Merged A Thread for AlexPontik to Explain his Ideas

[Startz]

Thanks Gord.

I usually (but not this fall) teach an introductory econometrics course. About half the students are studying accounting. I'd like to be able to show examples in which regression is used in accounting or auditing to help motivate the material. Getting economic data is easy. Getting accounting data is hard, as most of it's proprietary.

 

[Matthew Ellard]

I appreciate the links, but I didn't see any obvious downloadable data. I probably should have been more clear. I'm looking for downloadable data that can be used in a regression.

Good point. I guess I need to clarify that matching comparative ratios to investigate if inherent risk exists, generally only applies to similar industries. If a mid sized furniture retail outlet turns over stock twenty times a year and has roughly 5% of the P&L annual cost of goods, sitting in the balance sheet, then similar furniture retail firms should show similar comparatives.

The main user of this logic is the Australian Tax Office (ATO). In Australia we lodge our returns through self assessment. We have to supply simplified financial statements and an industry code. The ATO uses computers to compare all similar industries together and those with the greatest variance from the norm are audited by the ATO.

The funny thing is that these specific industry comparative ratios are incredibly secret. If they weren't, naughty tax agents would massage actual financial statements to look normal ratios and thus avoid ATO audits.

I used to promote tax scams before being caught. When inflation was 17% there were ways of investing in Australian content movies (10BA) and receiving 120% tax deduction. The movie's producers would pay the tax payer back after the taxpayer had retired and thus received even more tax concessions. Mad Max and Crocodile Dundee were both 10BA tax films. The Aussie company Beyond that produced "Mythbusters" was originally a tax accounting practice that made 10BA films. I started there in the late 80's.

 

[Tippit]

Hi all,

I have the following argument regarding the purpose of money, does it seem correct to you, or am I wrong in my reasoning?
All feedback welcome, but please, keep it classy.

What is the purpose of money?

The purpose of money, is to enable elites to issue virtually unlimited quantities of it electronically out-of-nothing, and buy up all of the rent-producing assets of the world, including shares, bonds, and real-estate.

Then, when the rest of society wonders why there is such immense wealth disparity, they use the media which they bought long ago with the money they created, to inform everyone that it is because of "systemic racism".

 

[Matthew Ellard]

In the beginning humans had neither money nor capital.

Property (capital) included stone tools, woven baskets, livestock, clothing and so on. That's why we had the Neolithic Period (New Stone age)

Then humans had money, but money was concentrated on few people in society, and this was the law of the land.

Complete BS. "Counting stones" evolved before money to allow trading of things like livestock. It it still in use in PNG today.

Then humans said, let's allow everyone to have as much money as they want, and capital was born.

More BS. Counting stones and sticks represented a physical asset like livestock.

You seem totally unaware that people borrowed capital to improve their production output for almost 9,000 years. Did it occur to you for a nanosecond that "Usury" (interest) on borrowed money is heavily discussed in the bible and classical Roman law, more than 2000 years ago?

Here are 35,000 year old counting sticks.

 

[Matthew Ellard]

The purpose of money, is to enable elites to issue virtually unlimited quantities of it electronically out-of-nothing, and buy up all of the rent-producing assets of the world, including shares, bonds, and real-estate.Then, when the rest of society wonders why there is such immense wealth disparity, they use the media which they bought long ago with the money they created, to inform everyone that it is because of "systemic racism".

Do you think money should be backed by something like gold? Tell me the current wealth of the USA and then how much gold the USA holds?

Do you think the GDP of the USA should be forced to shrink back to its current gold reserve levels?

As for unequal wealth distribution, that is fixed by elections, not gold reserves.

 

[Matthew Ellard]

Start with a primitive society.

That's what anthropology and anthropological prehistory does. That's how I know about counting sticks, sexual division of labour and how early economic systems worked.

 

[Tippit]

Do you think money should be backed by something like gold? Tell me the current wealth of the USA and then how much gold the USA holds?

Do you think the GDP of the USA should be forced to shrink back to its current gold reserve levels?

As for unequal wealth distribution, that is fixed by elections, not gold reserves.

I think elites should be physically prevented from creating limitless money for their own benefit. How this gets implemented is irrelevant.

I think if gold, silver, or both were used, they would be repriced. Nothing would have to “shrink”

If you think elections solve the problem of unmerited wealth distribution, then i don’t think you understand the scope of either elections, or wealth distribution.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[marting]

Among'st other things:

"money is the mother's milk of politics" -Jessie Unruh

For me it's just what I have now that I'm retired.

 

[Matthew Ellard]

I think elites should be physically prevented from creating limitless money for their own benefit. How this gets implemented is irrelevant.

