AH AH AH AHAAAAHAAAHAAAH

When we think someone will do this or that for us, we simply hand over the keys to the kingdom. And the kingdom and its corporate elite are just fine with that.

The wealthy understand this. They understand that the laws of the land are in their favor. The privatization of the commons, the licensing and patenting of everything is their “land” grab. The Earth’s resources are being swallowed up by corporations and the wealthy.

Ninty percent of US land is in private hands! This is not just an issue of land, as I said, it is an issue of all natural resources.

So, I guess my question about “re-distribution of power” would be: who is the great Oz that’s going to do that if not us simply taking back the power we keep giving away?

Most people are into self-preservation and it is that self-preservation that enable the state to thrive. What you have to do is to convince people to put their lives on the line in order to defeat the state. That is a tough call.

We are condemned to repeated recessions and depressions unless and until we begin to look at land and to move our taxation and laws away from sales and labor/income.

Boom and bust is the self-imposition of allowing speculation to go unchecked. It is not simply regulation (or deregulation) that is the cure/cause. The cause of speculation derives from the instability of our economic system which promotes speculation (as well as debt).

Most of our economic problems can be found in fairly simple principles which have been exploited and are fairly easily fixed if we have the will to do so. These problems are all about access to the commons and how we have restricted access that began centuries ago, primarily in Great Britain. The development of the cancerous corporate charters which have exploited this access, creating opportunities to privatize everything in sight is how this problem has grown to massive proportion.

As I stated, it is the absence of land from our understanding of neo-classical/modern day economics which has feed into this boom and bust; remembering that land is the universe of all things NOT human created. Wars and poverty stem from this same source. The more we understand this and correct it, the more we’ll be able to reclaim our common wealth and undermine the structure that has created empires, particularly the American Empire.

We could erase our debt, rebuild our infrastructure pay for a world class education, eliminate poverty and end most major conflicts (all of which have their root causes not in ideology, but in the struggle to control natural resources – water, minerals, land, oil, etc.).

Greed is not the motivating force behind capitalism, it is a symptom of unfettered privatization of the commons. By assuring the commons stay in the public domain we eliminate the root cause of monopolies which grow from privatization and the limitated access to the Earth’s resources.

Laws that are produced by and for the wealthy who grow wealthy by privatizing through licenses and patents, are the basis of our economic disparities. Depressions and recessions are all created by this privatizing and concentration of wealth. It is a cancerous seed planted by allowing through laws the control of wealth by a few, charters to corporations which become preditors, purchasing and “owning” the wealth which should be available to all.

Until we understand this the problems we see today between the wealthy and everyone else will never be solved. The solutions are simple, the will and awareness of what the causes are must be applied.

I will reiterate, in part, my points above regarding Hudson and taxation.

First, for our discussion things like greed and materialism are not central. Those are, to be sure issues, but it is not central for our purposes. Also, capitalism is not the central issue. As far as democracy, we have never had democracy in the US so let’s just be clear on that score.

The central issue is the privatization of the commons. Keeping land (air, the ground, minerals, etc.) in the public domain will produce the necessary revenues to pay for essentially everything we need in the public domain. This is not about a struggle over “greed” or materialistic consumerism or even capitalism. It is about returning to the premise of classical economics which always had land as central to common wealth.

In the twentieth century, a group of economists, practicing and academics, took land and subsumed under capital. That move erased land from the central role it holds in creating wealth and has allowed the concentration of wealth to shift to a small group of wealthy elite. It’s not that this was happening before, but that it was now sanctioned as public policy and taught in to economic students – that is the fundamentals of wealth had been land + capital + labor. In neo-classical terms (the terms taught and practiced today), it has become capital + labor = wealth. Land is included under capital. Capital are mere the tools created by human efforts to produce wealth from land and labor.

If you place land (all natural assets) in the public domain (as Hudson prescribed for Russia after the collapse of the Soviet Union) you would have had a healthy economy following that collapse. The cost of public services, infrastructure and education would have been paid for through a rent on land. Instead, the neoclassical economists such as Jeffery Sachs, et al (what Naomi Klein calls the shock doctrine) came in and foisted the neoclassical principles on Russia allowing for all the natural resources to be privatized and held in the hands of a few, now billionairs, rather that used for public good.

