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Raging Inequality May Cause Unrest and Violence In America and the Rest of Western World
Preface: While conservatives are against redistribution of wealth and liberals want to tax the affluent, conservatives and liberals, the affluent and the less well-heeled should all agree that we have to stop the surge in inequality from rising further:
- As Robert Shiller said in 2009:
And it's not like we want to level income. I'm not saying spread the wealth around, which got Obama in trouble. But I think, I would hope that this would be a time for a national consideration about policies that would focus on restraining any possible further increases in inequality.
- The father of modern economics - Adam Smith - didn't believe that inequality should be a taboo subject
- Warren Buffet, one of America's most successful capitalists and defenders of capitalism, points out, "There's class warfare, all right, but it's my class, the rich class, that's making war ...."
- Conservatives - as well as liberals - are against rampant inequality. But all Americans underestimate the amount of inequality in our country
And while I am not calling for violence, I wonder if this is like South Africa at the end of the Apartheid era, where those in power had to hand over the reins to the majority to prevent violence.
Raging inequality was largely responsible for the Great Depression and for the current financial crisis.
I noted in January:
Egyptian, Tunisian and Yemeni protesters all say that inequality is one of the main reasons they're protesting.
However, the U.S. actually has much greater inequality than in any of those countries.
Is there any way that the growing inequality could cause unrest in America or the rest of the Western world?
Initially, the Greek and Spanish riots have grown out of bailouts and other windfalls for the big banks and hedge funds (see this, this and this), and austerity for the working stiff. So in a sense, they are about inequality.
Moreover, I pointed out in February:
Agence France-Press reports today:
The International Monetary Fund stands ready to help riot-torn Egypt rebuild its economy, the IMF chief said Tuesday as he warned governments to tackle unemployment and income inequality or risk war.
Forbes reported in February:
Harvard economist Kenneth Rogoff, co-author of a best-selling book on financial crises, “This Time It’s Different,” told Forbes today in an exclusive interview, that the high unemployment rate and high levels of debt in the U.S. will sooner or later trigger serious “social unrest from the income disparities in the U.S.”
The Obama administration has “no clue,” he told me what do about this terrible disparity in the economy that is bound to erupt sooner or later, he feels.
“I don’t understand why people don’t wake up to the crisis they are creating,” he said to me just minutes after appearing at a Council on Foreign Relations round-table on “Currency Wars.”
And I wrote in June:
CNN's Jack Cafferty notes that a number of voices are saying that - if our economy continues to deteriorate (which it very well might) - we are likely headed for violence, and civil unrest is a growing certainty.
Watch the must-see CNN viewer comments on this issue:
Newsweek wrote two weeks ago:
Reality is beginning to break through. Gas and grocery prices are on the rise, home values are down, and vast majorities think the country is on the wrong track. The result is sadness and frustration, but also an inchoate rage more profound than the sign-waving political fury documented during the elections last fall.
***
In search of the earthly toll of this outrage, NEWSWEEK conducted a poll of 600 people, finding vastly more unquiet minds than not. Three out of four people believe the economy is stagnant or getting worse. One in three is uneasy about getting married, starting a family, or being able to buy a home. Most say their relationships have been damaged by economic woes or, perhaps more accurately, the dread and nervousness that accompany them.
Could these emotions escalate into revolt?
Why Are People So Angry?
Why are people so angry?
Well, as the Newsweek article points out:
Corporate earnings have soared to an all-time high. Wall Street is gaudy and confident again. But the heyday hasn’t come for millions of Americans. Unemployment hovers near 9 percent, and the only jobs that truly abound, according to Labor Department data, come with name tags, hairnets, and funny hats (rather than high wages, great benefits, and long-term security). The American Dream is about having the means to build a better life for the next generation. But as President Obama acknowledged at a town-hall meeting in May, “a lot of folks aren’t feeling that [possibility] anymore.”
By way of background, America - like most nations around the world - decided to bail out their big banks instead of taking the necessary steps to stabilize their economies (see this, this and this). As such, they all transferred massive debts (from fraudulent and stupid gambling activities) from the balance sheets of the banks to the balance sheets of the country.
The nations have then run their printing presses nonstop in an effort to inflate their way out of their debt crises, even though that effort is doomed to failure from the get-go.
