A concern about “Medicare for All”

Image result for breaking chains

It takes only two things to keep people in chains:
The ignorance of the oppressed and the treachery of their leaders.

————————————————————————————————————————————————————

In the previous post, “How our friends hurt us more than our enemies can,” we explained that contrary to popular opinion, there is no shortage of money to support federal funding of Medicare for every man, woman, and child in America.

Our Monetarily Sovereign federal government never can run out of its own sovereign currency, the dollar. Indeed, the federal government’s method for creating dollars is to spend dollars.

The government sends instructions to creditors’ banks, instructing the banks to increase the balances in the creditors’ checking accounts. When the banks obey those instructions, brand new dollars are created.

In response, reader “Bgray” wrote:

“As the MS/MMT community knows, the real question about single payer universal health care is not how much it costs, as that is irrelevant, but rather are there sufficient resources, namely doctors, nurses, technicians, clinics, and hospitals, to handle the large influx of new patients.

“Let’s be honest, the real issue has more to do with the underlying fear with respect to the reallocation of medical resources away from the rich towards the poor, and how quickly the health care system can adjust to the increased demand.”

I agree and disagree.

Yes, Bgray is correct that the cost of universal health care is effectively irrelevant, as the dollars would be supplied from a limitless source.

But, though some of the rich (the .1%) may fear losing medical resources to the poor, that is unlikely to happen. Resources always follow the money. One cannot imagine wealthy people being unable to obtain services from the very best doctors, nurses, technicians, clinics, and hospitals.

But, I agree with “Bgray” about potential shortages of resources for the 99%.

Every major change leads to shortages. The invention of the automobile required vast changes in the supply of steel, oil, rubber, etc. All-electric cars have led to a shortage of batteries, which is why Tesla is building a giant battery factory.

Federal support of the military has created massive needs for weaponry, leading at times, to shortages of vital materials.

The invention of the smart phone caused shortages of rare earths. Medicine’s increase in human lifespan has created a shortage in elder care facilities.

As for the presumed shortage of doctors, nurses, technicians, clinics, and hospitals to service the 99%, this could be alleviated by:

  1.  Encouraging entry into the medical service professions by paying medical service personnel more. Because “Medicare for All” would not lack for money, there would be no need to skimp on pay.
  2. Paying students to attend school, and helping to reduce the dropout rate of potential future doctors, nurses,  and technicians. (See Steps #4 and #5, below)
  3. Increasing drug and medical procedure R&D, leading to faster recoveries and more home recoveries. We already have begun that. Most hospital stays today are much shorter than they were 20 years ago.
  4. Increasing R&D on computer-aided diagnoses and treatment to reduce the number of doctors needed per patient, and lead to fewer hospital admissions, and also to shorter stays.
  5. Developing better equipment to make doctors, nurses, and technicians more effective and able to service more patients per year
  6. Reducing personnel-dense intensive care and emergency room usage by making regular doctor and hospital stays affordable and medical services more effective.  This would make hospitals able to service more patients per year.

In summary, government funding of goods or services can lead to imbalances — shortages (and excesses) of related goods and services. These imbalances then are addressed by private and public efforts, which cause further imbalances.

There is no doubt that increased federal investment in health care will lead to shortages, but we cannot allow that to become a bar to life improvements.

The road of progress can be bumpy, but the destination has proven to be rewarding.

Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
Monetary Sovereignty

………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

The single most important problems in economics involve the excessive income/wealth/power Gaps between the have-mores and the have-less.

Wide Gaps negatively affect poverty, health and longevity, education, housing, law and crime, war, leadership, ownership, bigotry, supply and demand, taxation, GDP, international relations, scientific advancement, the environment, human motivation and well-being, and virtually every other issue in economics.

Implementation of The Ten Steps To Prosperity can narrow the Gaps:

Ten Steps To Prosperity:
1. ELIMINATE FICA (Ten Reasons to Eliminate FICA )
Although the article lists 10 reasons to eliminate FICA, there are two fundamental reasons:
*FICA is the most regressive tax in American history, widening the Gap by punishing the low and middle-income groups, while leaving the rich untouched, and
*The federal government, being Monetarily Sovereign, neither needs nor uses FICA to support Social Security and Medicare.
2. FEDERALLY FUNDED MEDICARE — PARTS A, B & D, PLUS LONG TERM CARE — FOR EVERYONE (H.R. 676, Medicare for All )
This article addresses the questions:
*Does the economy benefit when the rich can afford better health care than can the rest of Americans?
*Aside from improved health care, what are the other economic effects of “Medicare for everyone?”
*How much would it cost taxpayers?
*Who opposes it?”
3. PROVIDE A MONTHLY ECONOMIC BONUS TO EVERY MAN, WOMAN AND CHILD IN AMERICA (similar to Social Security for All) (The JG (Jobs Guarantee) vs the GI (Guaranteed Income) vs the EB (Economic Bonus)) Or institute a reverse income tax.
This article is the fifth in a series about direct financial assistance to Americans:

