No, no, I'm not a manic depressive, I'm just a bit on the glum side, that's all! My preceding post might have might have wiped the smile off your face but this will have you reaching for a handful of 'uppers'!
As you will have read elsewhere, in fact, anywhere on the finance pages of any media outlet, there is a major economic tsunami winding up even as I tap out this miserable message. The news has even reached little Georgie in No. 11 who, against all his previous 'cheery chappie' statements, issued a rather glum warning just a few days ago. As always, the guilty parties are difficult to pin down. Undoubtedly the lying liars who run China bear a great deal of the blame. It has been obvious for years, er, as this blog has constantly pointed out, that they couldn't run a chop suey shop because they don't understand capitalism and think they can order it around just as they order their people around. Now they are just beginning to realise that capital is a many-headed dragon that has several lives of its own. Unfortunately, when the banking system in China finally implodes the shock waves will hit us as hard as them.
Then there are our very own western governments who, despite the historical evidence before their eyes, still believe all that Keynesian nonsense, as James Bartholomew spells out in this week's 'Speccie':
[T]he most accepted part of economics is Keynesianism. Of course, John Maynard Keynes said lots of things about economics in between his many and varied sexual encounters. But, as is the way of the world, one of the things he said turned out to be particularly influential. It is so influential that it has gone around the world. It is repeated and relied upon by Japanese finance ministers, New York Times columnists, Nobel prize winners and anti-austerity demonstrators. It is in textbooks around the globe. It is on page 262 of the Edexcel Economics A-level text book. In fact, it crops up several times in the book in various forms. Keynes, personally, is mentioned more frequently than any other economist living or dead. The idea guides government policy around the world and certainly here in Britain.
There is just one little problem: the idea is wrong. And as China — a devout follower of Keynes these days as much as of Marx — falters, it is becoming more and more apparent just how wrong it is.
The idea that governments can just press the 'ON' button and print off reams of paper money to solve all our economic ills is so stupid that only a Nobel Prize winning prat like Paul Krugman could believe it. It is a governmental Ponzi scheme of gigantic proportions and, sooner rather than later, we will find out the truth of the scam the hard way.
However, here in Britain, the economic catastrophe could have even more alarming results. The vast majority of people in 'this septic Isle' view Jeremy Corbyn and his polit-bureau as more or less harmless cranks, just another, even funnier, version of 'the Milipede'. No one, bar a few loonies and teen-agers, would put them in charge of a parish council, let alone the entire country. But that could all change when the brown stuff hits the fan. With a collapsing currency, raging inflation and mass unemployment, 'the People' (dread words!) will vote for anyone offering a quick and apparently easy solution. And once they are in, can you see the Marxist likes of 'Jezza', Ken Livingstone, John McDonnell, Seamus Milne et al, ever willingly giving up the power they would have?
In the meantime, the printing presses keep on rolling . . .
The Keynesian model proved to be catnip for those statist types in government who just lust for the power and control printing money to solve problems offered. The Austrian model did not empower government statists, rather it empowered the individual and sound money. Statists win these battles by bribing the citizen with his own money...controlled by the state of course.
Posted by: whitewall | Saturday, 16 January 2016 at 14:49
An excellent summary, Whiters, as usual!
Posted by: David Duff | Saturday, 16 January 2016 at 15:06