[edit] "

^ "Times Topics European Union". New York Times. 5 December 2011. Retrieved 8 December 2011.
^ "Greek Austerity: Budget Cuts Deepen Recession, Quicken Reckoning". Huffington Post. 24 October 2011. Retrieved 8 December 2011.
^ "Greece: Country's Deficit Will Fall, No New Austerity Needed". Huffington Post. 24 October 2011. Retrieved 8 December 2011.
^ "Greek Politician Expects Recession Will Linger". The Wall Street Journal. 6 December 2011. Retrieved 8 December 2011.
^ "Greece to see out year in recession". Financial Times. 3 July 2011. Retrieved 8 December 2011.

using various sources.

In December 2011 the Guardian reported in parents forced to abandon their children by the deep recession.

""Psychologically we were all in a bit of a mess," said Gasparinatos. "We were sleeping on mattresses on the floor, the rent hadn't been paid for months, something had to be done."

And so, with Christmas approaching, the 42-year-old took the decision to put in an official request for three of his boys and one daughter to be taken into care.

"The crisis had killed us. I am ashamed to say but it had got to the point where I couldn't even afford the €2 needed to buy bread," he told the Guardian. "We didn't want to break up the family but we did think it would be easier for them if four of my children were sent to an institution for maybe two or three years."

The next day, his 37-year-old wife visited the local town hall and asked that her children be "saved"."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/de ... en-victims

You associate scientific observation, actual, perfectly verifiable mathematical and telescopic evidence, with a series of non-repeatable occurances with thosands or even millions of factors that are filtered by perceptions built through layer upon layer of even more random analysis? And you are playing the numbers game?! And you're only using a proportion of the population that agrees with you!? AND YOU ARE IGNORING MY REASONED POINTS TO FOCUS ON THIS ASSAULT ON LOGIC!?

Economics is not an exact science. My education is in geology. because it's about stuff that happened millions of years ago it's not an exact science either. Anyway, I was right. The cuts have done no good.

They are an excuse to privatise the Greek economy, another description is plunder.

There is a crazy new housing tax where you get charged on the area of the house regardless of income!

Anyway, stick to concrete stuff and not all the waffle, I wont read it. Dont waste time typing it. I quote the FT and the Economist because they are influential journals and while not always right are still worth taking note of.

Anyone can easily see the blindingly obvious that cutting spending reduces GDP. IT'S OBVIOUS! What isn't is that, a, whether the rate and scope of transition is a factor in itself, be, what caused further instability, and, c, do other areas benefit and create more good in a holistic sense? And before you DARE to say that the second one is agreed upon by the masses, argue AGAINST the Austrian, Monetarist, and even Georgist theories of the trade cycle to SHOW me why your argument is so much better.
Additionally, ANYONE can say that someone SAID something! That fact does not make an argument stronger.

Do other areas benefit? Yeah, the rich do ok in deep recessions usually. And things like pawn shops do well as desperate people start selling their possessions.

So, shock therapy did not occur, and central banking was utterly wiped away? And currency was inflated, at the very most, and only to pander to the monetarists and not the Austrians, to match GDP growth?
HELL NO! In fact, the Federal Funds Target Rate became more prone to sharp changes after the Reagan years, and the average value was getting progressively lower as well, culminating in financial instability for obvious reasons.
I would say that the financial system is the most important, with the structure of changes made for it and other features of economies as equally important for maintaining a stable foundation. Simply because the Iron Curtain fell and some countries went from 150% tariffs to 5% and also coincidentally suffered debt, and it was selective across so many countries, does not in hell mean that either Austrian economics or Neoliberalism occurred.
Your numbers for privatization mean nothing: Chinese government lost half of its government control of industries, but, by looking at this fact alone, you would assume that Neoliberalism likely occurred, just like in your Japan example, despite this not being what I assume your view is. privatization is a small part of what constitutes Neoliberalism and Austrian. If I say that, after a socialist revolution, a dictator takes power, would you defend that as true socialism? Nope. You would say that it is missing crucial elements.

I'm not an economist. Just tell me in a nutshell why you think neoliberalism didnt occur, seeing as the consensus is that it did.

I will get to employment, but you completely forgot about social spending as a proportion of the economy, which did increase.

Did it? It didnt in Britain. Support that. Bear in mind that social spending on the military and police went up in both countries, and also that in a recession like now obviously its gonna go up as people claim the dole etc and less taxes come in. What went up and what was it spent on exactly?


Be specific. Support your claims.

I notice that the only drop occurred with Uniformed Military Personnel. Do those represent government social influence? Also, this does not show members of government as a proportion of the population and it does not show the number of rules and regulations.

wtf? rules and regulations? What are you on about? It's numbers of government employees! wtf do you mean do they represent government social influence? They represent me proving your claim that government has grown is FALSE.

If you wanna know about regulations, google deregulation.

So, you see, based on currently available resources, we have the most efficient produce, permitting others to find more useful endeavors.

more useful endeavours like marketing junk food to children and making is as addictive as heroin and as easy to swallow as baby food. Great.

I assume you also argue against this for the reason to provide a perfectly acceptable alternative that is affordable to those poor people, one that doesn't use oil. Why can't that method be used later? How does the existence of oil prevent others from growing food?

what? The people in the poor countries need to be helped to develop sustainable farming. Big companies like Monsanto would rather have them buying fertiliser, seed and so on. They make them false promises and get them hooked on high tech food. GM plants are usually infertile so you have to buy seeds. They cause weakening of the soil and so on. Too many problems to go into here.

Yes, it's cheaper, but that's only bad in the sense that you simply want to be fixated on the 'horrors' of every contingency that could possibly happen in the short-run. You would have to expect people to buy more expensive food for long-term interests against accidents, which would happen if they were smart enough to agree on something as so correct as the idea that Neoliberalism took over the world. (shrug)

I dont really understand what you are saying. The simple fact is that relying on oil to grow food is not sustainable. 10% of the energy used in America is used by the food industry. Three calories of energy are needed to create one calorie of edible food in the USA. Grain-fed beef which requires 35 calories for every calorie of beef produced. And this doesn’t include the energy used in processing and transporting food. What is gonna be needed is a move to sustainable farming - food grown locally in an environmentally friendly way. We need to get things done sensibly. Flying beans daily from water scarce Africa to the UK is not right.

[Michaeluj]

The authority is a legitimate expert on the subject.
A consensus exists among legitimate experts on the matter under discussion.

That is an interesting use of the fallacy, in my opinion, because it doesn't consider how using someone's statements for the sole reason to crutch poor argument and to avoid making discourse with definable points and deduction ... is a terrible argument, like saying that the Bible says that 'the world was created in 7 days' to avoid saying how this is the case, how it occurred and how the evidence shows that this is the stronger argument. But, I'll pander to this use of it.
1. Is your authority legitimate? By this, I mean: Does it really have exact knowledge of economic history? You compare economics to geography to make economics a science without confliction, one which can have an authority. However, geography doesn't have such obvious deviations with theories (just look at how many different schools of economics exist); there have been more changing variables in 200 years of economics than 2 million in geography; humans have biases when regarding economics; and humans can be, at times, dumb and unexpected while rocks stay consistent. Age and a slow rate of change is not the same as random and complex. Therefore, geography does not show that the authority is valid.
2. Keynes is a legitimate expert: people love him and have used his teachings for decades. The bulk of economic policies today stem from him, and the majority of economists follow him for the most part.
Yet, I think he, therefore most of the establishment, is wrong. Since I don't think that these people are legitimate, since they focus on different variables more than others, ones which I think are less important, and believe that certain methods are better despite a lack of historical practice and a lack of examples that all theories are impeded by, they are about as trustworthy as experts in literature. To me, they are wrong, so you can't use their words without first persuading me with facts and figures and deduction.
And don't say that I should listen to them. Just don't. You're a communist: you wouldn't change your mind about communism even though most people in the world are capitalist from one spectrum to another, would you? I am a libertarian, you're a communist, and, so, we should argue man to man, not man to man to most people, because those people would screw us both over.

"Despite the long range of austerity measures, the government deficit has not been reduced accordingly, mainly, according to many economists, due to the subsequent recession[69

That still doesn't indicate Neoliberalism. Just remember my darn Chinese example.

Economics is not an exact science. My education is in geology. because it's about stuff that happened millions of years ago it's not an exact science either. Anyway, I was right. The cuts have done no good.

They are an excuse to privatise the Greek economy, another description is plunder.

There is a crazy new housing tax where you get charged on the area of the house regardless of income!

Anyway, stick to concrete stuff and not all the waffle, I wont read it.

It's so funny how you wrote the first two lines along with the third one.

michael wrote:
Anyone can easily see the blindingly obvious that cutting spending reduces GDP. IT'S OBVIOUS! What isn't is that, a, whether the rate and scope of transition is a factor in itself, be, what caused further instability, and, c, do other areas benefit and create more good in a holistic sense? And before you DARE to say that the second one is agreed upon by the masses, argue AGAINST the Austrian, Monetarist, and even Georgist theories of the trade cycle to SHOW me why your argument is so much better.
Additionally, ANYONE can say that someone SAID something! That fact does not make an argument stronger.


Do other areas benefit? Yeah, the rich do ok in deep recessions usually. And things like pawn shops do well as desperate people start selling their possessions.

So, wait, the first two points are, judging by how you're silent about them, correct? This means that you developed skepticism about your own assurance that libertarianism is clearly at fault!
Also, don't try to make cheap shots by intentionally finding the most obvious and minor benefits that could appear in a recession. Think about a scope of countries. If some countries benefited significantly while others did badly, could that show that the problems that occurred after increased trade from the existence of globalization are simply just a small picture of events?

I'm not an economist. Just tell me in a nutshell why you think neoliberalism didnt occur, seeing as the consensus is that it did.

I really hate to quote myself, especially when I made myself obvious, but here it is:

So, shock therapy did not occur, and central banking was utterly wiped away? And currency was inflated, at the very most, and only to pander to the monetarists and not the Austrians, to match GDP growth? Simply because the Iron Curtain fell and some countries went from 150% tariffs to sometimes 5% and also coincidentally suffered debt, and it was selective across so many countries. Your numbers for privatization mean nothing: Chinese government lost half of its government control of industries, but, by looking at this fact alone, you would assume that Neoliberalism likely occurred, just like in your Japan example, despite this not being what I assume your view is. privatization is a small part of what constitutes Neoliberalism and Austrian.

If you want to define Neoliberalism as just 'some lowered trade barriers and some lowered banking regulation that occurred at any point in the past, and lower corporate tax', then you've safely put up your own barriers to make anything, anything in the world, approaching this painfully vague notion as Neoliberalism. There is more to this theory, and Austrian Economics, than those generalities.

Did it? It didnt in Britain. Support that. Bear in mind that social spending on the military and police went up in both countries, and also that in a recession like now obviously its gonna go up as people claim the dole etc and less taxes come in. What went up and what was it spent on exactly?

It did in America, considered the biggest home of Neoliberalism; but, here, I'm just poking at your argument to show that it's not necessarily effective.
I would love to see the data you found for this. All I could find is this, which is slightly inaccurate because it doesn't adjust for the recession. Oh wait, it doesn't really need to, because most of the data points don't relate to unemployment.

Also, I never counted military spending as "social". A country could have virtually zero government but a huge military, for all I know.
And I was also very specific about what was spent on and at what times in the thread I cited way back.

michael wrote:
I notice that the only drop occurred with Uniformed Military Personnel. Do those represent government social influence? Also, this does not show members of government as a proportion of the population and it does not show the number of rules and regulations.


wtf? rules and regulations? What are you on about? It's numbers of government employees! wtf do you mean do they represent government social influence? They represent me proving your claim that government has grown is FALSE.

Rules and regulations going through a pattern of increasing does exist entirely contrary to whether deregulation existed. Sure, with Reagan, regulations dipped throughout his presidency, but they went right back up and rose higher than ever, growing higher than before even during the next presidency. 30 years increased regulation far more than it shrunk.
Now, what is Uniformed Military Personnel? Do they organize welfare, health, government-owned businesses, subsidies, public goods, or anything remotely social? If they're focused just on the military, then their reduction does not show that government shrank for the social sector, which is the only issue for whether deregulation occurred or not. If they don't matter in the social circle, then government clearly grew to have more control of the economy.

more useful endeavours like marketing junk food to children and making is as addictive as heroin and as easy to swallow as baby food. Great.

As hilariously exaggerated as this is (seriously, I loved Cheese Nips, but I never cried over not having them, or even really thought about them until now), you miss the point that these methods are more efficient while they also do satisfy needs. Your argument is that the methods are bad, yet you just admitted that they, contrary to early assertions, work well. What comes after does not matter.

michael wrote:
I assume you also argue against this for the reason to provide a perfectly acceptable alternative that is affordable to those poor people, one that doesn't use oil. Why can't that method be used later? How does the existence of oil prevent others from growing food?


what? The people in the poor countries need to be helped to develop sustainable farming. Big companies like Monsanto would rather have them buying fertiliser, seed and so on. They make them false promises and get them hooked on high tech food. GM plants are usually infertile so you have to buy seeds. They cause weakening of the soil and so on. Too many problems to go into here.

You answered the second question, though you claim that lies and maybe even the short-shortsightedness or stupidity of the poor prove that these are faults of calculation. If those poor would get this GM foods for free, or just by voting for them (hey, they're the farmers: people should listen to them, right?), under socialism, why would they choose otherwise when it would be easier for them to continue as they are?

michael wrote:
Yes, it's cheaper, but that's only bad in the sense that you simply want to be fixated on the 'horrors' of every contingency that could possibly happen in the short-run. You would have to expect people to buy more expensive food for long-term interests against accidents, which would happen if they were smart enough to agree on something as so correct as the idea that Neoliberalism took over the world. (shrug)


I dont really understand what you are saying. The simple fact is that relying on oil to grow food is not sustainable. 10% of the energy used in America is used by the food industry. Three calories of energy are needed to create one calorie of edible food in the USA. Grain-fed beef which requires 35 calories for every calorie of beef produced. And this doesn’t include the energy used in processing and transporting food. What is gonna be needed is a move to sustainable farming - food grown locally in an environmentally friendly way. We need to get things done sensibly. Flying beans daily from water scarce Africa to the UK is not right.

You changed arguments, from the sustainability of oil running out and oil shocks, to literal energy consumption. The former, as I wrote, is based on a fixation of random problems and the short-term, and the latter is silly because people are willing to pay the extra energy costs of their food if it's of a good enough quality and/or if it's cheaper than the alternatives. Energy consumption is indicated by price, so it is part of calculations done for what people want.

[daft punk]

That is an interesting use of the fallacy, in my opinion, because it doesn't consider how using someone's statements for the sole reason to crutch poor argument and to avoid making discourse with definable points and deduction ... is a terrible argument, like saying that the Bible says that 'the world was created in 7 days' to avoid saying how this is the case, how it occurred and how the evidence shows that this is the stronger argument. But, I'll pander to this use of it.
1. Is your authority legitimate? By this, I mean: Does it really have exact knowledge of economic history? You compare economics to geography to make economics a science without confliction, one which can have an authority. However, geography doesn't have such obvious deviations with theories (just look at how many different schools of economics exist); there have been more changing variables in 200 years of economics than 2 million in geography; humans have biases when regarding economics; and humans can be, at times, dumb and unexpected while rocks stay consistent. Age and a slow rate of change is not the same as random and complex. Therefore, geography does not show that the authority is valid.
2. Keynes is a legitimate expert: people love him and have used his teachings for decades. The bulk of economic policies today stem from him, and the majority of economists follow him for the most part.
Yet, I think he, therefore most of the establishment, is wrong. Since I don't think that these people are legitimate, since they focus on different variables more than others, ones which I think are less important, and believe that certain methods are better despite a lack of historical practice and a lack of examples that all theories are impeded by, they are about as trustworthy as experts in literature. To me, they are wrong, so you can't use their words without first persuading me with facts and figures and deduction.
And don't say that I should listen to them. Just don't. You're a communist: you wouldn't change your mind about communism even though most people in the world are capitalist from one spectrum to another, would you? I am a libertarian, you're a communist, and, so, we should argue man to man, not man to man to most people, because those people would screw us both over.