Quantitative easing by the Federal Reserve is obviously causing food prices to skyrocket worldwide (and see this, this and this).
But the fact is that every country in the world that can print money - i.e. which is not locked into a multi-country currency agreement like the Euro - has been printing massive quantities of money. See these charts.
Moreover, the austerity measures which governments worldwide are imposing to try to plug their gaping deficits (created by throwing trillions at their banks) are causing people world-wide to push back.
As I warned in February 2009 and again in December of that year:
Numerous high-level officials and experts warn that the economic crisis could lead to unrest world-wide - even in developed countries:
- Today, Moody's warned that future tax rises and spending cuts could trigger social unrest in a range of countries from the developing to the developed world, that in the coming years, evidence of social unrest and public tension may become just as important signs of whether a country will be able to adapt as traditional economic metrics, that a fiscal crisis remains a possibility for a leading economy, and that 2010 would be a “tumultuous year for sovereign debt issuers”.
- The U.S. Army War College warned in 2008 November warned in a monograph [click on Policypointers’ pdf link to see the report] titled “Known Unknowns: Unconventional ‘Strategic Shocks’ in Defense Strategy Development” of crash-induced unrest:
The military must be prepared, the document warned, for a “violent, strategic dislocation inside the United States,” which could be provoked by “unforeseen economic collapse,” “purposeful domestic resistance,” “pervasive public health emergencies” or “loss of functioning political and legal order.” The “widespread civil violence,” the document said, “would force the defense establishment to reorient priorities in extremis to defend basic domestic order and human security.” “An American government and defense establishment lulled into complacency by a long-secure domestic order would be forced to rapidly divest some or most external security commitments in order to address rapidly expanding human insecurity at home,” it went on. “Under the most extreme circumstances, this might include use of military force against hostile groups inside the United States. Further, DoD [the Department of Defense] would be, by necessity, an essential enabling hub for the continuity of political authority in a multi-state or nationwide civil conflict or disturbance,” the document read.
- Director of National Intelligence Dennis C. Blair said:
"The global economic crisis ... already looms as the most serious one in decades, if not in centuries ... Economic crises increase the risk of regime-threatening instability if they are prolonged for a one- or two-year period," said Blair. "And instability can loosen the fragile hold that many developing countries have on law and order, which can spill out in dangerous ways into the international community."***
"Statistical modeling shows that economic crises increase the risk of regime-threatening instability if they persist over a one-to-two-year period."***
“The crisis has been ongoing for over a year, and economists are divided over whether and when we could hit bottom. Some even fear that the recession could further deepen and reach the level of the Great Depression. Of course, all of us recall the dramatic political consequences wrought by the economic turmoil of the 1920s and 1930s in Europe, the instability, and high levels of violent extremism.”
Blair made it clear that - while unrest was currently only happening in Europe - he was worried this could happen within the United States.
[See also this].
- Former national security director Zbigniew Brzezinski warned "there’s going to be growing conflict between the classes and if people are unemployed and really hurting, hell, there could be even riots."
- The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff warned the the financial crisis is the highest national security concern for the U.S., and warned that the fallout from the crisis could lead to of "greater instability".
Others warning of crash-induced unrest include:
- The head of the World Trade Organization
- The head of the International Monetary Fund (and see this)
- The head of the World Bank
- Senator Christopher Dodd
- Congressman Ron Paul (radio interview on March 6, 2009)
- Britian's MI5 security agency
- Leading economic historian Niall Ferguson
- Leading economist Marc Faber and billionaire investor Jim Rogers
- Leading economist Nouriel Roubini
- Leading economist John Williams
- Top trend researcher Gerald Calente
- European think tank Leap2020
Unemployment is soaring globally - especially among youth.
And the sense of outrage at the injustice of the rich getting richer while the poor get poorer is also a growing global trend.
Countries worldwide told their people that bailout out the giant banks was necessary to save the economy. But they haven't delivered, and the "Main Streets" of the world have suffered.
As former American senator (and consummate insider) Chris Dodd said in 2008:
If it turns out that [the banks] are hoarding, you’ll have a revolution on your hands. People will be so livid and furious that their tax money is going to line their pockets instead of doing the right thing. There will be hell to pay.
