Play Nice Random Chat Thread: Episode III

[Del191229]

Yes, I have seen it. Very nice, very gullible people get f’ed over all the time, it's the way of the world. I don't want to steer this discussion towards social justice warrior territory. I want to stay focused on the big picture economics of what is actually in the works right now.

Using another pop culture example - The Handmaid's Tale.

Avoiding the whole social aspect, one key moment in that, TV version anyway, is how the elite use our current financial system to completely disenfranchise one section of society - in this case women - at the push of a button by taking away access to their money, which is all electronic.

In the 08 crash in the UK there were very serious discussions about shutting down people's access to their money "until it could be sorted it out", and it did happen in limited circumstances.

This is where your point about cash comes in.

I have NO DOUBT that when the next crash comes the whole system will freeze up and the government will forcibly cut off people's access to their money electronically, largely to stop people withdrawing it en masse.

 

[Del191229]

At the end of the day that political machinery will be tasked with navigating out of the hole, so whilst there might be great initial pain, I think this economic model will still become the future way of the world.

The last crash massively changed the politics - Brexit and Trump are both direct creations of the last crash.

The next crash will change the politics even more, quite possibly away from any sort of democracy, or more likely after a while toward a far more direct democracy.

The climate crash will be the most powerful driver of political change though, how that works out, Christ knows.

 

[Snake_Baker]

This is where your point about cash comes in.

I have NO DOUBT that when the next crash comes the whole system will freeze up and the government will forcibly cut off people's access to their money electronically, largely to stop people withdrawing it en masse.

Yes, definitely, that is one aspect of the matters in the works.

My whole point in this is to shout from the top of a building that PEOPLES ECONOMIC SOVEREIGNTY IS ABOUT TO BE TAKEN FROM THEM!!!!!

UNDERSTAND THIS PEOPLE!!!

 

[Del191229]

The whole idea of these radical economic overhauls is to keep the current sham humming along.

If they can't do it, then the basic outcome is that there's too many "unproductive" people on the planet, and I hate to think where that could end up.

The human race has been sleepwalking, and it's about to be woken up.

Brilliant point - it is why the Silicon Valley types support a Universal Basic Income.

They know they are creating a huge pool of "unproductive people" and the choice when that happens is either the hate to think where that could end up you talk about (Police State, wars of choice to thin them out etc) or that huge pool of people storming the gates and taking their stuff.

They use the blood-curdling term SOCIAL VACCINE to describe it. But they do have a point.

Why Silicon Valley is embracing universal basic income

In a pilot study influential incubator Y Combinator will hand over cash monthly to 100 families in Oakland, California. What’s UBI’s payoff for tech entrepreneurs?

www.theguardian.com

 

[Del191229]

It happened in the US. Some cities in California could only generate money by selling pot growing licences. I think Oakland was one. At one point they paid a weeks budget for emergency services after selling a licence to someone to grow 5 hectares of pot iirc.

Contrast that with Nimbin...

Before the GFC we'd get plenty of tourists (even afterward for a couple of years) from Australia and overseas that would spend money in town. Especially on weed. That meant money came into the local economy from outside. The opposite of how things normally work in rural Australia (tho for the last 3 decades pretty much every country town on the East Coast has generated income from pot growing.) Even now I hear stories of farmers in the west of NSW and the Riverina selling heaps of weed just to maintain their ability to bring in water and stock feed. Obviously they are all second and third hand stories but I've never heard anything like that before.

Exactly - neo-liberalism has effectively bankrupted California as a state. Hence the need for new revenue sources.

When neo-liberalism bankrupts Australian states and cities, we'll do the same.

Victoria for example is hugely reliant on Stamp Duty, which has fallen off a cliff in the "housing downturn" and will be wiped out when housing really crashes.

Weed and MDMA taxing would happily meet that budget gap.

 

[Snake_Baker]

Brilliant point - it is why the Silicon Valley types support a Universal Basic Income.

They know they are creating a huge pool of "unproductive people" and the choice when that happens is either the hate to think where that could end up you talk about (Police State, wars of choice to thin them out etc) or that huge pool of people storming the gates and taking their stuff.

They use the blood-curdling term SOCIAL VACCINE to describe it. But they do have a point.