Dont waste your time typing this stuff, if I wanna quote the FT I will do.

Quote:
"Despite the long range of austerity measures, the government deficit has not been reduced accordingly, mainly, according to many economists, due to the subsequent recession[69

That still doesn't indicate Neoliberalism. Just remember my darn Chinese example.

What? No idea what you are on about. Neoliberalism is what happened over the last 30 years. The EU is an example, one of its aims was to privatise the utilities and attack pensions.

Quote:
Economics is not an exact science. My education is in geology. because it's about stuff that happened millions of years ago it's not an exact science either. Anyway, I was right. The cuts have done no good.

They are an excuse to privatise the Greek economy, another description is plunder.

There is a crazy new housing tax where you get charged on the area of the house regardless of income!

Anyway, stick to concrete stuff and not all the waffle, I wont read it.


It's so funny how you wrote the first two lines along with the third one.

no idea what you are on about

Quote:
michael wrote:
Anyone can easily see the blindingly obvious that cutting spending reduces GDP. IT'S OBVIOUS! What isn't is that, a, whether the rate and scope of transition is a factor in itself, be, what caused further instability, and, c, do other areas benefit and create more good in a holistic sense? And before you DARE to say that the second one is agreed upon by the masses, argue AGAINST the Austrian, Monetarist, and even Georgist theories of the trade cycle to SHOW me why your argument is so much better.
Additionally, ANYONE can say that someone SAID something! That fact does not make an argument stronger.


Do other areas benefit? Yeah, the rich do ok in deep recessions usually. And things like pawn shops do well as desperate people start selling their possessions.

So, wait, the first two points are, judging by how you're silent about them, correct? This means that you developed skepticism about your own assurance that libertarianism is clearly at fault!
Also, don't try to make cheap shots by intentionally finding the most obvious and minor benefits that could appear in a recession. Think about a scope of countries. If some countries benefited significantly while others did badly, could that show that the problems that occurred after increased trade from the existence of globalization are simply just a small picture of events?

No I just couldnt be bothered answering you vague waffle. Are you trying to say that cutting spending has some benefits? And that these outweigh the reduction of GDP? If you are be clear, say what they are, dont play guessing games.


"Think about a scope of countries. If some countries benefited significantly while others did badly, could that show that the problems that occurred after increased trade from the existence of globalization are simply just a small picture of events?"

What does this mean?

I really hate to quote myself, especially when I made myself obvious, but here it is:

Quote:
So, shock therapy did not occur, and central banking was utterly wiped away? And currency was inflated, at the very most, and only to pander to the monetarists and not the Austrians, to match GDP growth? Simply because the Iron Curtain fell and some countries went from 150% tariffs to sometimes 5% and also coincidentally suffered debt, and it was selective across so many countries. Your numbers for privatization mean nothing: Chinese government lost half of its government control of industries, but, by looking at this fact alone, you would assume that Neoliberalism likely occurred, just like in your Japan example, despite this not being what I assume your view is. privatization is a small part of what constitutes Neoliberalism and Austrian.

"So, shock therapy did not occur, and central banking was utterly wiped away?" What is this supposed to mean, that something Friedman said didnt happen? Yes shock therapy happened in places. Friedman never said central banks should be utterly wiped away.

"And currency was inflated, at the very most, and only to pander to the monetarists and not the Austrians, to match GDP growth? " What? Am I supposed to know the difference between monetarists and Austrian school people? They are both neoliberal.

So the Ausrians didnt get everything they wanted and therefore it wasnt neoliberalism and all the problems in the world are because not everything went 100% Hayek.

What a pile of shite.

"The former U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman, Alan Greenspan, speaking of the originators of the School, said in 2000, "the Austrian school have reached far into the future from when most of them practiced and have had a profound and, in my judgment, probably an irreversible effect on how most mainstream economists think in this country.""
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Austrian_School



"In February 1975, Margaret Thatcher was elected leader of the British Conservative Party. The Institute of Economic Affairs arranged a meeting between Hayek and Thatcher in London soon after.[40] During Thatcher's only visit to the Conservative Research Department in the summer of 1975, a speaker had prepared a paper on why the "middle way" was the pragmatic path the Conservative Party should take, avoiding the extremes of left and right. Before he had finished, Thatcher "reached into her briefcase and took out a book. It was Hayek's The Constitution of Liberty. Interrupting our pragmatist, she held the book up for all of us to see. 'This', she said sternly, 'is what we believe', and banged Hayek down on the table".[41]""

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedrich_Hayek

If you want to define Neoliberalism as just 'some lowered trade barriers and some lowered banking regulation that occurred at any point in the past, and lower corporate tax', then you've safely put up your own barriers to make anything, anything in the world, approaching this painfully vague notion as Neoliberalism. There is more to this theory, and Austrian Economics, than those generalities.

Bid deal.

Quote:
Did it? It didnt in Britain. Support that. Bear in mind that social spending on the military and police went up in both countries, and also that in a recession like now obviously its gonna go up as people claim the dole etc and less taxes come in. What went up and what was it spent on exactly?

It did in America, considered the biggest home of Neoliberalism; but, here, I'm just poking at your argument to show that it's not necessarily effective.
I would love to see the data you found for this. All I could find is this, which is slightly inaccurate because it doesn't adjust for the recession. Oh wait, it doesn't really need to, because most of the data points don't relate to unemployment.

After Thatcher, Labour had some underfunding to make up for.

In America it went up a bit but in 2001 it was the same as in 1981

Also, I never counted military spending as "social". A country could have virtually zero government but a huge military, for all I know.
And I was also very specific about what was spent on and at what times in the thread I cited way back.

If you discount military spending then social spending has been even lower as both countries spent a lot on the military, for instance Thatcher increased spending on the army and police. Then she cut spending on social stuff.

Quote:
michael wrote:
I notice that the only drop occurred with Uniformed Military Personnel. Do those represent government social influence? Also, this does not show members of government as a proportion of the population and it does not show the number of rules and regulations.


wtf? rules and regulations? What are you on about? It's numbers of government employees! wtf do you mean do they represent government social influence? They represent me proving your claim that government has grown is FALSE.


Rules and regulations going through a pattern of increasing does exist entirely contrary to whether deregulation existed. Sure, with Reagan, regulations dipped throughout his presidency, but they went right back up and rose higher than ever, growing higher than before even during the next presidency. 30 years increased regulation far more than it shrunk.
Now, what is Uniformed Military Personnel? Do they organize welfare, health, government-owned businesses, subsidies, public goods, or anything remotely social? If they're focused just on the military, then their reduction does not show that government shrank for the social sector, which is the only issue for whether deregulation occurred or not. If they don't matter in the social circle, then government clearly grew to have more control of the economy.

tbh I'm not really sure what you are on about here. Deregulation is about making the economy more free market, why are you waffling on about the military?

Quote:
more useful endeavours like marketing junk food to children and making is as addictive as heroin and as easy to swallow as baby food. Great.

As hilariously exaggerated as this is (seriously, I loved Cheese Nips, but I never cried over not having them, or even really thought about them until now), you miss the point that these methods are more efficient while they also do satisfy needs. Your argument is that the methods are bad, yet you just admitted that they, contrary to early assertions, work well. What comes after does not matter.

No exageration. Facts. Again i dont understand what you are saying or why. What is efficient about making junk food addictive? When did I admit that making junk food works well? What are you fucking on about?

Quote:
michael wrote:
I assume you also argue against this for the reason to provide a perfectly acceptable alternative that is affordable to those poor people, one that doesn't use oil. Why can't that method be used later? How does the existence of oil prevent others from growing food?


what? The people in the poor countries need to be helped to develop sustainable farming. Big companies like Monsanto would rather have them buying fertiliser, seed and so on. They make them false promises and get them hooked on high tech food. GM plants are usually infertile so you have to buy seeds. They cause weakening of the soil and so on. Too many problems to go into here.


You answered the second question, though you claim that lies and maybe even the short-shortsightedness or stupidity of the poor prove that these are faults of calculation. If those poor would get this GM foods for free, or just by voting for them (hey, they're the farmers: people should listen to them, right?), under socialism, why would they choose otherwise when it would be easier for them to continue as they are?

why is it such a struggle to fathom out what you are trying to say? Voting for who? Why would socialists give them GM food?

What I am saying is that in capitalism, big companies want farmers to become dependent on them, so they give them stories about how great it will be and suck the farmers in. Then the farmer finds he is in the shit because he cant afford the seeds and fertiliser etc.

There may be some GM crops in socialism, but it would have to be very carefully studied, its not something you can trust big business with.

You changed arguments, from the sustainability of oil running out and oil shocks, to literal energy consumption. The former, as I wrote, is based on a fixation of random problems and the short-term, and the latter is silly because people are willing to pay the extra energy costs of their food if it's of a good enough quality and/or if it's cheaper than the alternatives. Energy consumption is indicated by price, so it is part of calculations done for what people want.

Oil running out and global warming caused by energy consumption yeah, both are problems. Oil running out is due to the fixed amount of oil, not a fixation on random problems. People do not want to pay a lot for their food and many cant. This is irrelevant. The problems are real - global warming, soil degradation, high food prices, water shortage, peak oil, hunger.

The reasons agriculture needs to be changed is different in places like America and Africa. In America the problem is mainly that Americans cause so much global warming, and agriculture is a big part of that. In Africa the problems for many farmers are dependency on western companies.


read:

"Ending Africa's Hunger Means Listening to Farmers
Stephen Leahy

NAGOYA, Japan, Oct 16 (IPS) - Africa is hungry - 240 million people are undernourished. Now, for the first-time, small African farmers have been properly consulted on how to solve the problem of feeding sub-Saharan Africa. Their answers appear to directly repudiate a massive international effort to launch an African Green Revolution funded in large part by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Instead of new hybrid seeds, chemical fertilisers and pesticides, family farmers in West Africa said they want to use local seeds, avoid spending precious cash on chemicals and most importantly to direct public agricultural research to meet their needs, according to a multi-media publication released on World Food Day (Oct. 16).

"There is a clear vision from these small farmers. They are rejecting the approach of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa," said report co-author Michel Pimbert of the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED), a non-profit research institute based in London"

http://ipsnews.net/africa/nota.asp?idnews=53186

see how the African farmers are agreeing with me? This is because I know what I am on about and so do they.

[Michaeluj]

You are the worst opponent I ever had. Grassroots is an ideologue with a fixation on Foundation and human nature that act as his trump cards against everything, but at least he could comprehend words and even have some memory. I may have to talk to you like you're a child.

Dont waste your time typing this stuff, if I wanna quote the FT I will do.

Alright, but, just because people say something, doesn't mean that it's true. I will not accept anyone's views as solid facts.

What? No idea what you are on about. Neoliberalism is what happened over the last 30 years. The EU is an example, one of its aims was to privatise the utilities and attack pensions.

Again, you seem focused on defining Neoliberalism by these horrifically general terms. I say that there's more to it, and you .... Well, I'll get to that quoted passage soon enough.

michael wrote:
Quote:
michael wrote:
Anyone can easily see the blindingly obvious that cutting spending reduces GDP. IT'S OBVIOUS! What isn't is that, a, whether the rate and scope of transition is a factor in itself, b, what caused further instability, and, c, do other areas benefit and create more good in a holistic sense? And before you DARE to say that the second one is agreed upon by the masses, argue AGAINST the Austrian, Monetarist, and even Georgist theories of the trade cycle to SHOW me why your argument is so much better.
Additionally, ANYONE can say that someone SAID something! That fact does not make an argument stronger.


Do other areas benefit? Yeah, the rich do ok in deep recessions usually. And things like pawn shops do well as desperate people start selling their possessions.

So, wait, the first two points are, judging by how you're silent about them, correct? This means that you developed skepticism about your own assurance that libertarianism is clearly at fault!
Also, don't try to make cheap shots by intentionally finding the most obvious and minor benefits that could appear in a recession. Think about a scope of countries. If some countries benefited significantly while others did badly, could that show that the problems that occurred after increased trade from the existence of globalization are simply just a small picture of events?


No I just couldnt be bothered answering you vague waffle. Are you trying to say that cutting spending has some benefits? And that these outweigh the reduction of GDP? If you are be clear, say what they are, dont play guessing games.


"Think about a scope of countries. If some countries benefited significantly while others did badly, could that show that the problems that occurred after increased trade from the existence of globalization are simply just a small picture of events?"

What does this mean?

Since you read my words that say that you 'accepted the first two points', a and b, as factors that define how liberalization itself is not the only variable in these conditions, and having not responded to them, then I must say that you yourself admit that your argument, that Neoliberalism is the fault of the world, has holes. You may need me to draw a picture of this, so here:
You: N is the fault of the world.
Me: What about A and B?
You: No comment.
Me: Therefore, A and B are potential faults. You must now say "N may not be the fault."

Now, for my example of countries. China and India grew due to massive investments that would have otherwise occurred in already developed areas. If the corporations remained established in their native countries, not moving to China and India, then all of the money would have gone to those already developed countries instead, increasing GDP and thus showing that Neoliberalism, if it existed, would have no faults. But, since you already --basically-- agreed that points A and B show the lack of assurance you have in your argument, you would be better off just ignoring the whole China and India thing. Save yourself more time from thinking, because why should you find fault, if you do, with a third argument that says the same exact thing as the first two: that there are more variables, important ones, than just Neoliberalism.

"So, shock therapy did not occur, and central banking was utterly wiped away?" What is this supposed to mean, that something Friedman said didnt happen? Yes shock therapy happened in places. Friedman never said central banks should be utterly wiped away.

Shock therapy is obviously bad, especially with a drastically changing world and bad monetary policy. But we can regard monetary policy later. My point is that shock therapy is just as likely of a culprit as "Neoliberalism".
Now, when regarding central banking, I may have focused more on its complete end because I was regarding it in terms of the Austrian theory of the business cycle, which is very likely the absolute most important part of Austrian theory. Now, considering how Friedman condoned the Federal Reserve for causing The Great Depression, I would say that he believed that its use should be minimized and not erratic. Frankly, its use pretty much got worse since the 80s, like I had said. If you will use Friedman to define Neoliberalism, then consider more than just "privitization" and "free trade".

"And currency was inflated, at the very most, and only to pander to the monetarists and not the Austrians, to match GDP growth? " What? Am I supposed to know the difference between monetarists and Austrian school people? They are both neoliberal.

Yes, and now you know better. Well, I hope so. Since you now, hopefully, understand the monetary policy of both, then you can see that neither were implemented and, so, either economic philosophy, monetarist or austrian, had no participation.

So the Ausrians didnt get everything they wanted and therefore it wasnt neoliberalism and all the problems in the world are because not everything went 100% Hayek.

What a pile of shite.

Your following quotations imply that my argument is "shite" because Austrian economics was applied.
Now THAT is shite. I can name just one point that can utterly disprove this: Central Banks exist.

Quote:
If you want to define Neoliberalism as just 'some lowered trade barriers and some lowered banking regulation that occurred at any point in the past, and lower corporate tax', then you've safely put up your own barriers to make anything, anything in the world, approaching this painfully vague notion as Neoliberalism. There is more to this theory, and Austrian Economics, than those generalities.