Of course, the big banks are hoarding, and refusing to lend to Main Street. In fact, they admitted back in 2008 that they would. And the same is playing out globally.
As I noted in February:
No wonder former U.S. National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski ... warned the Council on Foreign Relations that:
For the first time in human history almost all of humanity is politically activated, politically conscious and politically interactive. There are only a few pockets of humanity left in the remotest corners of the world that are not politically alert and engaged with the political turmoil and stirrings that are so widespread today around the world.
***
America needs to face squarely a centrally important new global reality: that the world's population is experiencing a political awakening unprecedented in scope and intensity, with the result that the politics of populism are transforming the politics of power. The need to respond to that massive phenomenon poses to the uniquely sovereign America an historic dilemma: What should be the central definition of America's global role?
[T]he central challenge of our time is posed not by global terrorism, but rather by the intensifying turbulence caused by the phenomenon of global political awakening. That awakening is socially massive and politically radicalizing.
It is no overstatement to assert that now in the 21st century the population of much of the developing world is politically stirring and in many places seething with unrest. It is a population acutely conscious of social injustice to an unprecedented degree, and often resentful of its perceived lack of political dignity. The nearly universal access to radio, television and increasingly the Internet is creating a community of shared perceptions and envy that can be galvanized and channeled by demagogic political or religious passions. These energies transcend sovereign borders and pose a challenge both to existing states as well as to the existing global hierarchy, on top of which America still perches.
***
That turmoil is the product of the political awakening, the fact that today vast masses of the world are not politically neutered, as they have been throughout history. They have political consciousness.
***
Politically awakened mankind craves political dignity, which democracy can enhance, but political dignity also encompasses ethnic or national self-determination, religious self-definition, and human and social rights, all in a world now acutely aware of economic, racial and ethnic inequities. The quest for political dignity, especially through national self-determination and social transformation, is part of the pulse of self-assertion by the world's underprivileged
***
We live in an age in which mankind writ large is becoming politically conscious and politically activated to an unprecedented degree, and it is this condition which is producing a great deal of international turmoil.
That turmoil is the product of the political awakening, the fact that today vast masses of the world are not politically neutered, as they have been throughout history. They have political consciousness.
Watch an excerpt:
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If the evil ruling cabal (that funds the elections) sees him as the one least likely to veer from status quo, then we will have Marco Rubio.
I don't know America well enough to say that it's a problem.
But it shocked me to see they where talking against americans. Something I've seen muslims do over here.
Don't get me wrong, the Latino's where very friendly to us.
But I don't like it when somebody talks this way. I makes me a bit paranoid :)
It is a problem being fomented by the Latino elites. They are stirring up shit just like Louis Farrakhan and Jesse Jackson do in the black community. La Raza, MeChA and other brown supremacy groups are a much bigger threat than most would admit. Many Latino immigrants and their children don't want to become Americans. The ones form Mexico are extremely anti-American and anti-Semetic. Take a look at the MeChA website. They are even more racist than Nazis except their skin is brown.
you should work for fox news and the intelligence services as a 'mole', who makes his report every night to 'mother'. Rupert needs you desperately right now. That way you'd get to see a lot of churches and mosques.
The truth is racist.
Actually, considering the rampant racism (I know, the banksters left the border open on purpose, destroyed Latin American societies on purpose) it's extremely well founded. see The New Slavery at Law Enforcement Against Prohibition's website.
The racist Jews?
It is not just about the amount of percieved inequality, but also the RATE at which that inequality accumulated.
If my family goes from a 6 bedroom McMansion to a 1 room appartment, the COMPARISION is what makes men break. And this is exactly what is happening NOW.
To fall so far so fast is a great motivator to do something. As people starve and watch their previously happy family suffer, there is an irresistable need to DO SOMETHING.
That's the key to the tipping point, Chuck. When things get worse faster than people are willing to lower their standards, things will happen -- bad things. There is no use comparing U. S. citizens and their many toys to totally destitute others in foreign lands. It is only a comparative degradation that unbalances the scales.
Halleluiah, someone on here has common sense and a little foresight! It is that fall where you can't get back up that is the breaker.
