San Francisco's Chinese Bridge

[Al]

Originally Posted By: OVERK1LL

Al: Two questions: Were their trade tariffs in place? Was the infrastructure in place to make out-sourcing the lucrative money-sap it is now? The world has changed significantly since then.

I don't believe there were any tariffs and there was no need or demand to outsource. I'm not really saying the world has not changed. Just answering Buster's question.

 

[buster]

Originally Posted By: Al

Originally Posted By: buster

Explain to me how the US's living standard jumped ever since the new deal in the 30's, which many mistakes were no doubt made. Explain to me how massive government spending during WWII created a massive boom period.

Although Tempest answered it perfectly I will add that The U.S. crawled out from the depression "In Spite" of the new Deal. Mainly though there was nowhere to go except up. The U.S. was the Sleeping giant that had abundant resources and an excess capacity in industries. But Buster (and this you will hate) the Government stayed out of industry's way. Taxes were low, worker rights, mega regulation, and worker lawsuits were non existent. I hope you one day read "Freedom from Fear" by David Kennedy.

Al, your view of history as well as Tempest is not accurate. Read Ha-Joon Chang's 23 Things They Don't tell you about Capitalism. Al, the 30's are when regulations and more government intervention took place.

 

[buster]

Banks and corporations run the show. That is the main flaw in Tempest's thinking or any Libertarian. They assume politicians are in control. I'm not opposed to decentralization and eliminating government waste was much as possible, but those are political issues and will vary. Most important, the monetary system could be improved. You need to think outside the box more in terms of Left vs Right. We have a dysfunctional banking system that needs reform. It's not just how much Joe Schmoe hates the government and regulations. ""The liability side of banking is not the place for market discipline" - Warren Mosler

 

[buster]

Regarding debt: "Reserve accounting uses the standard accounting identities, but the meaning of “liability” is not “debt.” The husband-wife analogy for Central Bank-Treasury accounting relationships is apt. Since a husband and wife are responsible for each others debts, neither can be indebted to the other. That is to say, reserve accounting is a fiction that does not represent real relationships, such as exist between a creditor and debtor in the traditional sense. Moreover, government debt is not true debt either. At the macro level, the reserves that are transferred to banks through government disbursement are used to buy Treasury’s. That is, when a Treasury is bought, this involves a transfer of reserves from the buyer’s bank’s reserve account at the Fed to the government’s account (consolidating Central Bank and Treasury as “government”). When the Treasury’s are sold or redeemed, the reserves that were “stored” at interest are simply switched back, creating a deposit again. It’s pretty much the same as buying and redeeming a CD. It’s just a switch from demand to time back to demand in a bank account, and a switch between reserves and securities at the government level. That is to say, the government doesn’t have to draw on revenue, borrow, or sell assets to cover its “debt,” as households and firms do. It’s just a matter of crediting and debiting accounts on the (consolidated) government books, even though it may appear that there is a financial relationship occurring between the CB and Treasury due to the accounting. However, it’s just a fiction."

 

[LS2JSTS]

Originally Posted By: PandaBear

The point is, big government is the only organization that has the capability to fund and start these kind of projects that is good for the society in the overall cost benefit scale....

IME this is completely false. Are you trying to tell us that a 8 billion dollar investment that returns roughly half a billion on a yearly basis is something private industry wouldn't be interested in? Right now in Detroit, the State of Michigan is fighting with the Moroun Family. The Morouns own the Ambassador Bridge...and have been trying to build a second bridge across the River for years and fighting with the State....Why, you might ask, well because a LOT of money can be made owning a bridge over it's lifetime, the State wants to build and control and profit from their own bridge...this reasoning that private industry somehow cant or wouldnt be interested in taking some of the State owned Monopoly away is silly imo. The fact is many private industries are forced to COMPETE with government interests often at a big disadvantage.

