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King of Loss 
Prog Reviewer
Joined: April 21 2005
Location: Boston, MA
Status: Offline
Points: 16813
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 Posted: December 07 2013 at 14:35 |
 JJLehto wrote:
Thread is dying...I better step in to boost it's demand.
Just curious, can anyone explain China's economy to me? Specifically, how as an export driven economy, has it maintained these levels of growth despite the entire world be recessed? I mean where are all these products going?
It could all be going somewhere, but yeah was just curious how it's happening. Fake numbers? Bubble? Investing in other countries?
Also Roger and I discussed how it can't maintain it's export driven growth and I indeed read recently China seems open (at least in rhetoric) to liberalizing their economy a bit more and becoming a domestic consumption based economy.
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Your answer: Quantitative easing
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JJLehto
Prog Reviewer
Joined: April 05 2006
Location: Tallahassee, FL
Status: Offline
Points: 34550
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Posted: December 08 2013 at 00:26 |
Oh dear, someone mentioned the 1% a page ago...
It's mostly the nerd in me knit picking...I admit, but also if we ever want to form a policy I do think it's important to have the correct aims.
The 1% is not exactly the issue. It's a smaller % of that, what's the exact number I have no idea. But yeah, they are not all the "bad guys" liberals hate.
I've said this before, a few times, but I'll repeat...it really does feel good to give up the burning flames of hate against "the rich". That does not mean you have to like them, esp don't have to go through the elaborate defenses many do. Just merely is acceptance. As it was said, there has ALWAYS been the super rich and the rest (if you want to use the 1/99% break). The days of emperors, then the aristocracy, now the 1% or .1% or .01% or whatever number you want. I used to be blinded by anger/envy. Really never gave any thought to much else besides hating the rich and thinking of ways to tax them.
I've given that up, let the 1% be...focus on the 99% it was surprising how much better I feel and all the discoveries I made (since I now cared to research and not just fume!) find the ways to better us all, and just try to keep the super rich from dominating and periodically crashing us all. As that one article said, pre distribution! Through various gov means and regulation we CAN create a more fair society, without re distribution which does not work anyway, and we can't tax the super rich much. Simple facts that one must accept.
Could be KoL. QE doesn't really seem to cause growth though, it seems to be mainly easy money to banks. An inflation of stocks isnt growth as we see here in the US.
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dr wu23
Forum Senior Member
Joined: August 22 2010
Location: Indiana
Status: Offline
Points: 20649
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Posted: December 08 2013 at 05:41 |
JJLehto wrote:
Oh dear, someone mentioned the 1% a page ago...
It's mostly the nerd in me knit picking...I admit, but also if we ever want to form a policy I do think it's important to have the correct aims.
The 1% is not exactly the issue. It's a smaller % of that, what's the exact number I have no idea. But yeah, they are not all the "bad guys" liberals hate.
I've said this before, a few times, but I'll repeat...it really does feel good to give up the burning flames of hate against "the rich". That does not mean you have to like them, esp don't have to go through the elaborate defenses many do. Just merely is acceptance.
As it was said, there has ALWAYS been the super rich and the rest (if you want to use the 1/99% break). The days of emperors, then the aristocracy, now the 1% or .1% or .01% or whatever number you want. I used to be blinded by anger/envy. Really never gave any thought to much else besides hating the rich and thinking of ways to tax them.
I've given that up, let the 1% be...focus on the 99% it was surprising how much better I feel and all the discoveries I made (since I now cared to research and not just fume!) find the ways to better us all, and just try to keep the super rich from dominating and periodically crashing us all. As that one article said, pre distribution! Through various gov means and regulation we CAN create a more fair society, without re distribution which does not work anyway, and we can't tax the super rich much. Simple facts that one must accept.
Could be KoL. QE doesn't really seem to cause growth though, it seems to be mainly easy money to banks. An inflation of stocks isnt growth as we see here in the US. |
No hate or anger or envy...just simple truth , which is that as long as we have the mentality that the super rich (and those in power) embody which basically is to control the flow of capital, the various 'govts', and how things work so that their hegemony is maintained there will never be any real or meaningful changes in the way things are done on old planet earth no matter what 'system' is put into place.
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One does nothing yet nothing is left undone.
Haquin
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Slartibartfast
Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator / In Memoriam
Joined: April 29 2006
Location: Atlantais
Status: Offline
Points: 29630
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Posted: December 09 2013 at 06:11 |
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Released date are often when it it impacted you but recorded dates are when it really happened... 
