Utopianstates Blog

The data below is in accord with this site:  http://www.usdebtclock.org/

Big money does not, obviously, support solutions that would lessen the assets of the top one percent; the big one percent (1%) of Americans that have 50% of the wealth.

The wealthy one percent control the Nobel prizes that are awarded the top economists.  The top economists are NOT going to be awarded prizes for advocating the wholesale redistribution of wealth of the big one percent.   Nor are universities going to get large endowments for hiring economic professors that advocate the redistribution of wealth of the big one percent.  Ditto for representatives – they are not going to get money for advocating the redistribution of the wealth of the big one percent.

This site does not even advocate the redistribution of wealth of the big one percent but for different reasons.  However, this site does advocate a more even distribution of wealth (as opposed to redistribution).  It is time to stop the economy of large scale and promote the economies of small scale (small American family businesses).  More on the benefits of a small scale later…

The first reason this site does not advocate the redistribution of wealth is that a more perfect society should protect individual rights.  One of those rights is the right to own property.  However, note that this right does not mean that one percent of the people can own most of the wealth.  Without being socialistic, the goal is that all people can own wealth if that is their goal;  wealth should not be hoarded by the lucky few in any society.  The rules of the economic game should encourage economies of small scale and the family business.  A more perfect society would support neither socialism nor ultra richness.  Individuals have the right to own, but they do not have the right to own everything.

The second reason that this site does not advocate the redistribution of wealth is that once a non-perfect government is encouraged to steal the wealth of the big one percent, they will squander the money and then go after the wealth of those with slightly above average wealth – the 30 percent of the wealth owned by the top twenty percent (exclusive of the big one percent.) 

The third reason that this site does not advocate socialism is that thirty percent of the wealth being owned by the top twenty percent is not a bad distribution in that it motivates individuals to perform and accomplish.  This distribution of wealth (where the top twenty percent own thirty percent of the wealth) is typical of the wealth distribution of the some of the best nations on earth.  Exclusive of the Big One Percent, the wealth distribution of the top twenty percent in America is about perfect.

We continue to talk about a more even distribution of wealth where sixty percent of the wealth would be owned by the bottom eighty percent to illustrate how the economy of the USA would really pick up if this were a  reality.

This is kind of a joke solution to the economic woes.  It is presented only to make you think about the possibilities… 

The data below is in accord with this site:  http://www.usdebtclock.org/

The household assets of the USA are over 50 trillion.
The top 1% have 50% of the wealth.

50% of 50 trillion is 25 trillion.
Let the top 1% keep 5 trillion.
Pay 10 trillion towards the 13.6 trillion dollar debt.
Divide 10 trillion among the 70 million USA families with the stipulation that they spend it on American products.  That’s 143 thousand per family.  (Do it gradually over ten years.)

Will reducing taxes create more jobs?  You hear politicians continuously making the promise that cutting taxes will increase jobs and diminish unemployment.  However, neither is happening.  The debt and unemployment just continue to rise.

If that is the ONLY thing the Federal government does, then the answer has a three main answers.

1)       If the budget is to be balanced, the government will have to cut jobs to balance the budget with less revenue coming in.  Currently more jobs would have to be cut than would be created.

2)      In prior years if the government borrowed money to pay for the budget over run then jobs would have been created.  There was an effect known as the ‘multiplier effect’.  The salaries paid to the original people for whom jobs were created would buy American products which would result in people being hired in other industries.   It was a mathematical series.  The creation of one job would create others.  Eventually the increased national income would lead to increased tax revenue and that would pay the deficit.

3)      Today if the government borrows money to pay for their budget over runs then some jobs will be created.  However, the multiplier effect doesn’t work as well today.  The salaries paid to the original people for whom jobs were created will buy some products made in other countries.  Jobs will be created not in America, but in other countries.  There still a mathematical series.  However it is probable that the created jobs will NOT equal the money borrowed to create those jobs let alone to create sufficient government revenues to pay for the deficit.

The way taxes are collected and distributed could create jobs.  This will be discussed next.

Is this the age of intolerance for beliefs and ideologies?   Frequently heard is the term “Zero Tolerance” spoken with conviction as if there is no other way.   Republicans think theirs is the only correct way.  Democrats think their ideology is the only way.  Many are intolerant towards Scientologists.  Muslims (some) are intolerant of Christians and Westerners.   Judges are intolerant of everyone that has beliefs different than the law or even their narrow interpretation of the law.  Gun lovers dislike those with no affection towards guns.  The police and government openly use and embrace terms of intolerance like felon and sex offender.  If you think that any of the above is OK, then you are probably one of the intolerant. 

In Washington, the Republicans and Democrats stay apart like oil and water.  They never vote on the same issues.  They always speak poorly of the other.  Democrats hate Bush and ridicule Sarah Palin.  Republicans ridicule Obama and Gore.  They fail to see their own intolerance as prejudice.  Our leaders fail to understand that they are not only acting in a bigoted way, but are in total acceptance of their own prejudiced behavior.

