Having finished the Hobbit, and now eyeing the Fellowship of the Rings, I thought it prudent to finish the last chapter of "Economics for Helen" this evening. Earlier today, the news announced that wholesale prices of goods had risen greatly, jobless claims had jumped, and a miserable man in Texas flew his Piper Cherokee plane into the side of an IRS building.
Also today, our president lauded our escape from a second Great Depression. The only answer my mind's eye can conjure is that of the immense amount of sand required for a large flightless bird to thrust its head into the safety of pure, unadulterated ignorance. Jobless Recovery sounds a bit like "Jumbo Shrimp".
So it seems that we find ourselves, the American public, the unhappy recipients of the Confucian curse, to "live in interesting times". Never before has any nation owed so much for so little in return. Increasingly it seems we might be the last man standing in a perverse game of fiscal "hot potato", caught holding an immense debt when the music stops.
Belloc would grimace, if he were to review the economy of consumption we have wrought here, in light of his belief that societies of peoples must necessarily be one of three types.
"The Servile State: that is, the state in which the material Means of Production are the property of men who also own the human agents of production.
The Capitalist State: that is, the state in which the material Means of Production are the property of a few, and the numerous human agents of production are free, but without property.
The Distributive State: that is, the state in which the material means of Production are owned by the free human agents of Production."
Belloc also considers and then rejects Socialism/Communism/Marxism as being laughably impractical, the thought of "The State" owning and distributing everything, as this practically means a few men administering the will of the state, and expected to be paragons of virtue which politicians are most definitely are not (c.f.: politicians as dwarves, 2/17/2010's post).
The danger in the Capitalist State is its volatility and its tendency not to provide for the maintenance of the mass of people, what Belloc calls the "Capitalist Paradox". And we might be witnessing the great explication of his theory here in the U.S. of A. The fact is that Capitalism, when weighed against the annals of civilization, is a relatively recent (read "experimental") system of economy, and is a risky proposition.
Capitalism, more so than Servile and Distributive States, is easily disposed to making war. Is this why the last one hundred years has seen more war, death, and destruction than any of the other centuries combined? That the machines and engines of war are so terrible, in this, the age of the Capitalists?
What is also disturbing is Belloc writing about the Social or Historical Value of Money, and his understanding of the dangers of government and banking getting too cozy. I picture Hilaire awaking in 2010, beginning to read about the Federal Reserve, and asking rhetorically- "But of course, they could never print TOO much money, to ruin the economy by hyper-inflating the dollar's value, destroying the currency base, and ultimately destabilizing society itself... because, OF COURSE, they can only print an amount equivalent to the gold or silver on hand, or at worst some contrived fraction of these precious metals. Because, OF COURSE, America being the ruggedly awesome country it is, everyone would have considered the pure ludicrous nature of fiat currency and unchecked currency production. OF COURSE! Right?! Right?????? The danger it represents with warmongering, usury, and the fragile, Wizard-of-Oz-Pay-No-Attention-to-the-Man-Behind-the-Curtain nature of fractional banking!?!?!" But I digress.
If you call yourself an American, and care what America will look like in two generations, then please go find a copy of "Economics for Helen". Read it. Question it's messages, and ask yourself how we can begin to move towards a stable, productive, sustainable State where people and families own the Means of Production, not a few, and not the government.
American is not a land, it is an idea. And the idea is just as viable today as it was in 1776, no matter how much the governing class has mucked it up in the application. The answer is not policy or programs on the government's dole. It's not going kamikaze with a Piper Cherokee. The answer will not be found within the system. The answer is you and me living lives of virtue and sustainable living. So get busy.
And read another book or two. The answer might be written already, if we only look.
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