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The T
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator
Joined: October 16 2006
Location: FL, USA
Status: Offline
Points: 17493
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Posted: December 09 2013 at 08:53 |
This is wrong. Manson has a swastika carved on his forehead, so his real allegiance is quite clear 
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timothy leary
Forum Senior Member
Joined: December 29 2005
Location: Lilliwaup, Wa.
Status: Offline
Points: 5319
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Posted: December 09 2013 at 11:37 |
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Too bad he did not save the taxpayers $$ and carve it deeper
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The T
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator
Joined: October 16 2006
Location: FL, USA
Status: Offline
Points: 17493
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Posted: December 09 2013 at 11:48 |
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If he had carved any deeper some strange fluid would have poured out and who knows what kind of epidemic or strange blob monster the US would be facing now....
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King of Loss
Prog Reviewer
Joined: April 21 2005
Location: Boston, MA
Status: Offline
Points: 16813
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Posted: December 09 2013 at 17:59 |
JJLehto wrote:
Oh dear, someone mentioned the 1% a page ago...
It's mostly the nerd in me knit picking...I admit, but also if we ever want to form a policy I do think it's important to have the correct aims.
The 1% is not exactly the issue. It's a smaller % of that, what's the exact number I have no idea. But yeah, they are not all the "bad guys" liberals hate.
I've said this before, a few times, but I'll repeat...it really does feel good to give up the burning flames of hate against "the rich". That does not mean you have to like them, esp don't have to go through the elaborate defenses many do. Just merely is acceptance. As it was said, there has ALWAYS been the super rich and the rest (if you want to use the 1/99% break). The days of emperors, then the aristocracy, now the 1% or .1% or .01% or whatever number you want. I used to be blinded by anger/envy. Really never gave any thought to much else besides hating the rich and thinking of ways to tax them.
I've given that up, let the 1% be...focus on the 99% it was surprising how much better I feel and all the discoveries I made (since I now cared to research and not just fume!) find the ways to better us all, and just try to keep the super rich from dominating and periodically crashing us all. As that one article said, pre distribution! Through various gov means and regulation we CAN create a more fair society, without re distribution which does not work anyway, and we can't tax the super rich much. Simple facts that one must accept.
Could be KoL. QE doesn't really seem to cause growth though, it seems to be mainly easy money to banks. An inflation of stocks isnt growth as we see here in the US. |
Most of it also has to do with the gradual transition of China's economy from a Maoist model based on autarky to a state capitalist model based on export-based growth. Chinese working class laborers also are enjoying their 16 hour workdays in lovely hazy and polluted conditions....
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JJLehto
Prog Reviewer
Joined: April 05 2006
Location: Tallahassee, FL
Status: Offline
Points: 34550
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Posted: December 09 2013 at 22:47 |
King of Loss wrote:
JJLehto wrote:
Oh dear, someone mentioned the 1% a page ago...
It's mostly the nerd in me knit picking...I admit, but also if we ever want to form a policy I do think it's important to have the correct aims.
The 1% is not exactly the issue. It's a smaller % of that, what's the exact number I have no idea. But yeah, they are not all the "bad guys" liberals hate.
I've said this before, a few times, but I'll repeat...it really does feel good to give up the burning flames of hate against "the rich". That does not mean you have to like them, esp don't have to go through the elaborate defenses many do. Just merely is acceptance. As it was said, there has ALWAYS been the super rich and the rest (if you want to use the 1/99% break). The days of emperors, then the aristocracy, now the 1% or .1% or .01% or whatever number you want. I used to be blinded by anger/envy. Really never gave any thought to much else besides hating the rich and thinking of ways to tax them.
I've given that up, let the 1% be...focus on the 99% it was surprising how much better I feel and all the discoveries I made (since I now cared to research and not just fume!) find the ways to better us all, and just try to keep the super rich from dominating and periodically crashing us all. As that one article said, pre distribution! Through various gov means and regulation we CAN create a more fair society, without re distribution which does not work anyway, and we can't tax the super rich much. Simple facts that one must accept.
Could be KoL. QE doesn't really seem to cause growth though, it seems to be mainly easy money to banks. An inflation of stocks isnt growth as we see here in the US. |
Most of it also has to do with the gradual transition of China's economy from a Maoist model based on autarky to a state capitalist model based on export-based growth. Chinese working class laborers also are enjoying their 16 hour workdays in lovely hazy and polluted conditions.... |
....Still doesn't answer my question. I know they're export driven, that's what I said  and my question how in recent years have they maintained that growth with an export led model, despite global demand slacking. I'm sure there are answers, just no one really knows and you are just given your usual bashes of capitalism, which is fine but doesn't help
It is sad what will happen to the environment with China, India and a whole wave of countries growing. Would be great if there could be a global communion to agree to sustainable growth, in an environmental sense, but...all these countries argue they have the right to destroy the Earth aka grow, like we in the West did, and technically they are right. Those 80+ hour work weeks, horrid labor laws and mass polluting ways are what we went through in the 1800s and early 1900s. A new form of sustainable capitalism would be nice but alas....
