Please do; some time in the future, when you and I are long gone from this planet, maybe this thread will be found to be of use to others.

Your 4 bullet points are well founded.

Going on and on and on...
 

Thanks for your kind words walkabout, continuing my efforts to get the basics of the economy understood here, the following found at
How much is a trillion dollars? | IHTD

How high is a trillion in $1000 bills?

If you stack a trillion-worth of $1000 bills together, then:
1 million dollars = 4 inches high
1 billion dollars = 364 feet high
1 trillion dollars = 63 miles high or 101.38 Kilometers
(give or take a foot or two)
Note that this is a STACK, not laid end-to-end.

Therefore, if the stack were one trillion $1.00 bills instead of $1,000.00 dollar bills.
simple math tells us the stack would be:

63miles X 1000 = 63,000 miles high / 101 k X 1000 = 101,000 K high

So for each trillion we speak of here we have a stack of $1.00 bills that is 63,000 miles high or 101,000 high.

Since the circumference of the earth at the equator is: 24,902 miles or
40,075 K as all the RTWS know our stack of one trillion $1.00 bills is long/tall enough to encircle the earth with 23,000 miles left over.

If nothing else this provides a basic understanding of how many $1.00 bills equals a trillion dollars. Just imagine a debt of 18 trillion one dollar bills which is the national debt of the United States - representing about 101 % of the gross national product.... other countries are limited to have a debt below 60% of their GNP, go figure?

OK moving on, Walkabout has provided an excellent overview of the currency situation.

On a personal observation, that saddens me greatly, the financial magicians of the United States who burst on the stage in 1913 when they founded the Federal Reserve that has the U S treasury print money for them and then they lend the money to the United States at interest.... and then again in after WWII when the US struck a deal with the Saudis creating the U S dollar as the World Reserve Currency, by having the Saudis agree to only sell oil for dollars, dictating that all who care to purchase must first exchange their currency for dollars, and "inviting" the saudis to invest their petro dollars in the USA. And to convince the rest of the world to go along, during the Bretton Woods agreements, the US claimed that anyone could exchange U S dollars for U S gold.

Well, try changing your dollars for gold today! Or try selling your oil for any currency other than dollars and experience a real to life Dr. Strangelove experience.....

Not wanting to get political here, for I have friends who have responsibility to keep politics out of the HUBB, I will close with my personal concern for Argentina. The blue rate for the dollar is over 15 pesos AR to one US dollar and the official rate is under 10 pesos AR to the US dollar. This means a lot to the economy of Argentina and it is not good for industry or for the masses. While the U S goes further and further in debt to maintain its economy, the world has dramatically limited the ability of Argentina to go further into debt.

FIVE: A basket of foreign currencies is currently replacing the U S dollar as the World Reserve Currency, and the peoples of the United States will not tolerate another invasion of an oil producing or pipeline country based on lies without a provocation, so as in the past the U S needs to somehow, once again, justify going to war so as to have a reason for the demise of the economy and the means to rebuild it via the military/financial industrial complex . The basis of U S hegemony has been the World Reserve status of the U S dollar and of course its military might.

I am really trying to stick with economics here.

xfiltrate somewhere on Route 66

Another piece of the jigsaw in place
 

The same thing going on in Canada.
Rocco Galati challenges Bank of Canada to offer interest-free loans - Business - CBC News

Productive money
 

Australian commentators on their economy have identified the same issues:-
https://stableproductivemoney.wordpr...ower-of-money/

Being Australian, the article does not mince its' words.
e.g.
"The monetary system is usually privatised as well, but in a very stupid way. Governments permit private banks to create money out of nothing, then the governments “borrow” the money back with interest due. It started when the King of England was conned by the London money lenders who founded the Bank of England"

I have also come across somewhat similar graphical representations of such large numbers that illustrate the scale involved.
Unfortunately, it is very rare for such fundamentals to appear in the main stream media, anywhere.