Bid deal.

Now what does that mean?

In America it went up a bit but in 2001 it was the same as in 1981

I'm interested in the Britain example, but I would still like to see data from before 1980.

And, in America, that government spending has to be in context for these reasons: war spending (did it shrink or grow?), growth of economy vs proclivity for government to spend more, and how much of that spending is social spending and how much it grew over time.
Luckily, all of those points are accounted for in my thread that regards the existence of Neoliberalism in terms of social spending.

If you discount military spending then social spending has been even lower as both countries spent a lot on the military, for instance Thatcher increased spending on the army and police. Then she cut spending on social stuff.

You DEFINITELY didn't read my thread, then. Can you at least try to learn an opponent's argument before you act like you know it? I have debate integrity and gave you what you needed to learn my views of Neoliberalism.

Rules and regulations going through a pattern of increasing does exist entirely contrary to whether deregulation existed. Sure, with Reagan, regulations dipped throughout his presidency, but they went right back up and rose higher than ever, growing higher than before even during the next presidency. 30 years increased regulation far more than it shrunk.
Now, what is Uniformed Military Personnel? Do they organize welfare, health, government-owned businesses, subsidies, public goods, or anything remotely social? If they're focused just on the military, then their reduction does not show that government shrank for the social sector, which is the only issue for whether deregulation occurred or not. If they don't matter in the social circle, then government clearly grew to have more control of the economy.


tbh I'm not really sure what you are on about here. Deregulation is about making the economy more free market, why are you waffling on about the military?

1. Number of rules and regulations have increased. This is contrary to free market. Simple.
2. Your own source said that only Uniformed Military Personnel shrank in the government. If they, the Uniformed Military Personnel, are only about the military, then the part of the government that could relate to deregulation did not shrink: it grew. If you can't understand this, like you did in the last few posts, then you are hopeless.

No exageration. Facts. Again i dont understand what you are saying or why. What is efficient about making junk food addictive? When did I admit that making junk food works well? What are you fucking on about?

I just feel sorry that you became addicted to certain foods. It must be embarrassing to go through actual withdraw when you had to quit junk, huh? I mean, I was never remotely hooked on that food, despite appreciating it, so the only proof I have is your experience. It would be funny if you actually confused, 'Made to be delicious' with 'Made to be addictive'.
Anyway, you have one short memory. We are talking about economic calculation and how it's efficient. We already covered that the current method of farming is the most efficient, even though it's not permanent. You affirm this by not arguing against me, choosing instead to ignore this argument and shift to gripes about marketing. Really, if you only read what I wrote and thought about it for just a few moments, I'm sure that you would have understood this.

why is it such a struggle to fathom out what you are trying to say? Voting for who? Why would socialists give them GM food?

Because you have no comprehension that this argument is based on things we said in previous posts in this thread.
A communist would understand that they would vote, not for who, but for what. That's communism.
And, like I said, socialists would give them food because they, the farmers, want it. If they also don't have to pay for fertilizer and seeds, then they would want the best crops and vote to acquire those crops.

Oil running out and global warming caused by energy consumption yeah, both are problems. Oil running out is due to the fixed amount of oil, not a fixation on random problems.

Sigh.
People complain about oil running out and oil shocks causing problems. Guess what: those are short-term problems. They're the fixation, the gripes, and bemoaning for the sake of finding any problems to lash against.
For oil running out, increasing prices encourage a faster transition to alternative technologies. For shocks, complaining about oil would be equivalent to complaining about low winds for wind power and cloudy days for solar power. There's just no reason to use these arguments. Instead of assuming that I'm utterly clueless about even the most basic things, like the fixed amont of oil, just think about how the things I say could be interpreted to make the most sense.

The problems are real - global warming, soil degradation, high food prices, water shortage, peak oil, hunger.

The reasons agriculture needs to be changed is different in places like America and Africa. In America the problem is mainly that Americans cause so much global warming, and agriculture is a big part of that. In Africa the problems for many farmers are dependency on western companies.

First, you --probably, can't remember-- talked about oil shocks, then about the entire oil supply, then about this notion of total chemical energy, and now you're rushing out with every environmental problem you can think of. I think this means I'm pushing you into a corner.

After Thatcher, Labour had some underfunding to make up for.

Is this your response to my post which clearly shows the increased levels of social spending? I don't understand it.

There may be some GM crops in socialism, but it would have to be very carefully studied, its not something you can trust big business with.

Big business which won't exist in socialism?
I have a theory that you're saying that GM crops would be improved without Big Business, but I see that you wrote, "may be some GM crops", so I'm baffled.

[daft punk]

You are the worst opponent I ever had. Grassroots is an ideologue with a fixation on Foundation and human nature that act as his trump cards against everything, but at least he could comprehend words and even have some memory. I may have to talk to you like you're a child.

Just fucking make yourself clear.

Since you read my words that say that you 'accepted the first two points', a and b, as factors that define how liberalization itself is not the only variable in these conditions, and having not responded to them, then I must say that you yourself admit that your argument, that Neoliberalism is the fault of the world, has holes. You may need me to draw a picture of this, so here:
You: N is the fault of the world.
Me: What about A and B?
You: No comment.
Me: Therefore, A and B are potential faults. You must now say "N may not be the fault."

You write so much waffle it musta got buried. You need to concentrate on making you point which I dont think you have. Faced with half a fucking page about appeals to authority I'm not gonna be paying much attention am I?

Instead of all this you me you crap you could have reiterated your key points, if you have any. You made some, but worded them in an incomprehensible way.

Now, for my example of countries. China and India grew due to massive investments that would have otherwise occurred in already developed areas. If the corporations remained established in their native countries, not moving to China and India, then all of the money would have gone to those already developed countries instead, increasing GDP and thus showing that Neoliberalism, if it existed, would have no faults.

What the fuck is this garbage? If capitalists hadn't invested in India then we would have proof that neoliberalism had no faults? This is vague unsubstantiated drivel. Anyway, neoliberalism means capitalists put their cash where they can make the most profit which is where the labour is cheapest quite often, ie India.

But, since you already --basically-- agreed that points A and B show the lack of assurance you have in your argument, you would be better off just ignoring the whole China and India thing. Save yourself more time from thinking, because why should you find fault, if you do, with a third argument that says the same exact thing as the first two: that there are more variables, important ones, than just Neoliberalism.

I have no idea what points A and B are. I have no lack of assurance in my argument.

Just list you main arguments, that one was drivel like the others which werent even comprehensible. I dont attack people for poor English but I do say if something is not comprehensible.

Shock therapy is obviously bad, especially with a drastically changing world and bad monetary policy.

From what you wrote I thought you were advocating it.

But we can regard monetary policy later. My point is that shock therapy is just as likely of a culprit as "Neoliberalism".

I though shock therapy was part of neoliberalism

Now, when regarding central banking, I may have focused more on its complete end because I was regarding it in terms of the Austrian theory of the business cycle, which is very likely the absolute most important part of Austrian theory. Now, considering how Friedman condoned the Federal Reserve for causing The Great Depression, I would say that he believed that its use should be minimized and not erratic. Frankly, its use pretty much got worse since the 80s, like I had said. If you will use Friedman to define Neoliberalism, then consider more than just "privitization" and "free trade".

"Friedman condoned the Federal Reserve for causing The Great Depression"

are you sure you mean condoned? This does not make sense.

Why do you think neoliberalism means the complete end of central banking? Friedman didnt think that and neither did Hayek.

Yes, and now you know better. Well, I hope so. Since you now, hopefully, understand the monetary policy of both, then you can see that neither were implemented and, so, either economic philosophy, monetarist or austrian, had no participation

So why did Thatcher say that her policies were Hayek's?

Your following quotations imply that my argument is "shite" because Austrian economics was applied.
Now THAT is shite. I can name just one point that can utterly disprove this: Central Banks exist.

Hayek did not think central banking could be ended.

"Why, it is sometimes asked, should we not rely on the spontaneous forces of the market to supply whatever is needed for a satisfactory medium of exchange as we do in most other respects?

It is important to be clear at the outset that this is not only politically impracticable today but would probably be undesirable if it were possible. Perhaps, if governments had never interfered, a kind of monetary arrangement might have evolved which would not have required deliberate control; in particular, if men had not come extensively to use credit instruments as money or close substitutes for money, we might have been able to rely on a self-regulating mechanism. This choice, however, is now closed to us. We know of no substantially different alternatives to the credit institutions on which the organization of modern business has come largely to rely; and historical developments have created conditions in which the existence of these institut9ions makes necessary some degree of deliberate control of the interacting money and credit systems. Moreover, other circumstances which we certainly could not hope to change by merely altering our monetary arrangements make it, for the time being, inevitable that this control should be largely exercised by governments."

Hayek

Now what does that mean?

It means I'm not interested in or impressed by vague waffle. State your points clearly with support if necessary.

You DEFINITELY didn't read my thread, then. Can you at least try to learn an opponent's argument before you act like you know it? I have debate integrity and gave you what you needed to learn my views of Neoliberalism.

what thread? I'm not gonna read another thread, if you think neoliberalism didnt happen just say why. Ending central banking is not necessary for neoliberalism.

By the way in 2003 Friedman admitted that his advice to Thatcher to target the money supply was not a success.

1. Number of rules and regulations have increased. This is contrary to free market. Simple.
2. Your own source said that only Uniformed Military Personnel shrank in the government. If they, the Uniformed Military Personnel, are only about the military, then the part of the government that could relate to deregulation did not shrink: it grew. If you can't understand this, like you did in the last few posts, then you are hopeless.

What rules and regulations? In the finance industry and the economy generally the last 30 years were a period of deregulation.

Deregulation

Cutting red tape. The process of removing legal or quasi-legal restrictions on the amount of COMPETITION, the sorts of business done, or the PRICES charged within a particular industry. During the last two decades of the 20th century, many governments committed to the free market pursued policies of LIBERALISATION based on substantial amounts of deregulation hand-in-hand with the PRIVATISATION of industries owned by the state. The aim was to decrease the role of GOVERNMENT in the economy and to increase competition.

http://www.economist.com/economics-a-to ... e-21529695

I just feel sorry that you became addicted to certain foods. It must be embarrassing to go through actual withdraw when you had to quit junk, huh? I mean, I was never remotely hooked on that food, despite appreciating it, so the only proof I have is your experience. It would be funny if you actually confused, 'Made to be delicious' with 'Made to be addictive'.
Anyway, you have one short memory. We are talking about economic calculation and how it's efficient. We already covered that the current method of farming is the most efficient, even though it's not permanent. You affirm this by not arguing against me, choosing instead to ignore this argument and shift to gripes about marketing. Really, if you only read what I wrote and thought about it for just a few moments, I'm sure that you would have understood this.

I never said I became addicted ffs! I said junk foods are addictive. They are made to be.

"Junk food 'as addictive as heroin and smoking'"

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healt ... oking.html

what that article doesnt mention is that the rats would go after the junk food even if they thought they might get an electric shock.

"The American Industrial Food Complex

The most fascinating part of The End of Overeating is the section dealing with the American food industry. Kessler interviews many insiders to provide a startling picture of how foods are made irresistible to the palate. Not only are foods spiked with lots of salt, fat and sugar, they are also processed to an extraordinary degree. The goal of this is to make these commercially produced foods easy to swallow, minimising the amount of chewing required. One food industry insider quoted in the book describes this as a kind of 'adult baby food'. The aim is to make it possible to effortlessly swallow larger amounts of food, adding to the industry's profits."

http://chris-saliba.suite101.com/review ... er-a227010



"Dr. David Kessler, the dynamic former FDA commissioner who reinvented the food label and tackled the tobacco industry, now reveals how the food industry has hijacked the brains of millions of Americans. The result? America s number-one public health issue. Dr. Kessler cracks the code of overeating by explaining how our bodies and minds are changed when we consume foods that contain sugar, fat, and salt. Food manufacturers create products by manipulating these ingredients to stimulate our appetites, setting in motion a cycle of desire and consumption that ends with a nation of overeaters. "

"DAVID A. KESSLER, MD, served as commissioner of the US Food and Drug Administration under presidents George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton. He is a pediatrician and has been the dean of the medical schools at Yale and the University of California, San Francisco. A graduate of Amherst College, the University of Chicago Law School, and Harvard Medical School, Dr. Kessler is the father of two and lives with his wife in California."

This is science, not my fucking personal life for christ's sake.

Clearly market calculation is responsible for millions of obese Americans. 74.6% of Americans are overweight or obese. This problem costs America over $140 billion a year in medical costs and economic loss. Obesity kills 100,000 to 400,000 Americans a year. America has the highest obesity rate in the world. Obesity is America's number 1 killer, overtaking smoking in 2004.

I ignore your argument if I dont understand it. Try wording it coherently, argue it again, maybe this time I will understand.

In the meantime try to understand that when I say junk food is deliberately made addictive I am stating a general scientific fact about the food industry, not talking a bout a personal addiction!

Quote:
why is it such a struggle to fathom out what you are trying to say? Voting for who? Why would socialists give them GM food?


Because you have no comprehension that this argument is based on things we said in previous posts in this thread.
A communist would understand that they would vote, not for who, but for what. That's communism.
And, like I said, socialists would give them food because they, the farmers, want it. If they also don't have to pay for fertilizer and seeds, then they would want the best crops and vote to acquire those crops.

I dunno wtf you are on about. Read what I posted from the survey of African farmers - they agreed with me.

Sigh.
People complain about oil running out and oil shocks causing problems. Guess what: those are short-term problems. They're the fixation, the gripes, and bemoaning for the sake of finding any problems to lash against.
For oil running out, increasing prices encourage a faster transition to alternative technologies. For shocks, complaining about oil would be equivalent to complaining about low winds for wind power and cloudy days for solar power. There's just no reason to use these arguments. Instead of assuming that I'm utterly clueless about even the most basic things, like the fixed amont of oil, just think about how the things I say could be interpreted to make the most sense.

yawn. Oil running out means oil is more expensive and that means a major problem for billions of people. Old people die in the winter because they cant afford to heat their houses. The transition to new technologies is way too slow, and global warming is happening as we speak.

Just write clearly, I dont wanna have to guess what you are saying. As for making sense, you are a right winger so that's not likely. My view is that none of your right wing views make sense.

Is this your response to my post which clearly shows the increased levels of social spending? I don't understand it.

government spending went up when Thatcher first took over, mainly on the military and police. Then she made loads of cuts so it came down. Labout then had to up it a bit to get the health service going again. Then it came back down, so overall it's not changed over 30 years, just fluctuated a bit.

Big business which won't exist in socialism?
I have a theory that you're saying that GM crops would be improved without Big Business, but I see that you wrote, "may be some GM crops", so I'm baffled.

Of course big business wont exist in socialism. It would get nationalised. I am saying that MAYBE GM cops would have SOME part to play in socialism, but controlled by big business there are LOADS OF PROBLEMS

again see the stuff I posted about a survey of African farmers who happened to agree with me. I do know a bit about all this you know. That is why when they surveyed African farmers, they said what I have been saying for years. This is because I know what I'm talking about.

http://ipsnews.net/africa/nota.asp?idnews=53186

[Michaeluj]

You write so much waffle it musta got buried. You need to concentrate on making you point which I dont think you have. Faced with half a fucking page about appeals to authority I'm not gonna be paying much attention am I?

