No time for lullabies

[Lyrandar]

Read http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=6666919&postcount=76

I did. It talks about how this can happen, but doesn't mention what if anything the Fed can do in response and why such methods would be ineffective. I find it very hard to believe that the potential problems with this method are known only to whoever wrote that article, and that there is nothing that can be done about them. I also have very little information I can use to verify the source's credibility.

 

[Piggy]

Nothing apocalyptic, just a response to the coming economic decline of the United States.

The United States?

Let's be real here. The whole shebang is unsustainable.

Any nation that thinks it's in a position to usurp the role of the old powers is in for a sharp disappointment.

You can't get there from here anymore.

We've brought the environment to the brink of a period shift, so environmental exploitation is off the menu.

With nearly 7 billion people on the planet, growth economies are also doomed even in the middle-term.

The fact is, we've all got to figure out how to shift from a growth paradigm to a sustainability paradigm, and nobody yet knows how to do it.

The ones who figure it out first and best will be the ones who prosper the most.

Personally, I ain't waiting up nights.

 

[TFian]

The United States?

Let's be real here. The whole shebang is unsustainable.

Any nation that thinks it's in a position to usurp the role of the old powers is in for a sharp disappointment.

You can't get there from here anymore.

We've brought the environment to the brink of a period shift, so environmental exploitation is off the menu.

With nearly 7 billion people on the planet, growth economies are also doomed even in the middle-term.

The fact is, we've all got to figure out how to shift from a growth paradigm to a sustainability paradigm, and nobody yet knows how to do it.

The ones who figure it out first and best will be the ones who prosper the most.

Personally, I ain't waiting up nights.

Can't find anything I disagree with there. That's what I've been saying the whole time...

I think you'd really like the works of John Michael Greer. You should check him out.

 

[TFian]

I did. It talks about how this can happen, but doesn't mention what if anything the Fed can do in response and why such methods would be ineffective. I find it very hard to believe that the potential problems with this method are known only to whoever wrote that article, and that there is nothing that can be done about them. I also have very little information I can use to verify the source's credibility.

Well, they're not only known to the author of said article, he's simply detailing the issue.

Here's more http://www.thenewamerican.com/index.php/history/american/4873-americas-inflation-and-hyperinflation

With the reckless activities of the Federal Reserve and the United States Treasury over the past several years, some among the punditry are starting to fret that America may soon find herself engulfed by high inflation or even hyperinflation. The former has been a scourge since time immemorial wherever improvident governments chose to debase the value of their own currency. The latter — the catastrophic decline in a currency’s value, manifested by consumer price increases by hundreds or thousands of percent or more over a brief interval — has wreaked financial and social havoc on empires large and small for millennia, bringing post-World War I Germany to its knees in the 1920s, overthrowing the government of Argentina in the 1980s, and driving once-prosperous Zimbabwe into utter ruin in the current decade.

Get your dollar bills ready, they may make for useful fire material soon enough...

 

[Lyrandar]

Well, they're not only known to the author of said article, he's simply detailing the issue.

... Let me just make sure I'm understanding this: other people do know about this, but the actions that could be taken by the Fed to counter inflation and why they won't work are beyond the scope of that particular article. Is that about right?

Here's more http://www.thenewamerican.com/index.php/history/american/4873-americas-inflation-and-hyperinflation

I have seen arguments for the gold standard before, you know. This is no better than any of the others: ignores the fact that the world can change in a century or two, ignores any factors beyond the presence or absence of the gold standard, and refuses to acknowledge the fact that the Fed can inhibit as well as promote inflation. Also ignores the disadvantages of the gold standard, for that matter.

 

[TFian]

... Let me just make sure I'm understanding this: other people do know about this, but the actions that could be taken by the Fed to counter inflation and why they won't work are beyond the scope of that particular article. Is that about right?

The article in question is meant moreso to diagnose the problem, rather than offer a treatment.

I have seen arguments for the gold standard before, you know. This is no better than any of the others: ignores the fact that the world can change in a century or two, ignores any factors beyond the presence or absence of the gold standard, and refuses to acknowledge the fact that the Fed can inhibit as well as promote inflation. Also ignores the disadvantages of the gold standard, for that matter.

Well, a gold standard is certainly far better than a fiat money system based on debt, it can only do so much to address the real problems, which are peak oil (which caused the last financial meltdown), and a civilization that's hitting real (hard) ecological limits. We need a gold standard for sound money, but it won't let us continue business as usual. We're going to have to reform towards an economy hat's more like an agrarian economy if we really want to be secure in the future.