Why Silicon Valley is embracing universal basic income

In a pilot study influential incubator Y Combinator will hand over cash monthly to 100 families in Oakland, California. What’s UBI’s payoff for tech entrepreneurs?

www.theguardian.com

I am not prepared to head too far down the dystopian path at this point, because when viewed in a balanced manner, I can see why world leaders are heading down this path. If some radical overhauling isn't attempted, then we could very well land smack bang in a world wide depression, and I am not anywhere near smart enough to put forward viable alternatives. This modelling is front & square with the IMF, so basically, it's the agenda..

 

[Del191229]

An important thing to consider is paying off your debt if it's tied to an important asset (e.g. house).

It's something that often gets missed in standard of living studies. Whenever I have friends or family here question the living standards in Eastern Europe, I always pose the question: "what could you afford to buy and how would your living standards be if all of your debts were called in tomorrow?"

My EE family, on a humble single salary, own a humble house outright and their car outright. That's about it, and they hardly live the life of consumerism that we have here. On the surface our living standards are better here (after all, we have a bigger tv and uber eats). But if their debts were called in tomorrow, they'd survive. We wouldn't.

Yeah, there's nothing like the experience of economic collapse to spark preparation.

I've never lived anything like Eastern Europe's transition from Soviet certainty to what they have now.

But I was in Scotland when their banks collapsed in 2008, and saw the impact that had first hand.

As a result, apart from my mortgage, I have no debt - no credit cards, no store cards, no personal loans, no Afterpay, no points etc - and try not to keep too much cash in the bank (where it can be stolen from me) at any given time.

 

[Snake_Baker]

........... and try not to keep too much cash in the bank (where it can be stolen from me) at any given time.

Yeah well, thats going to be a thing of the past in the not too distant future.

 

[Del191229]

I am not prepared to head too far down the dystopian path at this point, because when viewed in a balanced manner, I can see why world leaders are heading down this path. If some radical overhauling isn't attempted, then we could very well land smack bang in a world wide depression, and I am not anywhere near smart enough to put forward viable alternatives. This modelling is front & square with the IMF, so basically, it's the agenda..

The IMF has as much idea as you mate, in fact, you have more idea than the IMF. Lots more.

To use a footy example, the IMF is like Norm Smith the coach. Brilliant mind but played a game long gone.

You could time travel Norm Smith from 1964 to today and give him a team loaded with talent like say a fully fit GWS squad and he'd get smashed by Stewie Dew's Gold Coast if they played this arvo. Give Norm a few years to work out how the game is actually played these days and he'd rapidly cotton on and become a gun.

The IMF is playing the game by 1980s and 90s rules. And they don't have time or inclination to catch up.

It isn't Western instituions, IMO, that are making the running or setting up what's coming, they are lost. They have lost control they used to have.

It is the private financial institutions - Goldman Sachs - and individuals, along with, both in conscious concert and both by happy accident with the non-democratic countries like Russia and China, making the running.

Take Brexit - the Brexiteers are pushiong no-deal because they will literally make a persdonal killing off it, both shorting the pound on the day, and by their instiutional "investment".

The crash we're discussing is a global version of the disaster capitalism inflicted on the likes of Agrentina, Greece and Asian countries in the late 90s.

 

[ferball]

Yeah, there's nothing like the experience of economic collapse to spark preparation.

I've never lived anything like Eastern Europe's transition from Soviet certainty to what they have now.

But I was in Scotland when their banks collapsed in 2008, and saw the impact that had first hand.

As a result, apart from my mortgage, I have no debt - no credit cards, no store cards, no personal loans, no Afterpay, no points etc - and try not to keep too much cash in the bank (where it can be stolen from me) at any given time.

I don't even have a mortgage.

 

[Snake_Baker]

I don't even have a mortgage.

Good.

Make your focus water tanks, vegetables/fruit/poultry/aquaponics, solar power/hot water.

Buy tools, learn to use them, and self educate with the basics of timber/metal/electronics.

 

[ferball]

The drug market is a huge cash economy.

Did you look at the clips and read the links I posted? Check them out mate.

One of them. In fact it had me thinking about an idea I heard years ago to do with the universal basic income. Two kinds of cash. One that depreciated every month after its last transaction and normal cash.

So with the first type you spend that money on everyday needs - food, shelter, short term needs like medicines, educational products etc etc and even entertainment and the second type - you do whatever you want with it. Hoard it all you like it doesn't matter. The first type cycles thru the economy and keeps it afloat and the second type is yours to do whatever with.