I literally made what I had said in that post as simple as possible. I even quoted EVERYTHING that you needed to understand it! But I forgot that you have no memory, and, it is evidenced by this:

michael wrote:
Anyone can easily see the blindingly obvious that cutting spending reduces GDP. IT'S OBVIOUS! What isn't is that, a, whether the rate and scope of transition is a factor in itself, b, what caused further instability, and, c, do other areas benefit and create more good in a holistic sense?

you wrote:
I have no idea what points A and B are. I have no lack of assurance in my argument.

, because you must have read this part, even if it wasn't quoted by you. You quoted sentences that came directly after this. You must have read it, and figured that A and B have nothing to do with the A and B in the shortened conversation that I made shortly after that. PS: The shortened conversation is the one that looks like a play.
But, anyway, I will have to make it even more simple, and, this time, I'll use EVERYTHING.

You: N(eoliberalism) is at fault.
Me: A(Shock Therapy is bad) and B(Other causes of instability, like monetary policy) and C(other countries that were invested) occurred.
You: No comment, except that C doesn't show that Neoliberalism is perfect*
Me: You are silent about A and B, meaning that you accept these points. If A and B are true, then N may not actually be the correct or biggest cause. Therefore, N, A, B are all possible causes.
Me: Therefore, your entire argument is based on a lack of assurance.

I though shock therapy was part of neoliberalism

/Facepalm.

Wow, are you defining free market economics or are you defining a really bad policy that almost no libertarian would consider valid?

"Friedman condoned the Federal Reserve for causing The Great Depression"

are you sure you mean condoned? This does not make sense.

Why do you think neoliberalism means the complete end of central banking? Friedman didnt think that and neither did Hayek.

Fine, replace with "condemned."

And, like I wrote in the passage you quoted to make this response:

Now, when regarding central banking, I may have focused more on its complete end because I was regarding it in terms of the Austrian theory of the business cycle

Friedman, who was a Monetarist and not and Austrian, would not have necessarily supported the end of central banking. In fact, in the same quoted passage, with the highlighted text actually in there:

I would say that he believed that its use should be minimized and not erratic.

I only ever put Austrian in this argument because you are so keen to say that it was practiced and is a part of "Neoliberalism". If you want to make this argument simpler, just talk about Monetarism. Leave Austrian out, because Austrian has a much more radical monetary policy, and because not even Friedman got his more tame one.

michael wrote:
Yes, and now you know better. Well, I hope so. Since you now, hopefully, understand the monetary policy of both, then you can see that neither were implemented and, so, either economic philosophy, monetarist or austrian, had no participation


So why did Thatcher say that her policies were Hayek's?

Because she wanted to pick and choose? Because she was only using one book which may not cover everything? Because she couldn't enact the most important policies? Because she enacted the correct ones so horribly? There are many possible reasons, and it can show how words don't reflect reality all the time.

Hayek did not think central banking could be ended.

A. He is one man.
B. Please explain why you think this argument exists?
C. None of this really matters because Central Banking became more erratic and/or strong since the 80s, not less. Both Monetarists and Austrians would be unsettled by this.

michael wrote:
Now what does that mean?


It means I'm not interested in or impressed by vague waffle. State your points clearly with support if necessary.

No, really, this is your response to this point?:

Quote:
If you want to define Neoliberalism as just 'some lowered trade barriers and some lowered banking regulation that occurred at any point in the past, and lower corporate tax', then you've safely put up your own barriers to make anything, anything in the world, approaching this painfully vague notion as Neoliberalism. There is more to this theory, and Austrian Economics, than those generalities.

If that is how you're willing to define it, then admit it. If not, then say what it really is. Be detailed, and I do mean it.

what thread? I'm not gonna read another thread, if you think neoliberalism didnt happen just say why. Ending central banking is not necessary for neoliberalism.

Only in the sense that you believe that Austrian theory has had its way by using it, which it doesn't. Even if we were to say that Austrian theory only calls for it to be significantly minimized, you've still got the fact that even this is clearly not the case.
And I have said why, making it obvious time and again. For crying out loud, I devoted an entire thread to why! Go into that thread and find your complaints! I give all of my reasons, explain my methods, and show lots of data. It's really not that hard.
Look, I'll make it easy for you by posting the link a second time:
viewtopic.php?f=26&t=135144

By the way in 2003 Friedman admitted that his advice to Thatcher to target the money supply was not a success.

What was his advice and how was it a failure? Was it enacted poorly, or other reasons?

michael wrote:
1. Number of rules and regulations have increased. This is contrary to free market. Simple.
2. Your own source said that only Uniformed Military Personnel shrank in the government. If they, the Uniformed Military Personnel, are only about the military, then the part of the government that could relate to deregulation did not shrink: it grew. If you can't understand this, like you did in the last few posts, then you are hopeless.


What rules and regulations? In the finance industry and the economy generally the last 30 years were a period of deregulation.

First of all, I'm incredibly amused that you ignored point 2. Allow me to put the reason why in terms which you can comprehend:
You: Here is source for government growth.
Me: Your source says that government in the social sector grew.
You: Uhh....
Me: Your silence indicates that you admit that government social care grew.

Ah, so funny.

Now, regariding point 1, number of total regulations did increase:

However, we can't tell how many went into banking or other parts of the economy. If you can find clear data for banking, then you might have something, but not really: a more radical monetary policy would do more damage to banks with more freedom to move their money.

Heck, your own source even says that regulation has been added every year!

I never said I became addicted ffs! I said junk foods are addictive. They are made to be.

You're quotes indicate that certain foods were made to be delicious, not addictive. Apples were once sour, before then they were created to be basically balls of fruit and sugar, but you never hear of people consuming them with the fervor of a junkie looking for heroine or getting withdrawal symptoms from not eating them. Both addictive and delicious invoke pleasure or satiation upon consumption, so we need some why to differentiate between the two. Addictive is when it hurts to not have the substance. Frankly, your argument seems rather weak when you can only gain moral ground by using "Addictive". 'Corporations should stop making food delicious!' just seems like the kind of argument that no-one takes seriously. Really, the only evidence of food being "addictive" is your say, and you would have to have been a victim to food for me to believe you.
You can claim that this case is special because it's food, which directly affects health, but then we should consider movies, television, the internet, videogames, paintings, sculptures, books, beds, couches, pillows, radio, instruments, and anything else that causes bodily weakness when used so much; should you complain that these things are made 'too well'? Sure, you can claim that some of these provide benefit, like hand-eye coordination for videogames, culture for paintings, something to focus on with instruments; but food keeps us alive and gives us energy, which is no different from the other benefits because it does help us live throughout our lives. It's all about how you use it. Could you complain because food is more directly tied to bad health, while art and games only kill you slowly and not because of obesity? Well, everyone eats while not everyone employs the other tasks (except for needfully sleeping proportionally to their exertion), and is biologically programmed to like foods that provide high energy, which can be converted to fat, and high fat content is unusual for our bodies while muscle weakness may not necessarily be so, so food would be the problematic issue. Nevertheless, problems do occur because people with long years of inactivity from all of those other good hobbies and activities: their hearts become weak, their muscles become atrophied, immune systems are less effective, and so on, costing money. Money is an issue, but isn't the health of every single person? Why should you be concerned about one demographic more than another simply because that demographic spends more on health costs? To hell with the weak and their 'delicious' videogames, you say! Health doesn't matter: money does! We must save money! All unhealthy are not treated equally! I mean, it's either that, or you condemn anything that can remotely hurt if abused. I'm only saying this to see if you'll actually say any of the rebuttals that I expect from this.
Now, if money really does matter most, and the concept of 'delicious' goods is relegated for its universality of detriment, why do people move themselves to this path, knowing that their actions have financial and very real consequences? You will probably, almost certainly, say that they are too poor to have any other means, but then I will point out my method to bring economic calculation to the forefront of monetary policy in order to produce stability and growth, then high wages. Then this argument will be dropped so that we can focus on monetary policy.

If you're going to start talking about how people are too poor to purchase good food, and only that, then it would appear that I pushed away another one of your arguments.

Clearly market calculation is responsible for millions of obese Americans. 74.6% of Americans are overweight or obese. This problem costs America over $140 billion a year in medical costs and economic loss. Obesity kills 100,000 to 400,000 Americans a year. America has the highest obesity rate in the world. Obesity is America's number 1 killer, overtaking smoking in 2004.

Clearly, we need to fund government policy to force everyone into exercise regiments and to eat beans, tofu, and a few of the less sugar-filled fruit. I don't see how else the problem can be solved as long as people want and spend money on this food. Anything to ensure that obesity is automatically gone, right? If they don't have to pay for medical help, then what's stopping them from eating the same food that everyone wants and would vote for?

I dunno wtf you are on about. Read what I posted from the survey of African farmers - they agreed with me.

They seem to have been more inclined to not endure the costs of those products. Without the costs, they might be enthusiastic to have GM crops.

yawn. Oil running out means oil is more expensive and that means a major problem for billions of people. Old people die in the winter because they cant afford to heat their houses. The transition to new technologies is way too slow, and global warming is happening as we speak.

The first few examples are, as I said, fixation.
For the latter, I presume that you believe that a solution is right around the corner; otherwise, how would socialists save the world on time? THERE ARE DISASTERS COMING RIGHT NOW, GO GO GO! If the answer is close enough for your philosophy to make a difference, how can you be so sure that it's not approaching now?

government spending went up when Thatcher first took over, mainly on the military and police. Then she made loads of cuts so it came down. Labout then had to up it a bit to get the health service going again. Then it came back down, so overall it's not changed over 30 years, just fluctuated a bit.

So, with military spending having shrunk significantly since 1982, all other social spending increased since Thatcher? If military spending went down and stayed exactly that low, then, with government spending as a proportion of GDP increasing to today at a level that is consistent with 80s Britain, then only social spending increased? I better draw a picture:

Spending80=Spending in the year 1980, basically before Thatcher could make significant cuts. The date may be off, but it doesn't matter because we both know that I'm talking about the time directly before the cuts, and, also, this is merely to illustrait.
SpendingM=Military Spending. It remains consistent.
Spending2011=Spending today. It's exactly the same as Spending80.
SpendingSocial= social spending, not including military.
Everything is given random numbers to reflect the given data, to simplify.

Spending80=Spending2011 = 100 = 100
Spending80=SpendingM1+SpendingSocial1 = 100 = 50m(military) +50s(ocial)
Spending2011=SpendingM2+SpendingSocial2 = 100 = 25m +75s

Spending80=Spending2011
50m+50s = 25m + 75s

My point is that social spending would have increased if the military decreased, if total spending eventually became similar in size.
Here.

Quote:
Big business which won't exist in socialism?
I have a theory that you're saying that GM crops would be improved without Big Business, but I see that you wrote, "may be some GM crops", so I'm baffled.

Of course big business wont exist in socialism. It would get nationalised. I am saying that MAYBE GM cops would have SOME part to play in socialism, but controlled by big business there are LOADS OF PROBLEMS

I just have no idea why socialists would continue to make them so badly, as your perceive them.





*Fine, that was a typo anyway

[daft punk]

You: N(eoliberalism) is at fault.
Me: A(Shock Therapy is bad) and B(Other causes of instability, like monetary policy) and C(other countries that were invested) occurred.
You: No comment, except that C doesn't show that Neoliberalism is perfect*
Me: You are silent about A and B, meaning that you accept these points. If A and B are true, then N may not actually be the correct or biggest cause. Therefore, N, A, B are all possible causes.
Me: Therefore, your entire argument is based on a lack of assurance.

You didn't say shock therapy was bad you asked if it had taken place. I said that it had and it was actually a neo-liberal practice.
Yes you mentioned monetary policy. Thatcher and Reagan were advised by Friedman, Hayek and the Chicago school. Hence they adopted neo-liberal policies.

Quote:
I though shock therapy was part of neoliberalism


/Facepalm.

Wow, are you defining free market economics or are you defining a really bad policy that almost no libertarian would consider valid?

"There are two types of shock therapy. The first was championed by economist Milton Friedman and which later became absorbed into the group of ideas that formed neoliberalism. "
"The first instance of shock therapy were the neoliberal pro-market reforms of Chile in 1975, carried out after the military coup by Augusto Pinochet. "

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shock_ther ... onomics%29

If you want to make this argument simpler, just talk about Monetarism. Leave Austrian out, because Austrian has a much more radical monetary policy, and because not even Friedman got his more tame one.

I know what you are saying, but it's ridiculous. Thatcher said her policies were Hayek's, yet you say that even the tamer Friedman didnt get his way.

"John Ranelagh writes of Margaret Thatcher's remark at a key Conservative Party meeting in the late 1970's, "Another colleague had also prepared a paper arguing that the middle way was the pragmatic path for the Conservative party to take .. Before he had finished speaking to his paper, the new Party Leader [Margaret Thatcher] reached into her briefcase and took out a book. It was Friedrich von Hayek's The Constitution of Liberty. Interrupting [the speaker], she held the book up for all of us to see. 'This', she said sternly, 'is what we believe', and banged Hayek down on the table." (John Ranelagh, Thatcher's People: An Insider's Account of the Politics, the Power, and the Personalities. London: HarperCollins, 1991.) "
http://hayekcenter.org/friedrichhayek/hayekquote.htm

Quote:
michael wrote:
Yes, and now you know better. Well, I hope so. Since you now, hopefully, understand the monetary policy of both, then you can see that neither were implemented and, so, either economic philosophy, monetarist or austrian, had no participation


So why did Thatcher say that her policies were Hayek's?


Because she wanted to pick and choose? Because she was only using one book which may not cover everything? Because she couldn't enact the most important policies? Because she enacted the correct ones so horribly? There are many possible reasons, and it can show how words don't reflect reality all the time.

You are gonna have to be specific to convince me. In the above quote she is clearly determined to follow his advice. She didnt just read the book, she had meetings with him.

Of course in real life no politician is gonna implement every word of an economist exactly.

Quote:
Hayek did not think central banking could be ended.


A. He is one man.
B. Please explain why you think this argument exists?
C. None of this really matters because Central Banking became more erratic and/or strong since the 80s, not less. Both Monetarists and Austrians would be unsettled by this.

I thought he was the man. I dont know why the argument exists, I just know that you seem to think that you have to get rid of central banking to have neoliberalism. Despite the fact that the two big names of neoliberalism dont agree. Central banking was erratic because different governments tried different things as the world economy went through convulsions.

Marx predicted: "by paving the way for more extensive and more destructive crises, and by diminishing the means whereby crises are prevented"

No, really, this is your response to this point?:

Quote:
Quote:
If you want to define Neoliberalism as just 'some lowered trade barriers and some lowered banking regulation that occurred at any point in the past, and lower corporate tax', then you've safely put up your own barriers to make anything, anything in the world, approaching this painfully vague notion as Neoliberalism. There is more to this theory, and Austrian Economics, than those generalities.


If that is how you're willing to define it, then admit it. If not, then say what it really is. Be detailed, and I do mean it.

Neo-liberalism is free trade. It is:

Privatisation
Removal of trade tarifs
Deregulation
Removal of restrictions on capital flows and investment
Increased restrictions on workers organisation
Reduced public expenditure
Pushing the bourgeois ideology of individualism as opposed to socialist ones
Economic globalisation

The free market was created in England in the 1800s after Adam Smith wrote the wealth of nations. England had a bourgeois rule from 1640 but mercantilism etc was not swept away instantly. The new capitalist class had to take power and establish themselves. This was the liberal vision - the free market. Neoliberalism is a return to that after Keynesianism.

Quote:
what thread? I'm not gonna read another thread, if you think neoliberalism didnt happen just say why. Ending central banking is not necessary for neoliberalism.