Who was the President of the USA who is quoted as saying "you can fool all of the people some of the time, or some of the people all of the time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time"?

Chris Martenson's 'The Crash Course' (short video series) is still one of the best explanations out there of what's really going on, and where we're all heading over the next 15-20 years. It's very well put together IMHO.

@ xfiltrate: Chapter 12: How Much Is A Trillion? underscores what you said about the height of a 1Tr stack of $1,000 bills, although CM reckons it would reach 67.9 miles (not 63 mi) high. Maybe he was stacking used, soiled and crumpled bills instead? But hey, who's counting?!
.

Crash Course
 

Keith1954, thanks for the info I just watched the accelerated version of
Chris Martenson's Crash Course.... very informative....
A great, easy to understand, course that only takes an hour to watch
with some excellent suggestions for you economic survival at the end.

The 'Accelerated' Crash Course | Peak Prosperity

Xfiltrate

A couple of more telling statements from those in the know:-

"A great industrial nation is controlled by it's system of credit. Our system of credit is concentrated in the hands of a few men. We have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated governments in the world--no longer a government of free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and vote of the majority, but a government by the opinion and duress of small groups of dominant men." — President Woodrow Wilson


"Give me control of a nations money supply, and I care not who makes it’s laws". - Mayer Amschel Rothchild

Well, OK then, one more for luck:-

"I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. Already they have raised up a monied aristocracy that has set the government at defiance. The issuing power (of money) should be taken away from the banks and restored to the people to whom it properly belongs." — Thomas Jefferson, U.S. President

Greece, Muppets, Madoff, Pay day loans, Mortgages ...............
 

............................ all the issues of the title of this post get a mention in the linked academic research.
Does Finance Benefit Society? by Luigi Zingales :: SSRN

Yep, it is the longest link in the world!
Anyone who doesn't want to read some 40 pages of academic research could just go to the table 1 included at the end of the paper to see how things have been over the past few years.

We, joe-soap-general-public are the muppets of this post title, as labelled by bank employees not very long ago.

To paraphrase the thread title, "when, and how, will the financial crisis end?"

There is a solution
 

Some countries are more aware than others of the topic of this thread.

One solution is up for consideration as per the link below.
Only the front, headline, page needs to be read for those who have even a slight understanding, although the devil will be in the detail and the banking fraternity will fight this to the death (because of the title I have given to this post).
VOLLGELDINITIATIVE SCHWEIZ: English -

Ted you are so right. The money market work's on the principal that. As the population grows more debit can be made. The greater debit than before will support the debit that is in place now.


Now lets move on. I see on a BBC news item that there is a bug that is restance to antibiotics. In the way that they have to use two very strong antibiotic to kill it off, and then it's not all ways successful. We are on our way to some kind of super bug. Hell I wish I could find the report on the BBC. Sounds to me as if it has come out of the Horizon team. What this is all about. Is if people are dying off with out clearing their debit. And there are less people to take on loans. The banking system, or the money system is going to collapse. Well that's not quite true. There will always be money. When you have the, have's and the have not's.


But as you say. It's people, there are too many of them. That and corruption.


John933

I read that article... Nature always finds a way.

It's alright saying that. But nature don't pick and choose what species is going to stay, and what is going to go. If any thing, it's going to be by size, what it eats, and where it lives. Humans are the wrong size and can't feed them self's unless Tesco is open seven day's a week. Nothing lives for ever.
Hell I'm not all gloom and doom. It's not as if the world is going to end a week next Tuesday.
John933

It is interesting that the quote you use is from this thread 4 years ago.
Has nothing changed for you over the past 4 years?

Regarding the point about population control, the UN has the policy "Agenda 21" dating from 1992 so there is no need for concern.
There was some recent reference to the matter in the other pub thread on "global warming"; the item about Malthus' theories.

