Zero Sum Traps
The protests that began on May 15 (M-15) continue – below is a live feed from Puerta del Sol Square in Madrid
Live feed via U-Stream
Links to information.
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/europe/2011/05/2011519233112661224.html
http://www.redpepper.org.uk/nobody-expects-the-spanish-revolution/
Short Clip of the Protests in Malaga on May 20th
In discussions about bailing out Ireland, NOBODY cares about the People of Ireland.
When the Media/Governments/IMF/EU say that “Ireland” must be bailed out, they don’t give a shit about the people of Ireland. They want to bail the lenders/banks out and keep the population of Ireland in debt. In debt, you lose autonomy.
What the IMF/EU are saying is…
“The people of Ireland can’t pay their debts, so we (IMF/EU) must pay those for them – then they will owe the IMF/EU. We will kindly help them to pay off those debts, assisting with collecting taxes and selling the countries assets.“
What is the reality?
“Casino developers and loan sharks (Anglo-Irish et al) borrowed money from foreign banks. Now they are bust. The banks now want to transfer those private loans to the tax payers (the developers and loan sharks have almost all retained their wealth and some have skipped the country). IMF/EU will pay those foreign banks (simply replace one loan with another) – then the Irish taxpayer will owe the IMF/EU. Not only do the Irish taxpayers have to pay off billions in Private loans, the IMF/EU) will effectively have direct political control by proxy (For this great gift of bail-out, Ireland must govern as the IMF/EU would like). That is, Ireland is no longer an Independent country – and still buried unpayable debt. What is the benefit?“
What exactly happened. 
Billions of Euro were pumped into the country from foreign private banks through local private banks in the form of debt. The Irish people couldn’t have known this was happening as money was simply very available – first to property developers (who don’t say no to money) who increased the housing demand and once the excitement was generated, it was easy to put the rest of the population in debt.
But you can’t “force” people to borrow money.
No, but you can make it financially ignorant to “not” borrow. If housing costs are rising very fast because others are borrowing, it makes little economic sense to not be included – it was around this time that the property market came to be called the property ladder – ie, it was a one way bet.
Now, The IMF/EU are indebting/enslaving Ireland to ensure the foreign lenders/banks make money. The foreign lenders/banks should be told to go to hell. The Irish People should audit the debt and triage it. In other words, pay back only the debt that will make a difference to its healthy survival and that which the public owe. During the audit, we will see who owes what money to who – it is important that private debt is not made public debt.
Remember: Private debt is where one person owes another. Public debt is where everybody in the country, including children and pensioners, and those not born yet, are obligated to pay. The Foreign banks certainly want it to be Public debt.
A little more description.
Through the 90′s, Ireland was doing fine and growing. But foreign banks started lending money into the small economy. This is the same as if Ireland started printing money. The volume of money to go around on the same amount of goods increased. This hit in inflation but as most of the money was lent in through the property market, that was sent sky high. If anyone could bring almost any amount of money into the country, property prices would have no ceiling.
But surely they should have seen all this money coming in?
Not a hope. It was local bank borrowing from foreign banks. As far as the average man on the street could see, it was local money as part of a strong economy.
But they shouldn’t have borrowed so much to buy the houses.
Wrong. If you are in an economy and everyone around you is buying and pushing prices higher and higher, it is “sound economic sense” to ensure you don’t fall behind. (And it is very sound if the reason prices are increasing is because of a genuine strong economy – which most thought).
Guardian
“The backlash is already under way: in Ireland and Greece there are increasingly noisy public campaigns demanding an independent audit of these countries’ debts, so that voters can see exactly who owes what to whom – and by implication, who precisely is being “bailed out”.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/mar/28/europe-debt-relief
But if they default, no-one would lend them more money.
On the contrary. If they default, the country immediately loses the interest debt payment (10 billion a year), which then stays in the economy and circulates. The economy will be much stronger without the debt and interest payments. It would be a great place to invest.
No one would lend to them to teach them a lesson. Lenders are not moralistic. They are predatory. If Pimco (large lenders to governments) see RBS lost billions, they would be quite happy to invest – sticking one to their competitors.
So why don’t they just do it?. They should – but let us be clear, the implications are enormous (which is why I encourage it). First, other country’s are simply going to follow suit -
“Is it morally or economically acceptable to destroy the welfare state, and to destroy schools and destroy hospitals to pay off these debts?”
Other thoughts.
Who is to blame for Ireland’s crisis? There are plenty to blame – for a start they need to sue KPMG, PWC and E&Y
http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2011/04/01/who-is-to-blame-for-irelands-crisis-easy-they-need-to-sue-kpmg-pwc-and-ey
Final thoughts.
I get angry about this for personal interest… particularly in Ireland. However, the sad thing is that this rape of a country is bog standard practice by rich countries on poor. And I haven’t given a shit.
Because I missed the point. The point is, the people who have to pay the money back are NOT the people who got rich on the money or actually borrowed it.
http://www.jubileedebtcampaign.org.uk/
Explaning this is not easy without understanding the players – Here is another attempt in story form.
The Irish economy is doing fine and there is enough money in circulation. Then, “Said Banker” from Carribbean Island puts 20 times more money into the system by loaning it to a few of his friends, “The developers” in Ireland. The Developers spend it everywhere, paying themselves billions in bonuses for spending it. Once spent, off they run to their Carribbean island with billions on bonuses, to sunbath beside Said Banker. Now “Said Banker” wants his interest payments for the next 40 years. The real people who owe him the money are sunbathing beside him, but with the flick of a pen that debt is passed over to the wage earners of Ireland, the elderly and the unborn.