Why Modern Monetary Theory’s Employer of Last Resort is a bad idea. Sunday, Jan 1 2012
MMT’s Job Guarantee (JG) — “Another crazy, rightwing, Austrian nutjob?” Thursday, Jan 12 2012
Why Modern Monetary Theory’s Jobs Guarantee is like the EU’s euro: A beloved solution to the wrong problem. Tuesday, May 29 2012
“You can’t fire me. I’m on JG” Saturday, Jun 2 2012

Economic growth should include the “bottom” 99.9%, not just the .1%, the only question being, how best to accomplish that. Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) favors giving everyone a job. Monetary Sovereignty (MS) favors giving everyone money. The five articles describe the pros and cons of each approach.
4. FREE EDUCATION (INCLUDING POST-GRAD) FOR EVERYONE Five reasons why we should eliminate school loans
Monetarily non-sovereign State and local governments, despite their limited finances, support grades K-12. That level of education may have been sufficient for a largely agrarian economy, but not for our currently more technical economy that demands greater numbers of highly educated workers.
Because state and local funding is so limited, grades K-12 receive short shrift, especially those schools whose populations come from the lowest economic groups. And college is too costly for most families.
An educated populace benefits a nation, and benefitting the nation is the purpose of the federal government, which has the unlimited ability to pay for K-16 and beyond.
5. SALARY FOR ATTENDING SCHOOL
Even were schooling to be completely free, many young people cannot attend, because they and their families cannot afford to support non-workers. In a foundering boat, everyone needs to bail, and no one can take time off for study.
If a young person’s “job” is to learn and be productive, he/she should be paid to do that job, especially since that job is one of America’s most important.
6. ELIMINATE FEDERAL TAXES ON BUSINESS
Businesses are dollar-transferring machines. They transfer dollars from customers to employees, suppliers, shareholders and the federal government (the later having no use for those dollars). Any tax on businesses reduces the amount going to employees, suppliers and shareholders, which diminishes the economy. Ultimately, all business taxes reduce your personal income.
7. INCREASE THE STANDARD INCOME TAX DEDUCTION, ANNUALLY. (Refer to this.) Federal taxes punish taxpayers and harm the economy. The federal government has no need for those punishing and harmful tax dollars. There are several ways to reduce taxes, and we should evaluate and choose the most progressive approaches.
Cutting FICA and business taxes would be a good early step, as both dramatically affect the 99%. Annual increases in the standard income tax deduction, and a reverse income tax also would provide benefits from the bottom up. Both would narrow the Gap.
8. TAX THE VERY RICH (THE “.1%) MORE, WITH HIGHER PROGRESSIVE TAX RATES ON ALL FORMS OF INCOME. (TROPHIC CASCADE)
There was a time when I argued against increasing anyone’s federal taxes. After all, the federal government has no need for tax dollars, and all taxes reduce Gross Domestic Product, thereby negatively affecting the entire economy, including the 99.9%.
But I have come to realize that narrowing the Gap requires trimming the top. It simply would not be possible to provide the 99.9% with enough benefits to narrow the Gap in any meaningful way. Bill Gates reportedly owns $70 billion. To get to that level, he must have been earning $10 billion a year. Pick any acceptable Gap (1000 to 1?), and the lowest paid American would have to receive $10 million a year. Unreasonable.
9. FEDERAL OWNERSHIP OF ALL BANKS (Click The end of private banking and How should America decide “who-gets-money”?)
Banks have created all the dollars that exist. Even dollars created at the direction of the federal government, actually come into being when banks increase the numbers in checking accounts. This gives the banks enormous financial power, and as we all know, power corrupts — especially when multiplied by a profit motive.
Although the federal government also is powerful and corrupted, it does not suffer from a profit motive, the world’s most corrupting influence.
10. INCREASE FEDERAL SPENDING ON THE MYRIAD INITIATIVES THAT BENEFIT AMERICA’S 99.9% (Federal agencies)Browse the agencies. See how many agencies benefit the lower- and middle-income/wealth/ power groups, by adding dollars to the economy and/or by actions more beneficial to the 99.9% than to the .1%.
Save this reference as your primer to current economics. Sadly, much of the material is not being taught in American schools, which is all the more reason for you to use it.

The Ten Steps will grow the economy, and narrow the income/wealth/power Gap between the rich and you.

MONETARY SOVEREIGNTY

 

How our friends hurt us more than our enemies can

Image result for the truth will set you free
It takes only two things to keep people in chains:
The ignorance of the oppressed and the treachery of their leaders.
————————————————————————————————————————————————————

When a right-wing, debt hawk warns about the deficit and debt being “unsustainable,” we can write it off as typical misdirection from a right-wing political group looking to justify cutting social programs, while raising taxes on the 99% (and, as always, lowering taxes on the 1%).

Image result for misdirection
Misdirection

But when a left-winger does the same thing, all we can do is ask, “Are there any progressives at all, in our government”?