Edited by JJLehto - December 09 2013 at 22:50
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Equality 7-2521
Forum Senior Member
Joined: August 11 2005
Location: Philly
Status: Offline
Points: 15784
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Posted: December 11 2013 at 10:57 |
rogerthat wrote:
Equality 7-2521 wrote:
Nothing is destroyed. People's tastes shift. The market adapts. You're taking something beautiful about capitalism and trying to portray it as a negative. Open markets are part of the reason that musical boundaries have been able to pushed so far in the past century.
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Er, the point is human behaviour cannot keep pace with the speed with which the market's momentum changes. If the know how involving in building and playing an instrument is lost, that is destruction. It is not so easy as somebody wants it tomorrow, therefore the market will make it available again. The market can do nought about something that is lost because a lot of these things are handed down from father to son through generations of craftsmen and not scientifically recorded. There is nothing beautiful about destruction unless you are the destroyer in question in which case you don't bear the brunt and rather reap the harvest.
Further, you cannot fit music to adapt to the tastes of every person in the audience. Do you think there are no people left in India who listen to music revolving around indigenous instruments? Hardly. There are a large number of them and they keep listening over and over to old records because the market is unable to offer them what they want. With a little bit of support, perhaps musicians who did have the know how to do so would have made the kind of music they sought. Markets do not apply as perfectly to arts as you seem to think. The belief in free markets and perfect competition fatally underestimates the sheer cost of making and acquiring instruments, recording music in a studio or mounting a live concert. It is too cost intensive relative to the typical returns a musician gets to respond adequately to dynamic market forces.
You may think a musician getting deprived of a livelihood because the marketing arsenal of big labels blitzed him out of the limelight reflects the beauty of capitalism but I can only reflect on what an unfair and discouraging a climate it provides to artists. By the evidence of the last five decades - the meat of the record making business - the market is good at remembering artists who brought them the big dough rather than artists who progressed the arts. The world is aware of the names of Debussy, Stravinsky or Schoenberg getting up to the 1950s but post that the centre of attention is focused on Elvis Priesley, Beatles, Michael Jackson, Madonna, Celine Dion. Wonder what's next up.
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You make a good case for why a person who enjoys those classical instruments may want to donate money towards the cause. What you're saying as public policy makes little sense. If the consumer base is not large enough to support the industry on its own, then you're demanding that people subsidize the esoteric tastes a few. Even in a standard neo-classical framework this makes no sense since you can site essentially no public utility in this case. I also don't get the time scales you're talking about here. If they're large enough to kill off an entire generation of musicians, then they're also large enough to allow for the retraining of said musicians. If it's shorter than that, then there is no problem at all. I'm a bit incredulous about the whole thing honestly. There's a large enough market in Philadelphia to support the weird sh*t I listen to from local bands. It doesn't take much.
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"One had to be a Newton to notice that the moon is falling, when everyone sees that it doesn't fall. "
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Equality 7-2521
Forum Senior Member
Joined: August 11 2005
Location: Philly
Status: Offline
Points: 15784
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Posted: December 11 2013 at 10:59 |
rogerthat wrote:
IIn fact, to further extend the logic on an individual to individual basis, the arts are extremely risky business with unreliable value perceptions so that a wise man may not seek to sell art to make a living in the market. Ergo, it follows that the free market is simply incompatible with artistic pursuit. An artist only acts on his impulses and hopes to please, he does not manufacture products for mass consumption. Left to fend for themselves, most artists will eventually be dealt a bad hand and that is indeed what happens to most artists even as the world celebrates the lucky few who get to be millionaires.
This is an issue that Aldous Huxley raised in Brave New World, so I will not claim any credit for following this line of reasoning. There are some intangible but valuable aspects of human life that may not fit into the market scheme of things. In that case, we have to question whether we should put the market imperative ahead of everything else or we have to make an effort to preserve certain aspects of our culture. What I have said about one style of art throwing out the other can be extended to the arts themselves. I don't think music labels make a lot of money anymore and some have surely been bleeding over the last few years. It is conceivable that they too will shut down in the not so distant future. What then happens to music itself? In the free market, music or cinema are not arts, they are just products in the entertainment industry. There is no space for outrageous artistic endeavour without commercial sense in the free market. And arts is just one example. What about wildlife preservation? There may be no ROI in that endeavour but is it not an unquestionably humane endeavour to seek to protect innocent animals from hunters? Or should we just roll the dice and pray to God that the number of people whose free will permits them to preserve an endangered species will always outstrip the numbers of those whose free will permits them to mercilessly take their lives? Why is the second option more convincing?
