Tuesday, April 14, 2020

Covid-19 and the New Revolution

Sitting here on the 14th of April I'm musing about the future - what will things look like this fall, next spring?  Are we going to go into recovery?   

Some observations:

1) 60% of households have no savings and can't make next month's rent or mortgage payment without their job.

2) 16MM people lost their jobs in the last 3 weeks - about 10% unemployment up from 3%. Forecasts are we exit the summer somewhere around 20-25%.
3) While states have instituted rent and mortgage relief programs for the duration, it's simply delaying the payments - not eliminating them. Go three months in lock down, in the fourth month you'll owe the back three plus the current payment. See points one and two above - we're going to see the greatest number of evictions in history come the fall, just in time for winter.

4) The increase in uninsured (see point 2) will result in enormous debt for coronavirus treatment (co-pays are waived, but out of pocket maxes aren't) for anyone afflicted - see points 1 & 2 again. This results in an increase trend in bankruptcies, evictions and inability to feed themselves.

5) Any recovery will require testing and vaccinations - which if everyone doesn't do them we'll not be able to exit this pandemic.

6) The US is a consumer driven economy - 70% of GDP driven by consumer purchases. Amy recovery will stumble over the above points - there simply won't be enough demand to restart the economic engine quick enough to get us out of problems.

7) Food is soon to be in short supply - farmers and dairies are already letting crops spoil in the fields because they have no distribution for their production - and the government is too inept to realize this and do something about it.

8) The IMF just forecast a 3% contraction in global GDP for this year, with next year up for grabs.

9) The Federal Government is increasingly ineffectual, chaotic, and leading to confusion in the states, asserting at first it has no accountability for helping the states, which should have done a better job of planning, and then that the President has the sole and unassailable right to tell the country when to go back to work.  Reports abound of the administration seizing PPE shipments to the states, and even to other countries, of  states forced to bid against the federal government for the same, all while apparently meting out strategic reserves based upon how "appreciative" (read ass kissing) the individual Governors are to the President.

10) There is no test for antibodies, a lack of tests for simple diagnosis, and a vaccination is estimated to be 12 - 18 months out.  How we will know that it is safe for the population, or individuals, to go back to work is still not understood, much less planned for.



All of which is to say, we're not exiting this anytime soon (I've seen projections of unemployment above 15% through the end of 2021, even without a resurgence of the virus in the fall.) 

I see massive unemployment, homelessness, illness that the current brand of capitalism and our dysfunctional political systems will be unable to cope with.

So, what's left?

As people are evicted from their homes, work is still unavailable, the entire system is likely to come crashing down - there is no FDR this time around to put in place the WPA and get us out of this situation.

Frankly, I'm not sure the Union survives - look at what Cuomo and the neighboring governors did yesterday on the East Coast, and California/Oregon/Washington did on the West Coast - organize in the absence of any semblance of leadership from Washington into regional affiliations that will work, cross states borders, on addressing the virus, and determining mutually when it is appropriate to begin relaxing social distancing programs.  It's cleat that the regions have recognized that the Federal government is incompetent, unable to address the situation, and actively working AGAINST the common weal. 

 And there it is - the revolution has begun - we just haven't recognized it yet.

