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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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the minotaur's maze...go kill the minotaur Theseus.
and then we are still in the maze, what then?
Find Ariadne and her thread to get out....like Theseus...
+1 well said
Millions of gang members who can't be controlled now, let alone during a crisis
Millions of hardened criminals who will be released from prison because we can't afford to hold them anymore
Millions of law enforecement who will be cut from payrolls
Millions of young and impressionable people without jobs just waiting for someone with charisma to tell them to pick up a rock
Millions of former middle class with no home, no job, and no prospects, sitting around all day because they have given up and watching bankers making record bonuses and getting bail outs.
Welcome to SR2 (Summer of Recovery II). Hey, what could happen?
Wow!! Thats a lot of millions. Glad you have such a good grip on this population thing. Milestones
good, then we will be stacking these mfers DEEP
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_registered_firearms_are_in_the_US
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_guns_are_non_registered_in_the_U.S
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/02/AR2009110202712.html
Gun owners have bought about 12 billion rounds of ammunition in the past year, industry officials estimate. That's up from 7 billion to 10 billion in a normal year.
and you think that they will be throwing rocks?
are you familiar with "Population Control"?
Like why would the Government want to get U.S. Citizens up in arms? why would the Government hand out Trillions in Bonus monies to Bankers but then openly and on T.V. take food out of Grandma's mouth?
watch this stuff...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O5Xe_ATNWQQ
Al Bartlett on energy consumption versus population
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ClqUcScwnn8
David Rockefeller speaks about population control.
Obama's Science Czar..
http://www.google.com/#sclient=psy&hl=en&source=hp&q=obama+science+czar+population+control&aq=1&aqi=g2g-v2g-sv1&aql=&oq=obama+science+czar&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.&fp=71c6c4af87148765&biw=1266&bih=575
http://vimeo.com/6475921 Control in Modern Times! Easier to Kill a Million People than Control a Million People in these modern politically awaken times. Revolution will come, will you be a spectator or will you help change your own future.. your children’s future, for the better?
So.. Pissing off "We the People" and having a HUGE Military who is trained in house to house / urban warfare.. looks like there are to many of us dont it?
Well, Iraq makes sense then - perfecting the urban warfare before the big bleed out.
now you're getting the drift
http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/video/video.php?v=181594775238193&oid=145097112198751&comments
you should see the Taliban Murdering Police Men in Pakistan.. firing squad.. I just said it is a firing squad so those that are sensitive should NOT! WATCH THIS VIDEO!
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/189841.html
Afghan policemen poisoned, killed Someone explain to me how Gay Day in Pakistan was worth it? I dont care what people do in their own home.. but getting these idiots riding around looking for trouble is NOT! worth some fags ego being bruised.the social fibre comes back to the US of A...or is it just a pipe dream in the land of the remorseless oligarchs?
BTW I published my first book here : http://www2.xlibris.com/books/webimages/wd/uk/301941
If you like a historical novel and rant...read it.
Careful George you just moved up a few spots on "the list".
Fuckin' commie.
Grow a set of balls and go steal it yourself.
Or is it that you just want to see them destroyed?
Envious little wimp, aren't you?
I'm sorry school didn't go well. It's probably the "commie's" fault
Oh, yeah. It's all envy. Because we ALL KNOW that all the rich people on Wall Street "earned" their wealth with "hard work".
Yep, and not in the to far in the future
Thanks
Thank You George!
as always FaceBooked and Tweeted! may the People Educate Themselves! forthe betterment of ALL of Mankind (forget those crazy bitches! we need to take away their voting rights!)
GW - Wow you can run with a premise as long and fast as anyone.
You lost me (and your argument) in the 2nd semntence where you compared the asset holders in RSA having to "give over" a portion of their assets to the "majority".
That is not likely to happen in the US as the majority have "the assets" and will likely look to cut the Gov't spending to the generational takers. Of course there will be violence...
