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(Another) Idiot Economist Says We Need "Major War" to Save the Economy

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Preface: Two weeks ago, well-known economist Tyler Cowen (a professor at George Mason University) argued in the New York Times that wars – especially “major wars” -  are good for the economy.

Cowen joins extremely influential economists like Paul Krugman and Martin Feldstein – and various talking heads – in promoting this idea.

Also, many congressmen assume that cutting pork-barrel military spending would hurt their constituents’ jobs.

It is vital for policy-makers, economists and the public to have access to a definitive analysis to determine once and for all whether war is good or bad for the economy.

That analysis is below.

Top Economists Say War Is Bad for the Economy

Nobel-prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz says that war is bad for the economy:

Stiglitz wrote in 2003:

War is widely thought to be linked to economic good times. The second world war is often said to have brought the world out of depression, and war has since enhanced its reputation as a spur to economic growth. Some even suggest that capitalism needs wars, that without them, recession would always lurk on the horizon. Today, we know that this is nonsense. The 1990s boom showed that peace is economically far better than war. The Gulf war of 1991 demonstrated that wars can actually be bad for an economy.

Stiglitz has also said that this decade’s Iraq war has been very bad for the economy. See this, this and this.

Former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan also said in that war is bad for the economy. In 1991, Greenspan said that a prolonged conflict in the Middle East would hurt the economy. And he made this point again in 1999:

Societies need to buy as much military insurance as they need, but to spend more than that is to squander money that could go toward improving the productivity of the economy as a whole: with more efficient transportation systems, a better educated citizenry, and so on. This is the point that retiring Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) learned back in 1999 in a House Banking Committee hearing with then-Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan. Frank asked what factors were producing our then-strong economic performance. On Greenspan’s list: “The freeing up of resources previously employed to produce military products that was brought about by the end of the Cold War.” Are you saying, Frank asked, “that dollar for dollar, military products are there as insurance … and to the extent you could put those dollars into other areas, maybe education and job trainings, maybe into transportation … that is going to have a good economic effect?” Greenspan agreed.

Economist Dean Baker notes:

It is often believed that wars and military spending increases are good for the economy. In fact, most economic models show that military spending diverts resources from productive uses, such as consumption and investment, and ultimately slows economic growth and reduces employment.

Professor Emeritus of International Relations at the American University Joshua Goldstein notes:

Recurring war has drained wealth, disrupted markets, and depressed economic growth.

 

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War generally impedes economic development and undermines prosperity.

And David R. Henderson – associate professor of economics at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California and previously a senior economist with President Reagan’s Council of Economic Advisers – writes:

Is military conflict really good for the economy of the country that engages in it? Basic economics answers a resounding “no.”

The Proof Is In the Pudding

Mike Lofgren notes:

Military spending may at one time have been a genuine job creator when weapons were compatible with converted civilian production lines, but the days of Rosie the Riveter are long gone. [Indeed, WWII was different from current wars in many ways, and so its economic effects are not comparable to those of today's wars.] Most weapons projects now require relatively little touch labor. Instead, a disproportionate share is siphoned into high-cost R&D (from which the civilian economy benefits little), exorbitant management expenditures, high overhead, and out-and-out padding, including money that flows back into political campaigns. A dollar appropriated for highway construction, health care, or education will likely create more jobs than a dollar for Pentagon weapons procurement.

 

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During the decade of the 2000s, DOD budgets, including funds spent on the war, doubled in our nation’s longest sustained post-World War II defense increase. Yet during the same decade, jobs were created at the slowest rate since the Hoover administration. If defense helped the economy, it is not evident. And just the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan added over $1.4 trillion to deficits, according to the Congressional Research Service. Whether the wars were “worth it” or merely stirred up a hornet’s nest abroad is a policy discussion for another time; what is clear is that whether you are a Keynesian or a deficit hawk, war and associated military spending are no economic panacea.

The Washington Post noted in 2008:

A recent paper from the National Bureau of Economic Research concludes that countries with high military expenditures during World War II showed strong economic growth following the war, but says this growth can be credited more to population growth than war spending. The paper finds that war spending had only minimal effects on per-capita economic activity.

 

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A historical survey of the U.S. economy from the U.S. State Department reports the Vietnam War had a mixed economic impact. The first Gulf War typically meets criticism for having pushed the United States toward a 1991 recession.

The Institute for Economics & Peace (IEP) shows that any boost from war is temporary at best. For example, while WWII provided a temporary bump in GDP, GDP then fell back to the baseline trend. After the Korean War, GDP fell below the baseline trend:

IEP notes:

By examining the state of the economy at each of the major conflict periods since World War II, it can be seen that the positive effects of increased military spending were outweighed by longer term unintended negative macroeconomic consequences. While the stimulatory effect of military outlays is evidently associated with boosts in economic growth, adverse effects show up either immediately or soon after, through higher inflation, budget deficits, high taxes and reductions in consumption or investment. Rectifying these effects has required subsequent painful adjustments which are neither efficient nor desirable. When an economy has excess capacity and unemployment, it is possible that increasing military spending can provide an important stimulus. However, if there are budget constraints, as there are in the U.S. currently, then excessive military spending can displace more productive non-military outlays in other areas such as investments in high-tech industries, education, or infrastructure. The crowding-out effects of disproportionate government spending on military functions can affect service delivery or infrastructure development, ultimately affecting long-term growth rates.

 

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Analysis of the macroeconomic components of GDP during World War II and in subsequent conflicts show heightened military spending had several adverse macroeconomic effects. These occurred as a direct consequence of the funding requirements of increased military spending. The U.S. has paid for its wars either through debt (World War II, Cold War, Afghanistan/Iraq), taxation (Korean War) or inflation (Vietnam). In each case, taxpayers have been burdened, and private sector consumption and investment have been constrained as a result. Other negative effects include larger budget deficits, higher taxes, and growth above trend leading to inflation pressure. These effects can run concurrent with major conflict or via lagging effects into the future. Regardless of the way a war is financed, the overall macroeconomic effect on the economy tends to be negative. For each of the periods after World War II, we need to ask, what would have happened in economic terms if these wars did not happen? On the specific evidence provided, it can be reasonably said, it is likely taxes would have been lower, inflation would have been lower, there would have been higher consumption and investment and certainly lower budget deficits. Some wars are necessary to fight and the negative effects of not fighting these wars can far outweigh the costs of fighting. However if there are other options, then it is prudent to exhaust them first as once wars do start, the outcome, duration and economic consequences are difficult to predict.

We noted in 2011:

This is a no-brainer, if you think about it. We’ve been in Afghanistan for almost twice as long as World War II. We’ve been in Iraq for years longer than WWII. We’ve been involved in 7 or 8 wars in the last decade. And yet [the economy is still unstable]. If wars really helped the economy, don’t you think things would have improved by now? Indeed, the Iraq war alone could end up costing more than World War II. And given the other wars we’ve been involved in this decade, I believe that the total price tag for the so-called “War on Terror” will definitely support that of the “Greatest War”.

