andyofborg Posted March 14, 2012 Share Posted March 14, 2012 Do you really believe that Jim? There are no serious inherent problems with our monetary system? If i go to the bank tomorrow, to get a business loan, i have to pay that bank a percentage of interest, most likely 5-10% over base rate. Where does the bank get that money from? from either it's depositors or from money the bank itself has borrowed from someone else. why, in general, is that bad? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
green Posted March 14, 2012 Share Posted March 14, 2012 from either it's depositors or from money the bank itself has borrowed from someone else. why, in general, is that bad? A bank only retains a small percentage from depositors. They leverage the rest. Its well worth having a look at some of the Positive Money youtube videos or numerous other people who explain our present monetary DEBT system. The current system is insolvent and will undoubtedly create many more issues for us, before it all comes crashing down. Does anyone seriously believe any country in the EEC, Japan or USA are going to pay back these debts we have created in the last 10 years? We are not even touching the interest payments. We are all borrowing more each and every day. It bodes badly. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IAchilleasI Posted March 14, 2012 Author Share Posted March 14, 2012 So it appears there are no serious inherent problems with the monetary system. Just as well as it's the only system there is. You should have told me that from the beginning, instead of wasting my time trying to prove to you the faults of a system you zealously and religiously believe in. Watched the Secret of Oz last night (can be found on youtube). Interesting documentary on the monetary system, but i struggled with the loose connections to Oz. Not sure it was necessary. There are many documentaries out there that do a very good job of explaining problems, such as Money As Debt, but many of them end up proposing very superficial solutions. A bank only retains a small percentage from depositors. They leverage the rest. Its well worth having a look at some of the Positive Money youtube videos or numerous other people who explain our present monetary DEBT system. The current system is insolvent and will undoubtedly create many more issues for us, before it all comes crashing down. Does anyone seriously believe any country in the EEC, Japan or USA are going to pay back these debts we have created in the last 10 years? We are not even touching the interest payments. We are all borrowing more each and every day. It bodes badly. Thank you for pointing this out Green. Although Fractional Reserve Banking isn't a necessary component for a monetary system to exist, it certainly exists in the current one. It's basically a big black hole that keeps sucking money and people suffer as a result. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andyofborg Posted March 14, 2012 Share Posted March 14, 2012 A bank only retains a small percentage from depositors. They leverage the rest. Indeed, but fractional reserve banking has worked for hundreds of years and has provided the resources for everything from the industrial revolution onwards. The current system is insolvent and will undoubtedly create many more issues for us, before it all comes crashing down. Does anyone seriously believe any country in the EEC, Japan or USA are going to pay back these debts we have created in the last 10 years? We are not even touching the interest payments. We are all borrowing more each and every day. It bodes badly. Indeed, what is needed is a massive, coordinated write off of all this debt. The problem is that the globalised nature of banking means you need the agreement of pretty much every country which is pretty much impossible to achieve. The other thing is that it means the end of the neolibconwotsit abomination we've suffered under for the last 30 years which would require the major political parties around the world to admit they have been wrong and the lack the courage to both do this and make the necessary changes to fix the system and keep it fixed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Longcol Posted March 14, 2012 Share Posted March 14, 2012 If I'm not debating my OP, its because I've been led on all sorts of irrelevant tangents on conspiracy theories <snip> Which you yourself introduced to the thread in post #22. http://www.sheffieldforum.co.uk/showpost.php?p=8674647&postcount=22 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cavegirl Posted March 14, 2012 Share Posted March 14, 2012 I would have to suggest IAchilleasI that the inherent problems within our modern capitalist economy are not the technical issues that you described in your OP rather that these are the symptoms that arise from having an economy that is based upon competition and which is prone to regular crises. I really respect Peter Joseph/ Jaque Fresco's visionary ideas of a socialist resource-based economy. I love the idea of technology and robotics replacing, on a much much broader scale than we currently have today, the menial mundane labour that too many humans are forced to perform for disgracefully low wages. I love the idea that billions of human minds would be freed up from this unnecessary work in order to follow their real passions, whatever they may be. I'd love to live through the transition period, what a phenomenal cultural and technological explosion would occur! I'd love to see people being able to develop their research and creativity, in whatever field it may be, within a socially inspired culture rather than being hampered by the narrow focus of a profit driven