Svetska Kriza 2008-....

[brusli]

Mislim da imamo problem sa terminom 'regulacija'. Regulacija je po definiciji sama cinjenica da centralna banka uopste postavlja kamatne stope. I kada su niske, i kada su visoke, to je regulacija.

Cek pa moraju da postoje neka pravila, ne moze da radi ko sta hoce.Regulacija je poostravanje tih pravila, deregulacija je smanjivanje, bar ja tako razumem.I jedino se zalazem za regulaciju finansijskog sektora jer je on najopasniji, kao sto smo videli po sistem. Svaki veci poremecaj dovodi do uplitanja drzave, trosenja love poreskih obveznika, a sve ne bi li se sprecio lancani krah.Ostale sektore, autoindustiju, telekomunikacije itd mogu da liberalizuju koliko hoce. Jedini problem je sto ce onda Azijati produktivnoscu da oduvaju Zapad, ali i to je u duhu liberalnog kapitalizma, nek pobedi jaci.

[Anduril]

Cek pa moraju da postoje neka pravila, ne moze da radi ko sta hoce.Regulacija je poostravanje tih pravila, deregulacija je smanjivanje, bar ja tako razumem......

Pogresno. Pravila su uvek nesto univerzalno - recimo pravilo da moras da postujes potpisan ugovor, ili da ne krades (od poreskih obveznika i buducih generacija pa dajes bankarima za bonus), ne prodajes nesto suprotno opisu proizvoda, itd. Pravila vaze za sve delove drustva bez obzira da li se radi prodavcu na pijaci ili dileru na berzi. Da su se recimo postovala pravila, danas bi mnogi bankari iz JP-Morgana i Goldmana bili u zatvoru (ili jos bolje, placali kompenzaciju do kraja zivota) jer su prodavali proizvode uz konflikt interesa i jer nisu predocili sta su rizici tih proizvoda. To su prosta pravila.A regulacija je ono sto je specificno za odredjeni sektor privrede. Basel regulacija je relevantna za bankare, kako se pravi novac, cime i kad smeju da trguju, posebni porezi 0 takse itd., itd. Sve je to regulacija kojom ti nekoj grupi mozes dati vece ili manje privilegije a na stetu svih drugih. Edited September 20, 2011 by Anduril

[Muwan]

Dug, 100% gdp-a. Dodamo count state i local debt, to je 170%. (vise od Grcke). Dodamo soc.security/medicare 460%.Dodamo unfunded medicaid, to je vise od 600%. Pera zaradjuje 10h necega godisnje. A treba da ispise cek na 60h. Na koju foru?

... a kada se o tome govori čak i na CNN-u, onda znači da se stvarno debelo zabrazdilo.