But surely, if it was spent then they need to give it back? Said Banker is not stupid. He didn’t loan the money in just to park it. It acrues interest. 800 billion into the economy means 2 trillion back to Said Banker over a number of years. The value to the Irish economy, unfortunately, is 800 billion. When huge flows are pumped in over a short time it just inflates assests, not increase producing. So the loss for financial fraud is 2 trillion.
These are round numbers. “Said Banker” is a large group of bankers and International bond holders. “The developers” are local banks and bankers and large scale borrowers.
Talk is of moral issues if Ireland does not pay back its debt. Quite the opposite. It is the only moral path to not pay it back. Just because our lawmakers and regulators cannot understand money printing (loaning in far in excess of economic size) and the impacts on economies, doesn’t mean it is correct or just.
UPDATE: It seesm as though the Irish are gaining some success in isolating the debt they truly owe, from the lump they have been asked for.
http://www.jubileedebtcampaign.org.uk/Irish%20national%20debt%20audit%20to%20determine%20real%20picture+6968.twl
http://golemxiv-credo.blogspot.com/2010/10/who-are-bond-holders-we-are-bailing-out.html
http://www.economist.com/node/18560535?story_id=18560535
http://www.redpepper.org.uk/private-debt-public-pain-lessons-for-ireland/
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/may/25/ireland-credit-downgrade-threat-standard-and-poors?
Singing and dancing that the recovery is underway is a little specious based on all the most important data. The Telegraph led the way in daily newspapers in the UK, including dancing about the FTSE “bursting” through 6000 (omitting it first reached 6000 in 1998, 13 years ago).
However, Zerohedge again gives the contrarian view (or simple balances some of the bullshit).
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/do-economists-even-look-data-they-claim-supports-“recovery”?
Average (Mean) Duration of Unemployment – 1945 – 2011
And Timemetric have an other very interesting graph.
Average (Mean) Duration of Unemployment – 1945 – 2011
http://timetric.com/index/7TevNE4ERLm64b9WTjNUmA/
Revealing figures from the St Louis Fed, raising questions about where and how much money money is being pumped in.
Bloombergs Misery Index, which is an index from Unemployment + Inflation expectations.
New Home Sales have never been this bad. Considering that the Population of the US has doubled over the last 40 odd years, these figures are grim, but also reflect the huge inventory (and shadow inventory) of existing homes.
Finally, a bit of perspe
ctive on “the start point” when we talk about recovery. In the end, when so many people are unemployed, there is a new industry created simply for those millions of people. It “IS” those people, calculating them, feeding them, analysing them…
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A pretty interesting report can be viewed here. It is not always easy to view in Scribe so I generally save them to desktop for a read. Opinions aplenty, but the stats and graphs can all be validated.
Things that make you go Hmmmm
For Decades, poorer countries have been arguing that they should not have to pay the national debt as they (the citizens) did not borrow it of benefit from it. It was loans to dictators for weapons to keep them under control, not to benefit them.
But all their squealing and wingeing was ignored. They should pay their debts….
How things are viewed differently now in Ireland, Greece, etc etc.
A Narrative is developing, with a couple of articles popping up – expect more soon.
Irish bank flight quickens despite EU rescue
Irish central bank data showed losses of €40bn (£34bn) in deposits from the key banks in December, compared with €27bn a month earlier. Over the past year Irish lenders have haemorrhaged €110bn, equal to 60pc of gross national product. “Would I want to leave money in an institution where I don’t know who is making the rules?” said Gary Jenkins from Evolution Securities.
…and a couple of months before….
Iceland offers risky temptation for Ireland as recession ends
The Nordic economy grew at 1.2pc in the third quarter and looks poised to rebound next year. It ends a gruelling slump caused largely by the “New Viking” antics of Landsbanki, Glitnir and Kaupthing, the trio of lenders that brought down Iceland’s financial system in September 2008.
The economies of the two “over-banked” countries have both contracted by around 11pc of GDP, but Iceland has achieved it with inflation that devalues debt, while Ireland has done it under an EMU deflation regime that raises the burden of debt.
Mr Osborne, while sitting in Davos, had been manipulated by chums through “what do you want to be after you leave politics…”, stated it was time to stop bashing the banks. This was his statement in mid January. At the same time, the negative 0.5% drop in GDP in 3rd quarter 2010, was down to some snow. This is our cheif economist…
Office of National Statistics figures
The debt we now have (see graph and the ONS site), has destroyed this country quicker than any war or terrorists could do.
According to the Economist Magazine (View Here), we have the following situation…..
Does it matter that Britain’s public debt – allowing for subsequent heavy government borrowing but some shrinkage of the banks’ balance-sheets – now stands at 155% of GDP? Not really since the government also controls the assets on the other side of the banks’ balance-sheets. Only if they turn sour will there be a genuine further call on taxpayers, other than the equity they have already ploughed into the businesses, together with a form of catastrophe insurance for RBS if its loans incur really serious losses. And if things work out better than expected, the taxpayer might even make a profit on these unwelcome emergency investments.
…as long as the assets don’t turn sour…! Thank goodness it is safe! House prices don’t go down, Bonds are always repaid, countries never default, and sharemarkets always rise.
Osborne is right. Move on. We must all be safe.