Re: Flamewars and Resolution

[Hyman Blumenstock <hystock@xxxxxxxxx>]

John:  As a Real Scientist, I see no purpose to pussyfooting, but rather
to get instantly to the heart of the problem.  Perhaps, in this case,
your approach in trying to move only a little bit in the right direction
in an unnecessarily tedious journey to the same ultimate goal, might
be more appropriate in consideration of the egos of the most prestigious
professionals in the world, Economists.  They are so prestigious, they
advise Presidents and Kings and everyone else, and trouble is perpetuated.

I didn't say they cause the tragedies.  I say that these tragedies were
born in the Agrarian era when there was not enough sustenance for everyone.
However, I condemn the economic profession for deliberately maintaining
these tragedies by refusing to allow a new era of Food Abundance, the
Post Agrarian era, to bear the fruit of technological advance, by first
deliberately destroying Food, unto the present day with Farm Subsidies,
and further by successfully diverting man's natural obsession with adequate
Food, into a new, uncalled for obsession with Money, and that kept as Scarce
as Food once was.  This is consciously done, as is evident in a film I saw
on TV called "Money Made Easy," sponsored by the Federal Reserve and the
Bureau of Engraving, calculated to persuade still impressionable pre
school children about the "virtues" of Money -- why how else can you
buy lollipops.  What else then, but such a mind fixation after one grows up.

As far as "trying to remedy that fault," to do a proper job, they all
will have to condemn in its entirety all that they endured in learning
their profession, with its basic foundation, "Food is Scarce"
(deliberately diverted in the face of de facto Food Abundance, into
ANYTHING being scarce, on the false premise stated, "Human Wants Are
VIRTUALLY Infinite" and therefore, without thinking about it, Insatiable.).

They would have to start anew from scratch, with the new premise,
"At Long Last, Food is Abundant," and rephrase that deliberately
misleading statement into, "Human Wants Are Finite, and therefore
Satiable."  Unfortunately, the immediate reaction would be that the
profession of Economics would be naturally reduced into nothing more
than a Bookkeeping function to keep track of an abundant inventory.
However, I think that a positive program to use all that intellectual
prowess immediately, diverted into more useful pursuits in the Real
Sciences and the Social Sciences becoming in their own right, Real Sciences.

The immediate step, is as you suggest, increase with fiat money, the
National Budget to Balance the Budget in reverse, based on covering
the requirements of every last one of us, rather than to reduce
expenditures to match a deliberately deficient Budget, insufficient for
too many of us.

An immediate practical approach with the least trauma is for the government
to fund with Deficit Spending, the private sector to embark upon tasks such
as Restoring the Environment, Space Programs, Pursuit of Knowledge, Anything,
until there is not one single person untrained and unapplied to some decent
job at a decent wage.

John Gelles wrote:
>
>         Dear Hyman,
>
>         You and I sometimes write a lot.  And we both hate
>         the existence of poverty and other tragic conditions
>         in life.  But we chose, voluntarily, to address
>         scholars who do economics as a profession.
>
>         We are privileged to be in their company.  We want
>         their advice and approval.  We cannot say that
>         the field of study, or the social science, or
>         the "whatever economics is", is itself the cause
>         of the tragic conditions a branch called political
>         economy addresses. Nor is classical economics or
>         econometrics the cause.  Not even "doctrinaire
>         economics", a phrase that may point to some
>         economists or to some branch of the study, the
>         cause.
>
>         These studies are conducted by professionals who
>         care to contribute to a better world at least as
>         much as we do.
>
>         Let us all be factual.  Tragic conditions exist.
>         Neither political science nor economics, as
>         professions, cause the tragedies.  If we would
>         invent or discuss cures, we have a choice of
>         forums.
>
>         On this forum dignity is prized.  No more blame
>         against economics for what the leaders of the
>         world, (and their supporters among the mass of
>         voters and citizens), may have allowed to exist.
>         Their fault is in what they won't do and what
>         they don't understand.
>
>         To the best of their ability, the economists
>         we address are trying to remedy that fault.
>
>         Your friend, John
>
>       ---------------------------------------------------
>       John Gelles        voice: (805) 642-6675
>       5706 Loma Vista    email: jjgelles@xxxxxxxx
>       Ventura, CA 93003  WWWeb: http://rain.org/~jjgelles/
>                                 http://myturn.org
>       ---------------------------------------------------
>       Finance national & jobs priorities as we do weapons
>       in war: Create capacity with federal money, limited
>       only by environmental and material constraints  and
>       inflation that supply, saving and taxes can't halt.
>       ---------------------------------------------------
>