Re: PKT digest 1347/mosler seminar

[Randy Wray <lwray@xxxxxx>]

Quick responses to some responses:

1. James O and Warren: nice thoughts on a local "money" or tax credit
system. There is no technical reason why a local govt could not put
people to work and solve local problems thru such a system.

2. Mason: yes, i think there is plenty of evidence that wpa was not a
waste; many of the prettiest bldgs in the US were built by wpa. you
used the word "inefficient"--careful, the meaning of that is pretty
vague unless you have full emp of all resources. the funny thing is
that whenever i drive past a private construction project, about all i
see is idle workers leaning on shovels. maybe that is the way things
are constructed? i do a lot of construction around the home and also
lean on the shovel quite a bit. things do eventually get done, and i'm
not quite sure they would get done faster, or in any case better, if i
didn't lean on the shovel now and then.

3. John G. what is "make work"? surveys show many, perhaps most, US
bridges are dangerously in need of repair. is it make work to put
people to work to repair them? I find it pretty strange to argue (and
i don't mean you are arguing this) that local govts cannot find ample
things that need to be done to keep the reserve army busy for the next
few centuries. when that is finally done, let us then worry about
"make work". bread and circuses are a long way down the road.

randy wray

ps: yes, Louise, i think you got a "header" mixed up; Alan I. was
always a gentleman (altho perhaps a stubborn one, at that). (that is
humor, alan). I see three problems here. First, there is a tendency to
attribute ideas to people that they may not have. this is an
acceptable error, for the nature of the medium makes it hard to know
exactly what someone is saying. Second, there is a tendency to impute
motivations to others. There was an awful lot of that (not by alan's
side, tho) in the media debate. This is very marginal behavior, and
should be avoided. third, there is outright flaming. that is not
acceptable. we didn't have too much of that, altho there seems to be
some other debate going on--which i am not folowing--carried on by
only 2 individuals, and there seems to be a lot of flaming going on. i
am w/louise: take it off line. no one else is interested.