Fed to Lift its Foot Off the Brake

Investment Analysis Clubs Macro Economic Trends and Risks
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If the Fed lifts its foot off the brake on September 21, it’s a clear sign that the confiscatory policy of (monetary) inflation is squarely in place. The Fed confiscates the purchasing power of our earned and saved dollars only to distribute this stolen loot to entities that would otherwise fail in a free market system.

Our general standard of living is decreasing to keep favored failures afloat.

Doesn’t make much sense, does it?

Thank goodness the Fed declares itself independent of political influence!

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If the Fed lifts its foot off the brake on September 21, it’s a clear sign that the confiscatory policy of (monetary) inflation is squarely in place. The Fed confiscates the purchasing power of our earned and saved dollars only to distribute this stolen loot to entities that would otherwise fail in a free market system.

Our general standard of living is decreasing to keep favored failures afloat.

Doesn’t make much sense, does it?

No, it doesn’t. But at least there are low-fee, no commission investment vehicles like an S&P500 index fund that allow any American to benefit from the fraud.

If you had an early understanding of the new culture starting in 1980 that made work pay less, and idle wealth much more, you would have done very well over the past 40 years.

https://static01.nyt.com/images/2022/08/12/briefing/15-morni…

Minimizing the “Skim” – the Key to Retiring Early
https://retireearlyhomepage.com/minimizing_the_skim.html

intercst

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If you had an early understanding of the new culture starting in 1980 that made work pay less, and idle wealth much more, you would have done very well over the past 40 years.

I entirely agree — however, I’m writing for the younger (smart) set. I want them to know what kind of overwhelming confiscating power they’re up against.

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Our general standard of living is decreasing to keep favored failures afloat.

Doesn’t make much sense, does it?

But it does! Forever we have been making ‘labor saving’ devices. Whose labor? The work force labor! It should not come as a surprise that the only jobs that are growing are the ones robots have yet to take over. Tesla is working hard to make a new set of robots that will eliminate lots of “dangerous, repetitive, boring tasks.” I.e. more unemployment, fewer minimum wage jobs. Watch the video: https://www.irishtimes.com/business/tesla-robot-will-elimina…

At the same time Elon Musk is in favor of Universal Basic Income (UBI) which in my opinion is the wrong remedy. What if instead all of us had two or more TeslaBots, one for our own use and the others to hire out to make us a living?

As devices eliminate “dangerous, repetitive, boring tasks” we need to either have the talent to do creative work which will also in time be taken over by AI, and or be the owners of the productive capital of the economy, that is, have a wealth increasing stock portfolio.

The “standard of living is decreasing” only applies to parts of the cycle of progress. The standard of living might be lower than the last generation’s but it is certainly higher than 100 years ago and most certainly higher than under feudalism.

To solve ‘the problem’ you need a longer term perspective, not an instant cure.

The Captain

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It should not come as a surprise that the only jobs that are growing are the ones robots have yet to take over.

It would be quite a surprise to me, given that there are more low end jobs now that at any time in history.

Here’s an exercise. Think about 1970. (Doesn’t matter, choose 1980 or 1990 if you like.)

How many Dollar Store clerks back then? Right, zero. OK, how many WalMart cashiers? A lot fewer, obviously. (OK, there were a few at the local stores WalMArt displaced, but they had fewer aisle stockers, truckers, parking lot cart attendants, etc.)

How many nail salons were there back then? How about pizza delivery drivers? Oh, waiters, cooks, bus boys? In 1970 there was one restaurant for every 7,500 people. Today it’s one for every 300.

Did you notice a lot of people hiring landscape companies to mow their yards back in the 70’s? Now you can hardly drive down the block without passing three of them working busily on somebody’s grass.

Call centers in 1970 America? Not so much. Today? They’re all over the place. E-commerce warehouses? I would hazard a guess there are more now than then.

People have been complaining about automation since the Luddites, or since Henry Ford, or since Roomba vacuumed its first floor. We have moved from farming to manufacturing, and now from manufacturing to service. We show an inordinate desire to pay people to do things we would rather not do ourselves: cook dinner, trim the sidewalk, clean the house, stand behind a counter and ask “fries with that?”

Don’t worry. When those jobs go away there will be others to replace them, because there is an endless list of things we’d rather pay people to do than do them ourselves. That’s how it works. That’s how it has always worked.

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Our general standard of living is decreasing to keep favored failures afloat.

Doesn’t make much sense, does it?

But it does!

Therein lies the problem: there seems to be no shortage of people telling us to content ourselves with less.

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there seems to be no shortage of people telling us to content ourselves with less.

Please read the rest of my post/reply. It says NOTHING about “telling us to content ourselves with less.”

https://discussion.fool.com/our-general-standard-of-living-is-de…

The Captain

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It would be quite a surprise to me, given that there are more low end jobs now that at any time in history.

There are two ways to count low end jobs, by job description (fruit pickers) and by the number of people employed in those jobs. The number of jobs by “job description” certainly has grown but the relative number of people working at survival pay jobs has fallen. A lot of those low end people were lifted to the middle class.

Dollar Store clerks – new job description
WalMart cashiers? – new job description
pizza delivery drivers? – new job description
Oh, waiters, cooks, bus boys? – OLD job descriptions, growing middle class to serve.

Farmers? – OLD job description mostly replaced by productivity enhancing machinery

PICKING COTTON (Country Style)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wOpb7lkGBTw

Don’t worry. When those jobs go away there will be others to replace them, because there is an endless list of things we’d rather pay people to do than do them ourselves. That’s how it works. That’s how it has always worked.

Of course the long tail of the Power Law Distribution will always stay long but is that a good reason not to think (worry?) about improving the lives of those at the tail end of the long tail? Isn’t that the whole point of UBI? UBI, a transfer payment that blunts motivation and dignity?

The Captain

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Call centers in 1970 America? Not so much. Today? They’re all over the place.

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Huh???

Don’t know WHERE you get your unsolicited telephone calls from, but the vast majority of mine are from “offshore”!

BTW, the Ma Bell breakup in 1982 opened the flood gates for multiple “long distance carriers” {& the subsequent onslaught of robot calls}.

sunray
a man on the Do Not Call Registry