Big Problems, Modest Solutions: Global Economic Collapse
Discussion
"From Des Moines to Da Nang the have-nots are having less not and the have-lots are having a lot less. Through no fault of our own, we now find ourselves in the throes of nothing less than a global economic collapse. The impact of this collapse is being felt throughout every industry. The banks are shuttering, the automakers are teetering on the brink, and if things continue down this perilous path we may soon be facing the extinction of the homemade cloisonné bead making industry.
The who and why and how are all important. I've created a short explanatory diversion if you are not up to speed, so feel free to read it and educate yourself as to how we have found ourselves in this predicament. If you are already familiar with the intricacies of our economic crisis then you may skip ahead.
How the American Dream Became the World's Nightmare
By Zack Parsons
Stocks falling.
Smelling of sweat and desperation, Joe Everyman claws his way into a bank and with a terrifying roar demands a home loan. Steve the Banker tries to point out that the man has no income and a credit rating that resembles an inseam, but Joe is wild-eyed and obviously dosing on some sort of exotic minority drug. Something Steve hasn't heard of like Floorge or Nedbeatties. Poor Steve the Banker has no choice but to give Joe Everyman a 600,000 dollar home loan.
Once Joe Everyman leaves the bank, Steve calls up his buddy Andy the Investment Banker. Steve asks Andy for help with the crazy loan he just had to give out to the guy with the glassy drug-stare. Andy tells Steve not to worry, he'll buy it. And at a hefty profit!
After a couple days Andy the Investment Banker starts to worry about the home loan. What if Joe Everyman doesn't pay? Andy will end up owning a stupid 600,000 dollar house with no sod and a marble countertop in the kid's bathroom.
Andy decides to break up the home loan into a bunch of pieces and then mix those pieces up with pieces from other home loans he bought from other friendly bankers. Then he sells the big bag full of the pieces to another banker in Iceland. And he sells another bag to a banker in China who he barely knows. And another bag to a banker in England he once saw naked. This goes on and on until all of the pieces of the mortgage are sold and the Andy has made a terrific profit.
Stocks falling.
Meanwhile, an investor in a submarine is watching all of this through a periscope. He decides to buy 10 million dollars worth of default insurance on one of the mortgages. All he has to do is pay a little money every month and if one of the bags of mortgages rips open and all the pieces fall out then the investor gets 10 million dollars. Only the bag doesn't seem to be ripping fast enough, so the investor decides to sell his insurance to someone else for 5 million dollars. Hey, he just made money!
Everyone is happy and making a tidy profit on all of this until, suddenly and unexpectedly, the crazed maniac Joe Everyman in the Inland Empire mini-mansion fails to make his first mortgage payment. And then he misses his second. By the time the third rolls around the bags of mortgage pieces are starting to sag and tear.
Then RIIIIP! All because Joe failed to pay his third month's mortgage the bag rips open and all of the mortgage pieces default and hundreds of bags rip open in a cascade and the banks selling insurance to investors in submarines have to pay out billions of dollars in speculative bets.
The next thing you know, every house in the neighborhood is shuttered, the water in the pool is green and full of mosquitoes, and you're selling your wife to a guy with guns for cans of baked beans and potable water.
All because the free market was over-regulated.
The natural reaction to a catastrophe of this magnitude is to curl into a defensive ball and secrete some sort of foul-tasting liquid from the anal glands. Unless we are being devoured by a bear or tiger, this is probably counterproductive. We need to stand up, control our anal glands, and confront this existential threat to our generation head-on.
The government spendthrifts around the world seem to believe that vomiting the half-digested contents of the public coffers into various private sector entities is the way to stop the collapse. They either trust that the men and women responsible for these dire economic straits will use taxpayer largesse to reform or they simply don't care. So far any faith seems ill-placed; the banks and automakers have come begging for more handouts, yet their wastefulness seems as carefree as ever.
The IV drip of taxpayer bailouts and loans is not going to save the patient. This situation requires a dramatic event to reshuffle the deck, to upset the global economic applecart.
Nothing stimulates every organ and tissue of the capitalist corpus, floods every economic gland and winds every fiduciary sinew, quite like the orgasmic eruption of spending seen only in protracted conflict.
War.
War! Not the pitiful police actions in godforsaken deserts that have been slowly gnawing away at the US economy. Real, man-making war. Just the sort to waste an entire generation of debtors and mortgage-defaulters. To clean up the books and clear the balance sheets of all that persnickety debt.