Only in the sense that you believe that Austrian theory has had its way by using it, which it doesn't. Even if we were to say that Austrian theory only calls for it to be significantly minimized, you've still got the fact that even this is clearly not the case.
And I have said why, making it obvious time and again. For crying out loud, I devoted an entire thread to why! Go into that thread and find your complaints! I give all of my reasons, explain my methods, and show lots of data. It's really not that hard.
Look, I'll make it easy for you by posting the link a second time:
viewtopic.php?f=26&t=135144

I know what you are saying. That the neoliberalism of the last 30 years wasnt enough, you like make out it never even happened. You are saying the medicine that made us sick did so because we didn't take enough. A bigger dose of your poison becomes a beneficial thing, homoeopathy in reverse.

If only we had gone further!

Quote:
what thread? I'm not gonna read another thread, if you think neoliberalism didnt happen just say why. Ending central banking is not necessary for neoliberalism.


Only in the sense that you believe that Austrian theory has had its way by using it, which it doesn't. Even if we were to say that Austrian theory only calls for it to be significantly minimized, you've still got the fact that even this is clearly not the case.
And I have said why, making it obvious time and again. For crying out loud, I devoted an entire thread to why! Go into that thread and find your complaints! I give all of my reasons, explain my methods, and show lots of data. It's really not that hard.
Look, I'll make it easy for you by posting the link a second time:
viewtopic.php?f=26&t=135144

ok I will have a look when I get time

Quote:
By the way in 2003 Friedman admitted that his advice to Thatcher to target the money supply was not a success.


What was his advice and how was it a failure? Was it enacted poorly, or other reasons?

"The 1980s economic policies of Margaret Thatcher and General Pinochet were inspired--and defended--by Mr Friedman. However, in 2003, he admitted that one of those policies, the targeting of the money supply, had "not been a success" and that he doubted he would "as of today push it as hard as I once did"."
economist.com A-Z

Quote:
michael wrote:
1. Number of rules and regulations have increased. This is contrary to free market. Simple.
2. Your own source said that only Uniformed Military Personnel shrank in the government. If they, the Uniformed Military Personnel, are only about the military, then the part of the government that could relate to deregulation did not shrink: it grew. If you can't understand this, like you did in the last few posts, then you are hopeless.


What rules and regulations? In the finance industry and the economy generally the last 30 years were a period of deregulation.


First of all, I'm incredibly amused that you ignored point 2. Allow me to put the reason why in terms which you can comprehend:
You: Here is source for government growth.
Me: Your source says that government in the social sector grew.
You: Uhh....
Me: Your silence indicates that you admit that government social care grew.

Ah, so funny.

I didnt ignore 2 I meant to check it and forgot, I assumed you were mistaken. The number of civilian federal employees fell from 3 million in 1967 to 2.76 million in 2010. So there was a fall. However on average it has fluctuated around those numbers. But the population of America grew by 50% over this period, so relatively speaking the size of even the civilian number fell as a proportion.

Ah, so funny.

Now, regariding point 1, number of total regulations did increase:
However, we can't tell how many went into banking or other parts of the economy. If you can find clear data for banking, then you might have something, but not really: a more radical monetary policy would do more damage to banks with more freedom to move their money.

Heck, your own source even says that regulation has been added every year!

the number of regulations doesnt tell you the real story

The banking industry was deregulated of the last 3 decades as was the economy generally.

Lets take a look at what some of the world's top economists and finacial commentators have said:

Financial Times October 2008
"The combination of such guarantees with deregulation has proved lethal. Moral hazard is far from meaningless."
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/6e23cdc8-a517 ... z1j9GsMwIR

Again, FT October 2008
"Karl Marx was wrong about many things, but in 1893 he provided as good an account of today's financial implosion as any living commentator. "To the possessor of money capital, the process of production appears merely as an unavoidable intermediate link, as a necessary evil for the sake of money- making. All nations with a capitalist mode of production are therefore seized periodically by a feverish attempt to make money without the intervention of the process of production."

That passage from Das Kapital is a fine description of the financialisation of the economies of the English-speaking countries in recent years and of the resulting credit bubble. As always in financial history, the feverish attempt to make money has now given way to a fevered urge to find someone to blame."

"In an era of deregulation and liberalisation, markets appeared to rule."

FT again a few days ago
"High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut & paste the article. See our Ts&Cs and Copyright Policy for more detail. Email ftsales.support@ft.com to buy additional rights. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/fb95b4fe-3863 ... z1j9JyAiu8

Much of that frustration relates to the banks. In contrast to the 1930s, when banking was about deposit-taking and lending, modern bankers engage in complex trading that they themselves do not always understand and whose social utility is not apparent to ordinary mortals – or even to the likes of Lord Turner, head of the UK Financial Services Authority, who famously declared that many parts of the banking business had “grown beyond a socially reasonable size”. Many have shown a disregard for their customers, while fiduciary obligation has become a casualty of deregulation and the shareholder value revolution. There is a widespread conviction that these bankers constitute a protected class who enjoy bonuses regardless of performance, while relying on the taxpayer to socialise their losses when they have taken excessive risks. At the same time, the public is aware that top executive rewards more generally are poorly related to performance and tend to go up even when profits fall."

Everyone knows it. I already quoted the economist I think:

"Deregulation

Cutting red tape. The process of removing legal or quasi-legal restrictions on the amount of COMPETITION, the sorts of business done, or the PRICES charged within a particular industry. During the last two decades of the 20th century, many governments committed to the free market pursued policies of LIBERALISATION based on substantial amounts of deregulation hand-in-hand with the PRIVATISATION of industries owned by the state. The aim was to decrease the role of GOVERNMENT in the economy and to increase competition."

You're quotes indicate that certain foods were made to be delicious, not addictive.

Are you serious, when one was headed ""Junk food 'as addictive as heroin and smoking'""

Dont say stuff that is clearly untrue.

here is another

"The researchers found that rats offered junk food quickly became so attached to it that they would endure painful but harmless electric shocks to their feet in order to eat it. They would even prefer to starve themselves rather than eat the "salad bar option" of the typical rodent food eaten by rats that had never had junk food.

When the scientists analysed the brains of the junk-food rats they found that a key pleasure-reward system known to be involved in triggering drug addiction in humans was overstimulated, causing the animals to eat more and more food in order to enjoy the same chemical "high" felt in their brains."

""It presents the most thorough and compelling evidence that drug addiction and obesity are based on the same underlying neurobiological mechanisms," said Professor Paul Kenny at the Scripps Research Institute in Jupiter, Florida.

"The animals completely lost control over their eating behaviour, the primary hallmark of addiction. They continued to overeat even when they anticipated receiving electric shocks, highlighting just how motivated they were to consume the palatable food."

The three-year study, published in the journal Nature Neuroscience, tried to reproduce a diet for rats based on the sort of high-calorie, high-fat food known to contribute to human obesity. The scientists found that it was easy to accustom the rats to eating such delicacies as sausages and cheesecake.

"They always went for the worst types of food and, as a result, they took in twice the calories as the control rats. When we removed the junk food and tried to put them on a nutritious diet – what we call the 'salad bar option' – they simply refused to eat," Professor Kenny said.

"The change in their diet was so great that they basically starved themselves for two weeks after they were cut off from their junk food."

Rats showing an addiction-like behaviour towards junk food also had fewer dopamine D2 receptors in a part of the brain called the striatum compared to ordinary rats. These receptors are responsible for triggering a response to dopamine, a neurochemical that transmits signals between certain brain cells involved in the feeling of pleasure towards things like food, sex and drugs.

Fewer D2 receptors in the striatum of the human brain are associated with drug addiction, as well as a genetic predisposition towards obesity. In the case of the rats, they compensated for the fall in receptors by eating more junk food in order to stimulate the less-sensitive pleasure-reward pathway in the brain, Professor Kenny said."
http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style ... 29982.html

Dont waste my time

[Michaeluj]

You didn't say shock therapy was bad you asked if it had taken place. I said that it had and it was actually a neo-liberal practice.
Yes you mentioned monetary policy. Thatcher and Reagan were advised by Friedman, Hayek and the Chicago school. Hence they adopted neo-liberal policies.

I think you're referring to fiscal policy, policy relating to how much is spent, not how money is designed to enter, leave, and go through the economy.

And I did say that shock therapy is bad. I even used it in an argument to explain why Neoliberalism could be the fault of historical circumstance.
Nevertheless, you have shown, by Friedman changing his mind about fiscal policy, that they, the advisers, could be wrong. I think you, also, admitted that politicians may not support policies or even support them correctly, but, if you did not, it's still a valid point. Thirdly, Chicago and Austrian monetary policies are conflicting and also haven't been achieved-- as I will show later. Monetary policy is important, because it is the adhesive the prevents collapse.

"There are two types of shock therapy. The first was championed by economist Milton Friedman and which later became absorbed into the group of ideas that formed neoliberalism. "
"The first instance of shock therapy were the neoliberal pro-market reforms of Chile in 1975, carried out after the military coup by Augusto Pinochet. "

Ah, so you're saying that libertarianism is wrong because a politically and commonly purported version of it included a policy that I, and the man who 'spearheaded' it, disagree on: Shock therapy? That's like me saying that socialism is wrong because the USSR was a dictatorship or because computers didn't exist, because my only example is loaded with baggage that don't disprove the whole thing.
You know what, maybe we should skip whether Neoliberalism, as libertarianism, existed or not, and focus on monetary policy. Because you have clearly defined the topic as something utterly unsuitable for providing examples of practical failure of theoretical economics.

I know what you are saying, but it's ridiculous. Thatcher said her policies were Hayek's, yet you say that even the tamer Friedman didnt get his way.

"John Ranelagh writes of Margaret Thatcher's remark at a key Conservative Party meeting in the late 1970's, "Another colleague had also prepared a paper arguing that the middle way was the pragmatic path for the Conservative party to take .. Before he had finished speaking to his paper, the new Party Leader [Margaret Thatcher] reached into her briefcase and took out a book. It was Friedrich von Hayek's The Constitution of Liberty. Interrupting [the speaker], she held the book up for all of us to see. 'This', she said sternly, 'is what we believe', and banged Hayek down on the table." (John Ranelagh, Thatcher's People: An Insider's Account of the Politics, the Power, and the Personalities. London: HarperCollins, 1991.) "

If George Bush put down the Bible, would we have no usury, pray more often, and other such laws?
Anyway, from what I could read of that book, I have a backup argument: If he did support these theories of monetary policy, then you're arguing around me by not arguing against my points! You might as well say, "So you're a libertarian because you want to enslave black people as literal slaves?" However much Hayek disagreed with the Austrian School's monetary policy, I have to disagree about it and, therefore, the amount that the Austrian School was involved.

In fact, allow me to point out how central banking became more unstable:


When it is reduced, investment is increased, but it is based on economic figures that are basically a lie. The cost of money should reflect the amount of savings, which should reflect how many resources have not been consumed. When rates go back up, the price of resources that did not exist for use go back up as well, leaving a swath of financial burdens on whoever tried to utilize them.
Before the 80s, it was bad as well, but at least it went in an upward direction, encouraging reduced spending rather than more. Also, after that point, rates were enabled to remain stable after a time, encouraging a feeling of safety to push for more spending within each occurrence of a flat rate keeping prices predictable for a time, so, when rates were suddenly arisen, a fully entrenched economic structure, not just the initial investments made during that time, become irrelevant, heightening economic decay.
By encouraging wasteful spending and by employing the same sharp changes only after noticeable periods of safety, an overall decline would emerge. Central banking did not become weaker.
Hey look, you even wrote that as well:

Central banking was erratic because different governments tried different things as the world economy went through convulsions.

You are gonna have to be specific to convince me. In the above quote she is clearly determined to follow his advice. She didnt just read the book, she had meetings with him.

Of course in real life no politician is gonna implement every word of an economist exactly.

I'm starting to think that this path of arguing path has become moot, because of shock therapy.

Neo-liberalism is free trade. It is:

Privatisation
Removal of trade tarifs
Deregulation
Removal of restrictions on capital flows and investment
Increased restrictions on workers organisation
Reduced public expenditure
Pushing the bourgeois ideology of individualism as opposed to socialist ones
Economic globalisation

And did those have to occur at any one point, regardless of what happens to those points in the future?

I know what you are saying. That the neoliberalism of the last 30 years wasnt enough, you like make out it never even happened. You are saying the medicine that made us sick did so because we didn't take enough. A bigger dose of your poison becomes a beneficial thing, homoeopathy in reverse.

Nope, just poorly implemented. After that, we could go farther.

"The 1980s economic policies of Margaret Thatcher and General Pinochet were inspired--and defended--by Mr Friedman. However, in 2003, he admitted that one of those policies, the targeting of the money supply, had "not been a success" and that he doubted he would "as of today push it as hard as I once did"."
economist.com A-Z

Even Milton Friedman agrees with me that shock therapy was stupid. You're really pushing a little in the wrong direction when trying to prove that libertarianism is clearly as problem.

The number of civilian federal employees fell from 3 million in 1967 to 2.76 million in 2010. So there was a fall. However on average it has fluctuated around those numbers. But the population of America grew by 50% over this period, so relatively speaking the size of even the civilian number fell as a proportion.

What's particularly interesting is that this proves that Clinton was Neoliberal, huh? I mean, either the public is wrong for assuming that he isn't, or you are for using this as proof of Neoliberalism's existence; and you wouldn't want your evidence backed up by common views to be rendered moot, would you?
Anyway, we should consider how much power each politician wields, whether regulations increased or not, state government regulation and size, and whether we are truly more Neoliberal than the very low regulations of the 60s.

the number of regulations doesnt tell you the real story

The banking industry was deregulated of the last 3 decades as was the economy generally.

In other words, "Screw data, I won't even post my own, because I've got potential idiots, the mislead, and biased on my side pushing out jargon without evidence."
I'm really starting to think that this part of the argument is fruitless, because it's all just going to end with the efficacy of monetary policy being shown as the crux of the matter.

Are you serious, when one was headed ""Junk food 'as addictive as heroin and smoking'""

The report uses evidence that the rats don't want to eat their old food (presumably pellets) and that they get less happy from them. Would you like to go to raw meat and pellets after eating whatever food you ate throughout your life?
Nevertheless, the term "addition" means differently based on the person, and food only has certain aspects of addiction.

How do you decide if something is addictive? A technical journal feels obligated to question whether food acts on the brain's neural pathways like famously addictive drugs - such as heroin and cocaine - do. And the answer is (this is my paraphrase), "In some ways yes, in some ways no. Why do you ask?" The list of follow-up articles gives a good sense of what this debate looks like:

Obesity - is food addiction to blame?
Food and addiction - sugars, fats and hedonic overeating.
Food addiction not helpful: The hedonic component - implicit wanting - is important.
All foods are habit forming - what I want to know is which will kill me!
Important next steps in evaluating food's addictive potential.
In fact, the history of addiction is replete with questions of when to split hairs and when to subsume new objects into the addictive pantheon - from nicotine and cocaine in the 1980s, to marijuana in the 1990s, moving forward to gambling and potentially the Internet and sex currently.

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/add ... wants-know

[daft punk]

I'm not gonna go through this line by line. You have already derailed the thread. As far as I'm concerned neo-liberalism happened throughout the world from 1979 onwards. Britain and America got right wing leaders who were influenced by Hayek and Friedman. After that came New Labour which was more of the same. Privatisation, cuts in social spending, deregulation, free trade etc, it all happened. It is still ongoing, with the Tories in Britain launching savage cuts.

