Search All of the Math Forum:
Views expressed in these public forums are not endorsed by
Drexel University or The Math Forum.
|
|
|
|
Re: Speachless In New York (or, another OMG moment)
Posted:
Oct 29, 2012 2:05 PM
|
|
On Mon, Oct 29, 2012 at 12:02 AM, Paul Tanner <upprho@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Doesn't sound like you know.
>
> Of course I know.
>
OK, just I asked a question out of curiosity and you didn't seem to
think it would matter if you told me.
>> I was just making the point that Uncle
>> Sam is broke,
>
> Which is why I said it does not matter. That is, you claim he's broke
> - - no matter how we measure being broke, or you wouldn't flat out claim
> he's broke.
>
I think it matters how Uncle Sam came to be in his current predicament.
> Thing is, I do not agree that he's broke - by any measure.
>
> It's still not even close yet. Unless you want to redefine "broke".
>
I might, but not in this thread.
> This second graph you give is public debt in absolute terms - next to
> meaningless, since it could be going up forever even if the public
> debt as percentage of GDP gets always closer to 0. The first graph you
> gave is in terms of percentage of GDP, much more meaningful. And it
> shows exactly what I said below.
>
I don't think it could keep going up forever with a GDP that catches up.
The GDP includes foreign owned factories making stuff in the US, e.g.
Chinese companies making solar windmills in Arizona.
http://ucatlas.ucsc.edu/fdi/fdi.html
You could have a growing deficit + GDP with most USAers either in
prison or working as prison security guards.
Uncle Sam sold them out but was never "broke" no siree.
Note that as a % of GDP the debt has increased every year since 2000
and is around 100% these days.
>> Taxes are not the only source of revenue.
>
> In the US is it the vast majority.
>
I don't know why you say that. Those deficits of so many hundreds of
billions per year are uncovered expenses that have to be covered
through borrowing.
That's a lot of interest. Borrowing to pay interest in an exponential
game... the mathematics is interesting and should be taught in K-12.
How many 12th graders really understand what they'll pay for a house
over 30 years at %6 or %8.
A lot of our housing crisis today (so many foreclosed homes standing
empty, decaying, at huge costs, while many are homeless) has to do
with people not knowing how to do the math I would say.
Is that why math education is so poor, to keep Americans dumb? It's
working. They might not be such mindless consumers if their math
skills improved.
>> Tax payers should not take
>> credit for all the publicly funded programs they see, as they do not
>> cover the costs by themselves.
>>
>> I agree with Romney that China is sponsoring a lot of US government
>> activities, such as NPR.
>
> One wonders why that Bozo does not ask himself where the federal
> government of China ultimately gets all that money to not only spend
> at home but abroad as well - like lending money of the US government.
> That is, what the original source actually is. Hint to answer: It is
> not from revenue from their own economy. (Another hint: Gold standard
> junkies are clueless as to the answer.)
>
Yes, where does China get all that money for high speed rail etc.?
From interest received on US debt?
US taxpayers are paying for the growth of many economies around the
world that way, in coughing up that interest.
I'm not against their doing this by the way. Better than sending bombers.
> Maybe he does know where all that money comes from, given that we have
> the same type of ultimate source as they do, but just cannot handle
The sun is the ultimate source of energy for Planet Earth and the vast
majority of credit, in energy terms, for ecosystem assets, goes to
that energy source.
Economics, for the most part, is not yet intelligent enough to
explicitly acknowledge this in its text books, which is why general
systems theory will be overtaking economics in the board rooms
(already has in more intelligently managed companies, say in China,
where more of the CEOs tend to have engineering training, not just
"finance" and "accounting").
Or course we can keep calling it "economics" for the layman, even as
it gets more of an infusion from STEM.
> the truth that the only reason we don't do for ourselves what they do
> for themselves is that there are enough conservatives like him
> standing in the way. I repeat that China's modern economy is clearly
> modeled on Norway's per-capita-twice-as-large-as-the-US economy (and
> is not modeled on the US's economy) at least in terms of creation of
> money and where it goes into the economy (public banking) as well as
> government ownership of corporations, each country's government owning
> a majority of the shares of roughly 1/3 of all publicly traded
> corporations as well as fully owning more corporations.
>
I don't think just because two economies share some similarities one
must say that one is modeled on the other.
China has its own history, is shaped by various traditions. To
think it needs to sit at the feet of Scandinavians sounds somewhat
racist, as if they're not smart enough to figure out public investment
themselves.
I've long thought the USA government should have a controlling share
and management stake in many businesses. A chain of hotels, some
banks, a rental car agency or two, run by the government? Why not?
http://controlroom.blogspot.com/2011/05/cowardly-capitalism.html
> In this light, I reiterate everything I said in
>
> http://mathforum.org/kb/message.jspa?messageID=7914033
>
> and
>
> http://mathforum.org/kb/message.jspa?messageID=7913922
>
> including all the facts with respect to public banking I link to.
I think more computations with money, debt, interest should go on in
school. Budgeting.
We waste too much time on fictional story problems and waste their
time in that way. More realism, more how things work... but then a
lot of that info is available outside the classroom.
It's the point of those classrooms that I think we're not getting.
The point of those teachers.
What have they been teaching again? Was it worth it? Did they change
their ways when the technology changed all around them? No?
If parents weren't forced to work two jobs and not parent (i.e. if
parents were not forced to neglect their primary responsibilities)
then I think homeschooling would be on the rise even more
exponentially, but in cahoots with public funding. If Uncle Sam wanted
smart civic-minded citizens, investing in home schooling directly
might be the next step. Let the unions wail. They had their chance.
Their math teaching didn't adapt. Maybe it's too late now. Way too
late.
Kirby
|
|
|
|