Princess Irulan: A beginning is a very delicate time. Know then, that is is the year 10191. The known universe is ruled by the Padishah Emperor Shaddam the Fourth, my father. In this time, the most precious substance in the universe is the spice Melange. The spice extends life. The spice expands consciousness. The spice is vital to space travel. The Spacing Guild and its navigators, who the spice has mutated over 4000 years, use the orange spice gas, which gives them the ability to fold space. That is, travel to any part of the universe without moving. Oh, yes. I forgot to tell you. The spice exists on only one planet in the entire universe. A desolate, dry planet with vast deserts. Hidden away within the rocks of these deserts are a people known as the Fremen, who have long held a prophecy that a man would come, a messiah, who would lead them to true freedom. The planet is Arrakis, also known as Dune.
Princess Irulan: A beginning is a very delicate time. Know then, that is is the year 10191. The known universe is ruled by the Padishah Emperor Shaddam the Fourth, my father. In this time, the most precious substance in the universe is the spice Melange. The spice extends life. The spice expands consciousness. The spice is vital to space travel. The Spacing Guild and its navigators, who the spice has mutated over 4000 years, use the orange spice gas, which gives them the ability to fold space. That is, travel to any part of the universe without moving. Oh, yes. I forgot to tell you. The spice exists on only one planet in the entire universe. A desolate, dry planet with vast deserts. Hidden away within the rocks of these deserts are a people known as the Fremen, who have long held a prophecy that a man would come, a messiah, who would lead them to true freedom. The planet is Arrakis, also known as Dune.
sounds like it is missing a 'c'...dune becomes dunce...but the hat fits all the same.
Liberals do tend to be very hateful when you listen to them (hoping Chris Christie has heart attack, throwing shoes and pie tins at politicians, shouting people down, Bush in crosshairs, wishing Walker dead, ad nauseum) so when the talk turns to action......could be pretty ugly.
"Liberals" are much less likely to own firearms than "conservatives".
No doubt about it, "Liberals" are the most hate-filled. In the Bush I and II years, I applauded their criticisms of the religious, warmongering right. It was only since the age of Obama dawned that these people truly unveiled themselves as smug, snobbish fools, sneering about 'Teabaggers' and fawning over Obama, right or wrong. Perfect stooges.
Your argument loses credibility when you base the argument on the dichotomy of the two-party dialectic.
100% correct Dex. Let them junk you....when it comes down the left wing facsits will be in for a long decade.
Liberals are very hateful when you listen to them on Faux News.
Today's crop of right wingers are calm and reasonable when your listen to them on Faux News.
When talk turns to flying planes into government offices, executing opponents, blasting kids in school yards, terrorist threats, religious persecution and sedition I'm sure you will be shocked and tune in to Faux News to sort it all out.
Oh, yeah. Because conservatives never do those types of things. Riiiight.
Well, they tend to get blamed for a lot, like that congresswoman shot in Arizona, but all the hateful rhetoric and some actions like vandalism and such really do seem to come from the left side. And, I've watched maybe 1 hour of Fox News channel in my life, so my views are not coming from that propaganda machine.......can you say the same?
Another day, again propaganda.
This issue is classical in the expansion scheme. The solution is known:
export people.
A new wave of colonization is about to be triggered. People from the middle class are going to be pushed outside of the west to flood other countries.
This is how it will be solved.
Logistics, logistics... It's far easier to nuke a Western European/US city in a false flag op and then invade Iran, triggering a World War in the Middle East. Then, you just ship your Middle Class there to fight the good fight - worked last time, both times, back in the 20th century.
As for local populace in the West rising up in a glorious, virtuos revolution... LOL!
Perhaps, but wars are expensive. Printing up enough money for a World War means serious inflation. It might be more trouble than it is worth, even to a sociopath ruler.
since when they worried about money before going to war...When in/after, they 'developed' resources; 'borrowed' with empty promises; and 'installed' 'democracy' to effect 101% control.