Lets have a quick roundup of typical opinions:

a few typical books on the subject:
"Anchored in the principles of the free-market economics, 'neoliberalism' has been associated with such different political leaders as Ronald Reagan, Margaret Thatcher, Bill Clinton, Tony Blair, Augusto Pinochet, and Junichiro Koizumi. In its heyday during the late 1990s, neoliberalism emerged as the world's dominant economic paradigm stretching from the Anglo-American heartlands of capitalism to the former communist bloc all the way to the developing regions of the global South. At the dawn of the new century, however, neoliberalism has been discredited as the global economy, built on its principles, has been shaken to its core by a financial calamity not seen since the dark years of the 1930s. "
Neoliberalism - Very Short Introductions

by Manfred B. Steger, Ravi K. Roy
Publisher
Oxford University Press




"The financial crisis seemed to present a fundamental challenge to neo-liberalism, the body of ideas that have constituted the political orthodoxy of most advanced economies in recent decades. Colin Crouch argues in this book that it will shrug off this challenge. The reason is that while neo-liberalism seems to be about free markets, in practice it is concerned with the dominance over public life of the giant corporation. This has been intensified, not checked, by the recent financial crisis and acceptance that certain financial corporations are ‘too big to fail'. "

The Strange Non-Death of Neo-Liberalism

by Colin Crouch
Publisher
Polity Press



"Neoliberalism - the doctrine that market exchange is an ethic in itself, capable of acting as a guide for all human action - has become dominant in both thought and practice throughout much of the world since 1970 or so. Its spread has depended upon a reconstitution of state powers such that privatization, finance, and market processes are emphasized. State interventions in the economy are minimized, while the obligations of the state to provide for the welfare of its citizens are diminished. "

A Brief History of Neoliberalism

by David Harvey
Publisher
Oxford University Press




one of the most important economic websites:

"The source of the current global economic crisis lies deeply in U.S.-style neoliberal capitalism, or contemporary laissez faire."


http://www.economonitor.com/blog/2011/0 ... iberalism/

The boss of that website was voted the most influential economist in the world by Forbes. It is a pro-capitalist website and a $ multi million financial advice service. But they are honest. In fact Roubini was famous for predicting the 2008 crash a couple of years earlier at the IMF - everyone laughed at the time and called him a Cassandra. He was nicknamed Dr Doom by the New York Times.

That sums it up. The right wing neoliberals largely got their way over the last 30 years, but because it ended in global crisis they pretend it never happened.

In a hysterical frenzy the right wing run around calling Obama a socialist, scared that their feeding frenzy may end, while in fact it is not really ending as in Britain we have Tories in power and in America you have a politician who had to pretend he was gonna make a few changes to benefit the masses after 8 years of Bush.

I'm not interested in the theories of the neoliberals. They were doomed to failure.

read this

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/arc ... coup/7364/

"The Quiet Coup

The crash has laid bare many unpleasant truths about the United States. One of the most alarming, says a former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund, is that the finance industry has effectively captured our government—a state of affairs that more typically describes emerging markets, and is at the center of many emerging-market crises. If the IMF’s staff could speak freely about the U.S., it would tell us what it tells all countries in this situation: recovery will fail unless we break the financial oligarchy that is blocking essential reform. And if we are to prevent a true depression, we’re running out of time.
By Simon Johnson
"

[Michaeluj]

I derailed it? I could swear that the argument went like this:

Me: Let's talk about economic calculation.
You: Ah, but a system can't be efficient, or at least worthwhile, if unemployment exists.
Me: That's why I'm a libertarian.
You: ...

...

...

SSSSSSTTTTTTTTRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAWWWWWWWWMMMMMMMMAAAAAAANNNNNNNNN!!!

(By which I mean, 'Libertarianism has run the world because a bunch of people said that Neoliberalism had run the world by simply guessing that only financial regulations have both stayed shrunk and are the only ones that matter, also this generic notion of increased trade; it became dependent on monetary policy that you think actually helped ruin it and modern economics in general; it used the political tool of shock therapy which is not economic tool for libertarianism; it still happened even though non-military social spending as a proportion of GDP rose; and let's not forget that a bunch of likely ignoramuses used Neolibertarianism as a buzzword to get popular with the crowds.'

In short, argue against my economic policies and don't try to hide behind the words of others.

In a hysterical frenzy the right wing run around calling Obama a socialist, scared that their feeding frenzy may end, while in fact it is not really ending as in Britain we have Tories in power and in America you have a politician who had to pretend he was gonna make a few changes to benefit the masses after 8 years of Bush.

So what you're saying is that a prominent portion of the population is claiming something audacious and obviously untruthful? Well, I guess that puts everyone else, your witnesses, in a state of untrustworthy-ness.

I'm not interested in the theories of the neoliberals. They were doomed to failure.

Well, with the way you are willing to define them, so broad and without much concern for policy changes across time, you could easily pick and choose which cases are successes and which are failures (the failures are Neoliberals). But, in the end, you have been arguing against an economic system and using criteria against it which even I would consider meddlesome with economic efficiency. So, shall we argue libertarianism, or should we argue your strawman of libertarianism --- which, in case you weren't paying attention, is Neoliberalism?

[daft punk]

Quote:
In a hysterical frenzy the right wing run around calling Obama a socialist, scared that their feeding frenzy may end, while in fact it is not really ending as in Britain we have Tories in power and in America you have a politician who had to pretend he was gonna make a few changes to benefit the masses after 8 years of Bush.



So what you're saying is that a prominent portion of the population is claiming something audacious and obviously untruthful? Well, I guess that puts everyone else, your witnesses, in a state of untrustworthy-ness.

Try to write in a straightforward manner. I dont wanna struggle to figure out each bit. Dont play guessing games and so on, just say explicitly what your point is, otherwise I cant be arsed.

What 'witnesses'? What 'everyone else'? Are you saying Obama is a socialist? Are you saying that a prominent portion of the population says Obama is a socialist and they are right, so that makes me untrustworthy.

What I am saying is that the people who call Obama a socialist are clueless. Some think he is because others tell them that. Some just say it because they want to steer public opinion in a neo-liberal direction.

Quote:
I'm not interested in the theories of the neoliberals. They were doomed to failure.


Well, with the way you are willing to define them, so broad and without much concern for policy changes across time, you could easily pick and choose which cases are successes and which are failures (the failures are Neoliberals). But, in the end, you have been arguing against an economic system and using criteria against it which even I would consider meddlesome with economic efficiency. So, shall we argue libertarianism, or should we argue your strawman of libertarianism --- which, in case you weren't paying attention, is Neoliberalism?

The failure is the global crash of 2008 which is still ongoing. I do not understand your last sentence, you said neoliberalism never happened but should have all through this thread. Why suddenly mention libertarianism and discard neoliberalism?

[Michaeluj]

What 'witnesses'? What 'everyone else'? Are you saying Obama is a socialist? Are you saying that a prominent portion of the population says Obama is a socialist and they are right, so that makes me untrustworthy.

What I am saying is that the people who call Obama a socialist are clueless. Some think he is because others tell them that. Some just say it because they want to steer public opinion in a neo-liberal direction.

Ouch, it hurts that you were so close to getting it. You should have written:

Are you saying that a prominent portion of the population says Obama is a socialist and they are wrong, so that makes them untrustworthy and, therefore, my use of members of the population to prove my point is rendered moot? Are you saying that, by accepting a large portion of the population as idiots, that I may be risking the veracity of my own evidence pertaining to large numbers of people?

What I am saying is that the people who call Obama a socialist are clueless. Some think he is because others tell them that. Some just say it because they want to steer public opinion in a neo-liberal direction.

So, it's only because you think that they're wrong that they're "clueless" and "steer[ed]", and, by the same merit, that your authorities are right because you already agree with them.

The failure is the global crash of 2008 which is still ongoing. I do not understand your last sentence, you said neoliberalism never happened but should have all through this thread. Why suddenly mention libertarianism and discard neoliberalism?

If you're so stubborn to define Neoliberalism as a bag of shock therapy and reckless monetary policy, then I have absolutely no reason to care for it. This use makes me so unconcerned for Neoliberalism as you defined it, that you might as well be arguing that I should defend socialism for ruling the world for the last few decades: I simply disagree with your idea of Neoliberalism to the point where debating against it is pointless. Because you also used it so poorly, giving it such vague notions as 'any deregulation in the past' and 'less gigantic trade barriers' and 'screw monetary police' and 'fiscal policy doesn't matter because proportion of government in of population only matters even though Clinton was responsible for that', you have basically ignored inconvenient trends, or used vague words of 'deregulation' to support a lack of data, and you blatantly ignored Clinton and monetary policy, thus making me want to show that Neoliberalism never actually existed. Social spending as a proportion of GDP, at least in America, increased, and the proportion of government employees to the population merely indicates that Clinton was a Neoliberal who actually didn't decrease social spending (that's excluding military) but merely increased spending much, much slower than GDP grew. I hate it when people throw the word "Neoliberalism", as a form of libertarianism, around everywhere simply because everyone else is saying it. 'But of course deregulation happened: everyone is saying it!'
That's stupid. I want data.

[daft punk]

Yes anyone who says Obama is a socialist is clueless and that has nothing to do with the credibility of most financial commentators who say we had neoliberalism for the last 30 years.

If you're so stubborn to define Neoliberalism as a bag of shock therapy and reckless monetary policy, then I have absolutely no reason to care for it. This use makes me so unconcerned for Neoliberalism as you defined it, that you might as well be arguing that I should defend socialism for ruling the world for the last few decades: I simply disagree with your idea of Neoliberalism to the point where debating against it is pointless. Because you also used it so poorly, giving it such vague notions as 'any deregulation in the past' and 'less gigantic trade barriers' and 'screw monetary police' and 'fiscal policy doesn't matter because proportion of government in of population only matters even though Clinton was responsible for that', you have basically ignored inconvenient trends, or used vague words of 'deregulation' to support a lack of data, and you blatantly ignored Clinton and monetary policy, thus making me want to show that Neoliberalism never actually existed. Social spending as a proportion of GDP, at least in America, increased, and the proportion of government employees to the population merely indicates that Clinton was a Neoliberal who actually didn't decrease social spending (that's excluding military) but merely increased spending much, much slower than GDP grew. I hate it when people throw the word "Neoliberalism", as a form of libertarianism, around everywhere simply because everyone else is saying it. 'But of course deregulation happened: everyone is saying it!'
That's stupid. I want data.

American social spending is 14.8%, half that of Denmark and Sweden. Lower than Japan. Lower than most advanced countries.



I showed you that the number of non-military government employees had dropped slightly since the 1960, but the population increased by 50%, so relative to that the number of government employees has dropped accordingly.

The USA government spends about the same % of GDP as Canada and Australia, but Australia and Canada have free healthcare for all and pay unemployment benefit indefinitely. Australian and Canada also have significantly lower debt.

Of course a lot of American government spending is bailing out the rich and so on.

My definition of the world being neoliberal is mainstream. It is also based on politicians like Thatcher following Hayek and Friedman and it is based on the policies adopted. It might not be quite what your libertarian voodoo blogs require in their imaginary world, but it is neoliberalism as practised by the capitalist class since the 1970s.

You want data on deregulation?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gramm%E2%8 ... Bliley_Act

The Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act (GLB), also known as the Financial Services Modernization Act of 1999, (Pub.L. 106-102, 113 Stat. 1338, enacted November 12, 1999) is an act of the 106th United States Congress (1999–2001). It repealed part of the Glass–Steagall Act of 1933, removing barriers in the market among banking companies, securities companies and insurance companies that prohibited any one institution from acting as any combination of an investment bank, a commercial bank, and an insurance company. With the passage of the Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act, commercial banks, investment banks, securities firms, and insurance companies were allowed to consolidate. The legislation was signed into law by President Bill Clinton.

Criticisms

Many believe that the Act directly helped cause the 2007 subprime mortgage financial crisis. President Barack Obama has stated that GLB led to deregulation that, among other things, allowed for the creation of giant financial supermarkets that could own investment banks, commercial banks and insurance firms, something banned since the Great Depression. Its passage, critics also say, cleared the way for companies that were too big and intertwined to fail.[22] Economists Robert Ekelund and Mark Thornton have also criticized the Act as contributing to the crisis. They state that "in a world regulated by a gold standard, 100% reserve banking, and no FDIC deposit insurance" the Financial Services Modernization Act would have made "perfect sense" as a legitimate act of deregulation, but under the present fiat monetary system it "amounts to corporate welfare for financial institutions and a moral hazard that will make taxpayers pay dearly."[23]

Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz has also argued that the Act helped to create the crisis.[24] An article in the liberal publication The Nation asserted that the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act was responsible for the creation of entities that took on more risk due to their being considered “too big to fail."[25]

just one example, it started in the 80s:

Big Bang (financial markets)

The phrase Big Bang, used in reference to the sudden deregulation of financial markets, was coined to describe measures, including abolition of fixed commission charges and of the distinction between stockjobbers and stockbrokers on the London Stock Exchange and change from open-outcry to electronic, screen-based trading, enacted by the United Kingdom government in 1986. The day the London Stock Exchange's rules changed, 27 October 1986, was dubbed the "Big Bang" because of the increase in market activity expected from an aggregation of measures designed to precipitate a complete alteration in the structure of the market.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bang_% ... markets%29


Note the phrase big bang to refer to the deregulation. It implies, to me, something large and sudden. Maybe to you it implies 'small implosion' or 'not much happened'. Or 'the universe is imaginary'.

Consequences

The effects of Big Bang were dramatic, with London's place as a financial capital decisively strengthened, to the point where it is arguably the world's most important financial centre even to the present day. An economic boom created a new class of nouveau riche that has persisted for two decades, and the boom expanded beyond the City into new developments in the Isle of Dogs area, particularly that of Canary Wharf. Deregulation stimulated financial innovation and enabled new entrants to provide services.

Some critics have charged that the deregulation, and the atmosphere that it created, were responsible for such scandals as the Barings collapse, although others argue the opposite, that the failure to disestablish the old boys' networks completely was to blame.

In May 2011, The Guardian's economic editor, Larry Elliot, wrote: "There is a simple reason why output is still 4% below its peak and growing only slowly: the debt-driven model of economic growth deployed in the 25 years from the financial deregulation of the 1980s to the bank run at Northern Rock no longer delivers."[1]

Heres something written before the crash, in 2002 by some financial consultancy

In the 1970s, commercial bank faced restrictions on interest rates, both on the deposit and lending sides of their business. They were restricted for the most part to classic financial intermediation – deposit taking and lending – to the exclusion, for example, of underwriting many corporate securities and insurance products. And, banks were limited in the geographical scope of their operations. No state permitted banks headquartered in other states either to open branches or to buy their banks, and many states prohibited or restricted intrastate branching.
Today, almost all of these restrictions have been lifted. Interest rate ceilings on deposits were phased out in the early 1980s, state usury laws have been weakened because banks may now lend anywhere, limits to banks’ ability to engage in other financial activities have been almost completely eliminated, as have restrictions on the geographical scope of banking. As a result, our banking system is now more competitive and more consolidated than ever – both vertically and horizontally.
This paper focuses on how one dimension of this broad-based deregulation – the removal of limits on bank entry and expansion – affected economic performance. In a nutshell, the results suggest that this regulatory change was followed by better performance of the real economy.

http://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j& ... xQ&cad=rja

random stuff

How Deregulation Eviscerated the Banking Sector Safety Net and Spawned the U.S. Financial Crisis

By Shah Gilani, Capital Waves Strategist, Money Morning
http://moneymorning.com/2009/01/13/dere ... al-crisis/

The Depository Institutions Deregulation and Monetary Control Act of 1980, signed into law by President Jimmy Carter, was the first major reform of the U.S. banking system since the Great Depression.