Halleluiah, someone on here has common sense and a little foresight! It is that fall where you can't get back up that is the breaker.
Man, let me tell you, if the millions of blacks knew that the bankster CIA are the drug cartels and the fedeal prison/plantation owners as well (and it's all there on the Internet and Eminem and MosDef sing about it) and prisons explode for lack of funny money funding.... ha! There will be bloody hell to pay!
Fuck yeah ! Kill the banksters and their drug trafiking pigs (dea,FBI,CIA, ATF, etc etc)!
Let th blood run red!!!!!!
you act as if blacks have critical thinking skills...if they were smart enough to figure this out, they wouldn't be hind tit in every society that they populate
Yeah Mos Def and Eminem are in the know all about the plots.
I'm expecting rioting just from the two lockouts. No football, no basketball! That should get the population restless. Now, just cut off unemployment insurance and food stamps and you have the perfect storm. No bread, no circuses.
You forgot Dances with the Stars. However, I see your point. No football, no basketball is going to give a lot of normally brain-dead people a lot of time on their hands, and they might just notice what the Hell is going on in the world.
Oh, and unemployment insurance IS being cut off. Food stamps are not nearly enough to replace them.
I'm forming a pet theory of something I've been observing. While we saw rioting in places like Greece or Spain, it's like we almost never see rioting for the same causes in any "anglo" country. Be it the US, UK, Australia, Canada or NZ. I may be wrong but there might be something there, something cultural, which makes them more tolerant to authority and less prone to rioting?
Apparently you were not around Chicago, St. Louis, Kansas City, L.A. to name a few cities in the late 60's. Milestones
So you didn't catch the footage of Bonnie Prince Charlie and Camilla getting roughed up a few months back as protestors went on the rampage in answer to the UK's "Austerity" budget ....
I'll grant that footage of what would pass for riots in the Anglo-American world is rare, but it is there ....
You have not been paying attention.
So you didn't catch the footage of Bonnie Prince Charlie and Camilla getting roughed up a few months back as protestors went on the rampage in answer to the UK's "Austerity" budget ....
I'll grant that footage of what would pass for riots in the Anglo-American world is rare, but it is there ....
You have not been paying attention.
It didn't used to be that way. A century or two ago people in anglo countries rioted as much as anyone else. Not sure what changed.
4O years ago Americans rioted as much as anyone else. What the hell happened.
They are all in the government, unions and education now and are running the country into the ground.
Those riots were all contrived by the Rockefellers, just like the ones in MENA.
major sports on TV and maybe major porn on internet. But then, I'm no specialist on either.
well duh
Only after Wall Street has collected TRILLIONS of Dollars (that they have done nothing with except give themselves HUGE bonuses). NOW is the time for “We the People” to implement Forced Austerity on themselves! LULZ!! Don’t raise the debt ceiling!! Its what’s good for America!
one way or another..
"We the Sheepeople" will be Fucked! Over!!
Uncle Sam is Broke.. because..
Uncle Sam Taxed the shit out of the middle..
Uncle Sam gave Tax Breaks and Subsidies to his Corporate Lobby Dollar Wielding Friends..
Those Corporations moved 6 Million Manufacturing Jobs to China over the last 10 years.. (really 11 now)
and those Corporations were paid by the "We the People's" Tax dollars to undermine / gut America's Manufacturing and Tax Base.
We gave away our tax base.. One better! We PAID Corporations to Undermine Our Tax Base and Our Manufacturing Base!
The Lobby Whores!
Were paid Lobby Dollars!
To Provide Tax Breaks and Subsidies! That DESTROYED! America's Manufacturing Base.. Which as well undermined America's Tax Base!
50,000 Manufacturing Jobs a MONTH!
Were shipped Off Shore!
For Tax Breaks and Subsidies that "We the People" paid for! (plus cheap Chinese Labor)
Government Paid Corporations "We the People's" Tax Dollars.. to DESTROY America's Manufacturing Sector and Tax Base that those jobs equated too.
what is 6 million people paying taxes worth.. not the top 1% who pay NOTHING! but the middle manufacturing jobs.. $50k to $100k average for the last decade?
