Intentions of the Holy Father for April

Ecology and Justice. That governments may foster the protection of creation and the just distribution of natural resources.
Hope for the Sick. That the Risen Lord may fill with hope the hearts of those who are being tested by pain and sickness.

The Elephant in Our Treasury's Plan

Keynesian economic principles, which have held ascendancy among our elite for some decades, indicate that we can get out of a recession by spending money. It makes sense. Kinda. Or does it?

I mean, it's what most of the media says over and over again. All the bailouts and stimulus packages are based upon that idea. But let's unravel it for a minute, and see if it holds to the light of common sense.

The recession is caused because money is tightening up - for individuals and companies. Money is tightening up because we are paying more out, individually and nationally, than we are bringing in - or at least we're getting there. A major source of payments out is the interest on debts that we owe. But if we borrow more money (and thus have higher debt service payments) we are supposed to be able to spend more money and thus everyone will earn more money.

Except, because most of what we buy is made overseas, we won't really make that money back. Other countries' residents will, just like they have been, increasingly, for 30 or so years, and especially since the free-trade bonanza of which NAFTA is a paradigmatic (but unfortunately, not a lonely) example.

So we will borrow money from foreigners so we can buy things from foreigners (or from the credit card companies we use to buy the stuff) at interest. So we owe them more money than when we started, and have higher monthly payments, and are deeper in debt, and money tightens up again and the debt is passed on, like a snowball, to our children - until it is too heavy and crushes some poor generation at last. Are we that generation?

Does anyone else think this "solution" is insane? A recipe for individual, corporate, and national bankruptcy?

We need a new way of doing things as a nation, in particular, but in the West in general.

Watch these YouTube videos and let me know what you think. One of the featured guests on the videos, Gerald Clemente, makes points that remind me of the forgotten (or perhaps never well-known) economic approach called distributism. Listen carefully to him.





No comments: