Global Economic Intersection
Advertisement
  • Home
  • Economics
  • Finance
  • Politics
  • Investments
    • Invest in Amazon $250
  • Cryptocurrency
    • Best Bitcoin Accounts
    • Bitcoin Robot
      • Quantum AI
      • Bitcoin Era
      • Bitcoin Aussie System
      • Bitcoin Profit
      • Bitcoin Code
      • eKrona Cryptocurrency
      • Bitcoin Up
      • Bitcoin Prime
      • Yuan Pay Group
      • Immediate Profit
      • BitQH
      • Bitcoin Loophole
      • Crypto Boom
      • Bitcoin Treasure
      • Bitcoin Lucro
      • Bitcoin System
      • Oil Profit
      • The News Spy
      • Bitcoin Buyer
      • Bitcoin Inform
      • Immediate Edge
      • Bitcoin Evolution
      • Cryptohopper
      • Ethereum Trader
      • BitQL
      • Quantum Code
      • Bitcoin Revolution
      • British Trade Platform
      • British Bitcoin Profit
    • Bitcoin Reddit
    • Celebrities
      • Dr. Chris Brown Bitcoin
      • Teeka Tiwari Bitcoin
      • Russell Brand Bitcoin
      • Holly Willoughby Bitcoin
No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Economics
  • Finance
  • Politics
  • Investments
    • Invest in Amazon $250
  • Cryptocurrency
    • Best Bitcoin Accounts
    • Bitcoin Robot
      • Quantum AI
      • Bitcoin Era
      • Bitcoin Aussie System
      • Bitcoin Profit
      • Bitcoin Code
      • eKrona Cryptocurrency
      • Bitcoin Up
      • Bitcoin Prime
      • Yuan Pay Group
      • Immediate Profit
      • BitQH
      • Bitcoin Loophole
      • Crypto Boom
      • Bitcoin Treasure
      • Bitcoin Lucro
      • Bitcoin System
      • Oil Profit
      • The News Spy
      • Bitcoin Buyer
      • Bitcoin Inform
      • Immediate Edge
      • Bitcoin Evolution
      • Cryptohopper
      • Ethereum Trader
      • BitQL
      • Quantum Code
      • Bitcoin Revolution
      • British Trade Platform
      • British Bitcoin Profit
    • Bitcoin Reddit
    • Celebrities
      • Dr. Chris Brown Bitcoin
      • Teeka Tiwari Bitcoin
      • Russell Brand Bitcoin
      • Holly Willoughby Bitcoin
No Result
View All Result
Global Economic Intersection
No Result
View All Result

The Ideology of Money Scarcity

admin by admin
October 10, 2015
in Uncategorized
0
0
SHARES
4
VIEWS
Share on FacebookShare on Twitter

by J.D. Alt, New Economic Perspectives

I’ve been continuing to work on the book I first proposed here at NEP last spring-The Millennials’ Money-and am getting close now to having it ready for publication. The aspect of it that was least successful (and there were several NEP comments to that effect) was the framing of the “ideology of money scarcity” as having evolved from the particularities of the baby-boomer’s generational experience.

That was always a shaky and not-very-insightful argument-and I recently came to realize it had to be replaced with a “framing” that focused the “target” of the book in a more useful way. This “target” became clear to me while reading a series of collected essays by Wendell Berry (The Art of the Commonplace) in which he very forcefully explains how and why local, self-sufficient economies are being exploited and destroyed by the multi-national corporate economy-and why it is essential for those local economies to somehow be re-established and regain some useful portion of their self-sufficiency. I realized this was, in fact, precisely what my book was suggesting ought to be the ultimate purpose of the “millennials’ money”-and that modern fiat currency, itself, makes achieving that goal uniquely possible. What follows here is part of my revised introduction, which is titled:

“The Ideology of Money Scarcity – A Brief History”.

…. Most important, however, all the monetary procedures that had been put in place to protect against the government issuing more dollars than it had in gold-even though they were no longer necessary-were left untouched. These protective “money procedures” (which we’ll outline in Chapter 2) kept everyone thinking and behaving exactly as they had before 1971. That is to say, they behaved as if the quantity of dollars available in the world was a finite and limited “resource” (like gold) for which everyone-including the sovereign government itself-had to compete to have a share of.

We could call this perception and belief the “ideology of money scarcity”-and we could speculate about who, or what interests, have most benefited from maintaining (and even reinforcing) its imposition on our common view of the world.

We might imagine, for example, one group of beneficiaries to be those who, for one reason or another, believe the federal government should be small and unobtrusive in the daily affairs of its citizens. Members of this group might believe as well that local governments should have more power and more to say about things than a big, central bureaucracy that’s out of touch with people’s needs. To keep the sovereign government small and its activism in check, this group only needs to argue that whatever it is the sovereign government wants to do, there isn’t enough money available to do it. The current presidential campaign of Bernie Sanders is a case in point: Mr. Sanders forcefully ticks off his list of collective goods the federal government ought to create, only to be confronted with media pundits who calculate that his federal programs will cost $18 trillion dollars-a number that is approximately $18 trillion dollars more than anyone believes the federal government has to spend, or could reasonably collect in taxes. “Tax and spend”-it’s an argument that shuts down any enthusiasm for national collective accomplishments every time.

I would argue that the primary beneficiary of the ideology of money scarcity, however, is the modern corporation-especially the multi-national corporation which has as its business model the transformation of self-sufficient local economies into the unwitting and dependent consumers of global supply chains from which the corporations greatly profit. The ideology of money scarcity assists this business model in numerous ways. The most powerful assist derives from the perception that the corporate economy itself is the “broker” of the money that’s available to be used in the world. This perception is projected and reinforced by the global stock and financial markets which seem to be the exclusive decision-makers about who gets to spend money, and for what purpose-even to the point of establishing and reinforcing the belief that sovereign governments themselves must borrow their money from the corporate economy’s “financial industry.” Thus the multi-national corporations are positioned perfectly to manipulate and guide the political decisions that support their business model, and their bottom line.

In his book Shattered Consensus, James Piereson argues that America today is thinking and acting with two diametrically opposed belief systems. On one side, those who call themselves “conservatives” believe that an intrusive sovereign government has not been constrained enough, and that what is needed is a radical new shrinkage of federal spending. To this I would add that the “conservatives” are strongly encouraged, supported and manipulated in this belief by the interests of the corporate economy which specifically want to shrink any efforts by the federal government to restrict or regulate their profit-making enterprise. (As an illustration, I give you the Coca-Cola Company which, it was recently revealed, paid millions of dollars for “scientific research” to debunk the connection between sugary drinks and childhood obesity, thereby discouraging any “health-based” regulation that might impact its profits.)

On the other side, according to Mr. Piereson, those who call themselves “liberals” believe the unfairness, inequities and environmental destructiveness of the corporate economic system-coupled with its inability or refusal to address major societal needs-demands a radical expansion of the government’s role and activism. This stand-off seems a fairly accurate description of our present political landscape, but it fails to observe the singularly important detail which we are now trying to see: Each of these opposing views is firmly grounded in the fundamental ideology of money scarcity. The conservatives wield every opportunity to invoke the mantra that the government is broke and its spending must be reined in, while the liberals (like senator Sanders) find themselves helpless to refute the “logic” that the many things they want the government to spend money on are severely limited by the fact that everyone (including the U.S. government itself) is competing for what appears to be a finite and limited pot of dollars.

The Millennials’ Money

As I’m about to demonstrate, this view of money is illogical at its core-and profoundly counter-productive for our society as a whole, not to mention millions of specific individuals and families who comprise the vast majority of that “whole.” Furthermore, the only true beneficiaries of maintaining the ideology of money scarcity are the multi-national corporations which are now, as I write, dramatically accelerating their global control of local resources. Local economies are cudgeled and manipulated into first becoming the providers of export commodities-which the corporations buy as cheap as possible-and then beguiled into becoming the eager consumers of imported commodities which the corporations sell as profitably as they can. It’s a “beautiful” business model if your goals are to maximize shareholder profits and executive bonuses. As a business model for humanity-and for humanity as a dependent member of the earth’s community of integrated ecosystems-it is fast becoming, quite simply, an unmitigated disaster.

What I believe (and hope) is that today’s Millennials, being the first cooperatively oriented (civic) generation to come to power in the first true era of modern “fiat money”, will also be the first to grasp the astonishing possibilities this “modern money” perspective makes available to a collective democratic society. Equally important, it’s my hope that those BGXers who legitimately (I believe) bemoan, mistrust, and abhor the bureaucratic behemoth that is our sovereign federal government, will come to see that modern fiat money is not a license to fatten the beast further, but rather a true opportunity to trim it into something lean and effective in assisting the affairs of both collective and individual aspirations.

This is why I believe that modern fiat money truly is, or will become, the “Millennial’s Money”-and, I might add, just in time. What they, as a generation, are inheriting is a growing cloud of collective problems that actually must be solved-and solved by whatever method gets the job done. Most challenging, perhaps, is the fact that these problems are not going to be solved by a corporate economy operating with a business model that, in fact, creates and exacerbates the problems themselves. Rather than obsessing about ideological norms and dogmas (like their parental generations), the Millennials have already begun searching for real, pragmatic, concrete solutions to the unfolding difficulties that they, and the rest of life on planet earth, are facing. Fortunately, as it turns out-and as I now hope to demonstrate-this kind of effort is exactly what modern fiat money is ideally suited to accommodate.

