Mindstream

So at the card shop we had an interesting discussion. Feel free to join in as you wish.

My friend Brian believes in a wealth cap. He would like to cap private wealth at around $450,000,000, meaning that once you have amassed that much wealth, you would be relieved of the rest through taxation or other means. You have any number of options available to you to get rid of your wealth before you hit that cap and are even encouraged to do so.

The basic idea behind this is that no person can gain that much wealth by him or herself. No matter what you do, you are always somehow exploiting others to gain that much wealth. Now in this sense exploit is a very loaded word. I exploit my car so it can take me to work. I make sure it runs, sure, and it serves me in it’s capacity, but much beyond that I don’t pay too much attention to it… and nor should I. It’s a car. It’s mine.

Now I’m not opposed to a wealth cap. I would quibble over the precise cap and whatnot, but I’m really not opposed to the idea. I’ve had an audiorant before about this, but since Ecyler only knows where those are going to wind up, I’ll go over it again briefly…

Money is a fixed system. We can’t (despite current economic policies) keep pumping more into it to fix out problems. The more monies floating around the system the less each money is worth. If I have 10 monies and there are only 100 monies around then I have a tenth of the total available wealth. If someone decides that there should be 1000 monies instead, my wealth is devalued. Get it? Good. That’s a fundamental point here. Remember that when you are at the voting booth as well… Just sayin’.

Now here is why the hoarding of wealth is a problem. Say again that there are only 100 monies to go around, say again that there are only 20 of us. In theory that leaves about 5 monies per person. Say if I worked a day, my boss gave me one money for my effort. In my working he gained three monies. He only has to spend one money on his business and living expenses, leaving him with one money to save. Following me so far? My boss is giving one money out to others to maintain his lifestyle and business. He is giving another money to me for me to do the same, and his business earns him one more money that he can do as he sees fit with. We’re going to assume he chucks it in a big pile to save it.

After a week, assuming I spend all the monies I will be breaking even, at my bosses spending rate, he will have a pile so 7 monies to sit on. He currently owns 7% of this worlds wealth. After a month he will have about 30% of the worlds wealth. The problem is since he has so many monies, there isn’t enough monies to go around. Those 5 monies I started with I still have, but now there are a few people with no monies, they can’t afford to actually buy or do anything and can no longer contribute to the economy. This means that my boss makes less monies. Since there is less to go around, the prices of everything fluctuate to reflect this. Since there are only 70 monies in circulation right now, everything will cost proportionally more. Since my boss now requires 1.3 monies to run his business, and the business is only producing 2.5 monies a day (since less people are buying) he has to pay me less to maintain his profit margin of 1 money a day. I now have to make due with .8 monies.

Now this is just a quick and dirty example, but I’m sure you can all see where I’m going here. When the wealth is concentrated that’s less wealth to go around. When the wealth stops going around, the economy begins to seize. You can think of money as blood in a living organism, when it stops flowing the organism dies. You can also think of it as oil in a car, when the oil stops flowing, the car seizes up. The spice money must flow.

The biggest misconception about the idea about a wealth cap is that the money will be given to those who don’t work. Brian suggested (and I believe) that this isn’t true at all. The money could very be used however the person sees fit. In the above example, once he’s reached his 5 wealth cap, he no longer needs that extra money. My boss can choose to pay me more (yay), upgrade and expand his business (hiring more people), donate the extra wealth to charity (noble), or simply give it away randomly. It’s his money still he can do whatever he wants with it as long as he’s not keeping it.

Now I know, this won’t stop the concentration of wealth, the richest people in the world will now have some richer friends to hang out with. Wealth will still be concentrated. I’m fine with that to a point. After all, if you manage to make that much money, you must be doing something right, but honestly, seriously, tell me how you would make enough money to hit a wealth cap, and not have enough to be able to disburse as you see fit. If you are worth $612,978,525.36 will it kill you to give away $162,978,525.36. Will it bankrupt you to invest that money in a business. If it fails, so what? You still have your maximum wealth that we’re not going to take away from you. If it succeeds, congratulations, you started another successful business, give yourself another point, and try it again.