Let’s look at the adverse effects of war in more detail …

War Spending Diverts Stimulus Away from the Real Civilian Economy

IEP notes that – even though the government spending soared – consumption and investment were flat during the Vietnam war:

The New Republic noted in 2009:

Conservative Harvard economist Robert Barro has argued that increased military spending during WWII actually depressed other parts of the economy.

(New Republic also points out that conservative economist Robert Higgs and liberal economists Larry Summers and Brad Delong have all shown that any stimulation to the economy from World War II has been greatly exaggerated.)

How could war actually hurt the economy, when so many say that it stimulates the economy?

Because of what economists call the “broken window fallacy”.

Specifically, if a window in a store is broken, it means that the window-maker gets paid to make a new window, and he, in turn, has money to pay others. However, economists long ago showed that – if the window hadn’t been broken – the shop-owner would have spent that money on other things, such as food, clothing, health care, consumer electronics or recreation, which would have helped the economy as much or more.

If the shop-owner hadn’t had to replace his window, he might have taken his family out to dinner, which would have circulated more money to the restaurant, and from there to other sectors of the economy. Similarly, the money spent on the war effort is money that cannot be spent on other sectors of the economy. Indeed, all of the military spending has just created military jobs, at the expense of the civilian economy.

Professor Henderson writes:

Money not spent on the military could be spent elsewhere.This also applies to human resources. The more than 200,000 U.S. military personnel in Iraq and Afghanistan could be doing something valuable at home.

 

Why is this hard to understand? The first reason is a point 19th-century French economic journalist Frederic Bastiat made in his essay, “What Is Seen and What Is Not Seen.” Everyone can see that soldiers are employed. But we cannot see the jobs and the other creative pursuits they could be engaged in were they not in the military.

 

The second reason is that when economic times are tough and unemployment is high, it’s easy to assume that other jobs could not exist. But they can. This gets to an argument Bastiat made in discussing demobilization of French soldiers after Napoleon’s downfall. He pointed out that when government cuts the size of the military, it frees up not only manpower but also money. The money that would have gone to pay soldiers can instead be used to hire them as civilian workers. That can happen in three ways, either individually or in combination: (1) a tax cut; (2) a reduction in the deficit; or (3) an increase in other government spending.

 

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Most people still believe that World War II ended the Great Depression …. But look deeper.

 

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The government-spending component of GNP went for guns, trucks, airplanes, tanks, gasoline, ships, uniforms, parachutes, and labor. What do these things have in common? Almost all of them were destroyed. Not just these goods but also the military’s billions of labor hours were used up without creating value to consumers. Much of the capital and labor used to make the hundreds of thousands of trucks and jeeps and the tens of thousands of tanks and airplanes would otherwise have been producing cars and trucks for the domestic economy. The assembly lines in Detroit, which had churned out 3.6 million cars in 1941, were retooled to produce the vehicles of war. From late 1942 to 1945, production of civilian cars was essentially shut down.

 

And that’s just one example. Women went without nylon stockings so that factories could produce parachutes. Civilians faced tight rationing of gasoline so that U.S. bombers could fly over Germany. People went without meat so that U.S. soldiers could be fed. And so on.

 

These resources helped win the war—no small issue. But the war was not a stimulus program, either in its intentions or in its effects, and it was not necessary for pulling the U.S. out of the Great Depression. Had World War II never taken place, millions of cars would have been produced; people would have been able to travel much more widely; and there would have been no rationing. In short, by the standard measures, Americans would have been much more prosperous.

 

Today, the vast majority of us are richer than even the most affluent people back then. But despite this prosperity, one thing has not changed: war is bad for our economy. The $150 billion that the government spends annually on wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (and, increasingly, Pakistan) could instead be used to cut taxes or cut the deficit. By ending its ongoing warsthe U.S. governmentwould be developing a more prosperous economy.

Austrian economist Ludwig Von Mises points:

That is the essence of so-called war prosperity; it enriches some by what it takes from others. It is not rising wealth but a shifting of wealth and income.

We noted in 2010:

You know about America’s unemployment problem. You may have even heard that the U.S. may very well have suffered a permanent destruction of jobs.

 

But did you know that the defense employment sector is booming?

 

[P]ublic sector spending – and mainly defense spending – has accounted for virtually all of the new job creation in the past 10 years:

The U.S. has largely been financing job creation for ten years. Specifically, as the chief economist for BusinessWeek, Michael Mandel, points out, public spending has accounted for virtually all new job creation in the past 1o years:

Private sector job growth was almost non-existent over the past ten years. Take a look at this horrifying chart:

 

longjobs1 The Military Industrial Complex is Ruining the Economy

 

Between May 1999 and May 2009, employment in the private sector sector only rose by 1.1%, by far the lowest 10-year increase in the post-depression period.

 

It’s impossible to overstate how bad this is. Basically speaking, the private sector job machine has almost completely stalled over the past ten years. Take a look at this chart:

 

longjobs2 The Military Industrial Complex is Ruining the Economy

 

Over the past 10 years, the private sector has generated roughly 1.1 million additional jobs, or about 100K per year. The public sector created about 2.4 million jobs.

 

But even that gives the private sector too much credit. Remember that the private sector includes health care, social assistance, and education, all areas which receive a lot of government support.

 

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Most of the industries which had positive job growth over the past ten years were in the HealthEdGov sector. In fact, financial job growth was nearly nonexistent once we take out the health insurers.

Let me finish with a final chart.

 

longjobs4 The Military Industrial Complex is Ruining the Economy

 

Without a decade of growing government support from rising health and education spending and soaring budget deficits, the labor market would have been flat on its back. [120]

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So most of the job creation has been by the public sector. But because the job creation has been financed with loans from China and private banks, trillions in unnecessary interest charges have been incurred by the U.S.

And this shows military versus non-military durable goods shipments: us collapse 18 11 The Military Industrial Complex is Ruining the Economy [Click here to view full image.]

 

So we’re running up our debt (which will eventually decrease economic growth), but the only jobs we’re creating are military and other public sector jobs.

 

PhD economist Dean Baker points out that America’s massive military spending on unnecessary and unpopular wars lowers economic growth and increases unemployment:

Defense spending means that the government is pulling away resources from the uses determined by the market and instead using them to buy weapons and supplies and to pay for soldiers and other military personnel. In standard economic models, defense spending is a direct drain on the economy, reducing efficiency, slowing growth and costing jobs.

A few years ago, the Center for Economic and Policy Research commissioned Global Insight, one of the leading economic modeling firms, to project the impact of a sustained increase in defense spending equal to 1.0 percentage point of GDP. This was roughly equal to the cost of the Iraq War.

 

Global Insight’s model projected that after 20 years the economy would be about 0.6 percentage points smaller as a result of the additional defense spending. Slower growth would imply a loss of almost 700,000 jobs compared to a situation in which defense spending had not been increased. Construction and manufacturing were especially big job losers in the projections, losing 210,000 and 90,000 jobs, respectively.