I was just reading through the post and that one caught my eye. About my self. I'm retired and have been for some time. Every thing is paid for. Own my own house, Have no bills out standing. So all I need to do is pay for service's I use, plus food and drink. And that don't come to much. So money is not a problem to me.


What douse concern me is the generation that is coming up be hind me, and the new one being born now. How they are going to manage I have no idea. Being lucky enough to be a child of the 60's. I could just pull up the ladder as in I'm all right Jack. Or try and help. But after saying that, there are some people who you just can't help. After being the bank of Dad. The children I have helped, are really no better off with the extra I gave. They complain about the bill's they have to pay. Then tell me about a phone or i pad or some game consul brought on plastic. Trying to tell them to get only the thing's you need. Not the thing's you want. Is like banging your head against a brick wall. Trying to tell them that the less deit you have, mean's that more of the money that comes through the door is yours.


It's a strange old world.
John933

I'm in much the same boat.

Over at the global warming part of the HUBB pub there has been some recent conversation on the same general lines.

All one can do with the kids, as a blood relative, is give them as good an education as possible, ensure they learn to smile and send them on their way at the age of majority.

And I do mean an education rather than the indoctrination practiced in UK establishments these days.

"How are they going to manage?" - one of my very first employers said that to me, and he was referring to me at the time.
But, expectations are extremely high nowadays, for no good reason.

Another year - has anything changed?
 

A review of Cypriot banking, based on "the historic haircut" imposed there in 2012-2013, written about a week ago.
Revisiting the Greatest Crash in History |

For those who can't abide blogs, here's the executive summary:-
Conclusion

The modern debt money system has a limited life span and it cannot stand still. The problem is that with every iteration of the boom-bust cycle, more real wealth is destroyed and more obstacles to the creation of real wealth are erected.
Hapless governments desperately try to squeeze blood out of a turnip by taxing and regulating the private sector to death, while central banks keep promoting monetary inflation. At some point the limit to this game will be reached – and the longer it takes to get to that point, the more devastating the eventual denouement will be.
We don’t see it as our task to offer a solution – with respect to that, we can only reiterate that a return to an unhampered free market system is the only way out, painful as it may initially prove to be. We know however that modern-day governments will simply not go down this path, as it would involve a vast loss of power for them.
All we can do is point out the risks, so that people can at least prepare on an individual level. A major lesson everybody should take to heart from the Cyprus experience is this: when the next crisis strikes, do not believe any of the promises uttered by government or central bank officials. You will be lied to in the critical moments, and you could stand to lose a lot if you believe the lies.
You don’t have to take our word for it: just ask anyone in Greece or Cyprus what they got for believing their deposits were safe.

+ the blog offers this succient summary of the Cypriot stock exchange situation over the past few years:
In order to fully grasp the extent of this devastation, consider the following: had you bought the market after it had declined by 90%, you would quickly have lost another 90%. Had you bought after it had declined by 90% twice, you would just as quickly have lost almost another 90%. So since 2007, this market has seen three consecutive declines of 90%. As far as we know this is unparalleled. If there had been a stock market in the Roman Empire, it might have done something similar around AD 400 – AD 500.

Where are things now, 4 years into this thread?
 

So, “is there a general economic crisis, and if so, is it planned.”


Pulling together the broad themes of the last 4 years of this thread as we enter 2016:
Early replies to this thread were pretty much on topic and, thereafter, the discourse drifted around in various posts covering aspects of the pursuit of money, methods of government, what constitutes the economy, commodity prices especially the price of oil, the BRICs (major developing countries – check that out) and other matters pertaining to both macro and micro economics.


What has been going on over the last 70 years or thereabouts?
In bullet points:
The developed world put up an agreement to deal with their affairs post-WW2.
This was done while that war was still highly active but the big players in the war still found time to look forward and agree on a plan.
This is known as the Bretton Woods agreement, named after the location of the meeting in the USA.