Its a form of hedging.

It was also in the context of the basic universal income being a proportion of GDP. Everyone gets it regardless of whether they have other income or not and its enough to meet basic needs and allow a little discretionary spending.

Its an interesting idea but I dunno how the details all work out tho.

 

[Snake_Baker]

One of them.

All of it. The end user doesn't go around to the local drug dealers house and purchase drugs with an electric toaster. It's done with cash, that accumulates, and goes up the ladder to the primary producers, who already have very nice electric toasters.

These drug lords are going to have fun navigating Morrison's $10,000 cash transaction limit. Comprende?

Cash black market, over. Profits down, as prices come down, and consumer availablility goes up = more people consuming drugs at less cost.

 

[ferball]

Good.

Make your focus water tanks, vegetables/fruit/poultry/aquaponics, solar power/hot water.

Buy tools, learn to use them, and self educate with the basics of timber/metal/electronics.

Aquaponics is a very difficult process to sort out. Of all those "permaculture" processes its the most complex and most fragile or least resilient. At least among the people I know who have tried it. Lots of "single points of failure".

Poultry is a good thing. Easier to work out too. You can fit 100 chooks in a caravan and manage their existence easily over a couple of acres. Predators can be an issue but dogs will stop that. Maremma's are good. They can be used to prepare ground for next year's crops.

 

[ferball]

All of it. The end user doesn't go around to the local drug dealers house and purchase drugs with an electric toaster. It's done with cash, that cash accumulates, and goes up the ladder to the primary producers, who already have very nice electric toasters.

These drug lords are going to have fun navigating Morrison's $10,000 cash transaction limit. Comprende?

Cash black market, over. Profits down, as prices come down, and consumer availablility goes up = more people consuming drugs at less cost.

Oh yeah. I totally get that.

 

[Del191229]

All of it. The end user doesn't go around to the local drug dealers house and purchase drugs with an electric toaster. It's done with cash, that cash accumulates, and goes up the ladder to the primary producers, who already have very nice electric toasters.

These drug lords are going to have fun navigating Morrison's $10,000 cash transaction limit. Comprende?

Cash black market, over. Profits down, as prices come down, and consumer availablility goes up = more people consuming drugs at less cost.

Its long been my view that the "mature" drug markets notably opiates and cocaine, primarily served to provide US intelligence with the black money and influence channels/tools to impose US geo political will.

The experience in South East Asia, South and Central America and South West Asia (Afghanistan) bears that out.

Literally US allies grow or profit from illicit drugs and/or the drugs keep those areas unstable and unable to oppose US policy.

But the rise of meth, and synthetic opiates has turned China the locus of production.

How that plays out on the macro scale I don't know.

I agree with your analysis as above as regards Australia, but I don't know how it plays out a level above.

The US used drugs as a geo political weapon for decades, now China can do the same if they wish.

 

[Snake_Baker]

Aquaponics is a very difficult process to sort out. Of all those "permaculture" processes its the most complex and most fragile or least resilient. At least among the people I know who have tried it. Lots of "single points of failure".

No, it's not mate. I have written papers on it. P.M. if you are interested in some ideas.

Poultry is a good thing. Easier to work out too. You can fit 100 chooks in a caravan and manage their existence easily over a couple of acres. Predators can be an issue but dogs will stop that. Maremma's are good. They can be used to prepare ground for next year's crops.

Incorporate poultry in to your vegetable garden maintenance.

Idea: Set up your hen house in the centre of 4 fenced areas, two of which grow vegatables, one which lays fallow for a year after a year of chicken residence, and one that is the current chicken residence.

100 chickens should be able to easily afford all of your families poultry/egg and vegetable requirements, relative to other soil considerations, with the (considerable) excess being sold at the farm gate. In fact, 20 chooks should be all you need to cover your personal needs.

Incorporate meat rabbits also. They can feed off your excess vegetable matter, and are easy to breed and grow.

 

[Snake_Baker]

Its long been my view that the "mature" drug markets notably opiates and cocaine, primarily served to provide US intelligence with the black money and influence channels/tools to impose US geo political will.

The experience in South East Asia, South and Central America and South West Asia (Afghanistan) bears that out.

Literally US allies grow or profit from illicit drugs and/or the drugs keep those areas unstable and unable to oppose US policy.