Here are writer Noah Rothman’s comments about Democrat, California, Senator Kamala Harris’s comments:

“I intend to co-sponsor the Medicare-for-all bill because it’s just the right thing to do. Taxpayers are paying huge amounts of money” for emergency-room care.

A Medicare-for-all system would generate “a return on investment for taxpayers.” This is, to be gentle, nonsense.

Rothman is correct. It is nonsense, but not for the reasons he thinks.

Yes, a Medicare-for-all system would not “generate a return on investment for taxpayers.” But the reason is that federal taxpayers do not fund federal spending and do not profit from federal savings.

Unlike state and local governments, which are monetarily non-sovereign, and do use taxpayer dollars, the federal government is Monetarily Sovereign and has no use for taxpayer dollars.

The federal government uniquely creates brand new dollars — its sovereign currency —  the dollar, every time it pays a bill. No other government can do that.

The nonpartisan Urban Institute pegged the cost of a Medicare-for-all system in America at $32 trillion over ten years, requiring an average tax hike on all Americans of $24,000 annually (to say nothing of the billions in lost economic activity as Americans tighten their belts).

This is a monstrous lie, aka the “Big Lie.“

Whether the cost is $32 trillion or $320 trillion, federal taxes would not fund it. Even with $0 tax collections, the federal government creates, ad hoc, all dollars necessary to pay all its bills.

And rather than causing ‘lost economic activity,’ and American belt tightening, that $32 trillion addition to our economy would add to GDP growth. No belt tightening needed, quite the opposite.

Remember this formula:  Gross Domestic Product = FEDERAL SPENDING + Non-federal Spending + Net Exports.

In short, the more the federal government deficit spends, the more GDP increases.

(Conversely, when federal deficit spending is eliminated, we have depressions):

1804-1812: U. S. Federal Debt reduced 48%. Depression began 1807.
1817-1821: U. S. Federal Debt reduced 29%. Depression began 1819.
1823-1836: U. S. Federal Debt reduced 99%. Depression began 1837.
1852-1857: U. S. Federal Debt reduced 59%. Depression began 1857.
1867-1873: U. S. Federal Debt reduced 27%. Depression began 1873.
1880-1893: U. S. Federal Debt reduced 57%. Depression began 1893.
1920-1930: U. S. Federal Debt reduced 36%. Depression began 1929.
1997-2001: U. S. Federal Debt reduced 15%. Recession began 2001.

Moreover, Federal Spending also increases Non-federal Spending by adding dollars to the private economy.  If the government pays you and businesses more, you will have more to spend and businesses will have more to spend.

When Democrats pitched the public on the ACA, the “cost” estimated to taxpayers was supposedly just $848 billion over ten years after implementation, but the Congressional Budget Office insisted that the actual figure was just over $2 trillion.

That’s an incredible strain on the nation’s budget, but it pales in comparison to the galactic numbers Senator Harris and her ilk heave about recklessly.

She is playing to the cheap seats, but it’s telling that her instinct is to pitch a single-payer plan by insisting it is an attack on, not an endorsement of, profligacy.

To say the above paragraphs are 100% bullsh*t is to do a disservice to bullsh*t, which at least fertilizes growth.

  1. Federal spending does not cost taxpayers one dime. Being Monetarily Sovereign, the federal government does not spend taxes. The tax dollars you send to the government cease to be a part of any money-supply measure, as soon as they are received. Said another way, federal taxes are destroyed upon receipt.
  2. Whether or not federal spending exceeds the budget does not “strain” anything. The government pays all its bills by sending instructions to creditors’ banks, instructing the banks to increase the numbers in the creditors’ bank accounts. This creates dollars.
  3. Growing the economy is not “profligacy.” Increased federal deficit spending is necessary to grow the economy, and decreases in deficit spending shrink the economy.

Even in Harris’s home state, the Democratic Party’s infatuation with the idea of socialized health care was crushed against the immovable object of fiscal realities.

A peek under the hood revealed that, under all the gauzy rhetoric about access to taxpayer-funded health-care coverage representing a human right, there is no feasible way to make that a reality.

The bill could not address the hurdles associated with cost control, delivery of care, and how to finance the thing. The Assembly bill was estimated to cost the state approximately $400 billion every year, more than double California’s total annual budget.

Here, Rothman demonstrates either abject ignorance regarding the difference between Monetary Sovereignty (the federal government) vs. monetary non-sovereignty (California’s government), or he is lying.

State and local governments, being monetarily non-sovereign, do not have the unlimited ability to create their sovereign currency for the simple reason: They do not have a sovereign currency. They use the dollar, the federal government’s sovereign currency.

So state and local governments can and do run short of dollars. The federal government cannot and does not run short of dollars. Not knowing the difference is a sure sign of economic ignorance.

Is Barack Obama’s health-care reform law a triumph of progressive public policy? Or is it, as Republicans have long insisted, a poorly-conceived measure with more adverse than positive effects?

First, if we are going to be honest, it’s not Obama’s health-care reform law; it’s Republican Mitt Romney’s.