While touted as a boon to consumers, the law was actually a gold mine for bankers. Among other requirements and banker "gifts" the 1980 Act's provisions:

Lowered the mandatory reserve requirements banks keep in non-interest bearing accounts at U.S. Federal Reserve banks.
Established a five-member committee, the Depository Institutions Deregulation Committee, to phase out federal interest rate ceilings on deposit accounts over a six-year period.
Increased Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC) coverage from $40,000 to $100,000.
Allowed depository institutions, including savings and loans and other thrift institutions, access to the Federal Reserve Discount Window for credit advances.
And pre-empted state usury laws that limited the rates lenders could charge on residential mortgage loans.

In 1980, in a virtual landslide, Ronald Reagan was elected and grabbed the conservative mantle. A year later, the shock troops of the heralded Reagan Revolution launched their attack and embarked on a massive, systematic de-regulatory campaign. President Reagan's first treasury secretary, former Merrill Lynch & Co. Chief Executive Officer Donald T. Regan, became chairman of the Depository Institutions Deregulation Committee.

In a burst of deregulatory bravado in 1982, Treasury Secretary Regan ushered through the Garn-St. Germain Depository Institutions Act. Key provisions of the Act ultimately coalesced with Treasury Secretary Regan's protection of the lucrative "brokered deposits" business, in which Merrill was a major player, and paved the way for the future collapse of the savings and loan industry.

Some of the provisions in that 1982 Act would later be blamed for thousands of bank failures. The provisions permitted the following:

Allowed savings and loans to make commercial, corporate, business or agricultural loans of up to 10% of their assets.
Authorized a capital assistance program – the "Net Worth Certificate Program" – for dangerously undercapitalized banks, under which the Federal Savings and Loan Insurance Corp. (FSLIC) and the FDIC would purchase capital instruments called "Net Worth Certificates" from savings institutions with net worth/asset ratios of less than 3.0%, and would theoretically later redeem the certificates as these shaky banks regained financial health.
And, most frighteningly, raised the allowable ceiling on direct investments by savings institutions in nonresidential real estate from 20% to 40% of assets.

The history of S&L greed and fraud – which resulted from brokered deposits and deregulation – wasn't forgotten by legislators. But it was steamrolled by bankers pursuing an even greater unshackling of the regulations that constrained their ambitions.

and so on

[Michaeluj]

Yes anyone who says Obama is a socialist is clueless and that has nothing to do with the credibility of most financial commentators who say we had neoliberalism for the last 30 years.

Yep, bias.

American social spending is 14.8%, half that of Denmark and Sweden. Lower than Japan. Lower than most advanced countries.

So less social spending to more social spending = Neoliberalism if more social spending < social spending elsewhere? Congradulations, you just proved that America hasn't had to reduce social spending: it was always Neoliberal, if all that matters is that it has less social spending than today's Canada, or The United Kingdom, or Poland--

Wait....

Poland had significant reductions in privatizations in the past, and probably regulations; and, since the growth of regulations can still mean that Neoliberalism is occurring even today, does this mean that Poland is actually Neoliberal? Or is Neoliberal strictly defined as 'More social spending as a percentage of GDP than Britain'? Or are you going to say that it has to strictly have shock therapy to be Neoliberal, saying that libertarianism only existed because of an inherently detrimental creation policy and thus forcing me to disagree about Neoliberalism being pertinent to this argument? Or are you going to continue arguing around me, trying to avoid the topic of libertarianism in terms of economic calculation by straw-manning me by showing that this notion of Neoliberalism is proof that I'm wrong?

I showed you that the number of non-military government employees had dropped slightly since the 1960, but the population increased by 50%, so relative to that the number of government employees has dropped accordingly.

Yes, you did, and I don't deny that, but the only shrinkage occurred during the Clinton Presidency, and, also, same number of politicians could have more power; and more regulations could be maintained by the legal system and not the political one. Therefore, unless we're willing to define Neoliberalism by government numbers as a percentage of population alone, and we are willing to admit that Clinton was Neoliberal, this part of the argument would have more walls barring progress of the debate than anything else. Neverthleless, you are still straw-manning me by saying that exacerbated monetary policy and shock therapy mixed in with rapid globalization is evident of libertarianism's faults.

Australian and Canada also have significantly lower debt.

I have literally no idea why you said that, unless you're willing to brag or let your biases get in the way of your argumentative judgements of what's pertinent to the discussion.

My definition of the USSR being communist is mainstream. It is also based on politicians like Stalin followingMarx and Hegel and it is based on the policies adopted. It might not be quite what my communist voodoo blogs require in their imaginary world, but it is communism as practised by the socialists since the early 20th century.

That was ... actually spooky.
I can't believe that I haven't seen it before: people spew nonsense of Neoliberalism, especially as a form of libertarianism, existing, while people espouse the notion that "communism" existed. Heck, you can even replace "communism" with "socialism"---and, by not using "badly applied socialism by a tyrannical sense", using "socialism" would still be, technically, incorrect for applying historical observations of history to claim that socialism "in the democratic sense" existed and therefore true communism can never exist. So, yeah, people are idiots who are willing to bitch-slap any ideology while too inebriated to realize that they were hitting the ugly cousins of those ideologies.

Of course a lot of American government spending is bailing out the rich and so on.

Again, why write this? It doesn't count as social spending.

Glass–Steagall

Congratulations. You named an example and didn't show any trends in banking regulation with data. I would happily accept a rating system by which each banking law is ranked from 1, not important, to 10, very important, and then arbitrarily adding them all up and showing how the numbers decreased over the years, but we both know that it doesn't exist and it would be funny to read. Heck, I would even be interested in just a graph showing numbers of banking regulations, but I can't find one.
Wait a second, even if this was true, banking deregulation doesn't disprove any theories of mine. If it could be proven that aliens visited the earth millions of years ago and did some modifications of life forms, does that disprove that evolution occurred throughout all that time? Georgism will always have land to fall back on, and Monetarists and Austrians would always have a convenient graph of Federal Funds Target Rate to recessions. So, again, you are arguing around me and, thus, missing the point of economic calculation. Economic calculation is important for the function of stability in an economy.

Note the phrase big bang to refer to the deregulation. It implies, to me, something large and sudden. Maybe to you it implies 'small implosion' or 'not much happened'. Or 'the universe is imaginary'.

Why, yes, I do believe that I showed you a graph that clearly indicates that such an event occurred in the US. However, it also showed that regulations increased to higher levels than ever before. So, if you're willing to define Neoliberalism as 'deregulation that occurred any time in the past', I will call socialism 'any attempted revolution that occurred any time in the past'.

Consequences
random stuff
Heres something written before the crash, in 2002 by some financial consultancy

Again, these take events of the past and presume that the trends obviously continued, without providing data. For crying out loud, at least the Heritage Foundation clearly shows its measuring system for the amount of liberty in the world and explains its reasonings for detailing each and every country for each change that occurs; you're just pulling vague generalities out of other people's asses.

[daft punk]

So less social spending to more social spending = Neoliberalism if more social spending < social spending elsewhere? Congradulations, you just proved that America hasn't had to reduce social spending: it was always Neoliberal, if all that matters is that it has less social spending than today's Canada, or The United Kingdom, or Poland--

I cant understand this.

Wait....

Poland had significant reductions in privatizations in the past, and probably regulations; and, since the growth of regulations can still mean that Neoliberalism is occurring even today, does this mean that Poland is actually Neoliberal? Or is Neoliberal strictly defined as 'More social spending as a percentage of GDP than Britain'? Or are you going to say that it has to strictly have shock therapy to be Neoliberal, saying that libertarianism only existed because of an inherently detrimental creation policy and thus forcing me to disagree about Neoliberalism being pertinent to this argument? Or are you going to continue arguing around me, trying to avoid the topic of libertarianism in terms of economic calculation by straw-manning me by showing that this notion of Neoliberalism is proof that I'm wrong?

"since the growth of regulations can still mean that Neoliberalism is occurring even today" what? this is stupid.

"Or is Neoliberal strictly defined as 'More social spending as a percentage of GDP than Britain'?" what???

Neoliberalism includes cuts in social spending as you yourself stated. Why are you now saying the opposite?

"Or are you going to say that it has to strictly have shock therapy to be Neoliberal, saying that libertarianism only existed because of an inherently detrimental creation policy and thus forcing me to disagree about Neoliberalism being pertinent to this argument?"
why are you saying such rubbish? Nobody said you had to have shock therapy.

What the fuck is a "libertarianism only existed because of an inherently detrimental creation policy"

Why cant you write comprehensible posts?

Quote:
I showed you that the number of non-military government employees had dropped slightly since the 1960, but the population increased by 50%, so relative to that the number of government employees has dropped accordingly.


Yes, you did, and I don't deny that, but the only shrinkage occurred during the Clinton Presidency,

Not true. The spending ended up lower than in the 60s, even with 50% bigger population.

This demolishes your main argument.

and, also, same number of politicians could have more power; and more regulations could be maintained by the legal system and not the political one. Therefore, unless we're willing to define Neoliberalism by government numbers as a percentage of population alone, and we are willing to admit that Clinton was Neoliberal, this part of the argument would have more walls barring progress of the debate than anything else. Neverthleless, you are still straw-manning me by saying that exacerbated monetary policy and shock therapy mixed in with rapid globalization is evident of libertarianism's faults.

what are you talking about? This is total number of non-military government employees, not just politicians. You are talking about school teachers and firemen and so on.

And there was deregulation as I showed.

Quote:
Australian and Canada also have significantly lower debt.


I have literally no idea why you said that, unless you're willing to brag or let your biases get in the way of your argumentative judgements of what's pertinent to the discussion.

just remember it next time you wanna say we need cuts to get rid of debt.

Quote:
My definition of the USSR being communist is mainstream. It is also based on politicians like Stalin followingMarx and Hegel and it is based on the policies adopted. It might not be quite what my communist voodoo blogs require in their imaginary world, but it is communism as practised by the socialists since the early 20th century.


That was ... actually spooky.
I can't believe that I haven't seen it before: people spew nonsense of Neoliberalism, especially as a form of libertarianism, existing, while people espouse the notion that "communism" existed. Heck, you can even replace "communism" with "socialism"---and, by not using "badly applied socialism by a tyrannical sense", using "socialism" would still be, technically, incorrect for applying historical observations of history to claim that socialism "in the democratic sense" existed and therefore true communism can never exist. So, yeah, people are idiots who are willing to bitch-slap any ideology while too inebriated to realize that they were hitting the ugly cousins of those ideologies.

I have no idea what you are trying to say. Socialism has never existed. See the Communist Party thread for details.

What we had for the last 30 years was capitalism with a strong dose of neo-liberalism. Not enough for you obviously.

Anyway, I'm bored with this now.

Quote:
Of course a lot of American government spending is bailing out the rich and so on.

Again, why write this? It doesn't count as social spending.

Of course it counts.

Why, yes, I do believe that I showed you a graph that clearly indicates that such an event occurred in the US. However, it also showed that regulations increased to higher levels than ever before. So, if you're willing to define Neoliberalism as 'deregulation that occurred any time in the past', I will call socialism 'any attempted revolution that occurred any time in the past'.

This is a waste of time. You believe there was overall increase in banking regulation even though the whole world knows it was deregulated.

I give up. See ya.

[Michaeluj]

michael wrote:
So less social spending to more social spending = Neoliberalism if more social spending < social spending elsewhere? Congradulations, you just proved that America hasn't had to reduce social spending: it was always Neoliberal, if all that matters is that it has less social spending than today's Canada, or The United Kingdom, or Poland--


I cant understand this.

Me:Social spending increased in the United States.
You: Let's compare US social spending with countries that obviously aren't Neoliberal.
Me: So, for Neoliberalism, social spending can still increase as long as the final spending level is less than the given group of countries?

I have no idea how you could think that and deny that at the same time.

"since the growth of regulations can still mean that Neoliberalism is occurring even today" what? this is stupid.

Yes, it is stupid. And you said it.
Want proof? I am going to mention the graph that shows total regulations growing well past previous, before-deregulation levels, immediately after Reagan. Now, you clearly, in the quoted passage that I'm responding to, said that there are no exceptions: If regulations increased, Neoliberalism must not exist. Okay? Now, I could give you the benefit of the doubt and pretend that you think that only the deregulation of banks apply for what constitutes as Neoliberalism, for that is what you alluded to before, but you really must say this explicitly in the next response. Or maybe you read "growth of regulations" as actually "steady growth that never, ever had any reductions" and, thus, simply could not comprehend how my past procurement of regulatory evidence applies to my present argument; this means, "You read my proof, and either forgot it or could not rationalize the thought that I would even think about using it again."
Honestly, you're making this far too difficult.

"Or is Neoliberal strictly defined as 'More social spending as a percentage of GDP than Britain'?" what???

Neoliberalism includes cuts in social spending as you yourself stated. Why are you now saying the opposite?

Sorry, that is a typo, and I sincerely apologize for that. I was hoping to correct it before you would see it. Would you like for me to bring up the quoted passage again, to help you re-read?

"Or are you going to say that it has to strictly have shock therapy to be Neoliberal, saying that libertarianism only existed because of an inherently detrimental creation policy and thus forcing me to disagree about Neoliberalism being pertinent to this argument?"
why are you saying such rubbish? Nobody said you had to have shock therapy.

What the fuck is a "libertarianism only existed because of an inherently detrimental creation policy"

"Inherently detrimental creation policy" = Shock Therapy. I have said that it's bad, and it is how, you said, Neoliberalism came into being. I, of course, wasn't referring to the Big Bang or the birth of Marx or the recommendations of Milton Friedman or Thatcher saying "This is what we believe." Tell me, what could it have meant to you?

Not true. The spending ended up lower than in the 60s, even with 50% bigger population.

Oh for the love of----

The evidence that I provided is based on social spending as a percentage of government spending! Combined with increasing total government spending, which grew --albeit in a wobbly fashion--, that means that it grew. The best you can argue is that Clinton could be seen to have shrunk it, due to the lower proportional government total spending but he didn't really cut any social services while the country grew and he reigned in extra spending. Social security and Medicare, as a proportion of government spending, increased during his presidency. There is absolutely no way for you to think that spending decreased.

what are you talking about? This is total number of non-military government employees, not just politicians. You are talking about school teachers and firemen and so on.

Hmm, so more students per teacher, a firefighter service that is less used, and much higher welfare and social security spending as a proportion of GDP. . . .
Actually, the education budget never changed as a proportion of Federal government spending, while government spending did increase, so there's less teachers but technically more financial inclination towards the school system.

And there was deregulation as I showed.

No, you never did. I clearly posted data showing that regulations increased, and you quoted generalities from others.

michael wrote:
Quote:
Australian and Canada also have significantly lower debt.


I have literally no idea why you said that, unless you're willing to brag or let your biases get in the way of your argumentative judgements of what's pertinent to the discussion.

just remember it next time you wanna say we need cuts to get rid of debt.

Uh, is this a throwback to the efficiency argument?

I have no idea what you are trying to say. Socialism has never existed. See the Communist Party thread for details.

NO FUCKEN DUH!!! I knew --and respected-- the notion that you would say that. The point is that, if you were to apply your ignorance of libertarianism, or even Neoliberalism, to the level which everyone else applies to communism, you could see that your argument is utterly hollow. How could you not even grasp that!?

Quote:
Quote:
Of course a lot of American government spending is bailing out the rich and so on.

Again, why write this? It doesn't count as social spending.


Of course it counts.

I doubt it, but it's still accounted for in my thread. Of percentage of total government expenditure, I only count Pensions, Education, Welfare, and Health. Bailouts may, possibly, account for as "Remainder". Those values increased, albeit slowly, over the last 3 decades, never getting below 1970's social spending percentage of government spending. Since government total spending increased, we can do the math and see that social spending went up.

michael wrote:
Why, yes, I do believe that I showed you a graph that clearly indicates that such an event occurred in the US. However, it also showed that regulations increased to higher levels than ever before. So, if you're willing to define Neoliberalism as 'deregulation that occurred any time in the past', I will call socialism 'any attempted revolution that occurred any time in the past'.