Thursday, January 22, 2015

Response to Penny Pritzker, Secretary of Commerce

Penny Pritzker, Secretary of Commerce, recently wrote a missive that I came across on Linked In's Pulse, entitled A Stronger Middle Class Begins with All of Us
In response to Pritzker's proposals:
1) Most of the jobs that have been created in the post 2008 period are either part time, or low wage - they don't really replace the jobs that have either been outsourced through "Free Trade" or lost in the banking meltdown following 2008
2) Business Tax rates are already low, even negative with the subsidies we tend to give out to even the most undeserving of industries, if anything they need to be tightened up to eliminate loop holes.
3) Trade - the Pacific Trade Agreement that is being shoved down our throats is anything but good for American industry or our workers - it
a) prevents any "buy-American" campaigns, eliminates our ability to regulate imports based on labor content (slave, child etc) or
b) environmental impact, taking the decisions for that outside the American judicial process and giving it to a non-governmental third party paid for and regulated by the very industries that we'd be taking action agains,
c) changes patent and trade mark law to extend proprietary patents beyond their American limitations (presumably our laws have some meaning on this)
d) makes "hire American" programs unenforceable - (See point a above)
In general, just as NAFTA and other "free trade" agreements had deleterious effects (in some cases unexpected - here, with the benefit of 25 years of "globalism" behind us the impacts are more readily predicted) the TPA will have tremendous and debilitating impacts on the US, and other economies through out the world, and further shift the balance of power from duly elected representatives to corporate interests
4) While training models and apprenticeships are certainly interesting, what is really needed is to reinvigorate the creation of full-time, high paid jobs in the US, rather than the part time, minimum wage model that we've adopted in this recovery.
The numbers may look good - but what sits behind them is a completely hollowed out labor market, a declining and disappearing middle class, and the shaping up of another market bubble of gigantic proportions. What sits behind Pritzker's facile and poorly thought through proposals is a blueprint to accelerate that decline and further instantiate the serf-class that has been created in this country.

Wednesday, April 30, 2014

Open Letter to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC)

An open letter to the DCCC in response to your ceaseless fundraising efforts targeting me for even a $5 contribution:

I support organizations that I believe make a meaningful contribution to American Society, however don't believe the DCCC is the appropriate channel or manner in which to support candidates or policies. 

I personally look at the overall Democratic Platform and approach to reaching a meaningful agreement to resolving / addressing the key issues our country faces as an abject failure.

The Democratic Party no longer meaningfully represents its constituencies, instead pursuing an approach of coddling big business to the detriment of the American People, and restricting our rights through efforts such as the NDAA and inadequate / incompetent oversight of the nation's intelligence agencies.

You've been unable to navigate the contentious waters of a Republican controlled Congress, and as a result the American People have suffered half a decade of lack of progress in any meaningful area.

And yet you continue to look to the People for money to pursue your failed agenda and evident incompetence.

It's frankly beyond me what you're thinking, and your excuses for non-performance are tiresome.

Please go somewhere else to find a bigger fool willing to part with their hard earned and heavily taxed earnings to fund your foolishness.

Friday, August 24, 2012

Akin, Religious Thuggery and Dr. Seuss


A few days in, Akin and the Republican Party in general are probably hoping this issue of "legitimate rape" and a woman's body's ability to fend off her rapist's sperm (where'd that come from?)  blows over - "oh it's all yesterday's news," I can hear them saying.  This will be what the talking heads on the news channels (at least the "Fair and Balanced" one) will be promoting as well.

But Akin's repugnant and unscientific views notwithstanding, the entire issue is a really a clear view into what a key component of the Republican Agenda is - a war on women.  Sharia-like laws enacted to take THEIR interpretation of what Christian beliefs are, and should be, and impose them on everyone else in our secular society.  The fact that Akin and Ryan co-sponsored legislation to accomplish this and that Romney supported it should give any freedom-loving individual pause when considering whether to support them or not.

To be sure, the next stage here will be that Akin's and the other religious radicals will scream that they're being persecuted because others object to THEIR attempted imposition on the rest of Americans.

I don't care if they're the majority or not (I certainly don't believe so) - that's immaterial.  This isn't a 50% + 1  rule of the mob country - this is a country ruled by principles and laws (hence we're a Constitutional Republic NOT a Democracy - something most people seem to have missed in Civics 101) - the first of which is a separation of church and state.  What you believe is your god's will really doesn't matter.  And to try and impose your religious beliefs on others is not just unconstitutional, it's reprehensible.

So take it away Dr Seuss ....  or a reasonable facsimile thereof


Wednesday, July 18, 2012

Time to overthrow the financial system

General question out there - when in the course of financial affairs the banks violate the basic principles of the agreement with their customers, should the customers refuse to pay the banks? Should the government uphold this action?