Pl understand that as a practicing accountant who swears by 'tallying' the balance sheet, I do understand how the market works and why it is needed. So I am not a leftie railing at profit motive and the creation of wealth by themselves. I just don't wholeheartedly endorse or embrace the free markets because I recognise that there are some walks of life that are not compatible with them. I recognise that taxes and deficits are a mess but so are the free markets.
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Preserve it with your own money not with the money of those who may derive no or insufficient benefit from it.
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"One had to be a Newton to notice that the moon is falling, when everyone sees that it doesn't fall. "
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Equality 7-2521
Forum Senior Member
Joined: August 11 2005
Location: Philly
Status: Offline
Points: 15784
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Posted: December 11 2013 at 11:03 |
Slartibartfast wrote:
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And Stalin would have most likely of, and in fact did, align with FDR. Stop saying meaningless and in this case completely baseless things.
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"One had to be a Newton to notice that the moon is falling, when everyone sees that it doesn't fall. "
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Padraic
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator
Joined: February 16 2006
Location: Pennsylvania
Status: Offline
Points: 31169
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Posted: December 11 2013 at 11:48 |
Make sure to run a spell check before creating a snarky political banner.
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King of Loss
Prog Reviewer
Joined: April 21 2005
Location: Boston, MA
Status: Offline
Points: 16813
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Posted: December 11 2013 at 18:33 |
Because Slarti posted that, I'm going to post:
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The T
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator
Joined: October 16 2006
Location: FL, USA
Status: Offline
Points: 17493
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Posted: December 11 2013 at 18:49 |
That's another really bad cartoon.
Man we have finally gone back to the beginnings of this thread: cartoons, cartoons, and cartoons.
Edited by The T - December 11 2013 at 18:49
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timothy leary
Forum Senior Member
Joined: December 29 2005
Location: Lilliwaup, Wa.
Status: Offline
Points: 5319
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Posted: December 11 2013 at 19:41 |
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Hey "What's up Doc?"
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King of Loss
Prog Reviewer
Joined: April 21 2005
Location: Boston, MA
Status: Offline
Points: 16813
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Posted: December 11 2013 at 21:02 |
The T wrote:
That's another really bad cartoon.
Man we have finally gone back to the beginnings of this thread: cartoons, cartoons, and cartoons.
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I just wanted to increase my post count. 
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Epignosis
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator
Joined: December 30 2007
Location: Raeford, NC
Status: Offline
Points: 32552
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Posted: December 11 2013 at 21:04 |
You miss me?
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rogerthat
Prog Reviewer
Joined: September 03 2006
Location: .
Status: Offline
Points: 9869
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Posted: December 11 2013 at 21:42 |
Equality 7-2521 wrote:
rogerthat wrote:
Equality 7-2521 wrote:
Nothing is destroyed. People's tastes shift. The market adapts. You're taking something beautiful about capitalism and trying to portray it as a negative. Open markets are part of the reason that musical boundaries have been able to pushed so far in the past century.
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Er, the point is human behaviour cannot keep pace with the speed with which the market's momentum changes. If the know how involving in building and playing an instrument is lost, that is destruction. It is not so easy as somebody wants it tomorrow, therefore the market will make it available again. The market can do nought about something that is lost because a lot of these things are handed down from father to son through generations of craftsmen and not scientifically recorded. There is nothing beautiful about destruction unless you are the destroyer in question in which case you don't bear the brunt and rather reap the harvest. Further, you cannot fit music to adapt to the tastes of every person in the audience. Do you think there are no people left in India who listen to music revolving around indigenous instruments? Hardly. There are a large number of them and they keep listening over and over to old records because the market is unable to offer them what they want. With a little bit of support, perhaps musicians who did have the know how to do so would have made the kind of music they sought. Markets do not apply as perfectly to arts as you seem to think. The belief in free markets and perfect competition fatally underestimates the sheer cost of making and acquiring instruments, recording music in a studio or mounting a live concert. It is too cost intensive relative to the typical returns a musician gets to respond adequately to dynamic market forces. You may think a musician getting deprived of a livelihood because the marketing arsenal of big labels blitzed him out of the limelight reflects the beauty of capitalism but I can only reflect on what an unfair and discouraging a climate it provides to artists. By the evidence of the last five decades - the meat of the record making business - the market is good at remembering artists who brought them the big dough rather than artists who progressed the arts. The world is aware of the names of Debussy, Stravinsky or Schoenberg getting up to the 1950s but post that the centre of attention is focused on Elvis Priesley, Beatles, Michael Jackson, Madonna, Celine Dion. Wonder what's next up.