 

The scenario we asked Global Insight [recognized as the most consistently accurate forecasting company in the world] to model turned out to have vastly underestimated the increase in defense spending associated with current policy. In the most recent quarter, defense spending was equal to 5.6 percent of GDP. By comparison, before the September 11th attacks, the Congressional Budget Office projected that defense spending in 2009 would be equal to just 2.4 percent of GDP. Our post-September 11th build-up was equal to 3.2 percentage points of GDP compared to the pre-attack baseline. This means that the Global Insight projections of job loss are far too low…

 

The projected job loss from this increase in defense spending would be close to 2 million. In other words, the standard economic models that project job loss from efforts to stem global warming also project that the increase in defense spending since 2000 will cost the economy close to 2 million jobs in the long run.

The Political Economy Research Institute at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst has also shown that non-military spending creates more jobs than military spending.

High Military Spending Drains Innovation, Investment and Manufacturing Strength from the Civilian Economy

Chalmers Johnson notes that high military spending diverts innovation and manufacturing capacity from the economy:

By the 1960s it was becoming apparent that turning over the nation’s largest manufacturing enterprises to the Department of Defense and producing goods without any investment or consumption value was starting to crowd out civilian economic activities. The historian Thomas E Woods Jr observes that, during the 1950s and 1960s, between one-third and two-thirds of all US research talent was siphoned off into the military sector. It is, of course, impossible to know what innovations never appeared as a result of this diversion of resources and brainpower into the service of the military, but it was during the 1960s that we first began to notice Japan was outpacing us in the design and quality of a range of consumer goods, including household electronics and automobiles.

 

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Woods writes: “According to the US Department of Defense, during the four decades from 1947 through 1987 it used (in 1982 dollars) $7.62 trillion in capital resources. In 1985, the Department of Commerce estimated the value of the nation’s plant and equipment, and infrastructure, at just over $7.29 trillion… The amount spent over that period could have doubled the American capital stock or modernized and replaced its existing stock”.

 

The fact that we did not modernise or replace our capital assets is one of the main reasons why, by the turn of the 21st century, our manufacturing base had all but evaporated. Machine tools, an industry on which Melman was an authority, are a particularly important symptom. In November 1968, a five-year inventory disclosed “that 64% of the metalworking machine tools used in US industry were 10 years old or older. The age of this industrial equipment (drills, lathes, etc.) marks the United States’ machine tool stock as the oldest among all major industrial nations, and it marks the continuation of a deterioration process that began with the end of the second world war. This deterioration at the base of the industrial system certifies to the continuous debilitating and depleting effect that the military use of capital and research and development talent has had on American industry.”

Economist Robert Higgs makes the same point about World War II:

Yes, officially measured GDP soared during the war. Examination of that increased output shows, however, that it consisted entirely of military goods and services. Real civilian consumption and private investment both fell after 1941, and they did not recover fully until 1946. The privately owned capital stock actually shrank during the war. Some prosperity. (My article in the peer-reviewed Journal of Economic History, March 1992, presents many of the relevant details.)

 

It is high time that we come to appreciate the distinction between the government spending, especially the war spending, that bulks up official GDP figures and the kinds of production that create genuine economic prosperity. As Ludwig von Mises wrote in the aftermath of World War I, “war prosperity is like the prosperity that an earthquake or a plague brings.”

War Causes Austerity

Economic historian Julian Adorney argues:

Hitler’s rearmament program was military Keynesianism on a vast scale. Hermann Goering, Hitler’s economic administrator, poured every available resource into making planes, tanks, and guns. In 1933 German military spending was 750 million Reichsmarks. By 1938 it had risen to 17 billion with 21 percent of GDP was taken up by military spending. Government spending all told was 35 percent of Germany’s GDP.

 

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No-one could say that Hitler’s rearmament program was too small. Economists expected it to create a multiplier effect and jump-start a flagging economy. Instead, it produced military wealth while private citizens starved.

 

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The people routinely suffered shortages. Civilian wood and iron were rationed. Small businesses, from artisans to carpenters to cobblers, went under. Citizens could barely buy pork, and buying fat to make a luxury like a cake was impossible. Rationing and long lines at the central supply depots the Nazis installed became the norm.

 

Nazi Germany proves that curing unemployment should not be an end in itself.

War Causes Inflation … Which Keynes and Bernanke Admit Taxes Consumers

As we noted in 2010, war causes inflation … which hurts consumers:

Liberal economist James Galbraith wrote in 2004:

Inflation applies the law of the jungle to war finance. Prices and profits rise, wages and their purchasing power fall. Thugs, profiteers and the well connected get rich. Working people and the poor make out as they can. Savings erode, through the unseen mechanism of the “inflation tax” — meaning that the government runs a big deficit in nominal terms, but a smaller one when inflation is factored in.

 

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There is profiteering. Firms with monopoly power usually keep some in reserve. In wartime, if the climate is permissive, they bring it out and use it. Gas prices can go up when refining capacity becomes short — due partly to too many mergers. More generally, when sales to consumers are slow, businesses ought to cut prices — but many of them don’t. Instead, they raise prices to meet their income targets and hope that the market won’t collapse.

Ron Paul agreed in 2007:

Congress and the Federal Reserve Bank have a cozy, unspoken arrangement that makes war easier to finance. Congress has an insatiable appetite for new spending, but raising taxes is politically unpopular. The Federal Reserve, however, is happy to accommodate deficit spending by creating new money through the Treasury Department. In exchange, Congress leaves the Fed alone to operate free of pesky oversight and free of political scrutiny. Monetary policy is utterly ignored in Washington, even though the Federal Reserve system is a creation of Congress.

 

The result of this arrangement is inflation. And inflation finances war.

Blanchard Economic Research pointed out in 2001:

War has a profound effect on the economy, our government and its fiscal and monetary policies. These effects have consistently led to high inflation.

 

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David Hackett Fischer is a Professor of History and Economic History at Brandeis. [H]is book, The Great Wave, Price Revolutions and the Rhythm of History … finds that … periods of high inflation are caused by, and cause, a breakdown in order and a loss of faith in political institutions. He also finds that war is a triggering influence on inflation, political disorder, social conflict and economic disruption.

 

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Other economists agree with Professor Fischer’s link between inflation and war.

 

James Grant, the respected editor of Grant’s Interest Rate Observer, supplies us with the most timely perspective on the effect of war on inflation in the September 14 issue of his newsletter:

“War is inflationary. It is always wasteful no matter how just the cause. It is cost without income, destruction financed (more often than not) by credit creation. It is the essence of inflation.”

Libertarian economics writer Lew Rockwell noted in 2008:

You can line up 100 professional war historians and political scientists to talk about the 20th century, and not one is likely to mention the role of the Fed in funding US militarism. And yet it is true: the Fed is the institution that has created the money to fund the wars. In this role, it has solved a major problem that the state has confronted for all of human history. A state without money or a state that must tax its citizens to raise money for its wars is necessarily limited in its imperial ambitions. Keep in mind that this is only a problem for the state. It is not a problem for the people. The inability of the state to fund its unlimited ambitions is worth more for the people than every kind of legal check and balance. It is more valuable than all the constitutions every devised.