Boston, Massachussetts (CNN) - by Laurence J. KotlikoffOur government is utterly broke. There are signs everywhere one looks. Social Security can no longer afford to send us our annual benefit statements. The House can no longer afford its congressional pages. The Pentagon can no longer afford the pension and health care benefits of retired service members. NASA is no longer planning a manned mission to Mars.We're broke for a reason. We've spent six decades accumulating a huge official debt (U.S. Treasury bills and bonds) and vastly larger unofficial debts to pay for Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid benefits to today's and tomorrow's 100 million-plus retirees.The government's total indebtedness -- its fiscal gap -- now stands at $211 trillion, by my arithmetic. The fiscal gap is the difference, measured in present value, between all projected future spending obligations -- including our huge defense expenditures and massive entitlement programs, as well as making interest and principal payments on the official debt -- and all projected future taxes.The data underlying this figure come straight from the horse's mouth -- the Congressional Budget Office. The CBO's June 22 Alternative Fiscal Scenario presents nothing less than a Greek tragedy. It's actually worse than the Greek tragedy now playing in Athens. Our fiscal gap is 14 times our GDP. Greece's fiscal gap is 12 times its GDP, according to Professor Bernd Raffelhüschen of the University of Freiburg.In other words, the U.S. is in worse long-term fiscal shape than Greece. The financial sharks are circling Greece because Greece is small and defenseless, but they'll soon be swimming our way.To grasp the magnitude of our nation's insolvency, consider what tax hikes or spending cuts are needed to eliminate our fiscal gap. The answer is an immediate and permanent 64% increase in all federal revenues or an immediate and permanent 40% cut in all federal noninterest spending.Such adjustments go miles beyond anything Congress and the president are considering. No wonder. They are focused on limiting growth in the official debt, while ignoring what's happening to the unofficial debt. To understand the thickness of their blinders, note that the fiscal gap, after inflation, grew by $6 trillion last year, whereas the official debt grew by only $1 trillion. Hence, our leaders are looking at one-sixth of the problem.The August budget ceiling crisis deal calls for $2.5 trillion in budgetary savings over the next ten years. President Obama is unveiling plans Monday to cut the debt by $3 trillion. Both of these are peanuts compared to what's needed to start eliminating the fiscal gap.There is a way forward to deal with both our fiscal mess and the economy, which is lying on the operating table in desperate need of open-heart surgery. Such surgeries are called radical because they require radical intervention. But they are also extremely safe compared with the alternative -- administering Band-Aids and letting the patient die.At www.thepurpleplans.org, I provide five radical, but absolutely essential plans to fix taxes, health care, Social Security, the financial system, and energy policy. Collectively, they would more than eliminate the fiscal gap and get our economy out of the emergency room and onto the racetrack.The plans are called purple because they should appeal to blue Democrats and red Republicans. If neither party adopts them, I guarantee that a third-party candidate running via www.americanselect.org will.The Purple Tax Plan is of particular relevance now, given Obama's decision to push for a repeal of the Bush tax cuts for the rich and to levy a new tax on the super rich -- those with incomes above $1 million.The president wants to raise taxes. Can't argue with that. We desperately need much higher revenues along with much lower expenditures. Federal revenues measured as share of GDP are at a postwar low. And the president wants the rich to bear a bigger share of the tax burden. It's hard to disagree with this either. The rich have been getting off far too easy for far too long.But the Republicans want to ensure that more taxes don't mean more spending or smaller spending cuts than would otherwise arise. They also worry about high tax rates discouraging work, saving, and job creation by entrepreneurs.Most of us agree with both the president and the Republicans, which is possible because they're both talking past each other. But what we really want is a tax system that's simple, transparent, fair, and efficient. Neither the personal income tax, the corporate income tax, nor the estate and gift tax meet these criteria. Each is a bigger nightmare than the next.The Purple Tax Plan entails radical surgery. It eliminates the personal income tax, the corporate income tax, and the estate and gift tax. In their place it substitutes a highly progressive 17.5% federal retail sales tax plus a demogrant -- a monthly payment to each household, large enough that it reimburses the poor for the sales tax they've paid. (The 17.5% rate is the tax's nominal rate. Its effective rate is 15%, since 15 cents of every dollar spent goes to taxes and 85 cents to goods and services, with 15 divided by 85 equaling the 17.5% nominal rate.)If you're a Democrat, a sales tax, apart from the demogrant, probably sounds highly regressive. But nothing could be further from the truth. Taxing consumption is mathematically identical to taxing what's used to buy consumption, namely one's wealth and one's wages. Warren Buffett would effectively pay 15% on his wages, but also 15% on the principal of all his wealth, which is not now being taxed.The day the Purple Tax is implemented, Buffett will have the same number of dollars in wealth, but the purchasing power of his wealth will fall by 15%, thanks to the 17.5% higher costs of goods and services. And whether he spends his wealth on himself or gives it to his kids to spend, his wealth, plus any accumulated asset income, will buy 15% less in goods and services.The Purple Tax also makes the payroll tax highly progressive by eliminating its ceiling and exempting the first $40,000 in wages from the employee portion of the tax. Finally, the Purple Tax includes a 15% inheritance tax on inheritances and gifts received in excess of $1 million.Since the payroll tax is levied at close to a 15% rate, and the sales tax has an effective rate of 15%, and the inheritance tax rate is 15%, the Purple Tax plan imposes a single tax rate. This is very important for budgetary discipline. Under the Purple Tax, everyone will know that if Congress spends more on anything, the 15% effective tax rate will need to go up.The ongoing food fight between Obama and the Republicans is hiding the real game -- spending ever-larger sums on ourselves and leaving ever-larger bills for our kids. This fiscal child abuse must stop. The Purple plans would let both sides claim victory, save our kids, and get our economy back in the race.

[dekss]

... a kada se o tome govori čak i na CNN-u, onda znači da se stvarno debelo zabrazdilo.

