
Wealthy rent-seekers who profit from unjust government policy - SQL2219
https://democracyjournal.org/magazine/48/the-real-takers/
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Synaesthesia
Professor Michael Hudson, economist often talks about this. He wants the US to
have a national bank which can provide financial services to the population at
cost. He also often talks about the lack of infrastructure investment and
privatization hurting the economy.

Basically the infrastructure can be viewed as a 4th factor of production, like
capital, labour and land. Government subsidized, low cost infrastructure
allows for a more competitive economy, because of lowered costs for businesses
and individuals.

His thesis is that the end of the 19th century it was understood that
government investment in infrastructure and public subsidy for services
allowed the USA (and other countries) to become globally competitive. But now
the opposite is occurring.

~~~
Consultant32452
Why would a national bank be better than credit unions which already operate
not-for-profit?

~~~
Synaesthesia
Well that's fine too - the important thing is that they operate on a non-
profit basis.

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wpasc
While I may agree with certain ideas and disagree with others in this piece,
this article (which is a book review) reads like a series of angry platitudes
that often come into conflict with one another. Interestingly, many of the
regulations and policies that are stated to redistribute “income and wealth
upwards to elites” are decried and called for repeal by those very same
elites.

My least favorite thing about politics, the national conversation, and
resultantly the media is weak platitude based arguments that willfully ignore
the complexities surrounding virtually every issue we face today.

~~~
taxicabjesus
> willfully ignore the complexities surrounding virtually every issue we face
> today.

There are complexities, but every issue can be simplified. I think economic
inequality can be boiled down to a few key issues:

1\. The Imperial War Machine: Iraq/Iraq II/Libya/et al -- very expensive, no
economic return for anyone but the military-industrial complex [0]

2\. Economic warfare on Mexico/et al [1] in the 1980's -> Economic Refugees

3\. Free Trade -> more economic refugees (NAFTA put Mexican subsistence
farmers [2] in direct competition with mechanized agriculture)

4\. Cost-disease: medical-industrial complex edition

5\. Concentration of wealth -> investors seeking returns for their
investments.

[0] [https://www.cnbc.com/2017/01/18/chinese-billionaire-jack-
ma-...](https://www.cnbc.com/2017/01/18/chinese-billionaire-jack-ma-says-the-
us-wasted-trillions-on-warfare-instead-of-investing-in-infrastructure.html)
[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confessions_of_an_Economic_Hit...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confessions_of_an_Economic_Hit_Man)
[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subsistence_agriculture](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subsistence_agriculture)

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suff
Lots of assertions, but no real arguments. Weak article.