By and large this worked fine, with improving economies for most folk during the post WW2 period, through the 50s and 60s, until:-

In 1971 the USA government of the day abandoned the “gold standard” for their currency, in effect declaring the US dollar to be “fiat” in nature.

Thereafter, and over a number of years, the private banks were de-regulated which, in effect, permitted them to move away from routine high street banking practice and to engage in “investment” banking including the use of those monies deposited by their customers.
“Investment” in this sense of the word includes speculation which does not directly contribute to the economic well-being of a nation, or of it's people.
Also, see “fractional reserve banking” for further reference.

Development of computer technology, including algorithms for trading, have accelerated the global progress of this form of investment, to a point where investing in the real economy has been neglected in the pursuit of money for the sake of money.
Reference terminology:
Hedge funds
Derivatives
Credit default swaps
Exchange traded funds (one of the latest by the way)
Take your pick.

Concurrent with the deregulation of banking, credit became “easy”, in broad terms inflation roared away but economies still had every appearance of being “sound”. For each case of some form of retrenchment in the economic miracle (just one of the terminologies in use) there would be another area of expanding economic activity, whether measured within individual countries, across continents or worldwide.
Examples:
The BRIC countries

Now, it is common reporting to learn of many cases whereby it is impossible to repay debt (for every creditor there is a debtor).
In other words the debt burden is increasing faster than the means to pay off that debt.
Numerous examples occur, across personal cases, regions or nation states.
Examples:
Greece, Puerto Rico, The Ukraine, Venezuela are all current.

Where are things now? part 2
 

It is not too clear to me if there was ever clarity within this thread about what constitutes the real economy, differentiated from the pursuit of money as an end in itself – the latter are what are sometimes referred to as rentier societies and individuals.


It is the latter that is outlined below in the context of the modern world that is moving toward a globalised economy.


There are a few concepts about the situation described below; any or all of these can be followed up and found to have evidence for their inherent truth OR the fact that they are under consideration by various authorities, academics and others including those who comment on economics.
Incidentally, the logic of the flow below may not be fully in accordance with the pure principles of logic for reasons of brevity – but economics is far from logical in any case, dealing with essential interactions between human beings.

The current system of financing used throughout most of the world is a Ponzi scheme. As such it is a fraud; both a long term and an all-embracing fraud. Those who are not convinced of this probably should read no further – if you haven't experienced it or otherwise arrived at the widespread evidence for this statement by now then continue as you are, but this statement follows on directly from my last post concerning the inability to repay debt.

1. This Ponzi scheme has been in place at least since the Bank of England was established in the late 17th century as a means of privatising the money supply to the government of that day. Since then, it has grown and has come to be used throughout much of the world's systems.
2. This Ponzi scheme is on a path toward which it cannot be sustained; the well known “hockey stick” graph. The exponential growth graph cannot be sustained indefinitely, as nature itself has demonstrated in many examples of exponential growth.
3. Just as every other Ponzi scheme collapses, eventually, so the current approaches used for the supply of money have to end and be replaced with a system that is more sustainable. All of the current monetary and fiscal ploys in play are merely shuffling the deck chairs on the deck of the Titanic (to adopt a metaphor for a moment). The situation in Greece is a case in point.
4. The longer the time that elapses until the Ponzi scheme ceases and is replaced with a better system the worse the economic pain will be; the bigger will be the fall from the hockey stick graph of debt.
5. Fiat money: a fiat currency is defined as that which has no backing such as the earlier gold standard and similar methods of establishing value. All monetary systems currently in use in the developed world are fiat in nature; ever since the USA abandoned their gold standard in the early 1970s (in particular, in its role as the reserve currency of the world).
6. There is no example in history of a fiat currency remaining in use indefinitely; sooner or later each has collapsed via a loss of confidence by those with access to that currency.
7. Nevertheless, with modern methods of communication and education there is some potential to think that a fiat currency could be sustained; this is arguable but that argument does take place today among academic researchers, commentators et al.
8. An alternative would be to move toward another method of providing a measurement of the value of money, whether that be by the use of traditional gold or some other commodity (oil has been mentioned by some).
9. One method to establish “faith” in a fiat currency would be to have a single currency for the whole world; the evidence coming from the short history of the Euro plainly shows that this is impossible to achieve (Events in Greece, Cyprus, etc all show how fiat the Euro really is, even after making due allowance for any number of other issues related to the overall operation of the Euro; more deck chair re-arrangement).
10. Because of the previous statement, the practical solution must lie with nation states for any foreseeable length of time into the future.
11. Very recently, some nation states have been addressing their own situation with regard to their own currency; Ecuador, for instance, has adopted a system of electronic/digital money in a similar manner to Bitcoin but relevant only to their own nation.
12. Switzerland may hold a referendum to decide if the Ponzi scheme outlined above is to be abandoned, at least in part. This is a very significant development if only because it indicates that enough of the population of that country has developed sufficient interest in, and understanding of, their own financing system to want to instigate change. See an earlier post above for a link to the Swiss concept.
    