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You make a good case for why a person who enjoys those classical instruments may want to donate money towards the cause. What you're saying as public policy makes little sense. If the consumer base is not large enough to support the industry on its own, then you're demanding that people subsidize the esoteric tastes a few. Even in a standard neo-classical framework this makes no sense since you can site essentially no public utility in this case. I also don't get the time scales you're talking about here. If they're large enough to kill off an entire generation of musicians, then they're also large enough to allow for the retraining of said musicians. If it's shorter than that, then there is no problem at all.I'm a bit incredulous about the whole thing honestly. There's a large enough market in Philadelphia to support the weird sh*t I listen to from local bands. It doesn't take much. |
So culture has no utility? Identity has no value? So what does a nation stand for anyway, why should soldiers be expected to lay down their lives to protect the nation? You cannot buy that with money though you may well believe a soldier is only doing his job with stolen taxpayer money. You cannot buy anything you like with money. The environment that encourages achievement of a more intangible and unquantifiable nature must exist, otherwise nobody will go out of the way to do anything. The idea of public funding for the arts may well sound incredulous to you but it already exists in Europe and is just a substitute for royal patronage. I will address why this is required in the next comment.
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rogerthat
Prog Reviewer
Joined: September 03 2006
Location: .
Status: Offline
Points: 9869
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Posted: December 11 2013 at 22:01 |
Equality 7-2521 wrote:
rogerthat wrote:
IIn fact, to further extend the logic on an individual to individual basis, the arts are extremely risky business with unreliable value perceptions so that a wise man may not seek to sell art to make a living in the market. Ergo, it follows that the free market is simply incompatible with artistic pursuit. An artist only acts on his impulses and hopes to please, he does not manufacture products for mass consumption. Left to fend for themselves, most artists will eventually be dealt a bad hand and that is indeed what happens to most artists even as the world celebrates the lucky few who get to be millionaires.This is an issue that Aldous Huxley raised in Brave New World, so I will not claim any credit for following this line of reasoning. There are some intangible but valuable aspects of human life that may not fit into the market scheme of things. In that case, we have to question whether we should put the market imperative ahead of everything else or we have to make an effort to preserve certain aspects of our culture. What I have said about one style of art throwing out the other can be extended to the arts themselves. I don't think music labels make a lot of money anymore and some have surely been bleeding over the last few years. It is conceivable that they too will shut down in the not so distant future. What then happens to music itself? In the free market, music or cinema are not arts, they are just products in the entertainment industry. There is no space for outrageous artistic endeavour without commercial sense in the free market. And arts is just one example. What about wildlife preservation? There may be no ROI in that endeavour but is it not an unquestionably humane endeavour to seek to protect innocent animals from hunters? Or should we just roll the dice and pray to God that the number of people whose free will permits them to preserve an endangered species will always outstrip the numbers of those whose free will permits them to mercilessly take their lives? Why is the second option more convincing? Pl understand that as a practicing accountant who swears by 'tallying' the balance sheet, I do understand how the market works and why it is needed. So I am not a leftie railing at profit motive and the creation of wealth by themselves. I just don't wholeheartedly endorse or embrace the free markets because I recognise that there are some walks of life that are not compatible with them. I recognise that taxes and deficits are a mess but so are the free markets.
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Preserve it with your own money not with the money of those who may derive no or insufficient benefit from it. |
er, how do you even know there is no benefit to be derived by others at all? You only infer this from the absence of a market but that does not take cognisance of how the music industry works in the 21st century. Labels commit money where THEY feel secure of returns but an artist without label support would lose the battle in the promotional stage itself. I cannot comment on the state of things in America but in India it is very difficult for an artist to promote his work without advertisements in top newspapers and that costs a lot of money. In such a situation the artist keeps his unit lean so no scope for hard to get indian instruments. All I advocate is for the govt to support a fixed no of performances of classical music each year. It would give more benefit than the upkeep of the palatial residences of governers, the most ceremonial and redundant of British Raj relics still maintained in the nation. No, sorry, I don't see the harm of public funding in a country where we fund the pomp and power lust of the thugs we call politicians. I am not looking at it from a narrow libertarian view because India is nor libertarian anyway.
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"Freedom" thread or something
