Magill Ink

7th November 2011

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Greed is good?

I don’t generally forward any of those emails I get sent. I prefer to make my own comments on things as I see them.

Milton Friedman and the Greed is Good Gang.

The word greed is getting spread around a whole bunch and deserves some discussion. It is one of the 7 deadly sins, look it up in wikipedia. Greed has a good solid 3^rd place in the listing behind lust and gluttony. 

Now check out this video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RWsx1X8PV_A

Mister snappy dresser in this video is Milton Friedman an economist doing an interview on the Phil Donahue show. Here he is expounding on the virtues of greed. Never minding it is one of the 7 deadly sins, more on that later.

Mister fashoniesta had received a Nobel Prize for his writings on economic theory. That wasn’t why he was on the Donahue show rather because he was becoming the darling in-house economist for the soon to be Reagan administration. His work for which he got the prize wasn’t about greed but free markets and the great depression. He wrote that the great depression was made worse because the government did not inject enough money into the economy fast enough causing what would have likely been a recession to turn into a full-scale depression. In current context it would mean that the stimulus package of the last few years should have been bigger. Although he was know as a free marketer, his work mostly was about the relations of government policy and monetary policy at least until the spin-doctors got a hold of it.

Milton Freedman became the poster boy for supply side, Reagan-Omics or voodoo economics as Daddy Bush called it. Mr. Friedman was the Pied Piper of the right wing conservatives who were looking for an economic plan they could package up and sell. The greed is good line became part of the econo-bable of the time and was package in sound bites to be easily digested by the faithful. My biggest problem with this is that when Ronald Reagan famously quipped “Greed is good” every 2-bit hustler and crooked SOB thought they had a God/Gipper given license to lie, cheat and steal all they could. 

As you can see in the video he got his talking points down and of course was pushing a book. If you listen to this closely he is actually talking about personal self-interest, which comes in many different flavors other than just monetary. He only seems to recognize monetary. This dweeb turns the discussion into capitalism verses a communist system argument rather than the discussion of what greed is and what dangers are inherent in unfettered greed.

In his view the market place should have no controls over it and the strongest would survive for the good of us all. This is a very Darwinian approach to economics so whole-heartedly embraced by conservatives and so denied when it comes to the evolution of life. The hypocrisy of the right is totally amazing. Still if you really buy into this don’t weed your garden and see how that works. If those cancer cells are eating your but, hey let it go. The strong will survive but you wont.

We have the result of the decades of supply side economics and that is exactly what we are experiencing now. To much power and money in the hands of too few. Mr. Freedman wasn’t the only economist around in spite of what the right wing would have you believe. There was a John Kenneth Galbraith, a very noted economist who called Freedman a hack and a tool of the rightwing. He predicted that if Freedman’s policies were adapted it would lead to a boom and bust economy. An economy that would porpoise up in a bubble and down in a recession, each time becoming worse until it all collapses in a massive depression. If anyone remembers the first big one as the savings and loans collapsed in the 80’s, with a taxpayer bailout. The collapse of the South American financial institutions, with a taxpayer bailout in early 90’s. The dot.com bubble  with the ENRON mess and now this the great recession. I can hardly wait for the next one.

Well Punkie the proof is in the pudding as they used to say. Anyone who buys into this trickle down stuff isn’t misinformed unless they only listen to Fox news, isn’t misled unless they are following someone who only listens to Fox news, isn’t ignorant unless (see first line), isn’t stupid (we all know you can’t fix stupid) they are certifiably insane. This is because they are doing the same thing over and over again expecting something different to happen.

Giving tax breaks to big corporations and the very wealthy doesn’t encourage them to do anything but consolidate their power and monopolize. Or be lazy and stupid and let a Bernie Made-off mange their money. If you think that making them wealthier will make prosperity blow out their buts and rain down up on us all, you are completely delusional. If they are taxed more they will be encouraged to do something other than pay taxes like grow their business, get creative and do something productive. If supply side economics worked, the great Bush tax cuts would have had us all in hog heaven by now.

Speaking of hogs, I grew up on a farm in Iowa and we raised hogs on the farm. We always had one or two pigs that were especially greedy, pushing others away from food so they could have more. Of course they were the first to become pork chops. You don’t think greed has its problems? It can be deadly.   

The great Republicon debates are going on and on and on. We get to listen to Snow White and the seven dwarfs trying to act like they have a God given insight on how to fix everything. Every one of them is a supply-sider except for maybe a couple of them who would not know an economic plan if it bit them in their but. They do seem to be good at selling books.

If you happen to be one of those 1% ers who are doing so well, that’s great. I don’t think I know anyone who is doing very well certainly not that well. To all those doing well I salute you. It is tough to make it unless you inherit it. I think now is the time for a little of that shared sacrifice. It is time for those for whom things have slid well were taxed more and I think they should pay up or spend some of that capital and quit whining.