<div dir="ltr">Interesting video related to this subject:<div><br></div><div><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/video/2015/oct/28/david-graeber-what-government-doesnt-want-you-to-know-about-debt-video">https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/video/2015/oct/28/david-graeber-what-government-doesnt-want-you-to-know-about-debt-video</a><br></div><div><br></div><div>Jason</div></div><div class="gmail_extra"><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Tue, Mar 28, 2017 at 3:10 PM, John Clark <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:johnkclark@gmail.com" target="_blank">johnkclark@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><div dir="ltr"><span class=""><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-family:arial,sans-serif">On Tue, Mar 28, 2017 at 11:54 AM, spike </span><span dir="ltr" style="font-family:arial,sans-serif"><<a href="mailto:spike66@att.net" target="_blank">spike66@att.net</a>></span><span style="font-family:arial,sans-serif"> wrote:</span><br></div></span><div class="gmail_extra"><div class="gmail_quote"><span class=""><div lang="EN-US"><div class="m_-501952726234413670gmail-m_-96076770687531987gmail-m_-957168464455643969WordSection1"><p class="MsoNormal"> <br></p></div></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left-width:1px;border-left-color:rgb(204,204,204);border-left-style:solid;padding-left:1ex"><div lang="EN-US"><div class="m_-501952726234413670gmail-m_-96076770687531987gmail-m_-957168464455643969WordSection1"><div><div><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:calibri,sans-serif"></span></p><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline">> </div>the US federal government is dysfunctional too: it does not and cannot balance the budget. <p></p></div></div></div></div></blockquote></span><div><font face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif"></font><font size="4">Spike, doesn't the FACT that the US federal government has failed to balance the budget nearly every year since 1835 make you question the theory that they must balance the budget or they are dysfunctional?</font><br></div><span class=""><div> <br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left-width:1px;border-left-color:rgb(204,204,204);border-left-style:solid;padding-left:1ex"><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline">> </div>In a family, when there is a budget shortfall, something doesn’t get bought</blockquote><div><br></div></span><div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"><font size="4">Or they get a loan. Most families can't afford to pay cash for their house, and yet they still manage to live in a house somehow. In the mid 1970s INTEL handmade in a lab a new gadget called a "microprocessor", they could have continued to make them in the lab and tried to sell them for a million dollars a chip or they could have massed produced them in a factory and sold them for $10 a chip. They chose the second option, but to do so they had to go into debt, they had to go to a bank and get a loan to pay for the expensive factory. I think you would agree INTEL made the correct choice. </font></div> </div><div><br></div><div><span class=""><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left-width:1px;border-left-color:rgb(204,204,204);border-left-style:solid;padding-left:1ex"><span style="font-family:arial,sans-serif"><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline">> </div> I do not feel it is morally justifiable to speculate that the future will be richer and it is my solemn responsibility to spend its wealth. That the future will be more prosperous is my firm belief, but my firm belief might be wrong. </span></blockquote><div><br></div></span><div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"><font size="4">Yes we might be wrong, but if we waited until we were absolutely certain what the eventual outcome of our actions would be we'd be unable to perform any actions at all about anything; so all we can do is play the odds and place our bets to the best of our judgement.</font></div><font size="4"> <div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline">I think it is a very good bet that technology will improve and a even better bet that if technology improves then the total amount of wealth in the world will increase. The big uncertainty is how all that new wealth will get divided up. </div></font></div><span class=""><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:arial,sans-serif"><br></span></p><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left-width:1px;border-left-color:rgb(204,204,204);border-left-style:solid;padding-left:1ex"><span style="font-family:arial,sans-serif"><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline">></div>The future might be poor. </span></blockquote><div><br></div></span><font size="4">The future could contain poor people even if the total amount of wealth in the world increases. It<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline">'s</div> a good bet that if the number of poor people gets too large revolution will result and civilization will collapse, and it's a even better bet that if<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> </div>civilization collapses everybody will end up being poor.</font><span class=""><br><br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left-width:1px;border-left-color:rgb(204,204,204);border-left-style:solid;padding-left:1ex"><span style="font-family:arial,sans-serif"> <div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline">> </div>By running big deficits, we might be robbing from the poor to give to the rich.</span></blockquote><div><br></div></span><div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"><font size="4">We might be, but we're probably not.</font></div></div><div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"><font size="4"><br></font></div></div><div><font size="4"><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline">John K Clark</div> </font></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-size:12.8px"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:arial,sans-serif"><u></u> </span></p></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div> </div></div><br></div></div>
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