Yes, this is socialism. No this will not destroy america. Is there anyone here who would care to start a dialog on this? You know where to find me and my forums.

(www.gunnerrpg.com)

There is something to be said for selfishness.

I plan on going over this in more detail, but I’ll start off by saying that most people who are widely considered to be selfish are merely short sighted. Those who are truly selfish and self serving are the generous ones.

Let me rewind a bit and explain my somewhat counterintuitive position:

First off you must understand that to be self serving and selfish is not a bad thing in the least. We are programmed culturally, genetically, and in every way that matters to serve ourselves. After all there is a very good reason for this, as I tell people often without me, the world as I know it would not exist and that is absolutely the worst thing that could happen.

Self preservation is a noble endeavor. It’s largely the reason I am still alive today. The other reason being apathy. Nevertheless preserving oneself at the expense of others is not the same thing as being selfish. That is simply greedy.

Airplanes instruct you to make sure your mask is securely fastened before you attend to others. This is so that you can help others who cannot help themselves, after all you are no use to them if you are dead.

Aesthetics believe that true enlightenment is found through denying self. I’m not sure if I disagree, but I do know that those who do not contribute to society are a burden to it. While I applaud their efforts in making themselves lighter and thinner and thus much less of a burden, they still must be carried or they will die. In biology we call this a parasite.

On the other hand a symbiotic species is one that developed to serve itself and aid another at the same time. A symbiotic species (a biologist can feel free to correct me) as I understand it is one that is intertwined with another species for the survival of the other. Without one, a vital component is missing, and both species die. In such a case self preservation not only furthers yourself, but in the end contributes to another’s survival. This to me seems quite a noble goal.

Mutualists are very similar to symbiotic species in that the both rely in a level of interaction. In fact upon doing a bit of research I find that symbiosis is the broad category for parisitism, mutualism, and commensalism.

Parasitism described above is where one thing gains a benefit from the harm of another. This is a bad thing, although it does create a certain balance. Commensalism is where one thing gains a benefit and the other is unaffected. For example one thing feeding off the scraps of another. This is somewhat rare in real life as almost any sort of interaction is either beneficial or harmful in some subtle way.

However what I am striving for is mutualism. A mutual benefit between two things is ultimately good as both things benefit while neither is harmed. Think about this objectively for a moment.

The only reason anyone really ever does anything is if it has some perceived benefit. Be honest with yourself and ask when was the last time you truly did something that had no real benefit for you whatsoever, then ask yourself if it was worth it.

If you think about there only being a finite amount of happiness in the world then parasitism and competition make sense. After all in order for your happiness to increase, the happiness of someone else must decrease. This however is not only patently false it’s also insanity. Happiness isn’t a finite resource, it’s something that can be infinitely gained and lost. There is no balancing force.

So, one is left with a choice. If your increased happiness doesn’t require the decrease of another’s happiness, you can either increase your happiness at the expense of others, possibly decreasing the worlds happiness as a whole, or you can increase your happiness *with* others and make the whole world a better place.

The reason you would want to do the second is simple. If there is more happiness in the world, it is much easier to gain happiness for yourself. Since it’s not a finite resource you can, with management have unlimited happiness. If you harvest all the happiness from those around you, soon you will find yourself without any available happiness. In the long term, this is stupid.

Instead, and this is the truely selfish part… if you want to make yourself happy in the easiest and most efficient way in the long term… you should work toward making others happy.

This doesn’t mean that you should lower your own happiness to do so. No one is asking you to do that, nor should they. Instead consider the long term benefits involved. By performing actions that might result in less personal happiness, but more overall happiness, you raise the overall happiness of your environment. This also gives your environment incentive to raise your happiness spontaneously. Think about it. Free happiness. You don’t get that by being mean to those around you.

So. What I’m saying is, if you want to be utterly selfish and looking toward your own personal gain. Simple be nice and charitable to those around you. Not the parasites mind you, cut them off ruthlessly but if someone or something may have a future benefit to you, then help them out. Once they are in a position to do the same to you, you have both mutually benefitted. Once those who only drain happiness in the long term have been eliminated, the society as a whole will be a much happier place.

Selfishness is ultimately good for society. Short-sightedness is not.