 

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Reflecting on the calamity of this war, Ludwig von Mises wrote in 1919

One can say without exaggeration that inflation is an indispensable means of militarism. Without it, the repercussions of war on welfare become obvious much more quickly and penetratingly; war weariness would set in much earlier.***

In the entire run-up to war, George Bush just assumed as a matter of policy that it was his decision alone whether to invade Iraq. The objections by Ron Paul and some other members of Congress and vast numbers of the American population were reduced to little more than white noise in the background. Imagine if he had to raise the money for the war through taxes. It never would have happened. But he didn’t have to. He knew the money would be there. So despite a $200 billion deficit, a $9 trillion debt, $5 trillion in outstanding debt instruments held by the public, a federal budget of $3 trillion, and falling tax receipts in 2001, Bush contemplated a war that has cost $525 billion dollars — or $4,681 per household. Imagine if he had gone to the American people to request that. What would have happened? I think we know the answer to that question. And those are government figures; the actual cost of this war will be far higher — perhaps $20,000 per household.

 

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If the state has the power and is asked to choose between doing good and waging war, what will it choose? Certainly in the American context, the choice has always been for war.

And progressive economics writer Chris Martenson explains as part of his “Crash Course” on economics:

If we look at the entire sweep of history, we can make an utterly obvious claim: All wars are inflationary. Period. No exceptions.

 

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So if anybody tries to tell you that you haven’t sacrificed for the war, let them know you sacrificed a large portion of your savings and your paycheck to the effort, thank you very much.

The bottom line is that war always causes inflation, at least when it is funded through money-printing instead of a pay-as-you-go system of taxes and/or bonds. It might be great for a handful of defense contractors, but war is bad for Main Street, stealing wealth from people by making their dollars worth less.

Given that John Maynard Keynes and former Federal Reserve chair Ben Bernanke both say that inflation is a tax on the American people, war-induced inflation is a theft of our wealth.

IEP gives a graphic example – the Vietnam war helping to push inflation through the roof:

War Causes Runaway Debt

We noted in 2010:

All of the spending on unnecessary wars adds up.

 

The U.S. is adding trillions to its debt burden to finance its multiple wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, etc.

Indeed, IEP – commenting on the war in Afghanistan and Iraq – notes:

This was also the first time in U.S. history where taxes were cut during a war which then resulted in both wars completely financed by deficit spending. A loose monetary policy was also implemented while interest rates were kept low and banking regulations were relaxed to stimulate the economy. All of these factors have contributed to the U.S. having severe unsustainable structural imbalances in its government finances.

We also pointed out in 2010:

It is ironic that America’s huge military spending is what made us an empire … but our huge military is what is bankrupting us … thus destroying our status as an empire.

Economist Michel Chossudovsky told Washington’s Blog:

War always causes recession. Well, if it is a very short war, then it may stimulate the economy in the short-run. But if there is not a quick victory and it drags on, then wars always put the nation waging war into a recession and hurt its economy.

Indeed, we’ve known for 2,500 years that prolonged war bankrupts an economy (and remember Greenspan’s comment.)

It’s not just civilians saying this …

The former head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff – Admiral Mullen – agrees:

The Pentagon needs to cut back on spending.

 

“We’re going to have to do that if it’s going to survive at all,” Mullen said, “and do it in a way that is predictable.”

Indeed, Mullen said:

For industry and adequate defense funding to survive … the two must work together. Otherwise, he added, “this wave of debt” will carry over from year to year, and eventually, the defense budget will be cut just to facilitate the debt.

Former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates agrees as well. As David Ignatius wrote in the Washington Post in 2010:

After a decade of war and financial crisis, America has run up debts that pose a national security problem, not just an economic one.

 

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One of the strongest voices arguing for fiscal responsibility as a national security issue has been Defense Secretary Bob Gates. He gave a landmark speech in Kansas on May 8, invoking President Dwight Eisenhower’s warnings about the dangers of an imbalanced military-industrial state.

 

“Eisenhower was wary of seeing his beloved republic turn into a muscle-bound, garrison state — militarily strong, but economically stagnant and strategically insolvent,” Gates said. He warned that America was in a “parlous fiscal condition” and that the “gusher” of military spending that followed Sept. 11, 2001, must be capped. “We can’t have a strong military if we have a weak economy,” Gates told reporters who covered the Kansas speech.

 

On Thursday the defense secretary reiterated his pitch that Congress must stop shoveling money at the military, telling Pentagon reporters: “The defense budget process should no longer be characterized by ‘business as usual’ within this building — or outside of it.”

While war might make a handful in the military-industrial complex and big banks rich, America’s top military leaders and economists say that would be a very bad idea for the American people.

Indeed, military strategists have known for 2,500 years that prolonged wars are disastrous for the nation.

War Increases Terrorism … And Terrorism Hurts the Economy

Security experts – conservative hawks and liberal doves alike – agree that waging war in the Middle East weakens national security and increases terrorism. See this, this, this, this, this, this and this.

Terrorism – in turn – terrorism is bad for the economy. Specifically, a study by Harvard and the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) points out:

From an economic standpoint, terrorism has been described to have four main effects (see, e.g., US Congress, Joint Economic Committee, 2002). First, the capital stock (human and physical) of a country is reduced as a result of terrorist attacks. Second, the terrorist threat induces higher levels of uncertainty. Third, terrorism promotes increases in counter-terrorism expenditures, drawing resources from productive sectors for use in security. Fourth, terrorism is known to affect negatively specific industries such as tourism.

The Harvard/NBER concludes:

In accordance with the predictions of the model, higher levels of terrorist risks are associated with lower levels of net foreign direct investment positions, even after controlling for other types of country risks. On average, a standard deviation increase in the terrorist risk is associated with a fall in the net foreign direct investment position of about 5 percent of GDP.

So the more unnecessary wars American launches and the more innocent civilians we kill, the less foreign investment in America, the more destruction to our capital stock, the higher the level of uncertainty, the more counter-terrorism expenditures and the less expenditures in more productive sectors, and the greater the hit to tourism and some other industries. Moreover:

Terrorism has contributed to a decline in the global economy (for example, European Commission, 2001).

So military adventurism increases terrorism which hurts the world economy. And see this.

Postscript: Attacking a country which controls the flow of oil has special impacts on the economy. For example, well-known economist Nouriel Roubini says that attacking Iran would lead to global recession. The IMF says that Iran cutting off oil supplies could raise crude prices 30%.

War Causes Us to Lose Friends … And Influence

While World War II – the last “good war” – may have gained us friends, launching military aggression is now losing America friends, influence and prosperity.

For example, the U.S. has launched Cold War 2.0 – casting Russia and China as evil empires – and threatening them in numerous way. For example, the U.S. broke its promise not to encircle Russia, and is using Ukraine to threaten Russia; and the U.S. is backing Japan in a hot dispute over remote islands, and backing Vietnam in its confrontations with China.

And U.S. statements that any country that challenge U.S. military – or even economic – hegemony will be attacked are extremely provocative.

This is causing Russia to launch a policy of “de-dollarization”, which China is joining in. This could lead to the collapse of the petrodollar … which would wreck the U.S. economy.