Bombs falling.
The first and most obvious incentive to engage in large scale war is the stimulation of the job market. Companies around the globe are downsizing to stay afloat, creating millions of shiftless layabouts unable or unwilling to repay their debts. Nothing motivates volunteerism among this contemptible segment of society quite like the immediate threat of military invasion. Even if they are not motivated, the government has ways of motivating.
Forced conscription, militia auxiliaries, and the old shanghai are all options available. The employed can be conscripted and their jobs can be made available to those too feeble or clever to be forced into service. The military-industrial complex will need every available hand to contribute!
Rationing of goods can lead to individual thriftiness and the government is always free to seize materiel deemed necessary for the war effort. You would be amazed how crucial Korean LCD screens and Japanese video game consoles are to fighting a war.
For nations like the United States, which stand militarily almost unopposed in the world, the threat of invasion is minimal. But for other countries, the amount of economic stimulus they might receive is incredible. This makes the selection of warring nations crucial to determining the greatest benefit to the global economy.
Unemployment rates falling.
If the United States were to invade and pillage New Zealand, for example, the war would be over quickly and there would be little benefit to either party.
However, if Indonesia invaded New Zealand, or Australia invaded Japan, this could lead to many years of brutal conflict. The United States could go to war with China and Russia could face off against the European Union. Canada could use US bases to launch an invasion of Mexico and Peru could finally settle those scores it has with Morocco.
Think of each of these conflicts as a sort of stimulus package directed at military, manufacturing, and urban population centers. Each airbase must be rebuilt, each factory relocated to the inside of a mountain, and each city raised from the rubble. The millions of dead will require funeral services or, at the very least, mass-burnings. Think of it as cutting away the dead tissue. With bombs. The cities will be rejuvenated by new construction and, if they're not, they can always be bombed flat again.
Should nuclear weapons be used? Of course! An atomic bomb can level an entire city and it leaves an irradiated heap of rubble behind. It will take 50 years before that radiation dies down to reasonably safe levels, making each city nuked into an urban development time capsule just waiting to be unearthed and rebuilt.
It is my firm belief that with the careful application of military force, the global economy can be saved from the doldrums. I know that our better days are ahead of us, even if it takes global war to prove it.
- Zack "Geist Editor" Parsons"
http://www.somethingawful.com/d/news/modest-soluti...
The who and why and how are all important. I've created a short explanatory diversion if you are not up to speed, so feel free to read it and educate yourself as to how we have found ourselves in this predicament. If you are already familiar with the intricacies of our economic crisis then you may skip ahead.
How the American Dream Became the World's Nightmare
By Zack Parsons
Stocks falling.
Smelling of sweat and desperation, Joe Everyman claws his way into a bank and with a terrifying roar demands a home loan. Steve the Banker tries to point out that the man has no income and a credit rating that resembles an inseam, but Joe is wild-eyed and obviously dosing on some sort of exotic minority drug. Something Steve hasn't heard of like Floorge or Nedbeatties. Poor Steve the Banker has no choice but to give Joe Everyman a 600,000 dollar home loan.
Once Joe Everyman leaves the bank, Steve calls up his buddy Andy the Investment Banker. Steve asks Andy for help with the crazy loan he just had to give out to the guy with the glassy drug-stare. Andy tells Steve not to worry, he'll buy it. And at a hefty profit!
After a couple days Andy the Investment Banker starts to worry about the home loan. What if Joe Everyman doesn't pay? Andy will end up owning a stupid 600,000 dollar house with no sod and a marble countertop in the kid's bathroom.
Andy decides to break up the home loan into a bunch of pieces and then mix those pieces up with pieces from other home loans he bought from other friendly bankers. Then he sells the big bag full of the pieces to another banker in Iceland. And he sells another bag to a banker in China who he barely knows. And another bag to a banker in England he once saw naked. This goes on and on until all of the pieces of the mortgage are sold and the Andy has made a terrific profit.
Stocks falling.
Meanwhile, an investor in a submarine is watching all of this through a periscope. He decides to buy 10 million dollars worth of default insurance on one of the mortgages. All he has to do is pay a little money every month and if one of the bags of mortgages rips open and all the pieces fall out then the investor gets 10 million dollars. Only the bag doesn't seem to be ripping fast enough, so the investor decides to sell his insurance to someone else for 5 million dollars. Hey, he just made money!
