All companies who receive ANY government assistance should have their yearly compensation (including salary, bonuses and stock options) limited to the salary of the President of the United States which is $400,000. Meanwhile, no full time employee should be paid less than a living wage which is approximately $30,000 per year and varies some throughout the country. Thus there would be approximately a thirteen time ratio from the lowest to the highest paid employee in a company. Over time, the ratio should be reduced to approximately eight and apply to any U.S. company who receives any money at all from the federal government. The living wage should apply to every full time employee in America.
The total number of hours that an full time employee can work should be reduce to 35 hours per week so that more employees are needed. This number could be reduced on increased based on unemployment rates.
The only way to get America out of this financial crisis is to give jobs to all Americans and to pay ordinary Americans more money. Giving money to just the rich will not help this economy. America is based on a middle class with plenty of disposable income. As the middle class has been crushed, America has declined.
America is doomed.
Unlike weak Americans, the French have the balls to get out and protest against their government and the way they are handling the financial crisis. In the end the French will get more from their government.
Meanwhile, millions are laid off in America and hardly a peep is hear out of ordinary Americans. Americans need to get into the game and quit letting the politicians and rich people push them around.
America is doomed.
Blame America for the global financial crisis. The American form of “free enterprise” that has been championed by Milton Friedman and implemented by Republicans over the last forty years, has destroyed the economic system of nearly the entire world:
The ITUC warned that around the world more than 50 million jobs could be lost this year and that more than 200 million people would be driven into absolute poverty. The confederation said that the financial crisis had arisen because of “rampant speculation and financial profiteering” and that new global financial architecture needed to be established to “support regulation and ensure coherence”.
Some in American still think the current crisis is like other recessions that have occurred in the last forty years. They are wrong for many reasons. In the past, there were monetary and fiscal corrections that could be made which resulted in recoveries. These are gone this time. America is so far in debt that the increased debt alone will destroy the U.S. dollar. Protection is already a foregone conclusion and is in the latest Obama stimulus bill. Hyper inflation will emerge once crippling deflation finishes ravaging the economy, depleting savings and destroying wealth for ordinary people.
America will embrace socialism in order to provide basic necessities to Americans. There will be massive redistribution of wealth as America reconstructs a doomed currency. Oil and gold will become very expensive in U.S. dollars. The only commodities that will be relatively cheap are the ones that can be produced in America with little energy. Renewable energy will no longer be just to avoid importing oil — it will be the only energy the new America will be able to afford.
This Depression will not be like the Depression of the 1930s, because there are lots more people and many less options. People will not be able to return to farms to grow food to avoid starving to death. They will require the government to distribute food to all. Banks will be nationalized and in many ways have already been. Americans will attempt to emigrate to other countries because the conditions in America will be onerous and difficult. Many people will die and many will kill themselves as hope vanishes. There will be giant rallies of the unemployed, riots in cities, assassinations of politicians, elimination of current conservative political parties, and emergence of very left wing organizations which will make the current democratic party appear conservative.
A quicker solution would be to default on all the debt, establish a new currency, and nationalized banks so that commerce could begin again. All able people would be provided jobs or training for jobs. Great social programs, like universal health care, would be created. There will be living wage guarantees, higher taxes, and restrictions on wealth accumulation. A new green economy will emerge to employ millions of new workers. Universities will thrive as education is valued and people who excel at innovation are recognized as national heroes. Some private ownership will continue but most people would live in government owned properties. Corporations will be completely redefined in order to remove the greed and corruption from the system and virtually all will be non-profit.
Unfortunately, none of the transformation that is necessary will happen soon, because America continues to assume this is just an ordinary recession and the tools of the past will work again. They are wrong; thus, the pain will continue for a while.
America is doomed.
Today, Amazon announced strong earnings and is an excellent example of why America is doomed. The Amazon model for book delivery (and lots and lots of other merchandise) is very efficient, easy for consumers to use, and cheaper than the traditional brick and mortar model. Translation, Amazon achieves more with a lot less people, i.e. unemployment. Ditto, for Netflix. Meanwhile, goodbye Circuit City, Borders, Barnes and Noble, and Best Buys — to name just a few. Yes, a few more jobs at UPS and Fed Ex. But, on balance, a lot less jobs for America.
Amazon is a good company and kudos to the people that run the company. However, the implications of companies like this is less employment for America. Plus — nobody is talking about the extent that technology is eliminating jobs. Thus, nobody is addressing the job destruction phenomenon that is occurring in the U.S. The latest stimulus bill doesn’t address that at all.
Further, Amazon will have to get more efficient about its model in order to continue to do well. Translation, doing more with less people and using technology even more. In the process, the digital world will make it more difficult to sell “books”, just like the virtual destruction of the traditional music business. That is, if it is digital it can be copied and distributed for virtually zero cost.
Even authors, can publish online for almost nothing and receive almost nothing in income. This has been happening for decades with the free software foundation who produce more software than all the “for profit” software companies in America. Meanwhile, companies are embracing free software tools and paying virtually nothing for it. Companies, like IBM, have embraced linux in their bids. Screw Microsoft (yeah — those greedy bastards!), Sun, and you name it. Think of any great new software idea, start a company, and if it is really good the free software will clone it in short order and will probably do it even better. Too bad I spent all that time in Computer Science grad school.
Replicate the “free” model to Wikipedia, self-publishing authors, and new media stars ala youtube.com. All of these venues result in people producing products for free to other for free. Meanwhile, ignore traditional commerce and the “free enterprise” system. It is full employment for the unemployed who won’t make any money. Sure, there are still traditional books that are doing well but this is only because it takes a while for people to figure out they don’t have to buy it any more.
Think about this — if it was really difficult to leave the place you live, what place would you still have to go to? For me, it would only be places where my physical body must be there, e.g. doctor, haircut. That’s about it. So, how much commercial space does the U.S. need for retail? If your community is like mine, there is lots of retail space for lease and more every day.
America is doomed.
Todd Sullivan points out the scariest chart ever in his post. Below is the chart of U.S. bank borrowing from the Federal Reserve through 2008. Notice that all the previous borrowing is insignificant.
America is doomed.