Incompetent socialist governments use exactly the same methods to create money supply.The only way to reduce the wealth gap is through taxation, which is political and thus determined by voting.

Lenin introduced moderate capitalistic reforms in his New Economic Policy (1922) aware that he could retain socialist wealth policies through taxation.

I think if gold, silver, or both were used, they would be repriced. Nothing would have to “shrink”

Complete crap. How could the USA "re-price" gold and silver when other countries are producing these metals. You obviously don't have a clue how OPEC and oil works, or De beers and diamond production.

Top 10 Gold Producing Countries
China – 399.7 tonnes.
Australia – 312.2 tonnes. ...
Russia – 281.5 tonnes. ...

If you think elections solve the problem of unmerited wealth distribution, then i don’t think you understand the scope of either elections, or wealth distribution.

I live in a democratic socialist country with free health and education. You're an American right?

 

[AlexPontik]

Sorry, but that is not how income taxes work at all. There are plenty of people who don't pay income taxes at all. And I'm not talking about non-filing, I'm talking low earners. There is no exchange going on there at all. They don't do the "this" but they get the "that." And it totally ignores consumption or use taxes. There is no explicit exchange. I buy a shirt, pay a tax, what is the "that" I'm getting for that sales-tax?

"There are plenty of people who don't pay income taxes at all. "
If they don't have to pay taxes at all, then there is no trade between creditors and debtors here.
If they do have to pay taxes and don't, it works as "either me or you don't do their part".

"I buy a shirt, pay a tax, what is the "that" I'm getting for that sales-tax?"
Whatever the state does with the money, if it isn't what you want then "either me or you don't do their part" is the category you fall under.

Sorry, but I still don't understand why you are using words like "kids" and "jokers" which have a limiting definition to a subset of people when you are trying to be general? If you are trying to find out, use common words with common understanding.

Yes I can understand why you say this, so here are the definitions.

Kids: any human including his/her behavior targeted to have fun. This is what seems to be happening to me in reality, humans are all kids who want to have fun, they have tendencies to pretend that they are serious, I still haven't met a single serious human in my life, it's just another kid, who wants to have fun, together with that kid's attitude.

Jokers: any human including his/her skills targeted to have fun. This is what seems to be happening to me in reality also, humans can have such different skills, with such different behaviors, in such different roles, so Jokers sounded appropriate.


You can use humans or people instead of the words I used, but let me know if this isn't what you were looking for.

 

[AlexPontik]

Complete crap. 30,000 years ago I had to transfer one in five sheep to the village chief when it was born (tax). The chief didn't keep a debtors or creditors ledger , did he?

No he didn't, he said I do this for you you do that for me and no ledger was kept.
I am not sure what you mean.

 

[AlexPontik]

The application of complex economic theory using standardised terminology is called "Econometrics". It is very common.

Sure, and what are you getting at?

Basic supply and demand curves are psychological metrics.

They are and, what are you getting at?

Monkeys do the same thing as it is evolved behaviour. It is called "equity theory in psychology". Humans still give votive gifts to the gods in the subconscious belief the gods will be obliged to give something back.

so if monkeys know this, why are you making all this noise here, what are you getting at?

No. It is a consumer receiving wealth transfers.

if it is a consumer, what does it pay the producer with?

Pre-existing capital means the money already exists.

I am not sure what you are getting at here also, you will need to explain yourself further.

It is clear you don't know what a trust or company is.

It is unclear to me whether you are looking for a conversation or a fight here, if you are looking for a conversation, you need to explain yourself further.

 

[AlexPontik]

Well, once I saw a civilization reduced to employees and employers, I thought we were heading towards a Marxist philosophy of theft of labor and undoing the accumulation of wealth in the hands of owners. But this is not where this went. I have no idea where it did go, however.

Where this goes, depends on what is fun for humans, and whether they are willing to behave to have fun.

 

[AlexPontik]

You are only testing and measuring one factor with regards to the speed of light.

In economics you are making a hypothesis based on a sample (econometrics) that does not actually show you what all the variables could be. If I increase the price of bananas and households substitute something else for bananas, I don't know if that is apples, oranges, kiwifruit, blueberries or the household simply stopped buying fruit. I would have to count all the alternatives, rather than simply ask a demand curve question about bananas.

I think that physics has basic fixed rules which narrows the alternatives to combinations, whereas economics is both evolving and has no fixed combination rules.

I now have to be more careful because, as physics and economics are very different fields, common words have very different meanings in the different fields. "elasticity" is a good example.