 

[buster]

"There is no America, There is no Democracy ... There is only IBM and ITT and AT&T, and DuPont, Dow, Union Carbide and Exxon. Those are the nations of the world today ... What do you think the Russians talk about in their Councils of State? Karl Marx? They get out their linear programming charts, statistical decision theories, mini-max solutions, and compute the price-cost probabilities of their transactions and investments, just like we do ... The world is a BUSINESS Mr. Beale"-Arthur Jensen (Ned Beatty, "Network", 1976)

 

[Al]

Originally Posted By: buster

Al, your view of history as well as Tempest is not accurate. Read Ha-Joon Chang's 23 Things They Don't tell you about Capitalism.

With all due respect Buster..my view of history just differs from yours based on our sources. I'll take David Kennedy over Ha-Joon any day of the week.

Quote:

Al, the 30's are when regulations and more government intervention took place.

Of course regulations were added during this period Buster But I don't think the Code of Federal Regulations even existed back then. Today it has hundreds of thousands of regulations (industry stifling) in additional to State and local regulations. ] [/quote]

 

[buster]

Quote:

I'll take David Kennedy over Ha-Joon any day of the week. smile

 

[buster]

I'm for logical, rational based solutions that are agnostic to political ideology. The size and scope of government will change and fluctuate based on a lot of things.

 

[Al]

Originally Posted By: buster

Moreover, government debt is not true debt either.

Buster why can you not cal a spade a spade.

 

[javacontour]

Buster, if government debt is not debt, then why do they even tax, given the unpopularity of taxes. Couldn't they just print money or "borrow" and never tax. If G-debt really isn't debt, they why do we pay taxes. They could just magically make a mark in the ledger and start writing checks to pay for stuff. I suspect the truth is somewhere in the middle. It really is debt. Not as troubling as it would be for you and I to continually spend more than we take in every year. But it's not without risks and consequences either. Now where that point is is up for debate. But I'm pretty confident it's not at the ZERO debt point. Otherwise, there would be no need for taxing voters.

 

[Tempest]

Originally Posted By: OVERK1LL

This is government spending on a private sector endeavour. It isn't like government went out and hired individuals to perform the bridge building. The companies hired are all private sector. The one contractor, with whom the government chose to deal, is the one that explicitly stated that they would be out-sourcing a large percentage of the job.

This is NOT a private sector project. It's government all the way. The government must extract wealth from the people that generate it (profit) in order to do what it would like. Government usually pays corporations to do what it wants but that simply builds a bigger cake with the same base. All you do is move money around to different pockets, but no new wealth is created. Something of this size can seriously alter markets as well. LOTS of steel and concrete being used here, which increases the demand for these items and lowers the supply. This affects other parts of the economy in what is known as opportunity cost. Because government has access to so much capital (spending on things that the market doesn't want), it is very easy for it to seriously skew the market.

 

[OVERKILL]

Originally Posted By: Tempest

Originally Posted By: OVERK1LL

This is government spending on a private sector endeavour. It isn't like government went out and hired individuals to perform the bridge building. The companies hired are all private sector. The one contractor, with whom the government chose to deal, is the one that explicitly stated that they would be out-sourcing a large percentage of the job.

This is NOT a private sector project. It's government all the way. The government must extract wealth from the people that generate it (profit) in order to do what it would like. Government usually pays corporations to do what it wants but that simply builds a bigger cake with the same base. All you do is move money around to different pockets, but no new wealth is created. Something of this size can seriously alter markets as well. LOTS of steel and concrete being used here, which increases the demand for these items and lowers the supply. This affects other parts of the economy in what is known as opportunity cost. Because government has access to so much capital (spending on things that the market doesn't want), it is very easy for it to seriously skew the market.

While I agree with this, the big issue I have with THIS project is that the money being moved around... is being moved out of the country to be never seen again. And it is tax-payer money. Money that should be given to American corporations and American workers to be recycled back into the economy as taxes and consumer purchases.