So, regarding the thread question:
Yes, there is an ongoing economic crisis which has been building for a considerable time – we (each nation that is) are somewhere along the hockey stick graph and each nation will have to find its' own solution to have a sustainable level of debt.
Some individuals are in the same position as are organisations below the level of nation states.

Part 2 of the question:
It doesn't really matter whether it is pre-planned or we just happen to be where we are today; we are where we are in any case.

World Economic Forum 2016
 

I believe there are 8 major themes to this years' jamboree in Davos.

Up now:
Financial apocalypse: Ex BIS chief economist William White warns of epic debt tsunami worse than 2007

Taxation
 

Corporations.

And the matter of offshore accountancy.

Within this subject lie many of the current arguments related to taxation within the UK.

My thoughts are that corporation tax, in the manner it is currently imposed, should be scrapped – it patently does not work.
(think Apple, Google, Starbucks, Amazon et al, they are all multi-national corporations with worldwide recognised brands).
Then there is Facebook which paid £4000 corporation tax recently into the UK for all of it's activity within the UK.
(That is less than the individual tax paid by many people under personal taxation rules).

So, scrap it.

Then look again at the corporations and tax them on the fact that they exist and operate within a national boundary; one option would be to tax them on their turnover (as I understand it, the current taxation is based on declared profits which are passed through offshore bank accounts thereby showing little or no profit from massive presence in the UK).
To avoid a tax on turnover, corporations would have to close down operations in the UK; that is unlikely, but even if it did happen (for say a coffee shop) another business would start up to fill the gap.

Or tax them, literally, on the fact that they are here in the UK; look at what they do, analyse their presence, the amount of known customers (a form of poll tax on corporations), what premises they own, how much they spend on advertising in the UK, how many employees are based in the UK (another poll tax and it would apply even for those self employed and subcontracted to the corporation) and refine the taxation rules as experience of the way the corporations' lawyers and accountants react.
Such new tax rules would apply only to those companies registered as corporations because that latter designation has been misused for a long time.

Recently we managed to introduce laws to control the sale of plastic carrier bags and years ago we developed the means to track every animal that goes for sale in the auction marts (allegedly).

Such a new tax would be wide ranging because the establishment of corporations has become widespread for taxation reasons alone.
I don't know of a bank that is not registered as a corporation.
Many of the UK branded supermarkets are registered as offshore companies.
Many UK police forces are registered corporations.

It goes on.

Negative rates of interest
 

The bank of Japan has joined the move toward negative rates of interest, in their case by imposing charges for "storing" the cash of their depositors.
BOJ introduces negative interest rate to boost economy

This is becoming the norm for the central banks as they run out of methods to deal with the real economy.

More about how Japan does business
 

And, there are some interesting observations about the BoJ and their recent change of interest rates + reflections on how the economy of Japan functions.
https://hat4uk.wordpress.com/2016/01...e-desperation/

The comments to the short article are as illuminating as the article itself.