As I pointed out in the last thing I wrote. I am fat. While I’l slightly above average height, I’m quite a bit above average weight, and while I’m not quite at a quarter ton, I am certainly in the obese range (according to wii fit anyway).

A thing I have encountered is that people, in general, dislike fat people. Yet, most people, when they meet me don’t consider me ‘fat’. Granted, I have legs that were sculpted from pure marble (and just as white). Toned and muscled calves that make south american soccer players jealous. From the waist up however, I am soft and squishy.

I have come to realize that when people say they hate fat people, what they really mean is they hate lazy people. I am fat, but I am not lazy.

I weigh about twice as much as an underweight friend of mine. In general we eat mostly the same. I sometimes eat more than him and he sometimes eats more than me, but I suspect it evens out. I certainly don’t eat twice as much as him. Yet, I am about twice his weight.

I don’t especially eat unhealthy, I avoid fast food and pizza. I don’t drink very much soda, and when I do it’s usually an indulgence. I work the same job as my friend so he’s not burning his calories there. In fact as a general rule he even sleeps more than I do.

I have a pretty slow metabolism I suspect. It’s genetic isn’t really an excuse for me, although it could be the reason. I am fully aware that genetically fat people can work out and slim themselves down. I’m also aware that it takes a good deal of work and effort to do this. Meanwhile many people are perfectly average without doing a thing. I don’t consider this laziness of my part that I’m not willing to put in many many times as much effort as some people to achieve things they do naturally. By the same token, I don’t expect people to study for 8 hours a day just to get the same grades I do. It doesn’t make me better than them, just differently abled.

The people who *do* study and *do* bust their ass working out? Yes, they are better people than me. But we’re not talking about them.

All that said, I am trying to work out. My blood pressure has always been somewhat high, while my pulse has been fairly low. Being the ripe old age of just pas a quarter century, I begin to think about my mortality. Quite honestly, I’m pretty sure I’ve outlived my usefulness, but there are people who disagree so for their sake I’ll try to stick around for a while longer. Part of that involves trying to keep my blood pressure down.

Now, I’m by no means in shape. I’m fit in the sense that I can perform my daily tasks without passing out. Unfortunately as I get older, my stamina isn’t getting any better. So I’m working on getting my heart rate up so that as a general rule, my heart rate and blood pressure will be lower. It’s not anything I’d call fun. I may be allergic to sweat, but I’m doing it.

That is to say, I’m not actually very lazy. In general, I’m fine walking wherever I need to go. Unfortunately it’s about a half hour to get into town from where I live walking. I’ve done it several times when  I was without a vehicle. I don’t really mind it, except modern america demands that I hold to their schedules. I can’t spend an hour or two travelling every day and expect to really get anything done.

When I was living in South America? Things were completely different (I was also 40lbs lighter *sigh*). I walked everywhere and it was expected, I had very loose schedules and there was public transportation to take me if i needed tog et somewhere in a hurry. I actually miss those days.

I enjoy taking walks places. I actually really enjoy hiking and camping. I enjoy the outdoors and doing things. I’ll admit I don’t usually enjoy strenious physical activity, like most sports, but that’s usually because I am very *bad* at them. I am however looking into martial arts. Unfortunately no one in the area teaches the style I want to learn. Again I miss South America.

All this is is to point out that while I may be fat, even obese. I am certainly not especially lazy. When people say they hate fat people, I am often not included in the group. I think that is the key difference. People hate laziness.

I clean up after myself, have reasonably standard hygiene, am usually courteous and polite to people, and will certainly take time to help people. While I don’t often volunteer to help out of the blue, I don’t hesitate to help out if there is a group, or if my help is solicited. It can be reasonably said that I am not lazy. Yet I am quite fat.

Being overweight has actually done quite devastating things to my body image. I have always been overweight, I think I was even born slightly large. I have a naturally large frame and quite a large chest. It makes me very good at holding my breath (8 years on the swim team).

This image problem haunted me for quite awhile (I quit the swim team in middle school because I didn’t want people making fun of my size). I largely quit swimming because of the image issues. I had pretty low self esteem feeling that no one could possibly find me attractive. I settled a bit, and was reasonably certain that I *could* have gotten the girls I was after, if I weighed quite a bit less.