This is a real question as it becomes clear that the financial institutions banded together to systematically defraud Hundreds of Trillions of dollars in financial instruments through illegally manipulating the interest rates and terms upon which they are based.

Our cities are going bankrupt.
Our homes are being foreclosed.
We've paid higher than necessary interest rates on all our debt.

And yet, despite all this, banks continue to insist on enforcing the terms of our agreements- interest payments, fines and penalties and other exorbitant measures of financial penalties.

Should we continue to pay? When is enough enough?

I hold that, as of this day, our obligation to abide by the terms of agreements with banks, credit card companies and other usurious institutions is null and void - that through their systematic and PLANNED violation of the law, and common decency, they no longer can look to their debtors to follow the terms of any financial contract.

I further hold that, given the heinous nature of their offenses, that no longer shall fines alone be sufficient to ameliorate their crimes. No, from this day forward I say that We the People DEMAND that the traders, managers and executives that oversaw these and other illegal activities be tried and imprisoned. Since when is it acceptable in society that a man, found guilty of stealing a thousand dollars should be sentenced to 20 years imprisonment, yet one who has stolen Billions of dollars not be charged or tried at all.

This gets to the center of what type of society we want to live in.

I further hold that, if our government does NOT vigorously prosecute these financial criminals, that it is no longer a legitimate government and needs to be replaced IN TOTAL - the individuals, the institutions, the Laws and Regulations, indeed all facets of a government that would NOT hold criminals of this sort publicly accountable for their actions can no longer claim to legitimately govern its people.

Tuesday, June 19, 2012

A Working Model of American Social Innovation


There's a interesting meme making its way around the internet attributed to Aristotle that has sparked some interesting debate:








I think some ideas are, well, just bad ones.  And that you can see them at face value as such.  Others are more, well, complex or nuanced - often requiring a tweak here or there to get right, or needing to me maintained / updated to address changing times and circumstances.  And some ideas are just good ones to be picked up immediately.  Pure observation tells us that the vast majority of them are in the middle category, and that the advantage of having an open mind is that you can experience them, play with them, and then either drop them as bad ideas, change them to make them better, or adopt as good.


Which gets me to dogmatic orthodoxy - the tune of the day in this country with both the liberal and conservative camps having polarized themselves, and requiring strict adherence to a narrowly defined set of values or beliefs.  Through this there is no ability to try things on, no space for trial and error; imagine having to explain why what you thought might have been a workable idea turned out to be unworkable?  Shear heresy to have undertaken it.


So there must be more than one dimension at work here - for there are plenty of highly educated people on both sides of the aisle, and precious few of them seem to be willing to try something interesting to see what might happen.  Let's just call that something "Willingness to Try" or "Orthodoxy"  If we plot these two attributes on a simple two by two matrix let's see what we get:


Figure One
Here we can see the two by two with four resulting quadrants of social innovation.  Moving counter clockwise from the upper right we have:



  • Quadrant I - Innovation - a place where new ideas are entertained and the social environment exists to try them out
  • Quadrant II - Stagnation - a place where new ideas are entertained, but the polarized orthodoxies of the ruling class prevents society from testing or employing them
  • Quadrant III - Stasis - a place where no new ideas are identified, and the polarized orthodoxies of the ruling class prevents society from testing even those mediocre ideas that surface
  • Quadrant IV - Stagnation - no new ideas are entertained, but we'd be willing to try them out if they did (a null set of good ideas making it to the table)  - resulting in overall stagnation



A basic premise I'll employ is that of asymptotic distribution as we approach the extremes of either variable considered.  