Everyone is happy and making a tidy profit on all of this until, suddenly and unexpectedly, the crazed maniac Joe Everyman in the Inland Empire mini-mansion fails to make his first mortgage payment. And then he misses his second. By the time the third rolls around the bags of mortgage pieces are starting to sag and tear.
Then RIIIIP! All because Joe failed to pay his third month's mortgage the bag rips open and all of the mortgage pieces default and hundreds of bags rip open in a cascade and the banks selling insurance to investors in submarines have to pay out billions of dollars in speculative bets.
The next thing you know, every house in the neighborhood is shuttered, the water in the pool is green and full of mosquitoes, and you're selling your wife to a guy with guns for cans of baked beans and potable water.
All because the free market was over-regulated.
The natural reaction to a catastrophe of this magnitude is to curl into a defensive ball and secrete some sort of foul-tasting liquid from the anal glands. Unless we are being devoured by a bear or tiger, this is probably counterproductive. We need to stand up, control our anal glands, and confront this existential threat to our generation head-on.
The government spendthrifts around the world seem to believe that vomiting the half-digested contents of the public coffers into various private sector entities is the way to stop the collapse. They either trust that the men and women responsible for these dire economic straits will use taxpayer largesse to reform or they simply don't care. So far any faith seems ill-placed; the banks and automakers have come begging for more handouts, yet their wastefulness seems as carefree as ever.
The IV drip of taxpayer bailouts and loans is not going to save the patient. This situation requires a dramatic event to reshuffle the deck, to upset the global economic applecart.
Nothing stimulates every organ and tissue of the capitalist corpus, floods every economic gland and winds every fiduciary sinew, quite like the orgasmic eruption of spending seen only in protracted conflict.
War.
War! Not the pitiful police actions in godforsaken deserts that have been slowly gnawing away at the US economy. Real, man-making war. Just the sort to waste an entire generation of debtors and mortgage-defaulters. To clean up the books and clear the balance sheets of all that persnickety debt.
Bombs falling.
The first and most obvious incentive to engage in large scale war is the stimulation of the job market. Companies around the globe are downsizing to stay afloat, creating millions of shiftless layabouts unable or unwilling to repay their debts. Nothing motivates volunteerism among this contemptible segment of society quite like the immediate threat of military invasion. Even if they are not motivated, the government has ways of motivating.
Forced conscription, militia auxiliaries, and the old shanghai are all options available. The employed can be conscripted and their jobs can be made available to those too feeble or clever to be forced into service. The military-industrial complex will need every available hand to contribute!
Rationing of goods can lead to individual thriftiness and the government is always free to seize materiel deemed necessary for the war effort. You would be amazed how crucial Korean LCD screens and Japanese video game consoles are to fighting a war.
For nations like the United States, which stand militarily almost unopposed in the world, the threat of invasion is minimal. But for other countries, the amount of economic stimulus they might receive is incredible. This makes the selection of warring nations crucial to determining the greatest benefit to the global economy.
Unemployment rates falling.
If the United States were to invade and pillage New Zealand, for example, the war would be over quickly and there would be little benefit to either party.
However, if Indonesia invaded New Zealand, or Australia invaded Japan, this could lead to many years of brutal conflict. The United States could go to war with China and Russia could face off against the European Union. Canada could use US bases to launch an invasion of Mexico and Peru could finally settle those scores it has with Morocco.
Think of each of these conflicts as a sort of stimulus package directed at military, manufacturing, and urban population centers. Each airbase must be rebuilt, each factory relocated to the inside of a mountain, and each city raised from the rubble. The millions of dead will require funeral services or, at the very least, mass-burnings. Think of it as cutting away the dead tissue. With bombs. The cities will be rejuvenated by new construction and, if they're not, they can always be bombed flat again.
Should nuclear weapons be used? Of course! An atomic bomb can level an entire city and it leaves an irradiated heap of rubble behind. It will take 50 years before that radiation dies down to reasonably safe levels, making each city nuked into an urban development time capsule just waiting to be unearthed and rebuilt.
It is my firm belief that with the careful application of military force, the global economy can be saved from the doldrums. I know that our better days are ahead of us, even if it takes global war to prove it.
- Zack "Geist Editor" Parsons"
http://www.somethingawful.com/d/news/modest-soluti...
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