culture. I love the idea that people would be given the time to follow their passions by advancing their training and education without restraint throughout their lives rather than having such a big focus at the start and then being ushered into a particular industry. I love the idea that sharing a pool of consumer items such as cars would reduce the ridiculous amount of waste that occurs when everybody has their own but keep it sat on the driveway 50% of the time. All of our 'stuff' that sits there unused most of the time, it's such a waste of precious finite resources. Money is just an efficient tool for for transferring goods, if the monetary system is broken it's because the wielders of that tool, namely society, is broken due to the greed, power and corruption that inevitably emerge when a competetive economy keeps crashing. Capitalism can never be stabilised in the way that is needed to prevent these unpleasant human characteristics from developing and it is too efficient and wasteful of finite resources to be continued ad infinitum. Those resources have already begun to run out, but too few of us even contemplate the wider or longer term consequences of this. We're in a population bubble, 6 billion more people are alive today than is our 'normal' level and that growth has occurred in just the past 150 years. See here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:World-Population-1800-2100.png All animal species are prone to bubbles when resources are readily available, but in every single case that population bubble has burst once the integral resource has become depleted- we're no different. Capitalism needs growth, it can't be sustained through a declining population and resource base so I completely agree with you, it's time to start considering the alternatives more seriously. We need to manage our resources far more effectively. The Venus Project may be far from perfect, but to me the underlying vision of how society might organise itself through advanced technology and a resource-based economy seems far more human and hopeful than the system we live with today. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
green Posted March 14, 2012 Share Posted March 14, 2012 Indeed, but fractional reserve banking has worked for hundreds of years and has provided the resources for everything from the industrial revolution onwards. Indeed, what is needed is a massive, coordinated write off of all this debt. The problem is that the globalised nature of banking means you need the agreement of pretty much every country which is pretty much impossible to achieve. The other thing is that it means the end of the neolibconwotsit abomination we've suffered under for the last 30 years which would require the major political parties around the world to admit they have been wrong and the lack the courage to both do this and make the necessary changes to fix the system and keep it fixed. We often agree....and i very much like that. You may enjoy The Secret of Oz. If you watch it, dm me what you think. Im curious to discuss it with like minded people. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cavegirl Posted March 14, 2012 Share Posted March 14, 2012 3. I'm still not buying your automation argument either. It may be creeping into some areas but I doubt they'll make a machine that can plaster a wall or run in electrical cables and water pipes. Mechanisation can only go so far. Have Tesco got a machine that can fill the shelves, change the price labels or collect the trolleys from the river? Are you sure Jim? Take a look: http://www.pathnet.org/sp.asp?id=7542 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IAchilleasI Posted March 14, 2012 Author Share Posted March 14, 2012 Which you yourself introduced to the thread in post #22. http://www.sheffieldforum.co.uk/showpost.php?p=8674647&postcount=22 If you had read a bit further down, you would have seen this: Well, I'm either a terrible communicator or you're a terrible reader. Let me condense my argument as much as possible: the monetary system is a free-for-all. Individuals, NOT corporations, perpetuate their own survival in order to secure their place in a world of scarcity. Those Individuals don't necessarily conspire with one another, but sometimes they share common interests and will take similar actions to fulfill them. They don't get together and gather in a dark room and twiddle their fingers, in fact they could be living in opposite corners of the world and not even be aware of each other's existence. Sometimes their actions will result in benefiting the wider populace, other times they will be damaging. All I'm pointing out is how they are damaging. Before monetary exchange, we had the barter system. In the barter system people would trade goods, rather than money. A limitation of that system is that if I have 300 tons of hay and someone tries to sell me more hay in exchange for milk, I will naturally deny. He might need it to feed his kids, but I need to trade the milk for clothes. See how I am perpetuating my own survival without having engaged in conspiracy? Since the monetary system is just an evolution of the barter system, you can extrapolate my example accordingly. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IAchilleasI Posted March 14, 2012 Author Share Posted March 14, 2012 Indeed, what is needed is a massive, coordinated write off of all this debt. Doesn't it seem a bit silly though? Building a massive amount of debt and every time we realise its too massive to pay back, we just write the debt off? Why create the debt in the first place? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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