 

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Thu, 07/03/2014 - 05:53 | 4920739 crazytechnician
crazytechnician's picture

No sophisticated life - forms will exist on this planet let alone any economies.

Thu, 07/03/2014 - 12:28 | 4921813 DOT
DOT's picture

The Economists and Politicians will survive.

Pond scum and cock roaches are resistant to radiation.

Thu, 07/03/2014 - 12:52 | 4921888 crazytechnician
crazytechnician's picture

Huh , they may last months or even years in their dank bunkers depending on how well stocked they are on food , oxygen and spare parts. Fantastic - living the high life for a few misery months / years in a shitty bunker carrying the burden of knowledge that it was you cunts that sent the entire human race back to prime-ordial sludge. Well done boys ! WW - III bring it on !!!

Thu, 07/03/2014 - 03:55 | 4920615 crazytechnician
crazytechnician's picture

Krugman says if we have WW-III there will be 10 million years of new development - to get to where we are today.

Thu, 07/03/2014 - 03:44 | 4920606 KashNCarry
KashNCarry's picture

Quote from Orwell: "War is Peace Freedom is Slavery." These days Left is right, Down is Up. Stock market approaching 17,000.  What. me worry?

Thu, 07/03/2014 - 03:20 | 4920589 damicol
damicol's picture

"Cowen joins extremely influential economists like Paul Krugman and Martin Feldstein – and various talking heads"

 

 I agree with them. 100 %. And I hope you all agree with these people too.

In fact I agree so strongly with the likes of Krugman that I am declaring this very afternoon war on them. Yessir,

This afternoon I will be out there buying several big fuck off bombs I am going to drop on their houses. I want them to know that, so they too can benefit as I know we will both do. They can now get busy figuring out out how they fuck they can defend their house from my fucking bombs, because they are coming, make no mistake.

Yes they have me convinced that war is good for the economy and just so they benefit the most, by so kindly appraising me of these facts, they will be the first I declare war on.

I cannot hang around, I have bombs to buy and plans to to make  and future prosperity I know now beckons.

If anyone happens to pass any of these kind people listed above, do let them know I am coming, I want to catch them at home  just as they are putting the final bolts in place on their defenses and after they have spent and borrowed to the hilt to defend themselves.

After all there is no love lost in war is their.

 

 

Thu, 07/03/2014 - 03:01 | 4920575 ChargingHandle
ChargingHandle's picture

Bravo GW. An excellent piece. 

Thu, 07/03/2014 - 02:27 | 4920539 frank H
frank H's picture

The fact that we would need to write such an article show the how Keynesianism has reduced economics to a nonsense science. Many economist have been so brain washed as to be brain dead.  

ANY economist that makes such a contention  should have his PhD taken away from him.

My zero hedge article on the subject:

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-05-28/natural-disasters-dont-increase...

Thu, 07/03/2014 - 01:47 | 4920500 rex-lacrymarum
rex-lacrymarum's picture

From acting man in 2010: The Myth of War Prosperity: http://www.acting-man.com/?p=5402

Thu, 07/03/2014 - 00:46 | 4920405 tolivian
tolivian's picture

So now wait just a minute. It seems to me that it was not that long ago that the "go-to" economist of the decade, Paul Krugman hisself, proclaimed that all the economy needed was an invasion from outer space. Given his brilliant, nearly irrefutable argument (except for anyone with an IQ above room temperature) in favor of the wholly asinine trillion dollar platinum coin gambit, I suspect that GW's critique may be the final blow to Krugies's credibility. Does that merit a moment of silence? 

By the way this is a rather perverse turn of events by a guy - Cowen - who has actually written fairly competently in the area of economics. Is Krugmanism a contagious brain damaging virus?

Thu, 07/03/2014 - 08:43 | 4920983 TeethVillage88s
TeethVillage88s's picture

Looks like Krugman & Cowen are being paid off. Probably by NEOCONs like Dick Chaney.

Thu, 07/03/2014 - 12:23 | 4921798 DOT
DOT's picture

More likely an Obama sycophant like Arthur Sulzberger.

Thu, 07/03/2014 - 06:45 | 4920789 overmedicatedun...
overmedicatedundersexed's picture

GW, you keep on truck'n...don't know how many post under your name, but keep it up guys and gals. btw fuki nuki is well controlled? not a chance.

Thu, 07/03/2014 - 00:22 | 4920369 MeBizarro
MeBizarro's picture

Krugman gets his share of endless criticism on here but when is a guy who hasn't made a proper call since his criticism of the Euro in the late 1990s (Feldstein) going to take the criticism he is long overdue and richly overdue too. 

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 23:41 | 4920291 kchrisc
kchrisc's picture

Complicit-journalists' kids and that of the pols crats and banksters first.

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 23:34 | 4920275 IndianaJohn
IndianaJohn's picture

All warfare is an armed robbery.

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 23:14 | 4920182 rainingFrogs
rainingFrogs's picture

I suggest US warmongering could be brought to an end with two simple policies:

Make war a pay as you go proposition.  A nice, stiff war tax would end adventurism and shrink the military.  Successive administrations have waged continuous and concurrent wars by insulating the taxpaying public from the cost.  War and the war machine are financed with debt, an accounting entry, that leaves the public untouched financially.

In addition to a war tax, a mandatory 2-year conscription with no waivers and mandatory rotations to the front line would cut warmongering down to its bare essentials.  If each congressperson and CEO had kids and grandkids on the ground in whereveristan, we would not be there for longistan.

Of course the welfare-queen military/anti-terror industrial complex would have a hissy fit ... f#@k 'em.

Fri, 07/04/2014 - 03:26 | 4924105 Global Observer
Global Observer's picture

Who is going to enforce the policy on the warmongers?

Nuking a couple of US cities will likely do the trick of convincing the psychopaths to refrain from adventures or convince the rest to wrest power away from the psychopaths.

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 22:58 | 4920171 VWAndy
VWAndy's picture

GW nicely done.

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 22:37 | 4920124 Bear
Bear's picture

Send these guys first : "Cowen joins extremely influential economists like Paul Krugman and Martin Feldstein"

Fri, 07/04/2014 - 08:55 | 4924364 MFL8240
MFL8240's picture

Former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan also said in that war is bad for the economy.   

 

This lends instant credibility to the article!!  Sad!!

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 22:35 | 4920116 datapanik
datapanik's picture

Sorry for mentioning this inconvenient fact but war is also about the wholesale slaughter of human beings, which is another reason why the elite stages them - to curb the numbers of the great unwashed.

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 22:15 | 4920068 medium giraffe
medium giraffe's picture

Oh, well volunteered Mr Cowen.  Sign here and collect your uniform from the window...

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 22:10 | 4920052 MontgomeryScott
MontgomeryScott's picture

I caught the headline, and have to comment on it (I don't really give a shit about the charts and stats, although they might be fun for some who still hold on to the line that 'things will continue as they have always done').