With this defining principle in mind, to the basic framework outlined in Figure One above we can now add the identifiable frontiers of innovation


Figure Two
In Figure Two we can see the limits of innovation:

  • In Quadrant I we can identify the efficient frontier  - beyond which we're trying out too many new ideas with no guiding principles yielding total Chaos
  • In Quadrant II we can see that too high a degree of Political Orthodoxy coupled with a Highly Educated mind leads to Gridlock beyond the workable frontier, as no party can agree on what should be done or when
  • In Quadrant III we see the reactionary frontier, to me the scariest of them all, which sees us slipping quickly into the Dark Ages
  • And finally, Quadrant IV as we approach a total lack of orthodoxy coupled with an unwillingness to entertain new ideas leads to a Chaotic Dark Age.
Building upon Figure Two we can identify a point where we've attained minimum social efficiency in societal innovation.  In Figure Three I plot a hypothetical minimum social efficiency frontier - to the right of which we're entertaining sufficient new ideas to deliver the social innovation required to adapt to our changing environment, to the left of which we're not. 

Figure Three

Thus, any combination of ideas and political orthodoxy which yields a societal innovation profile between the minimum social efficiency line and the efficient frontier arc is at least a productive situation.  Anything beyond the efficient frontier, or to the left of the minimum social efficiency frontier is not.

All that is left is to plot where various parties on the political spectrum are to see what we have from a leadership standpoint.  This enables us to develop a prognosis for America's ability to adapt to our changing times and emerge from the financial and economic issues we face today successfully.

I've plotted a few of the major actors (and a couple of minor ones) Figure Four below - let's see what we get:

Figure Four
Crap.  We're hosed.  Not a single one of them looks like they're going to work for us.

I guess it's time to move to New Zealand.  Either that or find some middle ground in a new set of players that will actually help this country rather than hinder it.




Saturday, May 26, 2012

Affordable Care Act and the Supreme Court - a response to George Will of the Washington Post


This is a verbatim copy of my response to a Washington Post editorial in today's online issue:

Liberals put the squeeze to Justice Roberts


Will's clearly partisan opinion piece misses two central points that somehow elude those enamored in the so-called "libertarian" or conservative sound-bites of this issue.

First - Congress has not "created commerce" - it already exists.  Under current law emergency rooms MUST take all those who present for care, and if they can't pay, the government does.  This makes good sense from a public health stand point (unless you want people dying because they can't pay, or not presenting when they have contagious diseases.), as well as from a civil and social standpoint.

Second - the market for healthcare is a natural one.  No matter how healthy you are, at some point you'll need a doctor.  So to not be financially covered for this impending need, and to ultimately depend on the government for your coverage means you, by refusing insurance, are getting a free ride on the rest of the taxpayers and those who pay for their insurance.

Thus, this isn't a matter of freedom of choice as so called Conservatives would have you think.  This is a matter of you as an individual taking accountability for your life, and your expenses, rather than living on the dole.

I find it fascinating that the Conservatives don't want to understand this - I mean isn't that what they supposedly stand for?  Personal accountability?  But I digress.

If the matter here is whether the Congress has the authority to regulate this industry and require individuals to participate financially, I think it's relatively clear that
1) it is an existing commercial marketplace, and
2) all residents and visitors in the United States participate in it

So therefore the Congress has the Constitutional authority to regulate it.  That much is crystal clear.  And thus the Supreme Court really has no choice to affirm the law on that basis - unless it's truly voting a political agenda rather than ruling on the matter of Law, or attempting to overturn all Commerce Legislation since the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890.

A more fundamental question should be asked - is requiring everyone to buy private health insurance an adequate or even desirable way to achieve the required market participation?

I would submit no.  A far better solution would be to eliminate private insurance and institute a Single Payor system.  To be sure we could encourage additional riders or coverage from the private marketplace, but base can be provided far more efficiently, with lower cost, and higher quality for more people with a government run Single Payor system.  Current estimates are that as much as 25% of healthcare expense (thats 25% of nearly 3 Trillion dollars a year) is due to multiple billing relationships from multiple payors.  Eliminating this would save up to $750 BN a year.  Which pays for a lot of coverage.  And reduces the debt to boot.

So George Will is either naively misunderstanding the case in front of us, or pursuing some other partisan agenda - which do you think is going on here?