For the record, I like my girls what could be considered a bit chubby. I have no idea is this is because I understand their pain, or because I have rather Victorian standards when it comes to women. Further research may be required.

I think I had a plan when I started this, but it rather fell apart as it went on. I was somewhat distracted when I went to write this, so I took some time to take care of things and when I came back I had largely lost my train of thought. I know I wasn’t really going to deal with body image either, but that’s where this ended up I guess.

The point I’m trying to make is a bit simple. Fat doesn’t always mean lazy. It can be shown that lazy doesn’t always make people fat. Maybe it’s a stereotype, and there is certainly a basis for fat lazy people (I know a few). I think it’s a bit unfair to judge a tome until you’ve read it’s contents.

I am a gamer.

I have been playing games most of my life. Some of my earliest childhood memories involve games. The Game of Life inspired me to learn how to read (My dad was sick of reading things to me and refused to play whenever I wanted until I learned to do it myself). Games even taught me how to read. The Talking Teacher taught me spelling and math and reading at a level almost twice my actual age. My spelling hasn’t progressed much since then, but everything else laid out a rich foundation that I still use today.

I started gaming young as well. I remember playing something that I’m pretty sure was Pitfall on an old console and tv at my grandmother’s house. I remember playing Super Mario Bros. Level 4-2 (or was it 2-4, it was the first scrolling level) I played Altered Beast for the Genesis, was never very good at platformers and those kind of games, but I was there for them.

I snuck under my bed to watch my older brother play Dungeons and Dragons, and was absolutely elated when I was allowed to (still in the single-digits age wise) play the TMNT RPG made by Palladium.

I have since designed several RPG systems, programmed a handful of not very good games in ancient programming languages, and spent what could easily be considered most of my life playing games.

Yet, there are people who had the gall to tell me I am not a gamer.

I know. It’s insanity, right? I mean, I’ve spent most of my life immersed in some form of gaming or another I gravitate toward Pencil and Paper RPG’s, board games, card games, and other somewhat abstract games. Why? Becuase these are what has proven to hold my attention. I have written a couple of text based games, and played on MUD’s back in the day using stolen computer and internet time. Those are the games I miss.

I earned the nickname ‘The Blind Lemming’  playing Half Life. I earned this becuase I have the survival instincts of a blind lemming. I later earned the nickname ‘Passive Assassin’ when it was realized that most of my ‘kills’ were through secondary damage on AvP. I rarely actually killed someone of my own free ability. I didn’t mind, I had fun for the most part and it was good times with friends.

I am being told I am not a real gamer becuase my console of choice is the Wii. A large chunk of the reason I bought the wii shortly after it came out  and waited a few years to pick up the other ‘next gen consoles’ was because of the game selection. I don’t really go for the mini-game packs, everyone is so keen on berating. Rather, I enjoy the first party titles, specifically Metroid Prime 3: Corruption (which I bought slightly before the actual console) Super Smash Bros. Brawl, Super Paper Mario came with the system when I bought it used and I very much enjoyed it. I’m *still* slogging my way through Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. I enjoy it, but it didn’t capture my the same way Wind Waker did, it’s been pre-empted twice once by wii-fit and again by wii-fit plus. Yes, I’m fat. Yes I’m trying to do something about it.

Because of this. I’m told I’m not a gamer. I’ve never played HALO, although I do now own all them. The same can likely be said for just about any popular game for either the 360 or PS3. If I don’t actually own them, I do plan on purchasing them sometime, eventually. The only actual game that required a disk I’ve played on my 360 was Soul Calibur 4. I’m a big fan of fighting games, I know I should play Street Fighter 4, I’m waiting until the new one comes out this spring.

Again. I’m not good at FPS games. It took me the better part of a day to beat Portal. My friends have beaten it in a handful of hours. They made fun of me the whole time. I rather did enjoy the experience.  But since I don’t spend days on end playing other games such as TF2, HALO, COD, and what other mas of capital letters is the popular game now…. I’m not a gamer.

You may begin to understand why this irks me slightly.

I was reading a (somewhat dated) article saying how this or that development company will never develop games for the wii, since real gamers don’t play it. For some reason that raised my hackles a bit. Now I can understand them not making games for the wii becuase their target audience (American 18-30’s) tend to play other systems (Xbox 360), that is a perfectly reasonably choice. Not making a game for the best selling system worldwide is a bit debatable. If they’re so confidant they can make the best and shiniest games around, then why can’t they just as easily make the best and shiniest game for the Wii as well. But what would I know, I’m obviously not a gamer.

When people talk about the wii derisively they are quick to point out how it’s underpowered compared to it’s two rivals. This caught me as amusing for several reasons, first of all, the wii was specifically developed to target a different demographic. Nintendo realized it would be a somewhat silly move to go toe to to against two giants who have more money then they rightfully know what to do with. While I’m sure they could have produces a system comparable to the others, they chose to build a stable, reliable and less expensive system then the other companies, who indecently, lost money on every console sold, while Nintendo made a small profit. I haven’t heard of any hardware problems, in fact the Wii has used the same hardware since it came out, around the same time as the PS3. How many revisions have the other systems gone through to correct hardware malfunctions?

Anyway, the analogy I had to consoles was equating them to vehicles. They’re both an integral part of my life in general. While I may not drive cars professionally (although I have friends who do) I do drive them fairly often. The difference is I don’t really drive for pleasure, I drive becuase I live 20 miles from my workplace, and even when I lived closer, it took too long to walk to justify the energy. Again, yes, I’m fat, yes, I’m working on it, yes, I enjoy walking, just not by myself in the rain several miles then working a long shift only to have to walk back I’ve done it, I makes the actual working part very inconvenient.

I don’t drive a fancy car. In fact I bought my car used off of a coworker (much like my consoles). My car can’t go 0-60 in a few seconds. It actually takes  a bit of time, but it’ll get there. I don’t top out at 200 mp/h. In fact I’ve only ever came close to hitting about 90 while hurrying back from a long drive, although the spedometer tells me I can go to about 120 mp/h.

My car takes me from point A to point B fairly well. It’s not very fuel efficient, but it runs. I don’t have to take it to the shop every few months to get it fixed, and I didn’t have to take out a massive loan to get it. It has a functional speaker system, it’s not loaded with thumping bass, but I can hear the music I tell it to play.

The point is, my situation here is probably similar to many millions of drivers around the world. I have something that does what I want it to do. Sure, other people put themselves into bankruptcy to do the exact same thing I’m doing essentially, only they do it in a stylish new vehicle every few years (my car is almost old enough to drive itself and is by many years the newest car I’ve owned for any reasonable length of time).

Despite all this, few people will say I’m not a driver. People may say I’m not a very *good* driver, and I will be unlikely to despite the point. I am in fact licensed and have had a fairly trivial record thus far. So why is it that despite doing this thing only out of need and gaming for fun, people still don’t think I’m a gamer?

When people tell me they are a gamer, my first throught is, sweet someone to play Gunner with. Never heard of it, not surprising, how about GURPS, no? World of Darkenss? D&D? Oh, you don’t like those kind of games where you have to use your imagination? You like something you can see, don’t worry, I understand. Not everyone has the creativity to play those games, I’ve been playing them most of my life so I’m used to it, but I can see how someone who hasn’t played a lot of them might be intimidates. Something with rules then?

How about Mahjong.  No?  Shogi? Ah don’t worry, not a lot of people have played it, I’ve only found two other people willing to play it and only one who has played more than once. Well maybe. English games? Sure, Settlers of Catan? I’ll admit I’ve never played it, but want to badly. Never heard of it? Well no problem, what about anything by Fantasy Flight Games? Might I recommend Twilight Imperium? A little too long for you?

Board games not your thing? I have Magic, and a whole mess of other CCG games here? Ah, too expensive for you? I completely understand, I mean people have cards that cost more than my entire deck (and I can [sometimes] beat those people) with said cards with said deck) that’s fair.  Well I have regular playing cards (I always carry two decks with me) oh? the only game you know if Texas Hold’em? Well that’s fine, we can play something else.

Consoles you say? Oh great! I have those! I have Gunstar Heroes, Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter, I just picked up Smash TV. Something newer you say? Well, I have the newest Pokemon… Mario Party 8, Smash Bros Brawl, Soul Calibur (every version for every console thus far). Oh… you don’t like those games? That’s fair, well what *do* you play, I probably have it. Halo? Yeah… I have it, I’m not very good at it though, but I’ll watch you play, I’ve heard it was a good game and would love to see someone who is good at it play. Oh, the storyline sucks and you only play multiplayer? I’m sorry to hear that. Well, I have an internet connection, feel free to have fun playing with yourself, and the other nameless faceless people on the other end of the connection. Just one question though.

Why did you call yourself a gamer again?

The sexting laws completely baffle me. If you haven’t heard of them you should check out the forums I posted some links to different areas reactions, but it’s still strange to me. What they are essentially, are laws that say that a teenager under age, can be labeled as a child pornographer and sex offender under Megan’s Law for taking and distributing pictures of themselves or their significant others.

Now this seems ok in theory, I mean child pornography is bad right. We don’t want sex offenders running around and taking pictures of underage kids and posting them on the interwebs for everyone to see. I understand this. I understand that an adult can coerce a child into doing things they’d rather not do, and that is wrong. Right. Sometimes the children don’t understand the consequences of their actions and end up doing things that as an adult they’d regret. I don’t have an issue with that.

What I have an issue with is under the new interpretation of the laws, you can be sent to jail and be labeled a sex offender for pictures you took of yourself while you were under 18. If you look at those pictures, of yourself, that you took yourself, you are viewing and have already made child pornography and must now be put on a list of sex offenders with rapists and whatnot. Do you see the problem here?

Now I understand if a boyfriend pushes a pretty young thing to take those pictures. That is of course wrong, or worse still if he takes them himself via coercion or without her willing consent. Right that’s bad. But if someone takes pictures of themselves they are making child porn. That’s what I don’t get. Are we outlawing what we can do with ourselves in our own homes? As for the transmission of these files, that’s a little hairy (or not depending on how young they are)

I happen to have some pictures of my ex from back in the day, and I’m sure there are pictures of me floating around. I gave those willingly, and received those willingly. I don’t really have a problem with someone posting them somewhere (after all who would want to see them?). I however respect my ex enough to keep those pictures of her private. I understand that sending them to someone without her permission would be illegal, I don’t have a problem with that interpretation of the law. If you pass around nude pics of someone, that’s pandering obscenity, and that really should be a crime.

But it still boggles my mind how you can criminalize someone for taking pictures of themselves. Is this seriously what we want? Are we telling our kids that no, sex is bad, at least until you’re over 18, then have fun. *sigh* I guess I really don’t belong in this era.

No, no, not actual *work* at my job. That would be silly. No, I’m actually making progress on my game. (www.gunnerrpg.com/rpg)

I still have a long long way to go before I’m happy with it mind you, but it’s getting there. I’ve added tons and tons of new stuff, and am working on adding mroe bit by bit. I’m doing some coding research when I have time. I reconfigured my drives to allow me to work from damn near anywhere, which is a huge perk.

In other news, I’m going to hang out with dad today, there is a cookout of sorts. My brother is going to see wrestling tonight, and my cat, Shadow juzzed blood all over me earler today. I slept in, relaxed, woke up, did a bit of cleaning (still have to clean that bloodspot) did a bit of cooking (didn’t turn out nearly as good as I had hoped, damn alfalafa) and tried to a bit of coding. After repairing the database from my coding efforts, I decided it would be best to take a break.

I’m trying to get back in the habit of writing, my muse is missing which is painful, but hopefully I’ll figure something out in the meantime. (I was just concentrating so hard on writing drool came out). The other night it hailed and dandilions sprung forth, in the morning no one believed me it hailed, but I was there I knew, I saw it.

Ok, so much for trying to write museless. I’ll try to get back as quick as I can and write more. Hopefully someone can help me bring forth ideas.I really miss my muse

Since money seems to be a rather important issue (maybe I’m just longing for my next paycheck) I will now present my fortuitous reader with some more economic advice. The likelihood of this actually getting anything done is laughable, much like our current budget, so I think it’s an appropriate mix.

There is an old adage that you need to spend money to make money; which I firmly believe. There is also the adage that time is money, which partially inspired me to take up chronomancy, unfortunately, I am quite not rich, so that career path failed me, however spending money to make money makes a certain amount of sense, cents even if you do it right.

The basic idea behind all this is that anything worth doing is worth charging for, the free and open movement aside (which can be used as an example, but is something I’ll deal with later). The truth is that if you want something done properly and don’t have the time to sift through all the not-so-great free options you have to pay for it. Hey… maybe time does equal money…. Anyway…

The way the economy works is you give someone money and they give you something in return. Now this may seem like a rather basic concept, but people look like they’re having a hard time trying to figure that out. People are so afraid of what might happen in the future that they’re not spending any of their money. What this means is since no one is spending their money no one is receiving money to give you whatever it was that they were hawking on you. Since the hawkers aren’t selling they don’t have as much money as they’d like, so they aren’t buying as much. Since no one is buying, fewer people are selling and we find ourselves in a downward spiral.

Buying cheap isn’t always buying smart. Because by focusing solely on the cheapest product you are pushing out all the high quality products that might cost a bit more. Consider for example a $300 pair of jeans. This is something I, myself would probably never buy. But on the other hand I would love to sell someone those $300 pair of jeans. That’s good for the economy. Say what you will about wasting money, but spending money is a good thing.

Unfortunately it’s a tad hard to concentrate here at work, so I might try to clarify a bit later. But the point is that in order for the economy to recover, people need to spend money. We need to spend everything we can, push the economy. Now if you think that’s a stupid idea, let me leave you with a thought. Remember last time I talked about hyperinflation….

Well if I spend two thousand dollars on a computer this year instead of putting that money in the bank, like you, next year you might have a few more dollars in interest. However I have a computer. Next year when hyper inflation hits, I have still have a (now slightly outdated) computer, meanwhile you spend all the money you saved up and buy…. a computer that’s not nearly as good as mine, since those thousands you have in the bank are only worth about half as much now. So who comes out ahead. Think about it.

I have been called upon to speak out about this economic crisis I keep hearing so much about. It’s my understanding that people are out of work, losing their jobs, and that we are pretty much in the greatest depression in almost a century. The strange things I didn’t notice. It seems like no one told me. Granted, I work in food, not retail, but our business is more booming than ever, we’re going to be expanding yet again before too long. I’ve been working 6-7 days a week for the past several months almost to the exclusion of anything else.

Now I’ll take your word for it that we’re suffering. But it’s rather hard to believe. Our current budget is what? Four Trillion dollars? Have you taken a minute to think about how much money that is exactly? The recent budget cuts? A few hundred million? That’s nothing. If I were to spend money like that, I would be looked down upon by pretty much all my peers, but wait, I guess that’s what’s happening to us now. Oh well.

I don’t generally get political, politics aren’t something that I am even remotely interested in, but truthfully, this isn’t politics. This is money. Money is something I am *very* much interested in. Again to put it in perspective. If we used my yearly income as our yearly budget, just for an example here, because if we’re getting technical I’m only making about twice as much now as I did last year, which is peanuts compared to this years budget and last years, but bear with me… So this year’s budget is about my years pay. If I were to put the $30 I have in my pocket in the bank right now…. And not put anything else in the bank all year. That’s about how much money we’re saving with these ‘budget cuts’ Does anyone honestly think that this is enough?

That said I *am* saving a little of my money. But my prediction is, just as ‘bailout’ is the catchphrase of the year, ‘hyperinflation’ will be the one for next year. Look it up. The look up the economies of modern Zimbabwe, Peru in the 70’s and 80’s, and Germany in the 30’s. Yes. Germany in the 30’s, the same conditions that spawned Hitler are what we’re going to be looking at if we’re not careful. Now of course I just invoked Godwin’s Law here, so the debate should be over, and I *am* almost done. It should be know that Fujimori, man who tried to fix Peru’s internal problems is serving 25 years for Human Rights violations (I think he was Railroaded, but that’s me) So I’m just saying, we’re in dangerous times. I don’t expect our savings to be worth very much anytime in the near future.