25%? on $100k ='s $25k X's 6m ='s $1,500,000,000,000 (Social Security is passed straight thru, IOU my ass)
That is nothing to sneeze at.
Now multiple that $1.5 Trillion times 10 years.. we are down $1.5 Trillion in Tax Revenue per year! for those Manufacturing Jobs.. and over ten years (it’s really 11 years now, so even more) it would be $15 Trillion..
**************$15 Trillion Fucking Dollars!***************
In Tax revenue GONE to China! And “We the People” paid for it! Who Voted for that shit? Who among you voted to Gut America’s manufacturing sector?
Who among you voted to undermine America’s Tax Base? WHO?????
So the same amount of money we paid to move off shore is what we as a Country owe..
FUCK ALL OF YOU THAT DO NOT SPREAD THIS INFORMATION TO EVERYONE YOU KNOW!!!
***** “Over the last ten years, China has mounted the biggest challenge to the U.S. manufacturing sector ever seen, threatening producers of steel, chemicals, glass, paper, drugs and any number of other items with prices they cannot match. Not coincidentally, the United States has lost an average of 50,000 manufacturing jobs every month during the same period.” *****
http://blogs.forbes.com/beltway/2011/02/14/intelligence-community-fears-u-s-manufacturing-decline/
That is the 50,000 jobs a month.. equaling 6m jobs +++ becuae it has been 11 years now!!
http://www.banktech.com/articles/229700093?cid=nl_bnk_daily
Top U.S. Lobbying Banks Got Biggest Bailouts
1. [PDF]
A Fistful of Dollars:Lobbying and the Financial Crisis; Financial ...
File Format: PDF/Adobe Acrobat - View as HTML
A Fistful of Dollars: Lobbying and the Financial Crisis by. Deniz Igan ...
www.imf.org/external/np/res/seminars/2009/arc/pdf/Mishra1.pdf
that is the lobby dollars! what else do you need to see? to wake the fuck up? let me know! and I will make it dumb enough for you to understand!
http://www.treasurydirect.gov/NP/BPDLogin?application=np
and that is what we owe as a Country.
Bush signing the World Trade Organization Docs to Ship Jobs Off Shore!!
[PDF]
WORLD TRADE ORGANIZATION & REGIONAL TRADE AGREEMENTS
www.jetro.go.jp/theme/wto-fta/news/pdf/W_CMonthlyReport-July.pdf
You +1'd this publicly. Undo
File Format: PDF/Adobe Acrobat - Quick View
Mexico Threatens First Complaint Against China at the WTO on Investment ... President Bush signed into law the Farm Security and Rural Investment Act of ...
A really great rant!! I can dig it; and right on the button. Rates a 10. Milestones
what is 6 million people paying taxes worth.. not the top 1% who pay NOTHING! but the middle manufacturing jobs.. $50k to $100k average for the last decade?
25%? on $100k ='s $25k X's 6m ='s $1,500,000,000,000 (Social Security is passed straight thru, IOU my ass)
That is nothing to sneeze at.
Now multiple that $1.5 Trillion times 10 years.. we are down $1.5 Trillion in Tax Revenue per year! for those Manufacturing Jobs.. and over ten years (it’s really 11 years now, so even more) it would be $15 Trillion.
First, I wonder if you see the irony in the phrase "tax revenues."
Second, this simplistic little analysis misses the biggest point of them all - that irrespective of the level of tax "revenues," they are feeding an insatiable and corrupt pig. The U.S. didn't start running $1.5T annual deficits until it was collecting $2.2T in taxes. In 1976, the U.S. ran a budget deficit of $74B...on tax receipts of $269B.
Ya can't solve a gambler's problem by giving him more money.
Yes. Now that "We the People" have Voted to back stop all of the Trillions Sitting on the sidelines on Wall Street.. lets stop spending and fuck over the middle! Good Plan! so we will be sticking with the same ole', same ole' then?
No worries! we can just squeeze the poor people until they demand more money for Wall Street! I mean themselves! but you know how that goes! whoopsie!!
and to be clear! I am for! Forced Austerity! either the "We the People" will wake up or not.. but either way I can plan my next 10 years around it!
Methinks you have an exclamation point fetish this eve, JW.
