Nice try comparing predominantely one income families in 1972 with 2 income families in 2002 and declaring that the middle class is not shrinking. It's not shrinking because now it takes two people to earn what used to take one person 30 years ago. Besides it's a well known fact that housing prices were increasing way ahead of inflation and that is not taken into account.
dooo you should read the book. and write to mr Olaf Gersemann at financial times e-mail. this book was release in september 2004.. take care.
Nononsense, good post although I think you're referring to Ludwig Von Mises, I believe Richard was his brother and a mathematician. I also agree with you about the occult practices of the ruling elite. We don't have free-markets anywhere, what this world has is statism-socialism to one degree or another. As far as Marx's value theory goes, it's a huge non-sequitur just because you put work and effort into something doesn't give it value to others. Read Carl Menger's Principles of Economics http://www.mises.org/etexts/menger/principles.asp. For anyone who wants to learn economics, these are good websites to start http://www.mises.org/ and http://www.fee.org/
Sure, I understand it has nothing to do with you, I just wanted to point out to what appeared to be an obviuos statistical manipulation by the author. Besides all this statistics even if correct hardly proves the virtues of unregulated capitalism cause that's not what America was during this period. The country had mixed economy described by jamis359 in his excellent post above with strong government and lots of social protections and safeguards like labor laws, unions albeit weakening, minimum wage etc.
Hi Hoppean, Thank you for correcting, of course it's Ludwig von Mises! Sorry, my mistake. In the past, I have in fact been posting about both Ludwig von Mises and also about Richard von Mises who is one of the tenors of Probability Theory. What I could add is that Ludwig von Mises was kind of the leader of the Vienna/Austrian School of Economics. Together with his student F. Hayek they greatly influenced the later Chicago School of Economics. Be good, nononsense
Anyone familiar with Economic Policy Institute? Found a paper: Other Nations lead US. According to this, "the US has 17 percent of its total population living in poverty - the highest level of overal poverty among the 17 OECD countries where data was available." They had something about productivity being higher in some (socialist? egad!) countries too. Then again on their site they state "that federal statistics showed test scores lower in charter than in regular schools." Jesus Christ, no free marketeer would ever find fault with capitalism.
History points to the contrary. Wretched souls condemned to live through socialist hell! SOCIALIST REGIMES ONLY CREATE MISERY & EXPLOITATION & DEATH. Immortal references: "The Road to Serfdom", dedicated to the "Socialists of All Parties", by F.Hayek; (This book inspired Orwell to write "1984") "Animal Farm" by George Orwell (kind of an unforgettable "Socialism for Dummies") Let the Western so called "democracies", US included, be warned about the road that will INEVITABLY lead to their doom. nononsense
Insights spreading around on the internet recently: DEMOCRATIC You have two cows. Your neighbor has none. You feel guilty for being successful. Barbara Streisand sings for you. REPUBLICAN You have two cows. Your neighbor has none. So? SOCIALIST You have two cows. The government takes one and gives it to your neighbor. You form a cooperative to tell him how to manage his cow. COMMUNIST You have two cows. The government seizes both and provides you with milk. You wait in line for hours to get it. It is expensive and sour. CAPITALISM, AMERICAN STYLE You have two cows. You sell one, buy a bull, and build a herd of cows. BUREAUCRACY, AMERICAN STYLE You have two cows. Under the new farm program the government pays you to shoot one, milk the other, and then pours the milk down the drain. AMERICAN CORPORATION You have two cows. You sell one, lease it back to yourself and do an IPO on the 2nd one. You force the two cows to produce the milk of four cows. You are surprised when one cow drops dead. You spin an announcement to the analysts stating you have downsized and are reducing expenses. Your stock goes up. FRENCH CORPORATION You have two cows. You go on strike because you want three cows. You go to lunch and drink wine. Life is good. JAPANESE CORPORATION You have two cows. You redesign them so they are one-tenth the size of an ordinary cow and produce twenty times the milk. They learn to travel on unbelievably crowded trains. Most are at the top of their class at cow school. GERMAN CORPORATION You have two cows. You engineer them so they are all blond, drink lots of beer, give excellent quality milk, and run a hundred miles an hour. Unfortunately they also demand 13 weeks of vacation per year. ITALIAN CORPORATION You have two cows but you don't know where they are. While ambling around, you see a beautiful woman. You break for lunch. Life is good. RUSSIAN CORPORATION You have two cows. You have some vodka. You count them and learn you have five cows. You have some more vodka. You count them again and learn you have 42 cows. The Mafia shows up and takes over however many cows you really have. TALIBAN CORPORATION You have all the cows in Afghanistan, which are two. You don't milk them because you cannot touch any creature's private parts. You get a $40 million grant from the US government to find alternatives to milk production but use the money to buy weapons. IRAQI CORPORATION You have two cows. They go into hiding. They send radio tapes of their moo-ing. POLISH CORPORATION You have two bulls. Employees are regularly maimed and killed attempting to milk them. BELGIAN CORPORATION You have one cow. The cow is schizophrenic. Sometimes the cow thinks he's French, other times he's Flemish. The Flemish cow won't share with the French cow. The French cow wants control of the Flemish cow's milk. The cow asks permission to be cut in half. The cow dies happy. FLORIDA CORPORATION You have a black cow and a brown cow. Everyone votes for the best looking one. Some of the people who actually like the brown one best accidentally vote for the black one. Some people vote for both. Some people vote for neither. Some people can't figure out how to vote at all. Finally, a bunch of guys from out-of-state tell you which one you think is the best-looking cow. CALIFORNIA CORPORATION You have millions of cows. They make real California cheese. Only five speak English. Most are illegals. Arnold likes the ones with the big udders.
Where did I get the idea that natural resource wealth is a negative for a country in a capitalistic system? From the IMF, of course. http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/cat/longres.cfm?sk=3126.0
I strongly disagree. For those that want to do their own research on The labor theory of value (LTV) this is a good place to start: "...Very early on, the Austrian school, led by Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk, argued against the whole tradition of the LTV (see below). Much of Western economics followed this lead â and that of Jevons, Menger, and Walras â in the 1870s to discard the LTV as a theory of price determination in favour of neoclassical models based on demand and supply. In the end, the neoclassical "theory of value" (general equilibrium theory) is identical to the theory of price..." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labor_theory_of_value#B.F6hm-Bawerk.27s_critique Notice that in Capitalist societies, a 3-5% unemployment rate is a desirable number. Think about why that would be. nitro