We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.
Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
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Samizdata quote of the day The only other thing I would add is that I am in the advertising industry and most of the ads for sub-prime loans had dried up before the recent bail-out bill. As soon as that went through the volume for these ads went up 10 times. Whatever the government did to “fix” the problem ain’t working because all they did was just give everyone who didn’t make money the first time around another shot at the craps table.
– from a comment by “Ben Franklin” on this Belmont Club posting spotted by David Farrer
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Who Are We? The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling.
We are also a varied group made up of social individualists, classical liberals, whigs, libertarians, extropians, futurists, ‘Porcupines’, Karl Popper fetishists, recovering neo-conservatives, crazed Ayn Rand worshipers, over-caffeinated Virginia Postrel devotees, witty Frédéric Bastiat wannabes, cypherpunks, minarchists, kritarchists and wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists from Britain, North America, Australia and Europe.
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Very nice analysis of the long-term development of this whole affair by John Steele Gordon, going back to the early 1800’s. I found it at Instapundit.
Of course the fix isn’t going to work. The resue wasn’t intended to actually resolve the problems that caused the implosion, but rather to re-enable the game to continue playing.
The question I’ve been waiting to see asked in big letters on the front page is—Why are we paying attention to these “experts” any more?
All the way along, big-time finance people, big-time academics, big-time politicians, and big-time big shots of every conceivable stripe have been running the big money, big government, big financial management operation.
And it has crashed, repeatedly, getting more and more costly each time.
Good god almighty, I am tired of big shots of every possible kind, and very tired of paying for their endless mistakes.
Throw the rascals out!
“Of course the fix isn’t going to work. The resue wasn’t intended to actually resolve the problems that caused the implosion, but rather to re-enable the game to continue playing.”
Your statement, along with Mr. Micklethwait’s reference to a craps table, sums up the situation nicely.
Investment is a gamble. There will be losses. Bubbles don’t grow forever, and it’s pointless to try to legislate their continued growth.
I think Daniel Hannan might be trying for your quote of the day spot.
On the world government stuff:
Stig (the Nobel Price winning “economist”) was demanding world regulations and world subsidies (world government in all but name) in this week’s “Time” magazine.
And, no doubt, Paul Krugman (another Nobel Price winning “economist” without even a basic knowledge of economics) agrees with him.
So let us hear an end to claims that people who fear that key establishment types are working for world tyranny – are “paranoid people on the look out for black helecopters”.
We may be paranoid people on the look out for black (or dark blue) helecopters – but we are also correct, as the comming “international conferences” (with their collectivist agenda) will show.
Nor did these plans come from nowhere, they have been around for many years before the present financial crises.
Still back to the bailout:
Charles Payne of the Fox Business Network – a supporter of the bailout.
“And the good thing about this is the ratio – for every Dollar the government gives the banks, they will lend out ten”.
Some people will say “good”, and some people will say “bad”.
This is the difference beteen the Chicago School and the Austrian School.
To us wicked “hard money” types all loans must be 100% from real savings, and once money is lent out neither the depositor or the banker has the money any more – till when and IF the money is paid back.
Let us (for the sake of arugment) say that we are WRONG – that credit bubble castles-in-the-air are fine (we, or at least the elite, can live happily in them).
If so then there would no need for a “Bank of England” or a “Federal Reserve” system, with their endless bailouts (on no this is not the first – Alan Greenspan did this sort of thing on a smaller scale many times, and so did others).
Some supporters of what they call “modern banking” take exactly this view – but very few.
Almost all take the Tim Congdon view of supporting bailouts (in one form or another).
In short these “free market” people are free market in the same way that I am camel.
It is all a con – and when the “confidence” game fails (as it always does in the end), the resulting bust gives the collectivists their chance.
And now it is not just national collectivism – the establishment types (who have so long controlled the universities and so much else) see their chance for world collectivism.
This is the door that, unintentionally, the Chicago School has opened.
As Richard Weaver used to say “ideas have consequences”.
“By the way” if people want to read a book on money and banking they could do worse than de Soto’s (the Spanish de Soto, not the Peruvian) big book.
“Money, Bank Credit and Economic Cycles”.
Paul, what is the difference between Chicago and Austrian school in this context?