Second, it really is a poorly-conceived measure, because it makes the tacit and false assumption that it’s taxpayer funded. And because of that tacit and false assumption, ACA was developed as a Rube Goldbergian program designed to minimize the nonexistent, Federal taxpayer funding.

A very simple, federally funded, comprehensive, Medicare for every man, woman, and child in America, would cost taxpayers nothing and protect everyone. No FICA needed.

Republicans may soon have to defend a suboptimal status quo from an unpopular liberal campaign to nationalize the health-care system.

“Nationalize” is the right-wing’s code word for “socialize,” and it is wrong. The health-care system would not be “nationalized” or “socialized” by Medicare for All.

The only change would be for the federal government to take the place of health care insurance companies.

The system still would use privately run hospitals, private doctors, private nurses, privately owned drug stores, and privately owned pharmaceutical manufacturers. Everything about the system would remain private except for the insurance companies. They would disappear.

And is that a bad thing? Remember, insurance companies need to make a profit, which means charging premiums and minimizing payments to the public. It’s one of the reasons why insurance companies resist paying for expensive medications and treatments.

There are lawyers who make their living suing insurance companies to obtain health care treatments for their clients.

But the federal government does not need profits, does not need premiums and does not need to minimize payments to the public. In fact, every federal payment to the public adds to GDP.

Democrats have convinced themselves that the rising popularity of Medicare-for-all among Democrats amounts to a national wellspring of new faith in progressivism and, by extension, themselves.

They’re welcome to test that proposition at the ballot box. But, first, Democrats may want to rethink their messenger.

No, first the Democrats must have the courage to explain to the voters that:

  1. The federal government cannot run short of its own sovereign currency, the dollar.
  2. Federal spending does not cost taxpayers or their grandchildren, anything.
  3. The voters can have unlimited health care, provided by a privately-run health-care system.
  4. And by the way, it all can be done without causing inflation.

Now, what are the “good” reasons not to have comprehensive, federally funded Medicare for All?

There are none.

Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
Monetary Sovereignty

………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

The single most important problems in economics involve the excessive income/wealth/power Gaps between the have-mores and the have-less.

Wide Gaps negatively affect poverty, health and longevity, education, housing, law and crime, war, leadership, ownership, bigotry, supply and demand, taxation, GDP, international relations, scientific advancement, the environment, human motivation and well-being, and virtually every other issue in economics.

Implementation of The Ten Steps To Prosperity can narrow the Gaps:

Ten Steps To Prosperity:
1. ELIMINATE FICA (Ten Reasons to Eliminate FICA )
Although the article lists 10 reasons to eliminate FICA, there are two fundamental reasons:
*FICA is the most regressive tax in American history, widening the Gap by punishing the low and middle-income groups, while leaving the rich untouched, and
*The federal government, being Monetarily Sovereign, neither needs nor uses FICA to support Social Security and Medicare.
2. FEDERALLY FUNDED MEDICARE — PARTS A, B & D, PLUS LONG TERM CARE — FOR EVERYONE (H.R. 676, Medicare for All )
This article addresses the questions:
*Does the economy benefit when the rich can afford better health care than can the rest of Americans?
*Aside from improved health care, what are the other economic effects of “Medicare for everyone?”
*How much would it cost taxpayers?
*Who opposes it?”
3. PROVIDE A MONTHLY ECONOMIC BONUS TO EVERY MAN, WOMAN AND CHILD IN AMERICA (similar to Social Security for All) (The JG (Jobs Guarantee) vs the GI (Guaranteed Income) vs the EB (Economic Bonus)) Or institute a reverse income tax.
This article is the fifth in a series about direct financial assistance to Americans:

Why Modern Monetary Theory’s Employer of Last Resort is a bad idea. Sunday, Jan 1 2012
MMT’s Job Guarantee (JG) — “Another crazy, rightwing, Austrian nutjob?” Thursday, Jan 12 2012
Why Modern Monetary Theory’s Jobs Guarantee is like the EU’s euro: A beloved solution to the wrong problem. Tuesday, May 29 2012
“You can’t fire me. I’m on JG” Saturday, Jun 2 2012