 

THIS TIME, when the 'WAR' goes 'LIVE' (NOT a 'beta-test', but real unadulterated thermonuclear strikes and counter-strikes), there will be at LEAST TWO BILLION PEOPLE wiped off of the face of the Earth IMMEDIATELY.

As the 'economists' try to give themselves and their corporate bodies temporary solace by peeling the exposed skin off of their arms and faces, they won't be REALLY worried about the performance of their 'hedge-funds'.

They won't care about their tweets and blogs and 'social status' as they see their hair falling out, and observe the running sores on their arms and legs, and are not prepared to DIE in the aftermath of the WAR that they THEMSELVES have promoted in order to 'help the economy' that they erroneously told EVERYONE was 'important'.

'TYLER COWEN' is a stupid, self aggrandizing sociopathic fucking PRICK. I DO hope that all that fed-res paper-rag shit he has amassed won't catch fire spontaneously when the temperature reaches Farenheight 451.

When a Democrat and a Republican are both qualified as pilots, and you see the mountain approaching, and break in to the cockpit where the D and the R are steering the plane directly into the mountain despite the 'terrain warnings', and you try to yell at them and they look up at you wearing IPOD headphones and MASTURBATING FURIOUSLY, would you kick your own ass for failing to get the skills that might save not only YOU but also everyone you KNOW?

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 21:46 | 4919992 rsnoble
rsnoble's picture

So in other words the ones that want war will preach it's good for us and have backup to prove it now.

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 21:40 | 4919974 10mm
10mm's picture

Wars of old vs todays smart bombs and run and gun maneuvers.  Unless it's full blown frontal war or complete chaos, forget war. Or economic warfare.

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 21:40 | 4919961 malek
malek's picture

What these economists actually mean:

We need a "major war" so we can reboot (i.e. crash and rebuild from scratch) the unsustainable political-financial system (debts and promises), but point to some scapegoat as the cause!

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 21:17 | 4919901 cathrynm
cathrynm's picture

Idiot^h^h^h^h^hEvil economist...

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 21:03 | 4919866 PoliticalRefuge...
PoliticalRefugeefromCalif.'s picture

  A solid national defense is a great deterrant but what we have now is a global bully starting fights with an eye on supplying both sides.

  There is a place for a strong national defense but not the monster we have now which is little but a wealth transfer cash cow to the elites. 

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 20:35 | 4919791 besnook
besnook's picture

war is bad for the economy and the health of the people but the banksters do really well so if i were a banker and someone proposed war i would support with all the money i coukld print and your sons and daughters and brothers and sisters and dads and moms lives. those who live will enjoy many years of a growing economy because everything that was destroyed needs to be rebuilt.

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 20:26 | 4919767 DeadFred
DeadFred's picture

In reality No War will also end the petro dollar and bring hardship to the people so that's a wash. Let's not have a war simply because slaughtering our fellow humans and wrecking havok on the world is just not a good thing to do.

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 20:09 | 4919716 lasvegaspersona
lasvegaspersona's picture

Once again this is a subject fofoa dealt with 2 years ago. Too bad he doesn't send his stuff out.

http://fofoa.blogspot.com/2011/07/does-fiat-produce-endless-sea-of-wars....

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 20:08 | 4919711 Civilization
Civilization's picture

War increases central planning. If you like that sort of thing, think war.

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 20:04 | 4919694 Ban KKiller
Ban KKiller's picture

I agree. WAR. War on the Fascist Oligarchy. 

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 20:02 | 4919686 Reaper
Reaper's picture

"Cowen joins extremely influential economists like Paul Krugman and Martin Feldstein – and various talking heads – in promoting this idea." They don't think alike, they regurgitate the party line script to prepare the stupid to believe war isn't so bad. All the facts GW might present are not read by the common stupid, who'll just be informed by their media masters. The new talking point will be that there's prosperity and hope generated by a war.

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 19:52 | 4919662 RMolineaux
RMolineaux's picture

Compliments to George Washington for an excellent compilation of qualified opinion on the war and economy question.  Of course, any review of the history of empires would demonstrate the same conclusion.  Now all that is left to do is to convince myopic members of congress that they were not voted into office simply to keep open the military bases and factories in their districts, and that there are far more worthwhile alternatives. 

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 22:09 | 4919637 Radical Marijuana
Radical Marijuana's picture

Another excellent article, on the level at which it was researched and written. However, I maintain the theory of intellectual scientific revolutions, necessary to radically change the ways that we think about death controls. Of course, the murder system backs up the money system, and in general, all private property is based on backing up claims with coercion. At the deeper levels, human realities are necessarily organized lies, operating robberies, because, at the deeper levels, individual human beings, and groups of human beings, are basically entropic pumps of energy. However, human beings have developed ways to understand that backwards, because the language that we use is the biggest bullies' bullshit about what is happening.

The notions that there are false fundamental dichotomies between war versus peace, and the impossible ideals which attempt to promote that false notion about the nature of "peace," mean that we operate our death controls very badly, indeed, through the maximum possible deceits. Indeed, the basic systems are debt slavery backed up with wars based on deceits. However, those systems have generated numbers which are debt insanities, whose trajectories are towards provoking death insanities, and those are likely to go over the top in the foreseeable future, so much so that those times of Peak Insanities could make all efforts to understand that practically irrelevant. But nevertheless, I maintain the view that we need to go through intellectual scientific revolutions, which then apply to politics, and especially to the monetary and military systems.

Right now, we are spiraling downwards into the black hole of the established systems of political economy operated through the maximum possible frauds, while human ecology operates through the maximum possible deceits. That downward spiral of MADness, from Money As Debt, backed by Mutual Assured Destruction, is accelerating into overdrive due to progress in science and technology. That is the context inside which mainstream moron economists could recommend that "war is good for the economy," without appearing to have the slightest clue regarding how utterly insane their views have become, in a world where there are now globalized electronic fiat frauds, backed by the threat of weapons of mass destruction.

In that context, the only theoretical solutions would require radical rethinking of those problems. What we need are better dynamic equilibria between the various systems of organized lies, operating robberies. We need better organized crime, operating better murder systems, to back up better monetary systems. We need more radical truths, inside of a radically transformed frame of reference, in order to answer the questions in the issues raised by George Washington:

"It is vital for policy-makers, economists and the public to have access to a definitive analysis to determine once and for all whether war is good or bad for the economy."

Death controls are absolutely necessary parts of the economic system. They exist as social facts, despite how much most people tend to try to ignore them. The problems are that history selected for those to actually be done through the maximum possible deceits, and inside successful warfare being based on deceits, there developed controlled opposition groups which operate inside of the same deceitful frame of reference. Upon that basis was built a financial systems whose success was based upon frauds. Of course, that financial system, whose success was based on frauds, was enforced by a military system whose success was based on deceits.

More wars based on deceits were great for more economic activity based on frauds. However, meanwhile, there were chronic political problems, inherent in the nature of life, which must be resolved somehow. It is ONLY from the perspective of governments being the biggest form of organized crime, controlled by the best organized gangs of criminals, that "war is good for their economy." Of course, that is the case because war is organized crime on a larger scale. However, the deeper problems still continue to be that, when perceived as entropic pumps of energy, then human beings necessarily organize lies, to operate robberies.