But the rise of meth, and synthetic opiates has turned China the locus of production.

How that plays out on the macro scale I don't know.

I agree with your analysis as above as regards Australia, but I don't know how it plays out a level above.

The US used drugs as a geo political weapon for decades, now China can do the same if they wish.

It's just an example of a cash economy that is going to be significantly impacted by these changes.

 

[Val Keating]

All of it. The end user doesn't go around to the local drug dealers house and purchase drugs with an electric toaster. It's done with cash, that accumulates, and goes up the ladder to the primary producers, who already have very nice electric toasters.

These drug lords are going to have fun navigating Morrison's $10,000 cash transaction limit. Comprende?

Cash black market, over. Profits down, as prices come down, and consumer availablility goes up = more people consuming drugs at less cost.

They’ll adapt, if they don’t someone else will. Nothing stays the same. Crypto worked for the bloke who started Silk Road...till he got done

 

[Snake_Baker]

They’ll adapt, if they don’t someone else will. Nothing stays the same. Crypto worked for the bloke who started Silk Road...till he got done

How is digital currency going to get around this?

Quantum computing will render it useless anyway.

 

[Val Keating]

Making

How is digital currency going to get around this?

Quantum computing will render it useless anyway.

Tbh I haven’t watched the videos you posted yet but I’m sure they’ll figure it out. Never underestimate people’s ability to adapt.

 

[Snake_Baker]

Making


Tbh I haven’t watched the videos you posted yet but I’m sure they’ll figure it out. Never underestimate people’s ability to adapt.

Watch them. They are really important.

I seriously acknowledge adaptation, especially when it comes to short circuiting government policy that crosses the libertarian boundary, but if there's no cash, then there's no independent control of money.

The shrinking of the cash pool is going to commence in January, and it will wind down from there.

Goods & services will be the new independent currency.

 

[ferball]

Its long been my view that the "mature" drug markets notably opiates and cocaine, primarily served to provide US intelligence with the black money and influence channels/tools to impose US geo political will.

The experience in South East Asia, South and Central America and South West Asia (Afghanistan) bears that out.

Literally US allies grow or profit from illicit drugs and/or the drugs keep those areas unstable and unable to oppose US policy.

But the rise of meth, and synthetic opiates has turned China the locus of production.

How that plays out on the macro scale I don't know.

I agree with your analysis as above as regards Australia, but I don't know how it plays out a level above.

The US used drugs as a geo political weapon for decades, now China can do the same if they wish.

I've had a similar view for a long time.

 

[ferball]

Watch them. They are really important.

I seriously acknowledge adaptation, especially when it comes to short circuiting government policy that crosses the libertarian boundary, but if there's no cash, then there's no independent control of money.

The shrinking of the cash pool is going to commence in January, and it will wind down from there.

Goods & services will be the new independent currency.

Mullscript.

 

[ferball]

No, it's not mate. I have written papers on it. P.M. if you are interested in some ideas.



Incorporate poultry in to your vegetable garden maintenance.

Idea: Set up your hen house in the centre of 4 fenced areas, two of which grow vegatables, one which lays fallow for a year after a year of chicken residence, and one that is the current chicken residence.

100 chickens should be able to easily afford all of your families poultry/egg and vegetable requirements, relative to other soil considerations, with the (considerable) excess being sold at the farm gate. In fact, 20 chooks should be all you need to cover your personal needs.

Incorporate meat rabbits also. They can feed off your excess vegetable matter, and are easy to breed and grow.

You can get 1 dollar per egg if its organic and completely free range - ie they live in a paddock. If you want I'll try and find some designs that have been used around here and a few I've helped build over the years, if they are still around. At least one should be. Pretty similar to what you are talking about. The soil here is ****en great too. Stuff jumps out of the ground.



But that egg price is dependent on this inflated economy. People who pay that are earning good money on the coast and can afford to pay that much. Its like that river cottage guy. Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall is his name. Bangs on about organics and stuff but poorer people in the cities just can't afford that sort of food. I've seen organic garlic for 50 bucks a kilo in markets around here. 25 is a good farm gate type price.

Rabbits are a pest and attract predators around here. Requires alot of infrastructure to keep them secure. Just over the border there are serious fines for growing rabbits. Tens of thousands of dollars. Patrols and stuff.