That is the 'history' written by victors.
There are no losers, only controlled sheeples.
Thanks for sharing.
I keep saying it "Rioting is a job American's don't want to do." I hope someday that I will be proven wrong
We'll have to let the immigrants do our rioting for us, like our gardening....... :-)
As someone who lives in a relatively poor country, I sometimes laugh at the notion that rising wealth inequality in the US is on the verge of erupting into violence.
Let me assure you. It can get *significantly* worse and there still won't be any "revolutions".
Those of you clinging to the hope that there is a natural 'self-correcting' aspect to wealth inequality, should be prepared to wait decades for said inequality to reach levels which are unimaginable by most Americans. If you think you have wealth inequality in the USA, you ain't seen nothing yet.
Let me assure you. It can get *significantly* worse and there still won't be any "revolutions".
Not sure about that. Yes it can get significantly worse. But people react on the margin, not on the absolute. Any denegration - perceived or otherwise - to status can trigger some pretty acute reactions. Just look at the near-violence in Wisconsin over what amounts to nothing in the scale of poverty.
Those people were born into poverty and see nothing but poverty all their lives. To them, poverty is normal. Now you take 100 million middle class with guns and take everything away from them and see what happens.
What happens? I'll tell you: MILLIONS of Americans are going to die over the next 10 years. That's why I left. I just wish I didn't have this feeling that you had it coming to you. Flame away!
Weak people like you are like a 5 amp fuse in a 10 amp circuit.
Sorry, it's a rational calculation. America doesn't have the collective will or intelligence to save itself from disaster. Please, PLEASE, prove me wrong!
You are wrong about the will and intelligence. There are a lot of ignorant people in the US who are being taken advantage of. The information as to the true nature of the power play that kicked into high gear on 9 eleven is making its way out--but very slowly. Once people realize that they are being lied to once, it brings everything into question and scrutiny. Will the truth of things like the real nature of 9 eleven and the financial crises ever hit the main stream? Who knows for sure--but while I'm here I will keep it alive and you should also not lose all hope, there is still an outside shot for the US.
"So what is poverty? In America, poverty seldom means doing without.
A new Heritage Foundation study reminds us that America’s “poor” maintain a standard of living much of the world would envy. Typically, “poor” Americans have more living space than the average European. Plus air conditioning, cable TV, and computer games. They are well-fed, and report they are not hungry.
They usually have a refrigerator, stove plus microwave, washer and dryer, dishwasher, and cell phone. That’s the case in most households that our government defines as “in poverty.”
Most of America’s “poor” own a car. A third have two cars. And 43 percent own their homes."
http://www.newsmax.com/ErnestIstook/poverty-HeritageFoundation-stimulus-...
Time to end the inequality.
Tax the poor.
At the same time, there are millions of hungry kids in this country. I'd be suprised if any American on this board even knows any "poor" people.
don't get in the way of GW's bitching. Inequality doesn't cause depressions anyway and RSA didn't hand over power to prevent violence. The apartheid regime could have lasted forever because the average 70 IQ proles can't run the fucking country NOW much less have wrested it away from people one sigma to the right of their mean. Apartheid ended as a result of western pressure, the same as in Rhodesia. And the majority promptly have assfucked both countries on their way to complete collapse
Yes if we just reimpose apartheid everywhere our economic problems will be solved. The most amazing thing is how those people of another color and iq managed to reach all the way across the ocean to collapse us
Bullshit.
Most of the poor are taxed, and hard as it is for most folks to understand/believe, at a higher combined rate for all taxes as Warren Buffet.
Poverty is not penury; but yes, it is relative.
A mekmber of one of Panama's wealthiest told me sevewral decade ago that the problem with poverty in Panama was that nobody starved or froze to death so the uber-rich felt no sense of shame or obligation.
Hey let's not let facts get in the way of a good liberal bitchfest.
We'll pay for the 'poor's' food and they can buy 20 inch rims, cell pones and flat screens.