It is necessary for groups of human beings to operate according to the principles and methods of organized crime, because those are actually what best describes how human beings operate as entropic pump systems. The general principles of energy systems manifest in those ways, as human beings develop their artificial selection systems, as those emerge out of the previously always existing natural selection systems. In that context, it is theoretically possible for the human murder systems to be operated better, in order to back up better money systems.

By "better" I mean that which involves a greater use of information, as a higher consciousness, in order that the combined money/murder systems could become more effective and efficient. However, within the established systems, we are stuck in the rut of "success" flowing from being the "best" at backing up lies with violence, or by operating through enforced frauds. At the present time, we are wearing the bottom of that rut out!

The paradoxical ways that the production of destruction controls production are related to the fundamental facts that human realities are always organized lies, operating robberies. Of course, mainstream moron economists specialized in being intellectual mercenaries, being paid to promote the biggest bullies' (currently the banksters') bullshit social stories. Everything that those kinds of mainstream moron mercenary economists do is based on being able to operate without the slightest shred of common sense. Therefore, they are able to come to utterly irrational and insane conclusions that mass murders, and breaking enormous numbers of things, is "good for the economy."

However, none of the significant alternative economists featured in this article above end up being anything more than reactionary revolutionaries, because they never propose how to operate better death controls, to back up better debt controls. Instead, they stay within the same old-fashioned frame of reference of false fundamental dichotomies, and so, continue to propose "solutions" based on impossible ideals, which can never do anything but cause the opposite effects to finally happen in the real world.

The production of destruction must necessarily control production. Human systems are necessarily organized lies, operating robberies. Those are simply the ways that human beings, as energy systems, actually exist in the world. Better militarism, operating better death controls could be good for the economy, but if and only if that involved greater use of information, which enabled higher consciousness about those.

OF COURSE, "military strategists have known for 2,500 years that prolonged wars are disastrous for the nation." That old book on The Art of War started by saying "success in war is based on deceits," and ended by saying that "spies are the most important soldiers." Warfare is the oldest and best developed social science, which was the most paradoxical science because its "success" was based on deceit. Economics became a social science like militarism, because financial success became based on frauds.

The privatized making of the public "money" supply out of nothing as debts is the FRAUD that is backed up by the FORCE of wars based on deceits. That is real context in which mainstream moron economists can spout patently absurd nonsense about "war being good for the economy." However, at the same time, I barely detect any significant public presence of better ideas about how to operate the death controls, to back up the debt controls, which are essential for the economy, as well as the ecology.

Meanwhile, one way or another, sooner or later, the runaway debt slavery systems, which have generated debt insanity numbers, are going to go through psychotic breakdowns. There are no possible "reforms" within those systems which are mathematically possible to fix the basic problems, which were built into the basic design of the established systems. One way or another, sooner or later, we are necessarily headed through collapses into chaos, and severe social storms, which will open up opportunities for revolutions. In that context, I continue to promote the ideas of intellectual scientific revolutions as being what should inspire better social and political revolutions. The main body of this article above recites the ways that war actually effects the rulers and those they rule over, whereby the money/murder systems have their social polarization effects exacerbated by even more debt slavery, backed up by even more wars based on deceits. However, nowhere in that article are indications about what better revolutions would require be accomplished, which are necessarily better death controls.

Citizens are actually members of an organized crime gang, which is their country. Our main problem is that the vast majority of those people have been reduced to incompetent political idiots, or Zombie Sheeple, who were therefore being fleeced to exhaustion, while they were being set up to slaughtered. There is nothing wrong with the basic theory of a democratic republic operating through the rule of law. However, the methods of organized crime (mostly outside of the rule of law) have been applied to the political processes to effectively privatize public powers, which ALREADY result in systems based on enforcing frauds.

First it was the public "money" system that was almost totally privatized, and thereby transformed into an absurd State Religion, based on enforced frauds, in which context the mainstream moron mercenary economists were able to operate with attitudes of evil deliberate ignorance towards the central social facts, of that public "money" supply having become legalized lies, backed by legalized violence. Similarly, the same political processes have also been transforming the public murder systems in to more privatized enforced frauds too. The public murder systems are following the money systems in becoming absurd State Religions promoting what should obviously be seen as ridiculous bullshit, but which, nevertheless, actually more and more dominates the society, due to the real ways that violence IS able to back up lies, no matter how blatantly false those lies actually are.

Inside of that real context, no "reforms" are being implemented. Indeed, there are no possible "reforms" to those established systems which could be adequate. Instead, those entrenched systems are constantly becoming more MAD, faster, and thus, headed towards eventually precipitating possible revolutions, which will begin as psychotic breakdowns into death insanities.

At that point, the issues will emerge regarding the potential for better revolutions to develop better new systems of death controls, to back up better debt controls. In my view, the ideal solutions are, metaphorically speaking, for more people to become better wolves, not become better sheep. The ideal solutions are for better democratization of the death controls. However, that would only be relatively possible if more people were to understand more radical truths about the chronic political problems, and how and why we ended up with expedient sets of solutions, focused through social pyramid systems, in which the death controls were being done through the maximum possible deceits, which in turn backed up debt controls done through the maximum possible frauds.

Obviously, I agree that the mainstream moron economists who suggest we need another war ARE "Idiots." However, in my view all of the alternatives that continue being reactionary revolutionaries, or the Black Sheeple, that do not provide ideas about how to operate better death controls, to back up better debt controls, are also "Idiots" too. That is especially the case because there are profound changes coming due to the economic systems, which have been developed through strip-mining the planet's natural resources, reaching various thresholds of diminishing returns from being able to continue to do that!

Basically, we are going to be driven by environmental factors to go through transformations to develop different human and industrial ecologies, that may enable enough the natural ecologies to survive and be integrated into those systems. The central core features in that thrust of the development of new evolutionary ecologies are necessarily going to be the death controls, as the production of destruction that controls production. Human and industrial systems are ALREADY expressions of general energy systems, operating according to the principles of those systems. However, the ways that those are understood through the biggest bullies' bullshit language are all profoundly backwards, and the controlled opposition groups to the established systems tend to also mostly operate through the same frame of reference, understanding everything backwards, and therefore, proposing bogus "solutions" which are backwards.

Overall, we should be understanding human and industrial systems better, in ways which can be reconciled with our understanding of natural systems. The realities of natural selection should be understood more thoroughly in our artificial selection systems. However, at present, the philosophy of science is dominated by the biggest bullies' bullshit social stories, the same as finance based on frauds, and warfare based on deceits, currently are.

Militarism is the supreme ideology, and it deserves to be recognized as the supreme ideology. The human murder systems are the most important systems, that are at the bottom of the totem pole, upon which all other systems depend to stand. That is the context in which we should be going through intellectual scientific revolutions that apply to militarism, which then backs up the monetary systems.

George Washington clearly understands some of the preliminary levels of those paradoxes:

"We also pointed out in 2010:

It is ironic that America’s huge military spending is what made us an empire … but our huge military is what is bankrupting us … thus destroying our status as an empire."