An abstract from www.yourstrawman.com
 

When I made the statement above I had rather lost sight of where I had first seen this information.
Now I have come upon another statement of the issue:-

check it out via Dun & Bradstreet or any of the other places which records the setting up and performance of the 160,000,000 commercial companies world-wide. When you do that, you will discover that, for example, the House of Commons is a commercial for-profit company (number UC2279443), The Labour Party is a commercial company which trades under the name of “Allister Darling MP”, The House of Lords which is the highest court in the land is a private company, the United Kingdom Corporation Ltd. formerly known as the “United Kingdom plc” and which never complied with the law which requires it to file it's financial records, is also a private company. The Ministry of Justice D-U-N-S Number 22-549-8526, Directors: Lord Falconer of Thoroton is a private company set up in the year 1600. The Bank of England is a private company, as is every Court and every Police Force and even the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry is a company and not a person.

It gets even more ridiculous when you discover that The Devon and Cornwall Police is a company which has been taken over by a company owned by IBM which is paid an annual budget of £256,800,000 taken from members of the public. Gilbert and Sullivan would have loved this reality as a script for one of their comedies. Lancashire County Council was incorporated as a company (IP00666C) in 2002. It’s registered office was "3rd Floor, Christ Church Precinct, County Hall, Preston" and it was completely dissolved on 25th January 2008 and all of it’s Assets and Liabilities were transferred on 12th November 2007 to another company - “The Blues and Twos Credit Union Ltd.” whose registered address is Lancashire Police Headquarters, PO Box 77, Hutton, Preston. Do you by any chance get the feeling that you are being taken for a ride here?

http://www.yourstrawman.com/LCC.jpg

We have a strange view of economics. We ( broad brush but referring to most major economies) seem to view growth as the must have state of existence. Only problem is that we live in a finite space with finite resources so something has to meet the boundary wall of reality at some stage. Pyramid schemes can be popular and alluring but they all end the same way, and the economics of growth seems to have its parallels there. I am not sure if there has been a society that managed to sustain such a homeostatic state of being although I'd guess the Australian Aboriginal people did but I don't know enough to be sure.

What could be loosely called the Anglo-Saxon economic model does depend on economic growth -the oft quoted 2% growth - but not necessarily for the best of reasons.
Growth of the real economy is "traditional" and can be argued to be a desirable state of affairs of a nation, with the optimum use of expanding resources and the like and the attendant improvement in living standards for the population of said nation.

But, as per earlier posts in here, we are no longer living in anything like a "real" economy, but a system based on gambling-banks, fraud via the ponzi schemes of asset bubbles - inflate prices, suck in capital, collapse the bubble thereby fore-closing on each individual's "lost investment" and start over again.
Many "prosperous" companies keep their share holders content by means of financial accounting chicanery, buying back shares for instance, rather than investing in their real, original-reason-for-existing, economic activity.

Japanese debt is now thought to be at 250% of their GDP, up from 230% when last reported; the highest of the industrialised economies.
Weirdly, we don't hear of vast immigration figures for Japan - they are probably facing up to the 4th industrial revolution (I think that is what it is called = robotics).

Bump.

This needs to be revisited.
If only because the USA rates of interest have been raised by 1/4%, but for how long? (and why now?)

A short history of money
 

A useful short history of how money comes to exist:
THE HISTORY OF MONEY Rothschild Banking

How are the banks doing this week?
 

At heart, the Bank of England (BoE) is simply speaking, and acting, on behalf of their own private banking interests:
Sir John Vickers warns on inadequate bank capital | Business News | News | The Independent
And not in the best interests of the UK.

The article in this link gives an indication of why the BoE does what it does:
Volcker Rule Too big to fail Banks are too big to exist
With a nod in the direction of the Glass-Steagell legislation of the great depression era in the USA.
As an incidental, it has been commented elsewhere that the JPM banker in the picture within the link above is showing off his cufflinks quite prominently: the motif is that of a "seal of the US government".