Economic growth should include the “bottom” 99.9%, not just the .1%, the only question being, how best to accomplish that. Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) favors giving everyone a job. Monetary Sovereignty (MS) favors giving everyone money. The five articles describe the pros and cons of each approach.
4. FREE EDUCATION (INCLUDING POST-GRAD) FOR EVERYONE Five reasons why we should eliminate school loans
Monetarily non-sovereign State and local governments, despite their limited finances, support grades K-12. That level of education may have been sufficient for a largely agrarian economy, but not for our currently more technical economy that demands greater numbers of highly educated workers.
Because state and local funding is so limited, grades K-12 receive short shrift, especially those schools whose populations come from the lowest economic groups. And college is too costly for most families.
An educated populace benefits a nation, and benefitting the nation is the purpose of the federal government, which has the unlimited ability to pay for K-16 and beyond.
5. SALARY FOR ATTENDING SCHOOL
Even were schooling to be completely free, many young people cannot attend, because they and their families cannot afford to support non-workers. In a foundering boat, everyone needs to bail, and no one can take time off for study.
If a young person’s “job” is to learn and be productive, he/she should be paid to do that job, especially since that job is one of America’s most important.
6. ELIMINATE FEDERAL TAXES ON BUSINESS
Businesses are dollar-transferring machines. They transfer dollars from customers to employees, suppliers, shareholders and the federal government (the later having no use for those dollars). Any tax on businesses reduces the amount going to employees, suppliers and shareholders, which diminishes the economy. Ultimately, all business taxes reduce your personal income.
7. INCREASE THE STANDARD INCOME TAX DEDUCTION, ANNUALLY. (Refer to this.) Federal taxes punish taxpayers and harm the economy. The federal government has no need for those punishing and harmful tax dollars. There are several ways to reduce taxes, and we should evaluate and choose the most progressive approaches.
Cutting FICA and business taxes would be a good early step, as both dramatically affect the 99%. Annual increases in the standard income tax deduction, and a reverse income tax also would provide benefits from the bottom up. Both would narrow the Gap.
8. TAX THE VERY RICH (THE “.1%) MORE, WITH HIGHER PROGRESSIVE TAX RATES ON ALL FORMS OF INCOME. (TROPHIC CASCADE)
There was a time when I argued against increasing anyone’s federal taxes. After all, the federal government has no need for tax dollars, and all taxes reduce Gross Domestic Product, thereby negatively affecting the entire economy, including the 99.9%.
But I have come to realize that narrowing the Gap requires trimming the top. It simply would not be possible to provide the 99.9% with enough benefits to narrow the Gap in any meaningful way. Bill Gates reportedly owns $70 billion. To get to that level, he must have been earning $10 billion a year. Pick any acceptable Gap (1000 to 1?), and the lowest paid American would have to receive $10 million a year. Unreasonable.
9. FEDERAL OWNERSHIP OF ALL BANKS (Click The end of private banking and How should America decide “who-gets-money”?)
Banks have created all the dollars that exist. Even dollars created at the direction of the federal government, actually come into being when banks increase the numbers in checking accounts. This gives the banks enormous financial power, and as we all know, power corrupts — especially when multiplied by a profit motive.
Although the federal government also is powerful and corrupted, it does not suffer from a profit motive, the world’s most corrupting influence.
10. INCREASE FEDERAL SPENDING ON THE MYRIAD INITIATIVES THAT BENEFIT AMERICA’S 99.9% (Federal agencies)Browse the agencies. See how many agencies benefit the lower- and middle-income/wealth/ power groups, by adding dollars to the economy and/or by actions more beneficial to the 99.9% than to the .1%.
Save this reference as your primer to current economics. Sadly, much of the material is not being taught in American schools, which is all the more reason for you to use it.

The Ten Steps will grow the economy, and narrow the income/wealth/power Gap between the rich and you.

MONETARY SOVEREIGNTY

 

Schadenfreude and the deportation of the American soul. The storm is coming

Image result for the truth will set you free
It takes only two things to keep people in chains:
The ignorance of the oppressed and the treachery of their leaders.

————————————————————————————————————————————————————

There is a word for the feeling you get when a mean bully goes to kick an innocent, little puppy, and instead, the bully falls down and breaks his own leg. It’s a relative of, “Hah, serves him right.” The word is “schadenfreude.”Image result for post war berlin destroyed

It’s a feeling I try to fight when I see post-World War photos of Berliners sorting through the shattered remnants of their city – the same people who cheered the removal of people to death camps.

Schadenfreude is mean and low, like a drug that provides a short-lived high, to be followed by a long period of self-recrimination.

Today our government, rather than sending innocent Germans to death camps, plans to destroy lives a different way — by deporting young, innocent “Dreamers” to countries they don’t know. This is how the current administration plans to “Make America Great, Again.”

But there’s more to the story than just immorality and intentional cruelty. The deportation of 800,000 young, productive people will result in a recession, if not a full-blown depression, and the people who always are hurt most during economic crises are the lower-and-middle-income classes.

Those people, now delighting in the misfortune of good, young people, suddenly will realize it’s not so funny, when they themselves begin losing their jobs, as their companies start laying off workers.

The Dreamers are not stoop-labor picking your veggies in the South. They actually are among our best and our brightest.

Being “illegal” they have had to be far more careful to comport themselves better than is typical for American teens and young adults. They are less likely to commit crimes, more likely to attend college, and are the people we would rely on to be our leaders, helping to grow our U.S. economy.

Losing good people will force many American companies to lose profits, fire employees, and/or go out of business altogether. And guess which group of American citizens will be hurt most. Right. The lower-and middle-income class Trump backers.

Initially, the mean-spirited will cheer at the sight of unfortunate youngsters being rounded up and trucked to countries they never have known. Right-wingers will enjoy watching “law and order,” Trump/Sessions style.