Boston, Massachussetts (CNN) - by Laurence J. KotlikoffOur government is utterly broke. There are signs everywhere one looks. Social Security can no longer afford to send us our annual benefit statements. The House can no longer afford its congressional pages. The Pentagon can no longer afford the pension and health care benefits of retired service members. NASA is no longer planning a manned mission to Mars.We're broke for a reason. We've spent six decades accumulating a huge official debt (U.S. Treasury bills and bonds) and vastly larger unofficial debts to pay for Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid benefits to today's and tomorrow's 100 million-plus retirees.The government's total indebtedness -- its fiscal gap -- now stands at $211 trillion, by my arithmetic. The fiscal gap is the difference, measured in present value, between all projected future spending obligations -- including our huge defense expenditures and massive entitlement programs, as well as making interest and principal payments on the official debt -- and all projected future taxes.The data underlying this figure come straight from the horse's mouth -- the Congressional Budget Office. The CBO's June 22 Alternative Fiscal Scenario presents nothing less than a Greek tragedy. It's actually worse than the Greek tragedy now playing in Athens. Our fiscal gap is 14 times our GDP. Greece's fiscal gap is 12 times its GDP, according to Professor Bernd Raffelhüschen of the University of Freiburg.In other words, the U.S. is in worse long-term fiscal shape than Greece. The financial sharks are circling Greece because Greece is small and defenseless, but they'll soon be swimming our way.To grasp the magnitude of our nation's insolvency, consider what tax hikes or spending cuts are needed to eliminate our fiscal gap. The answer is an immediate and permanent 64% increase in all federal revenues or an immediate and permanent 40% cut in all federal noninterest spending.Such adjustments go miles beyond anything Congress and the president are considering. No wonder. They are focused on limiting growth in the official debt, while ignoring what's happening to the unofficial debt. To understand the thickness of their blinders, note that the fiscal gap, after inflation, grew by $6 trillion last year, whereas the official debt grew by only $1 trillion. Hence, our leaders are looking at one-sixth of the problem.The August budget ceiling crisis deal calls for $2.5 trillion in budgetary savings over the next ten years. President Obama is unveiling plans Monday to cut the debt by $3 trillion. Both of these are peanuts compared to what's needed to start eliminating the fiscal gap.There is a way forward to deal with both our fiscal mess and the economy, which is lying on the operating table in desperate need of open-heart surgery. Such surgeries are called radical because they require radical intervention. But they are also extremely safe compared with the alternative -- administering Band-Aids and letting the patient die.At www.thepurpleplans.org, I provide five radical, but absolutely essential plans to fix taxes, health care, Social Security, the financial system, and energy policy. Collectively, they would more than eliminate the fiscal gap and get our economy out of the emergency room and onto the racetrack.The plans are called purple because they should appeal to blue Democrats and red Republicans. If neither party adopts them, I guarantee that a third-party candidate running via www.americanselect.org will.The Purple Tax Plan is of particular relevance now, given Obama's decision to push for a repeal of the Bush tax cuts for the rich and to levy a new tax on the super rich -- those with incomes above $1 million.The president wants to raise taxes. Can't argue with that. We desperately need much higher revenues along with much lower expenditures. Federal revenues measured as share of GDP are at a postwar low. And the president wants the rich to bear a bigger share of the tax burden. It's hard to disagree with this either. The rich have been getting off far too easy for far too long.But the Republicans want to ensure that more taxes don't mean more spending or smaller spending cuts than would otherwise arise. They also worry about high tax rates discouraging work, saving, and job creation by entrepreneurs.Most of us agree with both the president and the Republicans, which is possible because they're both talking past each other. But what we really want is a tax system that's simple, transparent, fair, and efficient. Neither the personal income tax, the corporate income tax, nor the estate and gift tax meet these criteria. Each is a bigger nightmare than the next.The Purple Tax Plan entails radical surgery. It eliminates the personal income tax, the corporate income tax, and the estate and gift tax. In their place it substitutes a highly progressive 17.5% federal retail sales tax plus a demogrant -- a monthly payment to each household, large enough that it reimburses the poor for the sales tax they've paid. (The 17.5% rate is the tax's nominal rate. Its effective rate is 15%, since 15 cents of every dollar spent goes to taxes and 85 cents to goods and services, with 15 divided by 85 equaling the 17.5% nominal rate.)If you're a Democrat, a sales tax, apart from the demogrant, probably sounds highly regressive. But nothing could be further from the truth. Taxing consumption is mathematically identical to taxing what's used to buy consumption, namely one's wealth and one's wages. Warren Buffett would effectively pay 15% on his wages, but also 15% on the principal of all his wealth, which is not now being taxed.The day the Purple Tax is implemented, Buffett will have the same number of dollars in wealth, but the purchasing power of his wealth will fall by 15%, thanks to the 17.5% higher costs of goods and services. And whether he spends his wealth on himself or gives it to his kids to spend, his wealth, plus any accumulated asset income, will buy 15% less in goods and services.The Purple Tax also makes the payroll tax highly progressive by eliminating its ceiling and exempting the first $40,000 in wages from the employee portion of the tax. Finally, the Purple Tax includes a 15% inheritance tax on inheritances and gifts received in excess of $1 million.Since the payroll tax is levied at close to a 15% rate, and the sales tax has an effective rate of 15%, and the inheritance tax rate is 15%, the Purple Tax plan imposes a single tax rate. This is very important for budgetary discipline. Under the Purple Tax, everyone will know that if Congress spends more on anything, the 15% effective tax rate will need to go up.The ongoing food fight between Obama and the Republicans is hiding the real game -- spending ever-larger sums on ourselves and leaving ever-larger bills for our kids. This fiscal child abuse must stop. The Purple plans would let both sides claim victory, save our kids, and get our economy back in the race.