As a further incidental, the current Governor of the BoE who has been in post for more than 2 years has got wrong every public pronouncement that he has made concerning the state of the UK economy and where rates of interest might be heading.

Meanwhile, banks in Italy are in deep doo doo, stuck with new rulings from the European Central Bank related to bail-ins and the illegality, under EU rules, for supporting their own banks with bail-outs as was done by all in the great financial crisis of the last decade.

Greenbacks and Bradbury Pounds
 

It feels like a sensible time to mention, again, the Bradbury £
Series: Bring Back The Bradbury Pound | UK Column
in the context of the current debate about the future UK referendum concerning membership of the EU.

And, with the 100th anniversary of WW1 in full swing, a commentary on the banking and political responses to such proposals;
Bankers, Bradburys, Carnage And Slaughter On The Western Front | UK Column

?c?

Counter Intuitive, like a left handed thread
 

Here's an interesting, recent (2012) aspect of research into how economies work, for both developed nations and those developing.
Reassessing the impact of finance on growth
Summary for developed nations:
If levels of credit exceed the GDP and/or if the financial sector of a specific economy employs more than 3.5% of the working population, then the increasing levels of investment are harmful to that economy.


This appears to be a classic case of diminishing returns for the real economy.
Some may have felt this effect qualitatively, now the research shows this to be the case quantitatively.

We live in very interesting times
 

I was quite taken with this pithy comment about a possible future:

"The idea of ‘earning’ a living is over. There are just not enough jobs and too many simpletons. The nature of society has to change. Robotics will escalate this process"
Along the way, the source blog brings together commentary about both the current Japanese and Italian economies et al.
https://hat4uk.wordpress.com/2016/04...ina-and-japan/

Financialization, or financialisation if you prefer.
 

The process, in a nutshell.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Financialization

This is a commentary about how it is applied in practice in the UK, with respect to the UK NHS:-
"This is all standard practice.
A simple formula that has been used on all former [now private] services.
First, you trash the service by loading it up with unnecessary expenses.
Then,once you have made it top heavy with managers, extra expenditure, extra costs, higher prices and other forms of legalized fraud, you create administerial chaos and personel instability.
Then you churn out carefully scripted propaganda about how we cannot afford it any more.
Then once you have fraudulently ‘cooked the books’ you flog the service off on the cheap according to a pre-arranged aggreement.
The new owners remove all the artificial overheads and enjoy the moneeeeee fron their cheap assets.
All the politicians concerned swan off to America to collect their thirty pieces of silver.
The peasantry have to pay twice as much for half the service they used to get for free from the service that they paid to build and run in the first instance.
Same old formula"

This video about the future of work, humans and machines is quite an eye opener. It certainly raise valid questions.


Regarding jobs I am already seeing lots of white collars jobs vanishing fast.


Plan B Economics: Humans, Machines, and the Future of Work

Asimov, author of "I Robot", saw it coming
 

Yes, that's a decent enough summary of what may be in store for those of us below a certain age.
It's not wholly new - there have been many similar commentaries (and driverless cars are due to appear on UK roads next year) - but it is a useful review.
The graphical presentations tie in well with the data presented in:-
http://www.levyinstitute.org/pubs/wp...m=auto,-99,197
That paper of about 10 years ago takes the "traditional" economic-single-track view of how things are with the world today.

Regarding the fable of Eukosmos (can the EU part of that name be a total coincidence?) contained within the lecture:-
A country of that name exists in some minds, I have just discovered.
https://www.nationstates.net/nation=eukosmos
Such games will be the future for mankind when the robots are omnipotent?

One potential answer to this impending future has been proposed in at least one country; Switzerland.
It goes by the name of the social wage*, or similar.


