Federal Budget Resolution for Generalized Prosperity

WHEREAS the federal government belongs to all the people, and WHEREAS the federal government creates all of the dollar currency used by all the people, and WHEREAS all of the dollar currency so created belongs to the public commons until it is deposited in a commercial bank, and WHEREAS the federal government can provide funding to employ the unemployed in productive work, and WHEREAS all the people benefit from being gainfully employed in a highly productive economy, and WHEREAS the federal government can control currency inflation by raising federal taxes if needed; BE IT THEREFORE RESOLVED, that the federal government will create for deposit in state treasuries the amount of public commons currency dollars needed to fully support state job programs that provide productive employment at a living wage to all citizens willing and able to work, and BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that said federal job program will be utilized whenever the national unemployment rate is over 5%, and BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that whenever the national consumer price index (CPI) rises above 5%, a 1% surtax on adjusted gross income will be paid by all citizens until the CPI returns to 5% or less.

2012 Cosmic Coincidence #1

Delighted to read in WSJ this morning the revelation that Tim Tebow referenced John 3-16 by writing the verse notation on his eye black before the game - then passed for a playoff record of 31.6 yds/completed pass (316 yards on 10 completions). The WSJ article was written by a Jesuit priest trying to answer the question, "Is God answering Tim Tebow's prayers?" For me, this is the first obvious cosmic coincidence of 2012. A cosmic coincidence is special. It is a clue that things are going well. 2012 is fated to be a transformational year. No doubt Tim Tebow is part of that. God Bless.

Spiriterial

Back when I was a university student, I wrote a short story titled, "Spiriterial". It was a science fiction story about a future time when humanity has learned to use the gravitational force to direct the interstellar flight of the planet. The population had long before accepted humanity's unifying role as fellow passengers on Spaceship Earth. The time of predator capitalism had passed, nations had united into a global democracy with a constitution focused on human rights. In earlier times, predator capitalists and freedom oppressors had developed complex communication systems for their armies to use for control of the masses. But there were unintended consequences. "Free" enterprise evolved the communications systems and an information technology (IT) explosion occurred. Humanity's masses were educated and empowered by this IT explosion. They arose with a unity that eventually led to the global democracy. Nice story. Science fiction.
Lately I think. . .maybe not. At least, maybe not the part about global democracy. Ruminating about the future, it seems that the "Arab Spring" is an obvious clash between the natural desire for freedom and the fear-driven desire for power - a clash now possible only because of the IT explosion. So, how might the rest of the story play out? Well, the current trajectory seems to be that the wealthy of the world are circling the wagons and looking for protection from the downtrodden masses. This is not just true in the Arab world, but also in Europe and America. Whether from television or print outlets, media editorial opinion promotes a policy of "austerity" because "we can't afford it." But what if the Arab Spring grows beyond the middle east and spreads to Europe? The riots in England appear to be just that. In America, the economic discontent has been temporarily channeled into the Tea Party - a "grassroots" organization created by wealthy and influential republicans. (Americans seem to be a naturally arrogant people who are generally slow learners.) Nevertheless, as economic conditions worsen and increasing numbers of youth are out of work and out of luck, Americans may also begin to riot and loot. This would lead to more and more public debate on economic policy, which would spill over into a public debate about fiscal policy. This fiscal policy debate will cause more and more voters to learn the difference between their own household budget and the budget of the federal government. It will become apparent to all that the "full faith and credit" of the United States is now the new "gold standard." Gold-standard based thinking about "fiat" currency will no longer breed fear of hyperinflation. The fiscal policy debate will very likely conclude that the Modern Monetary Theory advocates have the winning argument, which is that their theory is not a "theory" at all but rather a description of actual monetary operations. This will eventually lead to the popular understanding that "money" is really only an accounting tool - and physical resources, not money, determine whether or not we can "afford it." The shift in focus from the accounting tool to the actual physical resources will reveal the abundance available once we stop looking only at the accounting tool. Deficit spending by governments with sovereign currencies will be accepted as normal, prompting the emergence of widespread government policies of raising taxes only when needed to cool down and economy and heating up a recessionary economy by lowering taxes and increasing spending. This will lead to a full-employment world with enough global economic security and enough global trade agreements to make resource wars untenable. The focus will shift from overcoming scarcity to assuring human rights. Happy ending. Yeah, I know, lots of assumptions. Hey, after all, it's just the continuance of a science fiction story.

Born poor

By far, most of the children born into our world inherit nothing except poverty and debt. This is true all over the world. And this is actually the crux of the problem. Or, perhaps I should say that our conditioned thinking is the crux of the problem. Can we even envision a world where most children are born into prosperity? We are constantly conditioned almost completely by the cultural belief system that surrounds us - indeed, we swim in it. This belief system leads us to accept poverty as if it were a natural part of life. Poverty is unnatural. It exists only because of the division of labor to enrich the capitalist class. For most of us, any capital we have grew out of accumulated savings from labor. Once upon a time, that labor resulted in a handcraft that was a complete product, or work that could not be done by a machine. Today, automated machines have eliminated an uncountable number of jobs once done by human labor. To make it worse, the same machines produce products that people favor over handcrafted products - eliminating the craftsman. The first cars were built by small shops employing skilled craftsmen. Henry Ford realized he could make cars cheaper by replacing one skilled craftsman with several low-paid assembly line workers - each doing only a part of what the craftsman did. Ford's new manufacturing method (assembly line mass-production) soon became the norm for all production. The craftsman went away, replaced by workers who are really only replicable cogs and gears. That simple little man who overcame his cultural conditioning to believe with all his heart that nonviolent action could liberate the people of India, Mahatma Gandhi, also showed us a way to achieve prosperity without capitalism. If all Indian homes today had a spinning wheel in regular use, then the Indian people would be offering the world the finest garments available anywhere; and every household would be a cottage industry. And those spinning wheels would be "spinning off" 12v household electricity. With incredible foresight, Gandhi realized that the division of labor would eventually lead to a world of indentured servants. However, the world will not go backwards to another day. Division of labor is now the norm, and we must focus on the present and future. Everywhere governments are in the pockets of big business. The poor can not wait for governments or charitable capitalists to save them. It will never happen. The poor must find a way to save the poor! Micro-finance is a fantastic tool for this, and I have long been an admirer of Muhammed Yunus. However, we must find a way for the gains of micro-financed enterprise to be sustained and passed on to the next generation(s). Inheritance tax must always be levied only on the wealthy, never on the poor and middle class. And we must continue to work to economically empower individual families, family groups, and villages.