If the trillion$ sitting on the sidelines are cut loose to the masses, we'll have $25/gallon gasoline. There is no free lunch.
The Price of Gasoline is going to $10 bucks whether or not anyone likes it, sooner than later.
I am not looking for Wall Street to put money to work 24 months + Later..
Now go fucking hang your offspring and yourself, so that the World doesnt have to suffer your brand of spin any longer.. or continue to take up space, God willing someone will find you out for who you are and dispatch you to a much calmer place.
I see I'm in your head. Maybe I'll just stay there for a while...maybe play some pong.
You forgot to include the wars.
Great cover for the rape.
Now we have the headwinds of resource depletion, higher costs, but human inadequacy versus machines.
Solyent Green.
The guvment owned by a few. And a competely whacky fight mob who are picking the wrong targets.
+1776
'Saving the children' again. 200+ years into the future...re-set and re-peat again. We are about to be re-duced to 'sheeps' again.
Thanks for sharing.
I can't understand why a Somali living on $1 a day would resent a Wall Street Bank CEO who will take yet another quarterly $15 Million Bonus?
Odd.
So let's go with this. How many options might there be to support/assist the Somali that don't involve a tax transfer from the Wall Street Bank CEO?
In other words, ignore the CEO and focus on the actual problem. If we can do something to help the Somali, why should we care if it is neutral or even beneficial to the CEO?
It is not "neutral" or "balanced" when a handful of favored banks are getting free money from the Fed Discount window at taxpayer's expense.
Understood. But why focus on that trap, when there may be much that can be done for the real problem facing the Somali? I'm not suggesting to do a jig for the CEO, just that they are two separate issues that are habitually meshed together. That's all.
Hey George, I think you're falling for a bit of bankster Kool-Aid.
It's not a matter of taxing the rich. I believe a case can be made that globalization and offshoring were not legit economics but criminal gutting of the middle class engine. What's more, I can prove that they knew exactly what they (the banksters) were doing and covered it up with their fake Fed funny money.
So it's not taxation but confiscation of fascist, treasonous wealth.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ct9xzXUQLuY&feature=related
Jay Rockefeller: Internet should have never existed
Investors are hoarding gold and cash as a perfect storm brews in global equities and credit markets.
Volatile equity markets coupled with the growing risk of sovereign bond default are sparking a rush to defensive assets, fund managers and investment strategists said, with little sign of sanctuary seen in any major global economy.
http://www.advancedtrading.com/articles/231002079?cid=nl_at_daily
That giving up of the levers of power and control is working for shit in South Africa. Have a Boer friend who was here on h1b and he talked about how things were tanking.
google up some "rape gates" and check out how they're fortifying homes there now. FerFal has made mention of them too on his blog.
point is, anytime power is given to the uncivilized, you get some very uncivil results. Junk away leftist bitches.
whites are fleeing because there is no longer any rule of law.
See Deathofjohannesburg blog...along with many others.
Hell, see thugreport for the face of crime here. Fuckin Cops producers admit that they have to grossly STILT their coverage so as to make it appear that the majority population in the US commits more crimes than they really do. Watch First 48 if you want to see reality. That show doesn't stilt.
Latest data from NYC shows blacks and hispanics commit 90% of the murders and 97% of the shootings. WTF. You want this diversity, bitchez, you can HAVE IT.
And what percent of the "white" collar crimes? How many crime victims do those have
Not sure why a leftist would junk that comment.
okay, I'll cede you that one. I typed in haste, and correlated leftist with political correctness.
junk away, politically correct "i'd like to buy the world a coke because we're all equal" bitches.
it beats the hell out of staying home.
Now we just have to whip the youth up into tearing down the establishment versus generational bashing or race baiting or chasing the red herring of political parties being a solution rather than part of the problem.
The structure has to be torn down; the judiciary, the legislative branch, the executive branch. They need to be gutted, the lawyers disbarred, the usurers and money changers tables overthrown, debt jubilee, and reinstatement of the Constitution.
A tall order for angry mobs but we are past the point where working within our corrupt and completely broken system of government will accomplish anything other than more slavery to corporations, politicians, and mammon lusting elites.
I see evil in the corridors of power, in Washington, in Wall Street - unfettered evil that needs to be rooted out.