Revolt of the Rich

[stone]

This put me in mind of that quote from the 1930s:

It is utterly impossible, as this country has demonstrated again and again, for the rich to save as much as they have been trying to save, and save anything that is worth saving. They can save idle factories and useless railroad coaches; they can save empty office buildings and closed banks; they can save paper evidences of foreign loans; but as a class they can not save anything that is worth saving, above and beyond the amount that is made profitable by the increase of consumer buying. It is for the interests of the well to do – to protect them from the results of their own folly – that we should take from them a sufficient amount of their surplus to enable consumers to consume and business to operate at a profit. This is not “soaking the rich”?; it is saving the rich. Incidentally, it is the only way to assure them the serenity and security which they do not have at the present moment.

And also of the 1994, very prophetic, interview with James Goldsmith:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4PQrz8F0dBI

[lazyboy]

Thanks for the great article and interview. Along these same lines is this article:

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/ne ... l-20120829

The truly perplexing and disheartening thing was the point made that Mitt is just the harbinger of this polite form of bust out vulture good fellas capitalism that has come to dominate the markets. It looks like more and more money is extracted this way ( along with other legal Wall Street scams) than actually made producing things in America. All the while, the productive soul of the country goes downhill. Good Old George Romney must be rolling over in his grave...one would hope. At any rate, the 1994 interview with Sir James Goldsmith (pt 3 where Laura Tyson makes her annoying case for what will prove to be the destructive Clinton globalization policies) adds historical perspective to this trend which started long before 1994. It's too bad Sir James isn't around to point out the bad social and economic effects of dismantling one's society for the sake of greed. I don't know if Clinton really believed these policies would work. It's possible that the optimistic BS being argued was very compelling. It's really a shame that every administration since has been a loyal servant of this type of capitalism or, at the very least, complicit in it's implementation.

[Reub]

Who's money is it anyway?

[stone]

Who's money is it anyway?

If the "money" is debt and credit created with the stroke of a pen by a bank in order to fund a leveraged buy-out of a company; that is a tricky question. I guess in that kind of scenario, money consists of a "relationship" between debtor and creditor rather than being a "substance". I think "relationships" very much are something that can be judged on whether they are mutually beneficial or abusive. That contrasts with a "substance" that can be seen simply in terms of who it belongs to.

[Reub]

So then, is it okay to take it?

[Pointedstick]

Who's taking what now?

[stone]

So then, is it okay to take it?

I thought you were questioning whether it was valid to criticize leveraged buyouts and the legal and tax structures that facilitate them and that have been lobbied for by those conducting them.

[MachineGhost]

Lets not beat around the bush.  Romney was a genteel Gorden Gekko and did it by bribing executive management instead of using hostile takeovers.

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[Bean]

Lets not beat around the bush.  Romney was a genteel Gorden Gekko and did it by bribing executive management instead of using hostile takeovers.

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"The point is, ladies and gentleman, that greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right, greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of its forms; greed for life, for money, for love, knowledge has marked the upward surge of mankind."
~ The Gekko

[Storm]

Really great article; thanks for posting it.  Reub posted one of his famous one-liners, and I would like to answer it with another question and a quote from the article.  A major tenet of the conservative platform seems to be that private industry seems to do a better job for less money than public government institutions.

Would it be acceptable to outsource every function of government to private industry?

The objective of the predatory super-rich and their political handmaidens is to discredit and destroy the traditional nation state and auction its resources to themselves. Those super-rich, in turn, aim to create a “tollbooth”? economy, whereby more and more of our highways, bridges, libraries, parks, and beaches are possessed by private oligarchs who will extract a toll from the rest of us. Was this the vision of the Founders? Was this why they believed governments were instituted among men—that the very sinews of the state should be possessed by the wealthy in the same manner that kingdoms of the Old World were the personal property of the monarch?

In short, I don't believe it is a question of taking money from one successful person and giving it to someone that is unsuccessful.  That is merely a talking point meant to distract you from their real objective: privatization of every government service so that they and their cronies can setup the tollbooth economy they have been salivating over for decades.

I am equally repulsed by the welfare state cradle to grave mentality of the democratic platform and the private industry cradle to grave mentality of the GOP platform.

[MachineGhost]

"The point is, ladies and gentleman, that greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right, greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of its forms; greed for life, for money, for love, knowledge has marked the upward surge of mankind."
~ The Gekko

You forgot the rest!

"...mankind and greed, you mark my words, will not only save Teldar Paper, but that other malfunctioning corporation called the U.S.A."

I miss the 80's.

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[align=center]Romney is fourth from left (I think).[/align]

[Pointedstick]

In short, I don't believe it is a question of taking money from one successful person and giving it to someone that is unsuccessful.  That is merely a talking point meant to distract you from their real objective: privatization of every government service so that they and their cronies can setup the tollbooth economy they have been salivating over for decades.

I am equally repulsed by the welfare state cradle to grave mentality of the democratic platform and the private industry cradle to grave mentality of the GOP platform.

Once upon a time in the USA, nearly all roads and bridges were private, and the first major American public library system was created, financed and endowed by Andrew Carnegie. Lots of parks all throughout the United States are actually privately owned and operated, unbeknownst to most people patronizing them because they don't have fences, tollbooths, or any of the other feared accouterments of private ownership. Zucotti Park of Occupy Wall St. fame, for example, is a private park that seems to function fine without either a government budget or restricted entry.

Many publicly-provided facilities and infrastructure have historically proven very resilient to the oft-predicted evils of private ownership.

[stone]

Apparently investors in Bain Capital et al are to a large extent GOVERNMENT entities.

… most members of the public do not know that close to half the investment capital in private equity funds is contributed directly by government entities. In this respect, private equity is little different than companies like Fannie, Freddie, and Solyndra that are regularly criticized in the media as recipients of government subsidies.

(that's from "private equity a government sponsored enterprise" on the nakedcapitalism site. I don't seem to be able to copy the link)
Leveraged buy outs are clear cut felling of long term private sector assets to supposidly create quick returns for government money but in fact simply  hand out colossal fees to the likes of Bain Capital.

On a more general level, I don't follow how leveraging up is ever supposed to benefit real economy productivity. Would real economy productivity actually improve if company equity could not be bought with borrowed money and limited liability status required a company to be debt free?

[notsheigetz]

"The point is, ladies and gentleman, that greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right, greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of its forms; greed for life, for money, for love, knowledge has marked the upward surge of mankind."
~ The Gekko

I like what Thomas Sowell had to say about greed in an article of his. He argued that blaming greed for economic outcomes is like blaming gravity for plane crashes.

[stone]

"The point is, ladies and gentleman, that greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right, greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of its forms; greed for life, for money, for love, knowledge has marked the upward surge of mankind."
~ The Gekko

I like what Thomas Sowell had to say about greed in an article of his. He argued that blaming greed for economic outcomes is like blaming gravity for plane crashes.

I think the duty of government is to ensure that the regulatory/tax/monetary etc structures are such that if everyone follows what is best for them financially, then the outcome is what is best societally (whatever that means).