This awakening of the value of land is central to Hudson. Capturing the wealth of the commons for public expenses is central to a funadmental shift in poverty, war, and a stable economy minus bubbles and speculation.

The damaging effects list of privatization is long and detailed. We needn’t look any further than south of our own borders where privatization schemes in accordance with Washington’s prescribed Structural Adjustment Policies for two+ decades effectively retarded the economic growth of the entire region of Latin America. The IMF, WB, IBRD and its policy makers have known beyond a doubt the benefits to be reaped through privatization — not for the communal whole of course, but for those pulling the strings.

The record clearly shows in case after case that privatizing does anything but provide economic relief and/or stimulation. It’s a well-orchestrated farce which funnels profits from increased consumer expenses to the privatized owners’ pockets thus concentrating the wealth instead of dispersing it.

As national infrastructure systems continue to disintegrate around the nation, and the bloated military budget diverts funds from needed social programs in favor of Empire expansion, tactics for privatization may continue to be sold as a final, desperate remedy. What was once the world’s strongest developed nation less than a generation ago, may soon be the world’s first developed nation to be reduced to underdeveloped status. But not to worry, the US already trails the list of developed nations in education, health care, employee benefits and infant mortality rates, soon to compete with the bulk of underdeveloped nations to the south of our borders.

Watching the once ‘greatest nation on Earth’ subside to historical lows and third world standards of living is just the medicine the doctor ordered in response to such reckless, corrupt and heartless behavior that the duopoly and their cohorts have been directing us toward for more than a generation. A tighter leash on leaders should have been kept.

The bed is made, and now the nation will have to lie in it. Or, maybe Amoeba will deliver us from shambles. I won’t be holding my breath.

Best to all.

The following sentence makes no sense. Please fix.

“As a result the city is rolling in cash for a moment, but faces a bleak future in which subsequent mayors and city councils will have few resources to water privatization dispose of on behalf of the people that elect them, . . .”

I would add, that what should never be privatized are those areas which are inclined to become monopolies. All monopolistic entities should reside in the public domain and NEVER be privatized.

If this is the case then we really should take a closer look at banking. Banking itself should not be in private hands and be considered a public utility. Yet another good reason to abolish the Federal Reserve.

Considering that the poor are heavily taxed on state sales taxes raising revenue on a sales tax on stocks seem extremely fair.

Rolling back the Social Security Tax since it was never necessary because the system is sound would alleviate the overburden on workers for the past 25 years as well.

That said, I would add as a major source of revenue a shift to land over captial/labor. We can pay for all infrastructure just by leveeing a rent or use tax. There are examples all over the world of how that would work.

New Orleans could be readily rebuilt just by following the model set by San Francisco after the Great Earth Quake. There was nothing but rubble and waste. Hardly a structure to tax. The Mayor, a friend of Henry George, decided to tax land. The city was built to become a leading urban center, dense (2nd to NYC) and with lush parks and open space. It works.

The problem with income tax (and I’m not against it on the wealthiest as well as a stiff inheritance tax) is that it is elastic and easy to move around. The administration costs and difficulty of administering it is considerable. Land is non-elastic and easy to administer at a fraction of the cost.

Land rent can provide the total cost of building our infrastructure and to do it with 21st Century intent. Hudson knows this and promoted it as the way the Russians need to go. Economist have considered it the best, fairest tax for producing the sufficient revenues to pay for social programs, infrastructure and education.

Of course, cut the military industrial complex. Shit, eliminate 95%.

But for a proactive fair way to get the US paying for what it needs – land value taxation or “usage rent”. (Hundreds of empirical studies attest to this – this aint theory.)

This blog seems to be less tuned to those sensibilities. Not only is Hudson an extremely bright economist, he’s a Georgist, which is why he understands the idea of capturing common wealth. He has done some incredible studies for the Henry George Foundation, but his work on the post-collapsed Soviet Union is truly brilliant.

Bruce you’ve got the most important dog by the tail – privatization of our common wealth. Land is central. It was, due to the neo-classical economists, subsumed under capital, turning it into an invisible commondity. Land (which is really all of nature) is one of the 3 most important incredient to wealth creation. Those with access concentrate the wealth. The Billionaires in Russia did just that leaving the people of Russia scrambling for crumbs.

Keep up the excellent work, Bruce. Your have it one of a very few critical areas that keep poverty and war on the front burner, and the remedy for irradicating both!!