This is a waste of time. You believe there was overall increase in banking regulation even though the whole world knows it was deregulated.

Hey, I just don't know. I also don't, however, have a clear feeling that "banking" regulation had an "overall" increase; just total regulations. Judging by how total regulations just kept going up, it is reasonable to ponder if the banking aspects of them also rose. However, absolutely no-one is willing to provide proof that banking regulations went far down and stayed down, and those are mostly the same people who say that communism existed, or that total regulations went down, so why should I accept their unsupported statements?



I just realized something:

And there was deregulation as I showed.

Where do you refer to this? Oh, wait, here:

michael wrote:
Why, yes, I do believe that I showed you a graph that clearly indicates that such an event occurred in the US. However, it also showed that regulations increased to higher levels than ever before. So, if you're willing to define Neoliberalism as 'deregulation that occurred any time in the past', I will call socialism 'any attempted revolution that occurred any time in the past'.


This is a waste of time. You believe there was overall increase in banking regulation even though the whole world knows it was deregulated.

But, instead of explaining why that data is wrong, you just wrote, 'Well, many people agree with me.'
Dude, I gave you proof that total regulations increased. You . . . . You just used the power of majority opinion to say,

"I cast thee out, troublesome data!"

That's not proof!
DEBATE!
DOESN'T!
WORK THAT WAY!

"Sir, we have video evidence that suspect A killed the victim."
"Bah, who cares?! Everyone thinks that The Evil Libertarian did it!"

[daft punk]

Me:Social spending increased in the United States.
You: Let's compare US social spending with countries that obviously aren't Neoliberal.
Me: So, for Neoliberalism, social spending can still increase as long as the final spending level is less than the given group of countries?

I have no idea how you could think that and deny that at the same time.

wrong. Neoliberalism was practised throughout all the capitalist countries. I was simply showing that American spending was no greater than Canada or Australia. In fact America is at the bottom of the list for welfare spending among advanced countries.

"es, it is stupid. And you said it.
Want proof? I am going to mention the graph that shows total regulations growing well past previous, before-deregulation levels, immediately after Reagan. Now, you clearly, in the quoted passage that I'm responding to, said that there are no exceptions: If regulations increased, Neoliberalism must not exist. Okay? Now, I could give you the benefit of the doubt and pretend that you think that only the deregulation of banks apply for what constitutes as Neoliberalism, for that is what you alluded to before, but you really must say this explicitly in the next response. Or maybe you read "growth of regulations" as actually "steady growth that never, ever had any reductions" and, thus, simply could not comprehend how my past procurement of regulatory evidence applies to my present argument; this means, "You read my proof, and either forgot it or could not rationalize the thought that I would even think about using it again."
Honestly, you're making this far too difficult."

You fail to see the difference between the number of regulations and their importance. Yes there may be more regulations while deregulating. The banks were freed up but lots of minor regulations were passed. Quantity is not the same as quality.

And it wasnt just the banks it was all sorts of stuff.

"Inherently detrimental creation policy" = Shock Therapy. I have said that it's bad, and it is how, you said, Neoliberalism came into being. I, of course, wasn't referring to the Big Bang or the birth of Marx or the recommendations of Milton Friedman or Thatcher saying "This is what we believe." Tell me, what could it have meant to you?

dont talk rubbish, I never said neoliberalism came into being through shock therapy. I said it was a neoliberal policy (true) carried out a few times (true) by people trying to follow a Chicago/Austrian agenda (true).

Fuck me, Friedman even went to Chile.

Quote:
Not true. The spending ended up lower than in the 60s, even with 50% bigger population.

Oh for the love of----

The evidence that I provided is based on social spending as a percentage of government spending! Combined with increasing total government spending, which grew --albeit in a wobbly fashion--, that means that it grew. The best you can argue is that Clinton could be seen to have shrunk it, due to the lower proportional government total spending but he didn't really cut any social services while the country grew and he reigned in extra spending. Social security and Medicare, as a proportion of government spending, increased during his presidency. There is absolutely no way for you to think that spending decreased.

I meant number of government employees, non military. Spending went up obviously, relative to GDP, but not loads.

Health spending was zilch in the 60s and rose to about 6% of GDP. Big deal. In Britain it's a lot more, as in all other advanced countries. But you know what?

Americans spend 250% more than us Brits on healthcare.

So stop winging about spending 6% on healthcare and start asking why your healthcare overall costs 2.5 times as much as ours.

Education went up a bit, tragic, more people went to uni. That is what you call progress, capitalism needs more educated people that in 1900.

Its not rocket science.

Actual welfare didnt increase much and is a small percentage of GDP.

NO FUCKEN DUH!!! I knew --and respected-- the notion that you would say that. The point is that, if you were to apply your ignorance of libertarianism, or even Neoliberalism, to the level which everyone else applies to communism, you could see that your argument is utterly hollow. How could you not even grasp that!?

because you are not living in the real world. You had your way for 30 years, it led to a crash. It the world was doing great now you would be running around posting threads about how Thatcher loved Hayek and the made a baby called world prosperity.

You dont probaly understand that government is there to do the bidding of big business. Welfare is just to stop revolution.

They were as neoliberal as they could,basically.

In Russia, Stalin waged a bloody one sided civil war against socialism. Did Clinton kill all of Friedman's supporters?

You are not comparing like with like.

Neoliberalism is just part of the economic theories capitalism relies on. They dont trust it completely so they chuck in bits of keynes and stuff.

Hey, I just don't know. I also don't, however, have a clear feeling that "banking" regulation had an "overall" increase; just total regulations. Judging by how total regulations just kept going up, it is reasonable to ponder if the banking aspects of them also rose. However, absolutely no-one is willing to provide proof that banking regulations went far down and stayed down, and those are mostly the same people who say that communism existed, or that total regulations went down, so why should I accept their unsupported statements?

shame you arent a Marxist. This is basic stuff. Let me offer you a choice, 1000 nails that are 2mm long, or 100 that are 1.5 inches long. Which are you gonna use to build your shed?

Go and research banking deregulation with an open mind, avoiding stupid right wing blogs.

Why do you think all the big mainstream voices of capitalism, the people capitalists take seriously like WSJ, FT, Economist, the serious press, people like EconoMonitor, all say finance was deregulated?

Get it into your head and we can move on to an actual serious discussion.

It was deregulated, so they could make more dosh, and that is why and how the finance industry in the USA and UK grew massively to dominate the economy and dominate the governments themselves, and that is why the crash was delayed but made much worse.

Then they saw Lehmans go down, shat themselves, and went for bailouts.

In the 30s it was the opposite, they let everything go down, the economy crashed, and there was fascism and world war. They tried to avoid that time time round.

[Michaeluj]

wrong. Neoliberalism was practised throughout all the capitalist countries. I was simply showing that American spending was no greater than Canada or Australia. In fact America is at the bottom of the list for welfare spending among advanced countries.

But then why would you say that? How does it have anything to do with proving Neoliberalism's existe---
You know what, screw it, it doesn't matter. I'm being sincere, because it's not an actual response to my arguments. I'm dropping this segment.

You fail to see the difference between the number of regulations and their importance. Yes there may be more regulations while deregulating. The banks were freed up but lots of minor regulations were passed. Quantity is not the same as quality.

Nope, I definitely did not forget. In fact, I note in my other thread, which is much older than this argument, this particular problem. Allow me to provide it here:
Defining the quality, or importance, of a law is quite non-objective. It's almost purely subjective. Therefore, there's not much of a point for using this method for rational debate. I don't think it's intelligent to just ascribe a value for a law and then add them all together to see how the "importance" of the laws grew or shrank, do you?

dont talk rubbish, I never said neoliberalism came into being through shock therapy. I said it was a neoliberal policy (true) carried out a few times (true) by people trying to follow a Chicago/Austrian agenda (true).

Eh, fine, it's semantics; and your main argument, now, is clearly that it's the importance of laws, not shock therapy or growth of spending.

I meant number of government employees, non military. Spending went up obviously, relative to GDP, but not loads.

Health spending was zilch in the 60s and rose to about 6% of GDP. Big deal. In Britain it's a lot more, as in all other advanced countries. But you know what?

Americans spend 250% more than us Brits on healthcare.

Health spending still increased, and that's not remotely the existence of Neoliberalism.

Anyway, why should only the proportion of government employees to population matter? There's always one mayor per city, even when that city grows; there's on President or Prime Minister per country; and I'm fairly certain that the same effectively applies for public works. Machines can automate transactions for giving out welfare.
Also, for at least the United States, Clinton was the one whose term created reduced proportions. That was 10 years after Reagan and Thatcher; and Reagan did not reduce government employment at all even though he took a notch out of regulations. Government-public proportions just don't seem like a viable measuring device.

michael wrote:
NO FUCKEN DUH!!! I knew --and respected-- the notion that you would say that. The point is that, if you were to apply your ignorance of libertarianism, or even Neoliberalism, to the level which everyone else applies to communism, you could see that your argument is utterly hollow. How could you not even grasp that!?


because you are not living in the real world. You had your way for 30 years, it led to a crash. It the world was doing great now you would be running around posting threads about how Thatcher loved Hayek and the made a baby called world prosperity.

You dont probaly understand that government is there to do the bidding of big business. Welfare is just to stop revolution.

They were as neoliberal as they could,basically.

In Russia, Stalin waged a bloody one sided civil war against socialism. Did Clinton kill all of Friedman's supporters?

All of this is one gigantic strawman, as I'll explain:

You are not comparing like with like.

You made an argument, which only exists because you support the result it leads to.
I simply replaced the words to make you aghast at how the results have been turned around, despite using the same logic. I did nothing more than replace names, not reasoning. Your argument should, therefore, be shown as empty. You don't like that, and that's the point.

Neoliberalism is just part of the economic theories capitalism relies on. They dont trust it completely so they chuck in bits of keynes and stuff.

Communism is just part of the economic theories socialism relies on. They don't trust it completely so they chuck in bits of Stalin and stuff.
Now, did your ideal socialism exist? No? Then this argument doesn't apply to Neoliberalism as well.

michale wrote:
Hey, I just don't know. I also don't, however, have a clear feeling that "banking" regulation had an "overall" increase; just total regulations. Judging by how total regulations just kept going up, it is reasonable to ponder if the banking aspects of them also rose. However, absolutely no-one is willing to provide proof that banking regulations went far down and stayed down, and those are mostly the same people who say that communism existed, or that total regulations went down, so why should I accept their unsupported statements?


shame you arent a Marxist. This is basic stuff. Let me offer you a choice, 1000 nails that are 2mm long, or 100 that are 1.5 inches long. Which are you gonna use to build your shed?

What? It's fine if you want to go back to economic calculation, or something, but ---
Oh, I just got it. You're saying that a few big regulations ended while a lot of small ones began, right? I already touched upon it.
Actually, it's funny that you say that banking regulations, in a numerical sense, increased. That reduces the objective nature of your argument by so much.

Go and research banking deregulation with an open mind, avoiding stupid right wing blogs.

Sure, I'll use Wikipedia and reports that are without sources.
Excuse me for only using sources for my research. Honestly, I stay away from all blogs.

Why do you think all the big mainstream voices of capitalism, the people capitalists take seriously like WSJ, FT, Economist, the serious press, people like EconoMonitor, all say finance was deregulated?

A mixture of ideology, stupidity, because everyone else is saying so, and because the politicians said so. And, for all I know, they're run by capitalists who want the government to pay for health care and to have more power through a bigger government, so they can make their own changes without much trouble in the overly-active hands of Big Brother. It's like making a bigger spider web to catch more flies. (sarcasm)

It was deregulated, so they could make more dosh, and that is why and how the finance industry in the USA and UK grew massively to dominate the economy and dominate the governments themselves, and that is why the crash was delayed but made much worse.

Yet, you're starting to seem less sure about yourself, as indicated by employing, 'It's importance, not amount, that counts' when regarding regulation.

[daft punk]

But then why would you say that? How does it have anything to do with proving Neoliberalism's existe---
You know what, screw it, it doesn't matter. I'm being sincere, because it's not an actual response to my arguments. I'm dropping this segment.

Because the focus of most right wingers' attention on these forums is on America. America has the biggest economy, the biggest financial industry, it was where the crash started, it is what most people focus on. You mentioned Obama. I am simply stating the fact that America's government spending is no higher than anywhere else.

Nope, I definitely did not forget. In fact, I note in my other thread, which is much older than this argument, this particular problem. Allow me to provide it here:
Defining the quality, or importance, of a law is quite non-objective. It's almost purely subjective. Therefore, there's not much of a point for using this method for rational debate. I don't think it's intelligent to just ascribe a value for a law and then add them all together to see how the "importance" of the laws grew or shrank, do you?

The fact is that although the total number of regulations may be greater, the banks and industry in general were deregulated. Deregulation is often linked with privatisation. Eg in Britain the utilities went from one big state company to lots of private ones. This privatisation is also called deregulation. Instead of British Gas you got countless others. The EU was formed to push all this deregulation through, breaking up state monopolies. Privatisation requires deregulation.

Try reading this

How Deregulation Fueled the Financial Crisis
http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article8210.html

As I say, Wall street controls the government.

"The Quiet Coup

The crash has laid bare many unpleasant truths about the United States. One of the most alarming, says a former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund, is that the finance industry has effectively captured our government—a state of affairs that more typically describes emerging markets, and is at the center of many emerging-market crises. If the IMF’s staff could speak freely about the U.S., it would tell us what it tells all countries in this situation: recovery will fail unless we break the financial oligarchy that is blocking essential reform. And if we are to prevent a true depression, we’re running out of time."

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/arc ... coup/7364/

Communism is just part of the economic theories socialism relies on. They don't trust it completely so they chuck in bits of Stalin and stuff.
Now, did your ideal socialism exist? No? Then this argument doesn't apply to Neoliberalism as well.

Did Clinton shoot anyone who agreed with Friedman?

You're saying that a few big regulations ended while a lot of small ones began, right?

exactly. The banks got to do all sorts of dodgy stuff.

Quote:
It was deregulated, so they could make more dosh, and that is why and how the finance industry in the USA and UK grew massively to dominate the economy and dominate the governments themselves, and that is why the crash was delayed but made much worse.


Yet, you're starting to seem less sure about yourself, as indicated by employing, 'It's importance, not amount, that counts' when regarding regulation.

No, you have read some bollocks somewhere and cant get it out of you head. You cant see the wood for the trees. Read the two articles above, one is by former chief economist at the IMF. The other is Money Morning, a typical investment blog. "Our worldwide research staff includes former investment bankers, international financiers, emerging markets specialists and veteran financial journalists."

The FT, WSJ, Economist, EconoMonitor, former chief economist at the IMF, Money Morning, anyone and everyone influential in the world of finance, everyone knows that deregulation happened and neoliberalism did to a large extent.

Get over it.

I am not gonna debate this any more. Let me know when you are ready to move on. Lets agree that neoliberalism happened 50% if it makes you happy. 50% neoliberalism, 50% Keynes or whatever. But the finance industry was deregulated. Go watch the film Inside Job. buy the DVD here
http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/?ie=UTF8&keyw ... ns2i0uyk_b

read the articles on the world economy here

http://www.socialistworld.net/

You can see what they were saying in the years leading up to 2008

watch this 3 minute video

http://www.socialistworld.net/doc/5306

a stock market trader explains that he ‘dreams of another recession’ because of the amount of money he could make out of it.