e, ako je nekome potreban cnn da poveruje u tvrdnje o ukupnom američkom dugu, onda ne mora ništa ni da veruje. nek živi u kojoj god hoće fantaziji...

[MancMellow]

Ovi apokaliptični scenariji za US i Zapad bi bili verovatno tačni kad bi ovi vodili samo i isključivo ekonomsku politiku.

[dekss]

Ovi apokaliptični scenariji za US i Zapad bi bili verovatno tačni kad bi ovi vodili samo i isključivo ekonomsku politiku.

ima tu nešto, ali razradi malo tu nešto... na šta ciljaš?

[Gandalf]

Ni ja - meni je blizi Hayekov free money model. To je danas u elektronsko doba verovatno daleko najbolje resenje jer obezbedjuje fleksibilnost koju zlatni standard nema kao i slobodnu konkurenciju.

Many have imagined republics and principalities which have never been seen or known to exist in reality; for how we live is so far removed from how we ought to live, that he who abandons what is done for what ought to be done, will rather bring about his own ruin than his preservation. - Niccolo Machiavelli

[noskich]

ima tu nešto, ali razradi malo tu nešto... na šta ciljaš?

Pitanje nije bilo upuceno meni, ali eto javni forum pa da pokusam da se ubacim.Verovatno da bi stvari bile daleko prostije i jednostavnije da nema elementa sile, tj. na vojnom planu niko ne moze ni priblizno da samostalno parira US, a ne postoje bilo kakvi konsolidovaniji savezi sa vojnom moci koja bi bila makar priblizna.Da nema tog elementa vrlo bi se lako raskusurali, sta smo imali ovde? Pa da naplatimo...Tako da ovde ne da se pravi racun bez krcmara, vec je krcmar napravio racun.Iliti u koga je noz, taj hleb sece i raspodeljuje. Edited September 21, 2011 by noskich

[MancMellow]

ima tu nešto, ali razradi malo tu nešto... na šta ciljaš?

Ne bavim se prognoziranjem budućnosti, samo jednostavno oni u kojih je najveća vojna i obaveštajna/informaciona, i, što je još važnije, tehnološka moć don't go down quietly. To naravno ne znači da će započinjati neke svetske ratove koji bi ih više povredili nego im pomogli. Edited September 21, 2011 by MancMellow

[dekss]