Then as the pink slips are given out, and the jobs disappear, and homes are lost, the realization will sink in: When you get rid of good people, business suffers, and when business suffers, the working class suffers most.

And then — I really am embarrassed about this — I will try not to shout, I TOLD YOU SO,” and though I’ll fight it, I’ll feel schadenfreude. It’s a feeling like a drug, with a short-term high, and a long period of self-recrimination, after.

You, of the middle classes,  can deny the storm is coming, but your denials won’t change the reality. The storm is coming.

I’m starting to feel schadenfreude already, just knowing what lies ahead. Darn it!

But, that’s not all.

The people who happily wish to deport “Dreamers” also deny global warming, and by a strange irony, they also will be the ones hurt more by the change in our climate.

The lower-and-middle-income-classes tend to live in more flood-prone areas, are less likely to have insurance, are less able to afford higher food and energy prices, will suffer more from insect-borne and warm-weather diseases, and will be far less able to maintain their lives, than will the upper-income groups.

The nation that immigrants grew, now wishes to deport immigrants — and for no good reason. These immigrants, by virtue of their consumption and their ambition, stimulate America’s economy. They add to available jobs. They act as good citizens without being citizens.

When they are gone, we will miss them and their contributions, and the ones who will miss them most are the ones who wished them away.

Trump’s followers will suffer the day. For the rest, it will be schadenfreude.

The storm is coming.

Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
Monetary Sovereignty

………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

THOUGHTS

•All we have are partial solutions; the best we can do is try.

•Those, who do not understand the differences between Monetary Sovereignty and monetary non-sovereignty, do not understand economics.

•Any monetarily NON-sovereign government — be it city, county, state or nation — that runs an ongoing trade deficit, eventually will run out of money no matter how much it taxes its citizens.

•The more federal budgets are cut and taxes increased, the weaker an economy becomes..

•No nation can tax itself into prosperity, nor grow without money growth.

•Cutting federal deficits to grow the economy is like applying leeches to cure anemia.

•A growing economy requires a growing supply of money (GDP = Federal Spending + Non-federal Spending + Net Exports)

•Deficit spending grows the supply of money

•The limit to federal deficit spending is an inflation that cannot be cured with interest rate control. The limit to non-federal deficit spending is the ability to borrow.

•Until the 99% understand the need for federal deficits, the upper 1% will rule.

•Progressives think the purpose of government is to protect the poor and powerless from the rich and powerful. Conservatives think the purpose of government is to protect the rich and powerful from the poor and powerless.

•The single most important problem in economics is the Gap between the rich and the rest.

•Austerity is the government’s method for widening the Gap between the rich and the rest.

•Everything in economics devolves to motive, and the motive is the Gap between the rich and the rest..

MONETARY SOVEREIGNTY

Make America compassionate, again

Image result for the truth will set you free
It takes only two things to keep people in chains:
The ignorance of the oppressed and the treachery of their leaders.

——————————————————————————————————————————————————————

Mr. Trump, tear down this wall.

President Trump is right about one thing: We Americans have allowed our former greatness to slip through our fingers, and yes, we have the opportunity to “make America great, again.”

But, that does not mean making America meaner, more frightened, or more selfish.

The way to make America great again is to make America compassionate again.

It takes far more strength of character and moral courage to be compassionate than to be cruel. It’s oh, so much easier to curse at the downtrodden than to help lift them.

Related image
The power of compassion

It’s oh, so much easier to put forth negative examples as excuses for being mean-spirited, than to look past the ragged clothes and different mores and to see the treasure within.

Do not despise the poor, the hungry, the homeless. They are not the enemy. The enemy is poverty. It is the real root of all evil, and we can help reduce poverty. We have that power. We need only use it.

A brave leader strengthens the moral fiber of his nation with a kind and helping hand. A fearful leader needs a harsh steel fist to maintain control.

Weak nations lead a frightened existence. A great nation is not a fearful people. A great nation does not defend itself with petty malice against the powerless. The measure of a nation is how it treats its last in line.

We Americans were great when we fought evil during World War II. Then, we fought for our existence.

But, we even were greater following the war, when we reconstructed Europe with the wise compassion and generosity of the Marshall Plan.

For you who are too young to remember the Marshall Plan (that may be nearly all of you), here are a few highlights:

The initiative was named after United States Secretary of State George Marshall, who served as the United States Army Chief of Staff during World War II.

The plan had bipartisan support in Washington, where the Republicans controlled Congress and the Democrats controlled the White House with President Harry S. Truman..

The purpose of the Marshall Plan was to aid in the economic recovery of European nations after the war.

The Marshall Plan offered the same aid to the Soviet Union and its allies, but they refused to accept it. In fact, the Soviet Union prevented its satellite states (i.e., East Germany, Poland, etc.) from accepting.

Immediately, you see the vast differences between our formerly great selves and today’s anxious America.