 

[Lyrandar]

The article in question is meant moreso to diagnose the problem, rather than offer a treatment.

Except in order to convince me that there is a problem in the first place, it needs to convince me that the standard methods the Fed uses aren't going to be effective this time around. Without doing so, it does nothing more than point out the possibility of a problem without giving me the actual probability that it's going to happen.

Well, a gold standard is certainly far better than a fiat money system based on debt...

Didn't I just say I wasn't actually convinced of this?

...it can only do so much to address the real problems, which are peak oil (which caused the last financial meltdown), and a civilization that's hitting real (hard) ecological limits. We need a gold standard for sound money, but it won't let us continue business as usual. We're going to have to reform towards an economy hat's more like an agrarian economy if we really want to be secure in the future.

I gather you have said this in the past, from reading the comments in this thread. I'd like to reread some of those previous debates before seriously discussing this issue - my initial impression is that you haven't proven that the tech level required for an agrarian economy is the only solution to the problems you present, but I'm sure that's been said before, and I don't really have time to do better than that now...

 

[TFian]

Except in order to convince me that there is a problem in the first place, it needs to convince me that the standard methods the Fed uses aren't going to be effective this time around. Without doing so, it does nothing more than point out the possibility of a problem without giving me the actual probability that it's going to happen.

Well, except that A.) The FED has never been able to stop a crisis like this in the past, and B.) these same methods have been tried in the past, in both Zimbabwe and the Weimar Republic, both with disastrous, hyperinflation results.

Didn't I just say I wasn't actually convinced of this?

I didn't say you were. It is though, a good policy, just not on it's own. It needs to be accompanied with other reforms.

I gather you have said this in the past, from reading the comments in this thread. I'd like to reread some of those previous debates before seriously discussing this issue - my initial impression is that you haven't proven that the tech level required for an agrarian economy is the only solution to the problems you present, but I'm sure that's been said before, and I don't really have time to do better than that now...

Well, you could always use the search function on JREF

 

[jakesteele]

I'm 60 yrs. old and I have seen extremely radical changes in this country compared to when I was growing. Many of these are bad. I found these links that collectively list many reasons for the decline of a civilization. Tell me what you think, especially if you're younger.




http://www.clintonmemoriallibrary.com/clint_change.html
1. The first sign of the end of a culture is that of a society which no longer worships or acknowledges God.
2. A second indicator of the end of a culture is the decline of the family.
3. A third important indicator of cultural demise is a society's low view of life.
Today, the popular culture now views abortion as a "right."
4. Another sign of the end of the civilization is the prevalence of base and immoral entertainment.
5. Still another troublesome indicator of society's demise is the increase of violent crime among young people.
6. Another key cultural indicator is the declining middle class.
7. Yet another sign of cultural demise is that of an insolvent Government.
8. Related to this, a government that lives off of society's moral decay is another sign of the end of a civilization.
9. One obvious indicator that a culture is in decline is when the ruling class loses its will.
10.The final indicator of the demise of a civilization is the failure of its people to see what is happening.

http://www.ourcivilisation.com/signs/index.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Societal_collapse

http://www.corson.org/archives/sociological/S27_090109.htm
From bondage to spiritual faith,
From spiritual faith to great courage,
From courage to liberty,
From liberty to abundance,
From abundance to selfishness,
From selfishness to complacency,
From complacency to apathy,
From apathy to dependency,
From dependency back again to bondage."

http://perebenoit.net/2004/07/30/the-five-signs-of-a-declining-civilization/
these are the five signs of a declining civilization: a dramatic increase in sexual promiscuity; the political undermining and disintegration of family values; the cultural destruction of the family unit; the killing of the innocent; and a radical increase in non-warfare violence.

 

[Lyrandar]

Well, except that A.) The FED has never been able to stop a crisis like this in the past, and B.) these same methods have been tried in the past, in both Zimbabwe and the Weimar Republic, both with disastrous, hyperinflation results.

I still see nothing about what the Fed will do if/when the problems you cite start to materialize more obviously. Or what the Fed could do before that point to prevent them from materializing at all.

Effectively, what I'm asking you to do is set up a good argument for the other side, then knock it down. I'm about ninety percent certain the Fed has measures to reduce inflation as well as encourage it. I'm asking you to tell me what they are (if you think that's not necessary, that is okay, though), then tell me why they won't work.

Well, you could always use the search function on JREF

I certainly could, and I intend to. Just not immediately.