 

[PandaBear]

Originally Posted By: Tempest

Originally Posted By: OVERK1LL

This is government spending on a private sector endeavour. It isn't like government went out and hired individuals to perform the bridge building. The companies hired are all private sector. The one contractor, with whom the government chose to deal, is the one that explicitly stated that they would be out-sourcing a large percentage of the job.

This is NOT a private sector project. It's government all the way. The government must extract wealth from the people that generate it (profit) in order to do what it would like. Government usually pays corporations to do what it wants but that simply builds a bigger cake with the same base. All you do is move money around to different pockets, but no new wealth is created. Something of this size can seriously alter markets as well. LOTS of steel and concrete being used here, which increases the demand for these items and lowers the supply. This affects other parts of the economy in what is known as opportunity cost. Because government has access to so much capital (spending on things that the market doesn't want), it is very easy for it to seriously skew the market.

What would the private sector do in this case? They'd say the bridge is no problem and good to go instead of being a quake risk, keep using it, until some piece of it collapse and someone killed again. Like they keep the toll road expensive and half empty for maximum profit. Is that the wealth you are talking about? The government pay more with other means so there are more usage of a fixed resource (bridge or road of certain capacity). Is that the wealth you are not talking about?

 

[Shannow]

There's also a significant difference between : * a Government minting coins for distribution as money; * a subsidiary to the federal reserve printing off money which has to be bought to get into circulation; and * all the one's and zeros that are transferred to and from banks and defecits. In theory, a government running a coin based monetary system, minting the coins with a cost of metals and labour that is less than face value could mint away, buy their goods and services, and pay their wages with coins, and not charge any taxes, as the tax is essentially on labour and goods, and is the difference between the cost of producing the coin, and the face value. It's not any of metal standard, and as has been shown by history, inflation makes the metal worth more than the coins over time, and the production of a coin is not a promise to pay back a debt. Very different to "mortgaging" yourself to have a piece of paper created. After our trip last year, I have a pocket of shrapnel (change) that mean if I'm there I can swap stuff for it, and are worthless here, and another small amount of notes that promise me part of the country, no matter where I am...they don't specify which bit of which building or person I'm entitled to 'though. As to the 0s and 1s, I don't know who they promise, what they promise, or who signed the contract.

 

[Tempest]

Originally Posted By: OVERK1LL

While I agree with this, the big issue I have with THIS project is that the money being moved around... is being moved out of the country to be never seen again. And it is tax-payer money. Money that should be given to American corporations and American workers to be recycled back into the economy as taxes and consumer purchases.

I understand the desire to employ American workers, but the $400 million saved, plus the money that was not extracted by the lack of Fed help, IS aiding the employment of American private sector workers.

 

[Shannow]

my last post was responding to java re taxes, just took too long to post it.

 

[Tempest]

Quote:

What would the private sector do in this case? They'd say the bridge is no problem and good to go instead of being a quake risk, keep using it, until some piece of it collapse and someone killed again.

Actually, that is exactly what happened to old bridge, under government ownership. The government is $2.2 Trillion behind on infrastructure maintenance. This clearly shows incompetence on it's part. Roads in good condition, that move well, and are safe, are very much in the interest of a private sector road builder. They have to compete with the "free" roads all around them.

 

[Shannow]

Tempest, surely that would give rise to more centralisation, as the only ones wanted by the private sector would be the high volume routes, or the haul roads built by the mines/loggers, and gambling destinations.

 

[Tempest]

Quote:

Buster, if government debt is not debt, then why do they even tax, given the unpopularity of taxes.

They tax to make the currency valuable. It ensures demand. Otherwise, other currencies would compete with it and government would loose the real advantage of printing money. Which of course is being able to redirect resources as it sees fit without doing ANYTHING. Not even providing defense, infrastructure, courts, police..... Just print and spend. This is why simply printing money and having the government spend it to "create jobs" will never work. Government has unlimited funds (but highly limited competency and information) so it has no incentive to use resources efficiently. This misapplication of resources causes vast opportunity costs and distortion of the market. It is also not self sustaining, in which case even more money has to be printed.......