  1. A Republican Congress and a Democratic President worked together, instead of trying to sow hatred and defeat each other.
  2. Rather than punishing our enemies, as we did after World War I (which led to WWII), we helped to rebuild them.
  3. The Soviet Union took the opposite course, building walls and enslaving their formerly enemy populations.

The results of our “clever compassion” vs. the Soviet’s “Iron Curtain,” are widely acknowledged. Compassion proved to be smarter and more productive than grim vengeance.

The result should have been predictable to anyone who understands human nature.

President Truman signed the Marshall Plan on April 3, 1948, granting aid to 16 European nations. During the four years the plan was in effect, the United States donated $17 billion in economic and technical assistance to help the recovery of the European countries.

The $17 billion was in the context of a US Gross Domestic Product of $258 billion in 1948, and on top of $17 billion in American aid to Europe between the end of the war and the start of the Plan.

In just the seven years after the end of the War, we Americans gave Europe $34 billion, about 13% of our GDP.

Today, that same 13% of our $19 trillion GDP would amount to $2.5 trillion.

(Try to imagine today’s weak politicians providing an additional $2.5 trillion to help our own poor, much less the poor of other nations.)

History shows that the Marshall Plan not only was compassionate. It was smart.

The Marshall Plan was replaced by the Mutual Security Plan at the end of 1951; that new plan gave away about $7 billion annually until 1961 when it was replaced by another program.

By 1952, as the funding ended, the economy of every participant state had surpassed pre-war levels.

Over the next two decades, Western Europe enjoyed unprecedented growth and prosperity. Marshall aid had provided the critical margin on which other investment needed for European recovery depended.

The Marshall Plan stimulated the total political reconstruction of western Europe.

By contrast, the eastern European nations, trapped behind the walls of the Iron Curtain, struggled in misery.  The Soviets saw no benefits from their Iron Curtain. They continuously had to expend resources guarding their borders, imprisoning violators and defending against sabotage.

The cost was great; the reward, non-existent.

Our compassion was not naïveté. We knew full well that some of the people and some of the nations receiving our dollars had collaborated with Hitler. Consider that Germans were among the largest recipients of our aid.

But rather than take the low road by and using the bad as examples and excuses for punishment, we demonstrated American greatness with compassion.

President Ronald Reagan’s finest line was, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.” That line will be remembered, forever.

Walls protect rooms. Walls protect houses, and jails. Walls protect the weak, but walls do not protect great nations. Great nations have neither need nor desire for walls.

By now we should have learned that our southern walls have not protected us from drugs and crime. More walls will do not better.

The drug dealers and the criminals know how to circumvent walls. A wall only deters the powerless and the innocent, the very sort of people who have built America.

Being Monetarily Sovereign, our government creates dollars at will. It has the unlimited ability to provide benefits to you, to me, and yes, to immigrants and foreigners — and contrary to popular belief, this aid doesn’t even cost us taxpayers, one cent.

Our Marshall Plan magnanimity actually grew our economy, created American jobs, increased business profits, and benefitted us all — at no cost to anyone.  We cast our bread upon the waters and it was returned to us many times over.

We need a “Marshall Plan for America.

Rather than punishing the poor for being poor, and rather than deporting the homeless and tempest-tossed, we must help them, lift them and make them an effective addition to America’s population.

That is how to make America great, again.

Image result for mr. gorbachev tear down this wall plaque
How a President is remembered. “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.”

People who have had the strength, courage, and desire to gather up their children and to make a perilous trip from their homes to a strange land — those people remind us of our immigrant ancestors.

What we are proud to call “America” comes from such people, who began with nothing and who created our great nation.

Today, we must remember our heritage. Today, we must remember who we are, what we are, and why we are here.

That is why I say, “Mr. Trump, tear down that wall.” We have the power to feed the hungry and to shelter the homeless, and helping the needy will make us stronger. There is no cost for such kindness. It will benefit us all.

All nations wish to be admired. All Presidents wish to be remembered kindly by history. How will we and our President be remembered?

There is one, and only one, to make America great, again. We must make it compassionate again.

Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
Monetary Sovereignty

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The single most important problems in economics involve the excessive income/wealth/power Gaps between the have-mores and the have-less.

Wide Gaps negatively affect poverty, health and longevity, education, housing, law and crime, war, leadership, ownership, bigotry, supply and demand, taxation, GDP, international relations, scientific advancement, the environment, human motivation and well-being, and virtually every other issue in economics.