(I'm a semi retired entertainment tax lawyer with an economics background)

Economics has basic fixed rules also, that humans wants to have fun.
What does this mean? That humans try to avoid doing what is not fun when they can.
This has implications for their behavior, and their behavior for their actions, and their actions for the economy.
These implications are not changing throughout human history, for example if something is too expensive for someone, then usually that someone tries to look for other options, because this is what is fun for that someone, but also for most humans.
And only because humans don't think it is fun to pay more than you should for something, they usually want to pay less.
But for the few privileged humans they want to pay more for something than it costs, as this way others won't have the money to buy it. This is what luxury or exclusive products are, when status is part of the deal.
In short humans can go many ways when it comes to their behavior, what is common about their behavior is that people are trying to have fun in their lives, when the fun they have is common they have cooperation, when it is not they have conflict.
Some humans enjoy labeling conflict as competition, so let me explain what I mean.

When you have conflict, you want to be better than someone else, and this someone else to accept that.
When you have competition, you want to be better than no one else but yourself, and you don't care what this someone else thinks, you just have the patience to get better.

 

[Matthew Ellard]

Economics has basic fixed rules also, that humans wants to have fun. What does this mean? That humans try to avoid doing what is not fun when they can.

I think you need to know about a Giffen Good, in economics. A Giffen good is a commodity that goes against demand curve logic.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giffen_good

And only because humans don't think it is fun to pay more than you should for something, they usually want to pay less.

You mean there are demand curves in economics.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demand_curve

But for the few privileged humans they want to pay more for something than it costs, as this way others won't have the money to buy it.

Complete BS. Some people try to display their wealth conspicuous consumerism
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conspicuous_consumption

....however as they pay more and more, then the supply curve increases production of that consumer product.

 

[Matthew Ellard]

Sure, and what are you getting at?

You are offering fuzzy definitions for economic concepts that are both already well defined and definitions that already exist.

You should buy a book and learn these definitions, as it allows you to communicate with all economists. Some economic theory is counter intuitive and needs explaining.

 

[psionl0]

The purpose of money, is to enable elites to issue virtually unlimited quantities of it electronically out-of-nothing, and buy up all of the rent-producing assets of the world, including shares, bonds, and real-estate.

Then, when the rest of society wonders why there is such immense wealth disparity, they use the media which they bought long ago with the money they created, to inform everyone that it is because of "systemic racism".

That's a bit like saying that the purpose of a motor vehicle is to run over pedestrians and kill them.

 

[Distracted1]

That's a bit like saying that the purpose of a motor vehicle is to run over pedestrians and kill them.

Or that the purpose of a handgun is to kill a human being.

 

[Jack by the hedge]

Or that the purpose of a handgun is to kill a human being.

It's perhaps more like saying the purpose of motor vehicles and handguns is to rob banks and get away.

 

[Leftus]

"There are plenty of people who don't pay income taxes at all. "
If they don't have to pay taxes at all, then there is no trade between creditors and debtors here.
If they do have to pay taxes and don't, it works as "either me or you don't do their part".

But they still get access to all of the general benefits, and even direct payments, from the federal government. So where, exactly, is the tit-for-tat exchange there?

For example, someone making the awesome sum of around 15K a year. They will pay ZERO income taxes, make a few grand from the EITC, and if they have kids, a few grand there. They will have paid a pittance in other taxes including SSI. Yet you exclude them from your creditor / debtor calculations.

"I buy a shirt, pay a tax, what is the "that" I'm getting for that sales-tax?"
Whatever the state does with the money, if it isn't what you want then "either me or you don't do their part" is the category you fall under.

So it's only a tit-for-tat exchange, if I agree with what the state / city is spending that tax on? Do I get to opt out? Why not?

Yes I can understand why you say this, so here are the definitions.

Kids: any human including his/her behavior targeted to have fun. This is what seems to be happening to me in reality, humans are all kids who want to have fun, they have tendencies to pretend that they are serious, I still haven't met a single serious human in my life, it's just another kid, who wants to have fun, together with that kid's attitude.

Jokers: any human including his/her skills targeted to have fun. This is what seems to be happening to me in reality also, humans can have such different skills, with such different behaviors, in such different roles, so Jokers sounded appropriate.

You can use humans or people instead of the words I used, but let me know if this isn't what you were looking for.

You are still missing the point. You have highly specific definitions for absolutely no reason. If they are just people or humans, then defining them as kids or jokers, with oddly specific definitions, makes no sense. If you define kids to include everyone, why use kids in the first place? It already has a set definition, and trying to supplant an established term with one of your own creation is a bad idea, unless you are intentionally trying to create confusion.