@noskich@MancMellowto što ste napisali stoji. SAD vojna moć definitivno ima i imaće veliki uticaj na sve sfere života širom sveta. imam potpitanje za vas (u bilo koga): da li ste u svoja razmišljanja uzeli u obzir da je onih 300, 400, ... 600% duga u najvećem delu interni dug? dug kini i japanu (pominjem njih jer je njihv udeo najveći) je (mrzi me sad da tražim) max 30% GDP - neka me neko ispravi ako grešim, ali nebitna je konkretna cifra - poenta je da je spoljašnji dug neznatan deo ukupnog duga države SAD (u njega ubraam i privatni i korporativni). i šta u tom slučaju vredi vojna moć? pa ništa.vojna moć može da se iskoristi da se prigrabe/kontrolišu preostali resursi na planeti. svi ratovi koje vodi SAD su isključivo iz tog razloga. pre svega oni u iraku i libiji. ko i pomisli da to ima veze sa demokratijom je prosto budala. "demokratija" je veoma zgodna floskula koja se moze savijati i oblikovati po svojoj volji u oružje u ličnom interesu SAD - što oni naravno i rade. da dodam još i ovo: ukupni dug svih država sveta (a pre svega OECD) je par 100%GDP - ni jedan od tih dugova se ne može i neće vratiti. ne postoji teorijska šansa za to. šta zapravo znači to da su dugovi toliki? to znači da smo svi mi (nemo manje neki više) pozajmili od svoje dece pare da bi sad lepo u udobno živeli. zapravo tačnije rečeno jedni su pozajmili od tudje dece da bi lepo i udobno živeli.ne verujete? napravite misaoni eksperiment: izbacite sve dugove iz bilansa svih država i imaćete mnogo manji rast privrede i mnogo manje novca na raspolaganju za potrošnju i s tim posledično mnogo manji standard svih na svetu... dakle? može ovo još da se razradjuje, ali pošto iz iskustva znam da niko ne čita čaršav-postove, bolje da se ovde zaustavim.

[noskich]

imam potpitanje za vas (u bilo koga): da li ste u svoja razmišljanja uzeli u obzir da je onih 300, 400, ... 600% duga u najvećem delu interni dug? dug kini i japanu (pominjem njih jer je njihv udeo najveći) je (mrzi me sad da tražim) max 30% GDP - neka me neko ispravi ako grešim, ali nebitna je konkretna cifra - poenta je da je spoljašnji dug neznatan deo ukupnog duga države SAD (u njega ubraam i privatni i korporativni).

Ako cemo da diskutujemo o javnom dugu tu nema relevantnijeg primera od Japana. Najveci interni dug na svetu kada se poredi sa GDP. Vec skoro dve decenije privreda u stagnaciji, deflacija, pucanje tradicionalnog sistema dozivotnog zaposlenja pa do poslednje katastrofe i niza svakodnevnih prirodnih nevolja koje se tamo desavaju... Pa opet ko dovodi u pitanje `business as usual` u Japanu? Niko.Nece biti da je glavni problem u US interni dug.

[dekss]

dug je dug - zao drug. bio unutrašnji ili spoljašnji. mora da se vrati - a ne može i neće se vratiti, u ovom slučaju (ili tačnije svim nabrojanim slučajevima) - nikako."Pa opet ko dovodi u pitanje `business as usual` u Japanu? Niko"Čuj, ko dovodi? Ako niko drugi neće, evo ja ću dovesti u pitanje ;)

[Daytrader]