*Basic Income is a better terminology; it's been a while since I looked at this concept.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_income

Further critique of Financialisation
 

#SIGH#

Now we're all predictors of the future!!!
The tide comes in and it goes out. Always has done and always will do.
The sun rises in the morning and sets in the evening. Always has done and always will do.
Geese fly south. Always have done and always will do.
People are born and then they die. Always have done and always will do.

The world's economy has zigs and then it has zags. Yip you've guessed it.....always has done and always will do.

I'm starting to believe there are professional scaremongers in the world. Hang on a mo.....they're called politicians :thumbdown:

And yet, the elephant is still in the room, piling up dung all over the carpet that is the world economy:-
Wall Street Has Taken Over the Economy and is Draining It

For sure, the politicians need a scare story to replace the earlier scare stories that are no longer valid - "fool all of the people some of time etc etc."

Living beyond our means
 

Here's another analysis of what is in store with an economy, in this case specifically the economy of the UK.
A crash is coming if we don't begin real investment

The appended comments are as perceptive as the main article, but it will be just fine so long as we have premier league football and X factor/"Talent" TV programmes to watch each Saturday night.

The author of the article has an amount of authority for his subject:-
John Mills biography - economist, entrepreneur and political commentator

Read my previous post......it still applies :thumbup1:

Fear sells.

I turned off th political mouth pieces years ago and am far better off because of it.

Damn. And I was planning for such a long time, to sell everything, buy some stocks and live from the 3-monthly emissions...:helpsmilie:

Ever hear of 'Paralysis by Analysis'


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Analysis_paralysis

Tell that to the dinosaurs.

Humans as we know them haven't been around all that long, relative to the age of the planet.

Humans will very likely commit self extinction as we saturate the planet with petrochemicals.
But who knows, maybe the age of Aquarius will prevail. :D

.....or your medication will wear off, whichever occurs first!! bier

Bush Pilot to the rescue
 

ChrisFS, I think what Bush Pilot means is we recognize the spiritual beings we are and drop the meat bodies. Matter of fact soon before the most recent age of Aquarius began, (2012) I wrote the following poem which explains my take on Bush Pilot's post.


xfiltrate Eat , Drink and Keep Meditating

Didn't Edward V George write that in 1979?

You got it right this time
 

ChrisFS, Did you get the point about the age of Aquarius?

In addition, let me try to explain. You see xfiltrate is my screen name and "EVG" is my real name and yes I wrote the poem in 1979 - in terms of the 2,160 years of the recent age of Aquarius my 1979 poem was written soon before the most recent age. Soon being relative to the more than 2,160 years of the age - which is the 26,000 year progression divided by 12 representing the 12 zodiac signs.

Would you like to see my copyright for my poem "Set Your Spirit Free" ? I have it handy as I have published this poem. Or just ask rosa del desierto my real name, or ask Grant or Susan - founders of horizons unlimited because I use my real name , not my screen name, when purchasing ads on the HUBB, so they know who I am.

If you have any other questions please feel free to ask, but perhaps we should stay on topic. My poem was used to illustrate my take on Bush Pilot's post - did you get it?

xfiltrate/EVG

I think I've lost interest :D

Very well.
 

Have you lost interest or, has your medication worn off? To quote your response to Bush Pilot.

Please try to stay focused on the topic, some of us really try to say something meaningful here.

xfiltrate

[QUOTE=xfiltrate;548925 some of us really try to say something meaningful here.xfiltrate[/QUOTE]
Really?
Ha ha! doh No, really???
That will be the day. In evidence, anyone can read the (probably) meds/ mushroom induced gibberish you post.
It's all gone to the dogs in here.

If I've lost interest in this thread because certain other contributors have turned it into something very boring and meaningless filled with bizarre tripe with their continual ranting and deviates drastically from the original post......then I think I'm entitled to feel that way towards it. I have nothing more to add to this topic (unless I get pissed off about life some day and want to re-visit the self-praised intelligence of others and deliberately want to irritate them!)