Look, I'm a Trump enthusiast, mostly because I think we need a genuine saboteur and wrecker at the helm of the federal government right now.
But I realize that you can't believe nuttin' that you see and hear on TV and the web, whether it's the crazed lefties at The Nation, the educated elite at The New York Times, the tame regime operatives at NPR, the NeverTrump folks in old conservative media, the middle-America mouthpieces on FoxNews, or the BannonBots on Breitbart, or whether it's a politician with an ax to grind.
So I am always looking for the message coming through in spite of all the spinmeisters.
So when I watched the Trump-led celebration of the passage of the tax cut bill at the White House yesterday, December 20, 2017, it was obvious that everybody was pretty happy. And, of course, Trump called out all the major players, the leaders and the committee chairmen that were part of the action.
It was also clear that Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) was there as a mascot, to show that Trump cares about black people too. On the other hand, Scott was there to recite that the tax bill also delivered for blacks. Somebody had to do it.
But what came through loud and clear to me is that Trump has been working with congressional leaders to get this thing passed. Who knew? I thought that Trump was a complete insult machine that had everybody on Capitol Hill as mad as hell. Apparently not. Apparently Trump has been on the phone to them. who knew?
Ii also thought that chaps like Vice President Mike Pence and Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT) went out of their way to lavish praise on the president and the moment.
Oh yes, of course the parade of corporations announcing $1,000 bonuses and investment programs was orchestrated and staged. But why wouldn't they play along? The reduction of the corporate income tax rate to 21 percent means that they can spend less time and money on tax avoidance, pushing for tax loopholes and keeping money offshore, and more time and money on doing business. What a concept!
The interesting thing to me is that most Americans think, right now, that they are going to be paying more in taxes. Gosh. I wonder where they got that idea! Surely not from the professional journalists doing their job in the national media! So it will be interesting to see what happens when Americans actually start seeing larger paychecks when the new tax-withholding tables take effect in February. Hey, maybe they won't even notice for a month or two, since most paychecks are paid electronically.
The bottom line is that the White House celebration showed a bunch of politicians patting themselves on the back for working together and getting something done. I get the feeling that the process brought the president and the congressional leaders together.
I say that we could do with a little more where that came from.
But now, let's get interest rates back to normal and let's start getting the bubble fodder out of the mortgage subsidies, so we can prick the next bubble early and often.
But I realize that you can't believe nuttin' that you see and hear on TV and the web, whether it's the crazed lefties at The Nation, the educated elite at The New York Times, the tame regime operatives at NPR, the NeverTrump folks in old conservative media, the middle-America mouthpieces on FoxNews, or the BannonBots on Breitbart, or whether it's a politician with an ax to grind.
So I am always looking for the message coming through in spite of all the spinmeisters.
So when I watched the Trump-led celebration of the passage of the tax cut bill at the White House yesterday, December 20, 2017, it was obvious that everybody was pretty happy. And, of course, Trump called out all the major players, the leaders and the committee chairmen that were part of the action.
It was also clear that Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) was there as a mascot, to show that Trump cares about black people too. On the other hand, Scott was there to recite that the tax bill also delivered for blacks. Somebody had to do it.
But what came through loud and clear to me is that Trump has been working with congressional leaders to get this thing passed. Who knew? I thought that Trump was a complete insult machine that had everybody on Capitol Hill as mad as hell. Apparently not. Apparently Trump has been on the phone to them. who knew?
Ii also thought that chaps like Vice President Mike Pence and Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT) went out of their way to lavish praise on the president and the moment.
Oh yes, of course the parade of corporations announcing $1,000 bonuses and investment programs was orchestrated and staged. But why wouldn't they play along? The reduction of the corporate income tax rate to 21 percent means that they can spend less time and money on tax avoidance, pushing for tax loopholes and keeping money offshore, and more time and money on doing business. What a concept!
The interesting thing to me is that most Americans think, right now, that they are going to be paying more in taxes. Gosh. I wonder where they got that idea! Surely not from the professional journalists doing their job in the national media! So it will be interesting to see what happens when Americans actually start seeing larger paychecks when the new tax-withholding tables take effect in February. Hey, maybe they won't even notice for a month or two, since most paychecks are paid electronically.
The bottom line is that the White House celebration showed a bunch of politicians patting themselves on the back for working together and getting something done. I get the feeling that the process brought the president and the congressional leaders together.
I say that we could do with a little more where that came from.
But now, let's get interest rates back to normal and let's start getting the bubble fodder out of the mortgage subsidies, so we can prick the next bubble early and often.
Part I
ReplyDeleteWhat are republicans doing differently today with Trump than they did back in 1980 with Reagan? Nearly 70 years ago I recall reading a story about an old woman who was freezing because her blanket was full of holes. Then, thinking like a republican, she solved her problem by cutting out the holes. Reagan's trickle-down economy didn't work back in the 1980s, and Trump's trickle-down economy won't work now.
Do we really believe that when republicans start cutting government handouts to 90% of Americans they are just going to roll over and take it without a whimper? Hell NO! As we have already seen this year they are beginning to rise up.
If we really want to get to the root of the problem and suggest ways to fix it, then we must understand the power and perils of automation. Read up on Artificial Intelligence and Robotic Technologies to understand why real job losses in the United States and around the world will only increase into the unforeseeable future. Look at the rapid advancement of self-driving car and truck technology to understand that in coming decades robotic devices will be more intelligent, dexterous, and reliable than humans. Why would any corporation or business want to employ humans to fill a high percentage of their service and production jobs when robots can perform the work at a small fraction of the cost, 24/7, and with minimal error?
But this robots-replacing-humans scenario is unsustainable! Why, because the head cannot survive without the body. Robots and the Unemployed are not consumers of the robots' products and services.
When robots and not employed human beings perform most of the product development and services tasks, and corporations and businesses pocket the huge savings, money stops circulating and economies stagnate. A stagnated economy is definitely not sustainable.
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ReplyDeletePart II
ReplyDeleteAre there any solutions? Robots are here to stay, so outlawing them is definitely out of the question. I'm an engineer, not an economist, but I do know that economists will have to change their way of thinking. In coming decades the number of real jobs is going to continually decline, and the number of people in poverty is going to continually rise. And when robots' products and services remain on the shelves, the number of failing corporations and businesses is also going to continually rise. The head cannot survive without the body.
So what is the best way to resolve this dilemma? I don't know, but a variant of Sander's Socialism comes to mind. Businesses and corporations are getting off nearly scot-free, exploiting their robots to pocket extra trillions of dollars. Clearly that's not sustainable. The solution may be to heavily tax all robots' products and services and distribute this tax money in equitable and responsible ways to the disabled and unemployed. By equitable and responsible I mean that this must not be welfare with no work commitment, as has been common practice for decades, but maybe more like the old Civilian Conservation Corps, where able-bodied people worked for their government checks.
A large percentage of people complain about their jobs, but they need to be doing something physically and mentally challenging, no matter how menial those jobs may be. The biggest challenge will be sorting out which of hundreds of thousands of jobs are more suitable for humans than robots and assign humans to them. These are more likely to be infrastructure and service jobs that bring in less revenue, which is why funding them with tax money may make more sense.
It also makes sense that millions of humans could work alongside robots to fill in gaps between what is practical and not for robots to accomplish. Numerous articles have already been written about robot/human interaction, which may be more critical today than it will be in coming decades as robots become more intelligent and dexterous. On the other hand, robot/human interaction may become more critical in coming decades as robots become more intelligent and dexterous and take over more and more of the human decision-making processes.
Humans have evolved to be highly adaptable to millions of minutely changing operating scenarios. A similar adaptability in robotic devices may never be incorporated, and this may be why humans working alongside robots to fill in gaps could be so practical. In essence, a robot may make the perfect cake every time, but it may not clean up after itself or replace a damaged tool. Of course other service robots could be waiting in the closet, but it may be more practical to pay adaptable humans to perform these random tasks. At least that would make sense into the coming decades until Artificial Intelligence and Robotic Technologies have advanced beyond our current imaginations.