Trusteeship and Binary Economics

American students are taught that there are only two types of economic systems: free-enterprise (capitalism) and "command" systems (communism and socialism). Actually, there are several others. One of them is Binary Economics. Binary economics was developed by Louis Kelso, who published the basics of his economic theories in a book entitled "The Capitalist Manifesto". Kelso believed in market economies, but also believed market excesses should be controlled. From his perspective there are two components to industrial production, labor and capital. Capital includes land, machines, cash, stocks, credit, etc. A person makes a living either from labor or by using accumulated capital. Since the time of Adam Smith, capital has become by far the dominant part of the industrial production process, while labor has become worth less and less. Ordinary people can no longer make a living by selling labor. Capital, concentrated in the hands of a few, needs to be accessible to everyone. To achieve this, Kelso called for laws that would disallow interest on loans, disallow inheritance taxes, and foster transition from corporate-owned industry to industry owned by employees. Kelso argued that a market economy could be a just economy if the workers were owners (Employee Stock Ownership Programs), if workers could pass accumulated capital to their children (no inheritance tax), and if the banking system was nationalized (to enable zero interest lending). The goal of binary economics is to give every family an accumulated capital base that can be used to help the family earn a living - a perpetual family bank. A perpetual family bank is also the goal of family-centered trusteership. Unwilling to wait for the wealthy few to become voluntary trustees, I believe in exploring other avenues to trusteeship. The family is a more sustainable unit than government. As governments fall and wars are fought, families find that love and family traditions allow them to find ways to stick together through thick and thin. Everyone is more interested in knowing about the grandparent's history than about who ran the government back then. We must find a way to establish a sustainable capital base under individual families. In India, Nehru wanted to do that through land redistribution and local village industry. Good ideas that depended on implementing legislation and, for that reason, perhaps did not go so well. (Perhaps he would have succeeded if he had been able to provide people with simple spinning wheels, and also banned textile factories.) Gandhi appealed to the wealthy to become willing trustees for the poor, as Ralph Nader has been doing in America. So far, not many have heeded their pleas. Binary economics is a system that would go a long way toward correcting the abuses of capitalism. For that reason, the capitalist class will never allow it.

Trimtabs, Talking Sticks, and Trusts

Mahatma Gandhi's humility led him to believe, "I have nothing new to teach the world. Truth and non-violence are as old as the hills." Yes, truth and nonviolence are as old as the hills; but organized nonviolent resistence to an unjust law was new when Gandhi led the march to Dandi opposing the Salt Act. Satyagraha was Gandhiji's great social invention. Dr. King used this invention to liberate Afro-americans from the unjust laws of segregation. Social inventions improve the relational landscape among humans, whereas industrial inventions improve the material landscape. Satyagraha is a "trimtab" social invention. A trimtab is a small control device that influences a larger control device, such as a small boat rudder used to move a large boat rudder. Satyagraha in India was the small rudder that eventually moved the larger rudder of the British Empire, causing the Empire to change direction. A trimtab social invention may at first appear too simple to work. A good example of this is another social invention - the talking stick used by many of Americas indigenous people before the European invasion. It is an amazing tool for resolving conflict. I have never seen it fail, and have used it dozens of times to resolve intractable conflicts. Yet. on the surface, it appears so simple that people often fail to use it because of the belief that it is "too simple to work." The Hindu Saint, Shree Maa of Kamakhya, has put forth another social invention that holds great promise. The outline of this invention is called "Family Wealth Presentation", and can be found at www.shreemaa.org.. This Presentation is brief, only 21 slides. Yet, it contains within it many seeds that will bear wonderful fruit for any family that plants and cultivates well. The seeds of this social invention, when planted in a family unit, empowers the family unit to preserve and increase family wealth through the generations - ending "born into poverty" as the usual human beginning. Shree Maa's social invention was the inspiration for Cloversweet Trust, my own attempt to realize this dream. Satyagraha, the talking stick, Family Trusts & Perpetual Family Banks - these are all social inventions. I am curious. What other social inventions have Gandhitopia members found helpful?

Searching for the Perfect Day

Sir William Osler told his students at Yale, "Live neither in the past nor in the future, but let each day absorb all your interest, energy and enthusiasm. The best preparation for tomorrow is to live today superbly well." Yes, anxiety seems always rooted in regret about the past or fear about the future. Each day should begin with a simple plan to reach attainable goals that very day, and end with a simple review. Each day a separate life - no regret of yesterday or anxiety about tomorrow. Perhaps even each moment a separate life - with one thought always repeating, "I make choices."