Prejudice is defined as:

1)    An adverse opinion or leaning formed without just grounds or before sufficient knowledge

2)    An irrational attitude of hostility directed against an individual, a group, a race, or their supposed characteristics

Ever hear people say a Liberal (or Conservative) believes blah-blah?   Or that a Liberal (or Conservative)  is blah-blah?   Those statements are irrational because the definitions of  Liberal (or Conservative) are different depending on viewpoint.  Each side has a different description of themselves than that painted by the intolerant party.  Republicans and Democrats are not people that believe in their own dogma, but people that have dogma chosen for themselves that are not supposed to alienate others of the party sufficiently to cause defection. 

People are made prejudiced by:

1)       Depersonalizing others or another group/party by calling them a name.

2)      Defining that name in an irrational or derogatory manner.

3)      Using that slur to describe your opponent in all future speech.

Prejudice starts with our leaders.  Look no further than Nazi Germany or the Early government of America.  In fact, look throughout history at prejudice and you will find government leaders and Judges at the forefront of ALL prejudice.  Also understand that the people are the last to recognize the prejudices of their own governmental leaders.

 

 

 

The Tenth Amendment of the United States is the amendment that could lead to the entire USA being a Utopian Country.   Utopia requires a strong enumeration of rights and a government that thinks it’s their duty to protect the enumerated rights.

Americans have many rights that aren’t enumerated — such as the right to eat and breath.  More generally the non-enumerated rights would be the rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.  The right to life could be further defined as the right to breath, eat, have shelter, have a family, have medical help, and to have an income in order to obtain the necessities of life.  The rights to liberty and the persuits of happiness would include the right to travel, read, talk, see movies, effect government, procure medical help, and to own property (including a firearm). 

The framers of the constitution argued against enumerating the rights for the reason that they did not want to forget to enumerate a right and thus have future governments and courts decide that that right wasn’t allowed.

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

The following quote is from the Cornell Law University at the following link.

http://www.law.cornell.edu/anncon/html/amdt10_user.html#amdt10_hd9

 “The Tenth Amendment was intended to confirm the understanding of the people at the time the Constitution was adopted, that powers not granted to the United States were reserved to the States or to the people. It added nothing to the instrument as originally ratified.”1 “The amendment states but a truism that all is retained which has not been surrendered. There is nothing in the history of its adoption to suggest that it was more than declaratory of the relationship between the national and state governments as it had been established by the Constitution before the amendment or that its purpose was other than to allay fears that the new national government might seek to exercise powers not granted, and that the states might not be able to exercise fully their reserved powers.”2 That this provision was not conceived to be a yardstick for measuring the powers granted to the Federal Government or reserved to the States was firmly settled by the refusal of both Houses of Congress to insert the word “expressly” before the word “delegated,”3 and was confirmed by Madison’s remarks in the course of the debate which took place while the proposed amendment was pending concerning Hamilton’s plan to establish a national bank. “Interference with the power of the States was no constitutional criterion of the power of Congress. If the power was not[p.1510]given, Congress could not exercise it; if given, they might exercise it, although it should interfere with the laws, or even the Constitutions of the States.”4 Nevertheless, for approximately a century, from the death of Marshall until 1937, the Tenth Amendment was frequently invoked to curtail powers expressly granted to Congress, notably the powers to regulate commerce, to enforce the Fourteenth Amendment, and to lay and collect taxes.

Is it possible that we are given the right to elect NO GOVERNMENT?  Or that we can set up our own government?  With 50,000 laws being passed each year, it would be the preference of many to start from scratch with a clean slate.  As with computer programs, sometimes it’s easier to junk and old program that was built for another era and totally rewrite a new program.  Ditto for buildings.  Press the link to see sixteen buildings in China simultaneously demolished .

 http://vidbunker.com/16_building_demolition_in_china

http://www.creators.com/opinion/david-sirota/was-ross-perot-right.html

And so without further ado, let’s answer the question Clinton ducked: Was Ross Perot right?

In 1993, the Clinton White House and an army of corporate lobbyists were selling NAFTA as a way to aid Mexican and American workers.

Perot, on the other hand, was predicting that because the deal included no basic labor standards, it would preserve a huge “wage differential between the United States and Mexico” that would result in “the giant sucking sound” of American jobs heading south of the border. Corporations, he said, would “close the factories in the U.S. [and] move the factories to Mexico [to] take advantage of the cheap labor.”

 

The historical record is clear. The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace reports, “Real wages for most Mexicans today are lower than when NAFTA took effect.” Post-NAFTA, companies looking to exploit those low wages relocated factories to Mexico. According to the Economic Policy Institute, the net effect of NAFTA was the elimination of 1 million American jobs.

Score one for Perot.

Since then we’ve had the trade agreements that Bush signed with China and others.

Lest you think that government knows what they are doing, consider this quote from page 56 of the July 2010 Discover Magazine on the article about “The Streetlight Effect”.

In 1992 a now-classic study by researchers at Harvard and the National Bureau of Economic Research examined papers from a range of economics journals and determined that approximately none of them had conclusively proved anything one way or the other.  Given that dismal assessment–and given the great influence of economists on financial institutions and regulation — it’s a wonder the global economic infrastructure is not in far worse shape.

The hypothesis that our economy could be straightened out by reversing all of the laws that Washington has written in the last 20 years (including the trade agreements) is worth study.