| Subject: | Re: [socialcredit] Re: Swanwick Principles | | Date: | Tuesday, December 14, 2004 15:58:49 (+0000) | | From: | Timothy Carpenter <timbeau_hk @........uk>
|
| In reply to: | Message 356 (written by Joe Thomson) |
Hi Joe,
On 14/12/04 3:25 am, "Joe Thomson" <thomsonhiyu@shaw.ca> wrote:
> Hello Tim,
>
> Thanks for your reply, and I'll try to answer your questions below.
>
> You wrote:- "As to 'workfare' I am not aware that the UK's 'sure-start' is
> such a thing.
>> If it is I agree with you."
>
> "Workfare" <snip>
Thanks for your further ammo that 'workfare' is no silver bullet!
> (Tim:-)"If it costs less which goods are going to be rebated?"
>
> All goods, in a sense.<snip> Or, it might
> be possible for the same thing to happen right at the point of purchase by
> manner of what's been called a 'negative sales tax'.
This is what I was hoping for, and I would think that refund at the bank or
credit card point would be better than at the retailer if we could get
product codes into the billing and thus identify home-produced products vs
imported products.
> (Tim:-) "It does not matter if
>> you rebate the purchaser, reduce the sales tax or subsidise the producer,
>> whatever happens the net "ticket" price goes down and the company gets the
>> sale, right? Help me out if I this rebate operates in a different way,
> Joe.".
>
> It matters in the sense that the 'Consumer Discount' under Social Credit is
> an application of 'new credit' used to lower prices. That's the critical
> point. It's not simply the dropping of a sales tax, though that certainly
> also can lower the prices of the items previously taxed. But at the expense
> of the government services that tax was paying for being unfunded.
>>
Joe, I was not suggesting simply dropping the sales tax, but replacing that
sales tax revenue with the injection of liquidity to the government to
allocate. However, I can see now that it may be better to refund using the
liquidity and let the government keep the sales tax revenue as originally
collected. If this is refunded on imports as well as locally produced
production then I seriously doubt the logic.
As to the 'hard working rich' I do agree that for them there is no such
thing as enough money or enough power. Even among the corporate classes
there are enough 'dick dastardlys' who seem to spend more effort wrecking
the opportunities of others to 'protect' themselves than in actually doing
anything worthwhile! :-)
As to working etc, I am not in favour of elitism or punishments or forcing
people and agree with your observations. What I am concerned about is when
people construct economic models/systems that presume and depend upon
idealistic and especially STATIC human behaviour patterns. People change and
adapt to the environment, that is why we are still around and not dry bones
on some African savannah. I do believe a large number of people will adapt
to "enough for nothing" and especially to "comfortable for nothing" and do
nothing, so rendering the economic model and the economy dysfunctional.
I am undecided about paying people to "stay out of the way" as you call it
but certainly not in favour of indulging them to increase their commitments
and responsibilities at others' expense. When this occurs, then the mindset
tips into their 'right to a living', which is both absurd yet very possible.
Tim
> (Tim:-)> "As to your 300lb oaf, indeed we all have such examples, but it is
> important
>> to know that they are, alas, exceptions that prove the rule and an entire
>> economic model cannot rest upon an idealistic hope. The lazy rich-kids
> (now
>> middle class too) are a different manifestation of the same affliction."
>
> I find it interesting that Douglas observed we have nothing to fear from the
> 'lazy rich'. It was the 'hard working rich' we'd best keep an eye on! I
> think he was right. Those seem to be the ones who'll always give the same
> answer when asked, "How much is enough?" That answer is, of course, "Just
> a little bit more!" It'll always be 'just a little bit more'. And the
> reason for 'more', more often than not? The 'will-to-power'.
>
> (Tim:-) > "Again, it is not about poor staying poor (for if this were the
> case we would
>> have no middle class) but about nurturing the lack of ambition and drive."
>
> I've been an 'employer' most of my adult life, Tim. Since I was 21, and I'm
> now coming up on 58. Before that, I was an 'employee' from the time I
> graduated, with very few intermissions between jobs, until I went into
> business for myself. I've been called many things in all those years, but
> 'lazy' hasn't been one of them! I have though, worked with people who were
> 'lazy'. In both my capacities of employer and employee. And some who were
> 'ambitious', too.
>
> In all that time that I have never seen a 'lazy' man turn into an
> 'ambitious' one. Though I have seen a few who were 'ambitious' develop a
> 'lazy' streak occasionally. I've seen some 'lazy' ones luck into finding
> the 'ticket to riches', and occasionally become fairly well-to-do. But I've
> never witnessed any of them change, and become hard-working to get 'that
> little bit more'. People are as they are.
>
> Now what perverse pleasure does anyone get in this day and age out the
> belief that no one should be made comfortable unless they're made
> uncomfortable first? I'd really like to know. Is it 'jealousy'? Or a type
> of 'elitism'? That WE know what's 'best' for someone else? Some wretch
> who'd sink into moral deprivation if WE didn't force him to keep his nose to
> the grindstone? Why do people feel this way? Especially when there is no
> rational 'economic' reason for it in our modern times?
>
> Some people 'like' to work. Most people, to a degree, do. They want to
> 'do' something, not sit and vegetate. But I can tell you, from experience,
> that efforts to get those who don't 'motivated', be they the truly 'lazy' or
> someone not interested in the job he's been 'forced' to take, are a complete
> waste of time and energy. We'd be far further ahead paying them to stay out
> of the way, and let those who want to do the job do it.
>
> Best wishes,
>
> Joe
>
>
>
>
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