O dugovima, razlozima, posustajanju Zapada, globalizaciji, moze da se napise roman ovde. Mogu da se vade parabole, slicnosti, primeri od starog Rima pa nadalje. NEgo da mi vidimo konkretno sta se desava sad? Pa od prosle god, odvija se pravi rat medju valutama. Yey war, ney peace. Nedavni primeri Brazila (kamate, mere da obore valutu), i Svajcarske (vezivanje za E), znace da kad god neka valuta odskoci, eto brze bolje obaranja iste. Niko ne zeli jaku valutu. (osim Srbije, al ona poseban slucaj talenta samodestrukcije). Brazil i Svajcarska su ipak sporedni igraci. Bitni igraci, globalno, su $, E, i yuan. Svi bi da obore vrednosti tih valuta, s tim sto Kinezi zaista imaju najmanje opravdanja nazovi. Znaci, treba provaliti odnose u tom trouglu, i sve je jasno. Svako tu ima interes da drzi valutu sto nize, zbog izvoza. Interes USA je da printing press-om obori $ i ofuca dugove. Evropa bi ocajnicki da evro padne, ali sada zavise od Kineza, za kupovinu obveznica, a od USA za tzv$ swap operacije likvidnosti/podrske. (Nemacka je poseban slucaj, oni i sa jakim E imaju sposobnost velikog izvoza, i sa jakom DM radili su isto, ali kod njih je to vise faktora, homogena kultura, dogovor sindikata i uprave i sl).Za Grcku i sl, jak E je katastrofa. E sad, sta dalje to znaci - ako $ devalvira u odnosu na E i yuan, dobili su tacno sta su hteli. Ako Kina, tj yuan, poraste u odnosu na $, a vezu ga za E, dobija pola od onog sto bi hteli.Ako E ostane jak u odnosu na $, a Kina veze yuan za E, dobijaju Shipak. Evropa - zasad su Grci prihvatili drasticne mere, ali koliko dugo? Neko ce da zalaje tu. Vecini u EU, odgovara slab E, ali na kraju, ili ce Nemci isplatiti sveza Grcku ili E mora da oslabi dobrano. A to onda ce da razbesni Kineze. Slab $ i slab E istovremeno Kini nikako ne ide u prilog, oni ce da prihvate jedno, ali nikako oba. Vec sada, pominje se da zbog slabosti E, ovi hoce da se povuku iz dogovora, podrske obveznicama, i traze mnogo povoljnije trgovinske uslove od EU. I tako rat u punom jeku. Samo je pitanje vremena, kad jedna valuta ojaca, kad ce da je obore, jer je to igra koju svi igraju.Posto ne mogu svi da devaluiraju istovremeno, a trziste znaci da svaki "dobitnik" sa niskom valutom proizvodi "gubitnika" sa jakom. (Brazil, Svajcarska primeri).Ceo globalni sistem je mix problema sa obveznicama, berzama, valutama...Pokazatelj koji treba pratiti je E.Ako oslabi znacajno jos, Kina ce opet vezati yuan peg-om za $. Onda stize sledeci QE. Setimo se da se ta igra igrala 70tih, a jos bitnije 30tih, tad je jedino vidjena.Svako svakom Wolfgang. Ko dobija u ovoj igri uopste? Pa niko. Tj nije bas niko. Cek necemo Shekspira, evo Sin City - Dok se crna trojka mlati u kafani, za shankom Goldie preti da se razuzda sasvim. Vamo viski za ortaka...Stari kontra trik, dok je war, dok se ovi mlate, vices peace i cekas na naplatu za sve. Peace. (for now)to vam je cela prica, konkretna.

Edited September 21, 2011 by Daytrader

[hazard]

Pametni saveti

Beware Those Black SwansNassim Nicholas TalebPublished 05 July 2010The bestselling economist Nassim Nicholas Taleb argues that we can’t make the world financial system immune to shocks –– but we can make sure it’s much more robust by building randomness into our planning. After completing my book The Black Swan, I spent some time meditating on the fragility of systems with the illusion of stability. This convinced me that the banking system was the mother of all accidents waiting to happen. I explained in the book that the best teachers of wisdom are the eldest, because they may have picked up invisible tricks that are absent from our epistemic routines and which help them survive in a world more complex than the one we think we understand. So being old implies a higher degree of resistance to "Black Swans" (events with the following three attributes: they lie outside the realm of regular expectations; they carry an extreme impact; and human nature makes us concoct explanations for their occurrence after the fact).

Prvi deo clanka:

Take Mother Nature, which is clearly a complex system, with webs of interdependence, non-linearities and a robust ecology (otherwise it would have blown up a long time ago). It is a very old person with an impeccable memory. Mother Nature does not develop Alz­heimer's - and there is evidence that even humans would not easily lose brain functions with age if they took long walks, avoided sugar, bread, white rice and stock-market investments, and refrained from taking economics classes or reading the New York Times.Let me summarise my ideas of how Mother Nature deals with the Black Swan. First, she likes redundancies. Look at the human body. We have two eyes, two lungs, two kidneys, even two brains (with the possible exception of company executives) - and each has more capacity than is needed ordinarily. So redundan­cy equals insurance, and the apparent inefficiencies are associated with the costs of maintain­ing these spare parts and the energy needed to keep them around in spite of their idleness.The exact opposite of redundancy is naive optimisation. The reason I tell people to avoid attending an (orthodox) economics class and argue that economics will fail us is the following: economics is largely based on notions of naive optimisation, mathematised (poorly) by Paul Samuelson - and these mathematics have contributed massively to the construction of an error-prone society. An economist would find it inefficient to carry two lungs and two kidneys - consider the costs involved in transporting these heavy items across the savannah. Such optimisation would, eventually, kill you, after the first accident, the first "outlier". Also, consider that if we gave Mother Nature to economists, it would dispense with individual kidneys - since we do not need them all the time, it would be more "efficient" if we sold ours and used a central kidney on a time-share basis. You could also lend your eyes at night, since you do not need them to dream.Almost every major idea in conventional economics fails under the modification of some assumption, or what is called "perturbation", where you change one parameter or take a parameter henceforth assumed to be fixed and stable by the theory, and make it random. Take the notion of comparative advantage, supposedly discovered by David Ricardo, and which has oiled the wheels of globalisation. The idea is that countries should focus on "what they do best". So one country should specialise in wine, another in clothes, even though one of them might be better at both. But consider what would happen to the country if the price of wine fluctuated. A simple perturbation around this assumption leads one to reach the opposite conclusion to Ricardo. Mother Nature does not like overspecialisation, as it limits evolution and weakens the animals.This explains why I found the current ideas on globalisation (such as those promoted by the journalist Thomas Friedman) too naive, and too dangerous for society - unless one takes into account the side effects. Globalisation might give the appearance of efficiency, but the operating leverage and the degrees of interaction between parts will cause small cracks in one spot to percolate through the entire system.The debt tabooThe same idea applies to debt: it makes you very fragile under perturbations. We currently learn in business schools to engage in borrowing, against all historical traditions (all Mediterranean cultures developed over time a dogma against debt). "Felix qui nihil debet", goes the Roman proverb: "Happy is he who owes nothing." Grandmothers who survived the Great Depression would have advised doing the exact opposite of getting into debt: have several years of income in cash before any personal risk-taking. Had the banks done the same, and kept high cash reserves while taking more aggressive risks with a smaller portion of their port­folios, there would have been no crisis.Documents dating back to the Babylonians show the ills of debt, and Near Eastern religions banned it. This tells me that one of the purposes of religious traditions has been to enforce prohibitions to protect people against their own epistemic arrogance. Why? Debt implies a strong statement about the future, and a high degree of reliance on forecasts. If you borrow $100 and invest in a project, you still owe $100 even if you fail in the project (but you do a lot better in case you succeed). So debt is dangerous if you are overconfident about the future and are Black Swan-blind - which we all tend to be. And forecasting is harmful since people (especially governments) borrow in response to a forecast (or use the forecast as a cognitive excuse to borrow). My "Scandal of Prediction" (bogus predictions that seem to be there to satisfy psychological needs) is compounded by the "Scandal of Debt": borrowing makes you more vulnerable to forecast error.Just as Mother Nature likes redundancies, so she abhors anything that is too big. The largest land animal is the elephant, and there is a reason for that. If I went on a rampage and shot an elephant, I might be put in jail and get yelled at by my mother, but I would hardly disturb the ecology of Mother Nature. On the other hand, my point about banks in my book - that if you shot a large bank, I would "shiver at the consequences" and that "if one falls, they all fall" - was subsequently illustrated by events: one bank failure, Lehman Brothers, in September 2008, brought down the entire edifice.The crisis of 2008 provides an illustration of the need for robustness. Over the past 2,500 years of recorded ideas, only fools and Platonists have believed in engineered utopias. We shouldn't think that we can correct mistakes and eliminate randomness from social and economic life. The challenge, rather, is to ensure that human mistakes and miscalculations remain confined, and to avoid them spreading through the system - just the way Mother Nature does it. Reducing randomness increases exposure to Black Swans.

Konkretni predlozi:

My dream is to have a true "epistemocracy"; that is, a society robust against expert errors, forecasting errors and hubris, one that can be resistant to the incompetence of politicians, regulators, economists, central bankers, bank­ers, policy wonks and epidemiologists.Here are ten principles for a Black Swan-robust society.1. What is fragile should break early while it's still small: Nothing should ever become too big to fail. Evolution in economic life helps those with the maximum amount of hidden risks become the biggest.2. No socialisation of losses and privatisation of gains: Whatever may need to be bailed out should be nationalised; whatever does not need a bailout should be free, small and risk-bearing. We got ourselves into the worst of capitalism and socialism. In France, in the 1980s, the Socialists took over the banks. In the US in the 2000s, the banks took over the government. This is surreal.3. People who drove a school bus blindfolded (and crashed it) should never be given a new bus: The economics establishment lost its legitimacy with the failure of the system in 2008. Find the smart people whose hands are clean to get us out of this mess.4. Don't let someone making an "incentive" bonus manage a nuclear plant - or your financial risks: Odds are he would cut every corner on safety to show "profits" from these savings while claiming to be "conservative". Bonuses don't accommodate the hidden risks of blow-ups. It is the asymmetry of the bonus system that got us here. No incentives without disincentives.Time to definancialise5. Compensate complexity with simplicity: Complexity from globalisation and highly networked economic life needs to be countered by simplicity in financial products. Complex systems survive thanks to slack and redundancy, not debt and optimisation.6. Do not give children sticks of dynamite, even if they come with a warning label: Complex financial products need to be banned because nobody understands them, and few are rational enough to know it. We need to protect citizens from themselves, from bankers selling them "hedging" products, and from gullible regulators who listen to economic theorists.7. Only Ponzi schemes should depend on confidence: Governments should never need to "restore confidence". Cascading rumours are a product of complex systems. Governments cannot stop the rumours. We just need to be able to shrug off rumours, to be robust to them. Do not give an addict more drugs if he has withdrawal pains: Using leverage to cure the problems of too much leverage is not homoeopathy, it's denial. The debt crisis is not a temporary problem, it's a structural one. We need rehab.8. Citizens should not depend on financial assets as a repository of value and rely on fallible "expert" advice for their retirement: Economic life should be definancialised. We should learn not to use markets as warehouses of value.9. Make an omelette with the broken eggs: The crisis of 2008 was not a problem to fix with makeshift repairs. We will have to remake the system before it does so itself. Let us move voluntarily into a robust economy by helping what needs to be broken break on its own, converting debt into equity, marginalising the economics and business school establishments, banning leveraged buyouts, putting bankers where they belong, clawing back the bonuses of those who got us here and teaching people to navigate a world with fewer certainties. Then we will see an economic life closer to our biological environment: smaller firms and no leverage - a world in which entrepreneurs, not bankers, take the risks, and in which companies are born and die every day without making the news.Extracted from the postscript to "The Black Swan: the Impact of the Highly Improbable" by Nassim Nicholas Taleb (Penguin, £9.99)© Nassim Nicholas Taleb 2008 penguin.co.uk

http://www.newstatesman.com/ideas/2010/07/debt-system-mother-black

[Anduril]

Many have imagined republics and principalities which have never been seen or known to exist in reality; for how we live is so far removed from how we ought to live, that he who abandons what is done for what ought to be done, will rather bring about his own ruin than his preservation. - Niccolo Machiavelli

Mislim da bi bilo bolje da potrazis neke druge citate ili prvo uopste nesto procitas na temu "free banking", kako funkcionise i gde je sve postojalo u realnosti pre nego sto postujes. Za pocetak, "Denationalisation of Money" od Hayeka ili ako te mrzi prosto: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_bankingSamo jedan primer:

# Sweden.[15] Sweden had two periods of free banking, 1830–60 and 1860-1902. Following a bank crisis in 1857, there was a rise in popular support for private banks and private money issuers (especially Stockholms Enskilda Bank, founded in 1856). A new bank law was adopted by parliament in 1864, deregulating the interest rate. The following decades marked the height of the Swedish free banking era. After 1874, no new private banks were founded. In 1901, issuing of private money was prohibited. Work on the Swedish free banking era has been done by Per Hortlund and Erik Lakomaa.[16] Erik Lakomaa (The Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics, Summer 2007), has demonstrated that the Swedish experiment in free banking was successful. It reduced booms and busts. Only one bank went bankrupt for 70 years, an event related to fraud and not to excessive lending as has happened wherever central banking has been practiced.

When private note issue was abolished in 1903, this was not due to any malfunctions. Contrary, the system was abolished because it worked too well. The main reason was the increasing political interest in active management of the currency. At the turn of the century, the idea of laissez-faire was challenged by new political ideas all having in common an acceptance of vastly increased political domains (Norberg 1999, pp. 197–201).29 With competing currencies, it was impossible to pursue an active monetary policy.30 The popularity of free banking had also decreased significantly among economists. Dowd (1992, p. 36) writes that “[f]ree banking, by then, had no significant support among economists” and one of the earliest demands from the League of Nations was that all countries should monopolize the money supply....citaj, doslo je vreme za basnoslovno stampanje para da bi se finansirali neverovatno skupi ratovi i njihove posledice koji su zadesili 20. vek, zatim socijalni sistemi koji su sada neodrzivi pa ce pogoditi pre svega sadasnje generacije koje placaju a nece mnogo dobiti u buducnosti, itd.

Edited September 21, 2011 by Anduril