Implementation of The Ten Steps To Prosperity can narrow the Gaps:

Ten Steps To Prosperity:
1. ELIMINATE FICA (Ten Reasons to Eliminate FICA )
Although the article lists 10 reasons to eliminate FICA, there are two fundamental reasons:
*FICA is the most regressive tax in American history, widening the Gap by punishing the low and middle-income groups, while leaving the rich untouched, and
*The federal government, being Monetarily Sovereign, neither needs nor uses FICA to support Social Security and Medicare.
2. FEDERALLY FUNDED MEDICARE — PARTS A, B & D, PLUS LONG TERM CARE — FOR EVERYONE (H.R. 676, Medicare for All )
This article addresses the questions:
*Does the economy benefit when the rich can afford better health care than can the rest of Americans?
*Aside from improved health care, what are the other economic effects of “Medicare for everyone?”
*How much would it cost taxpayers?
*Who opposes it?”
3. PROVIDE A MONTHLY ECONOMIC BONUS TO EVERY MAN, WOMAN AND CHILD IN AMERICA (similar to Social Security for All) (The JG (Jobs Guarantee) vs the GI (Guaranteed Income) vs the EB (Economic Bonus)) Or institute a reverse income tax.
This article is the fifth in a series about direct financial assistance to Americans:

Why Modern Monetary Theory’s Employer of Last Resort is a bad idea. Sunday, Jan 1 2012
MMT’s Job Guarantee (JG) — “Another crazy, rightwing, Austrian nutjob?” Thursday, Jan 12 2012
Why Modern Monetary Theory’s Jobs Guarantee is like the EU’s euro: A beloved solution to the wrong problem. Tuesday, May 29 2012
“You can’t fire me. I’m on JG” Saturday, Jun 2 2012

Economic growth should include the “bottom” 99.9%, not just the .1%, the only question being, how best to accomplish that. Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) favors giving everyone a job. Monetary Sovereignty (MS) favors giving everyone money. The five articles describe the pros and cons of each approach.
4. FREE EDUCATION (INCLUDING POST-GRAD) FOR EVERYONE Five reasons why we should eliminate school loans
Monetarily non-sovereign State and local governments, despite their limited finances, support grades K-12. That level of education may have been sufficient for a largely agrarian economy, but not for our currently more technical economy that demands greater numbers of highly educated workers.
Because state and local funding is so limited, grades K-12 receive short shrift, especially those schools whose populations come from the lowest economic groups. And college is too costly for most families.
An educated populace benefits a nation, and benefitting the nation is the purpose of the federal government, which has the unlimited ability to pay for K-16 and beyond.
5. SALARY FOR ATTENDING SCHOOL
Even were schooling to be completely free, many young people cannot attend, because they and their families cannot afford to support non-workers. In a foundering boat, everyone needs to bail, and no one can take time off for study.
If a young person’s “job” is to learn and be productive, he/she should be paid to do that job, especially since that job is one of America’s most important.
6. ELIMINATE FEDERAL TAXES ON BUSINESS
Businesses are dollar-transferring machines. They transfer dollars from customers to employees, suppliers, shareholders and the federal government (the later having no use for those dollars). Any tax on businesses reduces the amount going to employees, suppliers and shareholders, which diminishes the economy. Ultimately, all business taxes reduce your personal income.
7. INCREASE THE STANDARD INCOME TAX DEDUCTION, ANNUALLY. (Refer to this.) Federal taxes punish taxpayers and harm the economy. The federal government has no need for those punishing and harmful tax dollars. There are several ways to reduce taxes, and we should evaluate and choose the most progressive approaches.
Cutting FICA and business taxes would be a good early step, as both dramatically affect the 99%. Annual increases in the standard income tax deduction, and a reverse income tax also would provide benefits from the bottom up. Both would narrow the Gap.
8. TAX THE VERY RICH (THE “.1%) MORE, WITH HIGHER PROGRESSIVE TAX RATES ON ALL FORMS OF INCOME. (TROPHIC CASCADE)
There was a time when I argued against increasing anyone’s federal taxes. After all, the federal government has no need for tax dollars, and all taxes reduce Gross Domestic Product, thereby negatively affecting the entire economy, including the 99.9%.
But I have come to realize that narrowing the Gap requires trimming the top. It simply would not be possible to provide the 99.9% with enough benefits to narrow the Gap in any meaningful way. Bill Gates reportedly owns $70 billion. To get to that level, he must have been earning $10 billion a year. Pick any acceptable Gap (1000 to 1?), and the lowest paid American would have to receive $10 million a year. Unreasonable.
9. FEDERAL OWNERSHIP OF ALL BANKS (Click The end of private banking and How should America decide “who-gets-money”?)
Banks have created all the dollars that exist. Even dollars created at the direction of the federal government, actually come into being when banks increase the numbers in checking accounts. This gives the banks enormous financial power, and as we all know, power corrupts — especially when multiplied by a profit motive.
Although the federal government also is powerful and corrupted, it does not suffer from a profit motive, the world’s most corrupting influence.
10. INCREASE FEDERAL SPENDING ON THE MYRIAD INITIATIVES THAT BENEFIT AMERICA’S 99.9% (Federal agencies)Browse the agencies. See how many agencies benefit the lower- and middle-income/wealth/ power groups, by adding dollars to the economy and/or by actions more beneficial to the 99.9% than to the .1%.
Save this reference as your primer to current economics. Sadly, much of the material is not being taught in American schools, which is all the more reason for you to use it.

The Ten Steps will grow the economy, and narrow the income/wealth/power Gap between the rich and you.

MONETARY SOVEREIGNTY