Previous Post

The Most Dangerous Countries For Aid Workers

Next Post

Early Headlines: Guns On Campuses, South China Sea Dispute, Russia – Iran – U.S. In Syria, Dollar And Deflation, Nobel Peace Prize And More

Related Posts

How To Mine Bitcoin At Home
Econ Intersect News

How To Mine Bitcoin At Home

by John Wanguba
February 7, 2023
Adani's Market Losses Exceeded $100B As Crisis Shockwaves Extended
Business

Adani’s Market Losses Exceeded $100B As Crisis Shockwaves Extended

by John Wanguba
February 7, 2023
Airbus And Boeing Strive To Fill Massive Factories With Small Jets
Business

Airbus And Boeing Strive To Fill Massive Factories With Small Jets

by John Wanguba
February 7, 2023
Fed Officials See Lots Of Room To Eliminate Bonds From Balance Sheet
Economics

Fed Officials See Lots Of Room To Eliminate Bonds From Balance Sheet

by John Wanguba
February 7, 2023
Hong Kong Securities Watchdog Hires Crypto Personnel For Sector Supervision
Business

Hong Kong Securities Watchdog Hires Crypto Personnel For Sector Supervision

by John Wanguba
February 6, 2023
Next Post

Early Headlines: Guns On Campuses, South China Sea Dispute, Russia - Iran - U.S. In Syria, Dollar And Deflation, Nobel Peace Prize And More

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Browse by Category

  • Business
  • Econ Intersect News
  • Economics
  • Finance
  • Politics
  • Uncategorized

Browse by Tags

adoption altcoins banking banks Binance Bitcoin Bitcoin adoption Bitcoin market Bitcoin mining blockchain BTC business China crypto crypto adoption cryptocurrency crypto exchange crypto market crypto regulation decentralized finance DeFi Elon Musk ETH Ethereum Europe finance FTX inflation investment market analysis markets Metaverse mining NFT nonfungible tokens oil market price analysis recession regulation Russia technology Tesla the UK the US Twitter

Archives

  • February 2023
  • January 2023
  • December 2022
  • November 2022
  • October 2022
  • September 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • February 2022
  • January 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • October 2021
  • September 2021
  • August 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • February 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • May 2015
  • April 2015
  • March 2015
  • February 2015
  • January 2015
  • December 2014
  • November 2014
  • October 2014
  • September 2014
  • August 2014
  • July 2014
  • June 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • March 2014
  • February 2014
  • January 2014
  • December 2013
  • November 2013
  • October 2013
  • September 2013
  • August 2013
  • July 2013
  • June 2013
  • May 2013
  • April 2013
  • March 2013
  • February 2013
  • January 2013
  • December 2012
  • November 2012
  • October 2012
  • September 2012
  • August 2012
  • July 2012
  • June 2012
  • May 2012
  • April 2012
  • March 2012
  • February 2012
  • January 2012
  • December 2011
  • November 2011
  • October 2011
  • September 2011
  • August 2011
  • July 2011
  • June 2011
  • May 2011
  • April 2011
  • March 2011
  • February 2011
  • January 2011
  • December 2010
  • August 2010
  • August 2009

Categories

  • Business
  • Econ Intersect News
  • Economics
  • Finance
  • Politics
  • Uncategorized
Global Economic Intersection

After nearly 11 years of 24/7/365 operation, Global Economic Intersection co-founders Steven Hansen and John Lounsbury are retiring. The new owner, a global media company in London, is in the process of completing the set-up of Global Economic Intersection files in their system and publishing platform. The official website ownership transfer took place on 24 August.

Categories

  • Business
  • Econ Intersect News
  • Economics
  • Finance
  • Politics
  • Uncategorized

Recent Posts

  • How To Mine Bitcoin At Home
  • Adani’s Market Losses Exceeded $100B As Crisis Shockwaves Extended
  • Airbus And Boeing Strive To Fill Massive Factories With Small Jets

© Copyright 2021 EconIntersect - Economic news, analysis and opinion.

No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Contact Us
  • Bitcoin Robot
    • Bitcoin Profit
    • Bitcoin Code
    • Quantum AI
    • eKrona Cryptocurrency
    • Bitcoin Up
    • Bitcoin Prime
    • Yuan Pay Group
    • Immediate Profit
    • BitIQ
    • Bitcoin Loophole
    • Crypto Boom
    • Bitcoin Era
    • Bitcoin Treasure
    • Bitcoin Lucro
    • Bitcoin System
    • Oil Profit
    • The News Spy
    • British Bitcoin Profit
    • Bitcoin Trader
  • Bitcoin Reddit

© Copyright 2021 EconIntersect - Economic news, analysis and opinion.

en English
ar Arabicbg Bulgarianda Danishnl Dutchen Englishfi Finnishfr Frenchde Germanel Greekit Italianja Japaneselv Latvianno Norwegianpl Polishpt Portuguesero Romanianes Spanishsv Swedish