However, in that regard, (as I have been saying about almost every other article by George Washington that has been republished on Zero Hedge), while I agreed with almost everything that was said, I still tended to perceive all of that using a frame of reference which comes to diametrically opposite conclusions, when it comes to better resolutions of these currently runaway problems.

In my view the degree to which we live in a Bizarro Mirror World Fun House, in which everything appears proportionately backwards and distorted includes the "alternatives" promoted by the controlled opposition groups too. While the mainstream moron economists promoting more old-fashioned wars ARE "Idiots," there is no merit in any alternatives which do not promote better death controls, to adequately replace and sufficiently substitute for the old-fashioned forms of death controls.

There is NO DOUBT that:

"While war might make a handful in the military-industrial complex and big banks rich, America’s top military leaders and economists say that would be a very bad idea for the American people."

However, the only way that things could actually become genuinely better is for the American people to provide better death controls, to back up better debt controls. Of course, that appears to be the same as saying that there is necessarily going to be forced to transpire some sort of revolutions, since the established systems are not able and willing to reform themselves, since their fundamental structure is itself the source of the problems.

Of course, I recognize how that kind of statement appears to be stacking one political miracle on top of another political miracle, since the vast majority of the American People have become Zombie Sheeple. Most of them have been brainwashed to believe in the biggest bullies' bullshit social stories, as manifested in quite absurd State Religions.

Moreover, most of the opposition to those entrenched systems are led by Black Sheeple, or reactionary revolutionaries, whose "solutions" involve attempting to lead people to go backwards, to various old-fashioned religions or ideologies, rather than forward through intellectual scientific revolutions. Therefore, at the present time, one must expect that there will continue to be more debt insanities piled on top of previous debt insanities, and more deceitful wars piled on top of previous deceitful wars, driving everything towards more death insanities. But nevertheless, I continue to promote the theory of intellectual scientific revolutions, as necessary to be able to develop better militarism, to back up better monetary systems.

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 22:36 | 4920120 flapdoodle
flapdoodle's picture

The problem is that even the scientific establishment is corrupt, so good luck with a "scientific revolution" that doesn't start out tainted from its onset.

Fri, 07/04/2014 - 12:16 | 4920450 Radical Marijuana
Radical Marijuana's picture

Yes, flapdoodle, there is no doubt that ALL social enterprises suffered from the same ways that lies can be backed up with violence. Certainly, many of the basic aspects of the philosophy of science were driven to develop in the ways that they did due to how the biggest bullies, especially through their ability to dominate the funding of practically everything, including science, have resulted in sets of profound distortions.

However, I would rather hold on to some irrational hope, than have none at all. At least it can be demonstrated how there HAVE actually been a series of profound revolutions in the philosophy of science. Furthermore, the technologies that those paradigm shifts in science enabled are precisely what are driving the imperative needs to at least day dream of the kinds of political changes that MIGHT be able to survive having developed that kind of exponential progress in scientific understanding of the natural world. In principle, that could be done to our understanding of human nature too. However, that would take more wide-spread recognition of how and why the world is controlled by the methods of organized crime, because that is what happens when one actually applies more thorough understanding of general energy systems to human systems.

I tend to embrace the paradoxes regarding scientific revolutions that recognize the ways that warfare was the oldest and best developed social science, whose success was based on deceits. After the development  of weapons of mass destruction, and the more recent emergence of weapons of mass surveillance, the paradoxical ways that murder systems were most successfully done through deceits have become extremely acute.

Therefore, OF COURSE, a scientific revolution with respect to militarism, which is the ideology of the murder system, IS tainted from the start, and necessarily so! But nevertheless, we are still faced with the existing runaway problems of progress in physical sciences NOT being matched by progress in political science. What I have outlined above is a brief sketch of some of what it would take to up-date militarism, in order to PERHAPS survive the development of weapons of mass destruction.

I am certainly NOT guaranteeing success with that endeavour, however, I am asserting that is our only remotely possible reasonable hope to transform to become a Translithic Civilization, that would be enlightened enough to survive the consequences of progress in the physical sciences. At the present time, creating technologies which are trillions of times more powerful and capable (which are headed towards becoming quadrillions, or more, IF civilization continues to survive), is threatening to enable the social pyramid systems based on controlling civilization with deceits and frauds to madly destroy themselves!

At present, we are cursed with the interesting question whether childish apes with atomic bombs can evolve enough to survive their increasing political paradoxes. Right now, the chances of that happening seem very slim. However, we are constantly going to have the back-up systems of natural selection forcing us to develop more artificial selection, IF a scientific society survives?

There is nothing more important to a civilization based on technology than the philosophy of science, and there is nothing more necessary than intellectual scientific revolutions, IF we are going to develop a politics that can coexist with technologies becoming orders of magnitude more powerful and capable.

Of course, at the present time, there are overwhelming attitudes of evil deliberate ignorance, based on the history of successful deceits, regarding how the real murder systems actually operate their death controls, which back up the debt controls. At present, the scientific enterprise is just as tainted by the history of civilization being built on deceits and frauds as is every other area of human endeavour. However, I continue to maintain that it is not only theoretically possible, but also theoretically imperative, to go through intellectual scientific revolutions that would be applicable to politics, and especially to the combined money/murder systems.

However, from the perspective of practical politics, the first generations that ever encountered weapons of mass destruction, and mass surveillance, are still alive today. From the perspective of possible paradigm shifts in the future, in the past those always took generations to happen. The issues NOW are whether or not we will have enough time to adapt to the exponential progress in science and technology, which has made all previously established social and political institutions dangerously obsolete, and practically insane?

Of course, I do not know the answer to that, but, at least, I currently continue to promote systems of understanding the political problems which MIGHT be conducive to the kinds of intellectual scientific revolutions that "we" should go through ...

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 22:24 | 4920090 MontgomeryScott
MontgomeryScott's picture

WELL!

Your post is long and quite, um, 'thoughtful'

Since you are obviously an ACTUAL racist, however; I shall repost a quote from you (just so that those who scroll through your exhausting and non-sequitor comment can appreciate that I point out your bullshit way of life and belief):

Moreover, most of the opposition to those entrenched systems are led by Black Sheeple, or reactionary revolutionaries, whose "solutions" involve attempting to lead people to go backwards, to various old-fashioned religions or ideologies, rather than forward through intellectual scientific revolutions.

You are SERIOUSLY talking SHIT, by this point, I suppose. I will give you the 'benefit of the doubt', as a courtesy, but I am already of a higher knowledge that you should be shunned by all of humanity for your obviously racial connotations.

DAMNED DARKIES!

Thu, 07/03/2014 - 01:52 | 4920508 Radical Marijuana
Radical Marijuana's picture

That was a silly reply, MontgomeryScott, which blames me for the way that the English language has been set up to discuss these issues. What I am doing is extending the common ways that many other people have taken the words "People" and "Sheep" to blend them together, as may be spelled as "Sheople," but has become more commonly spelled as  "Sheeple."

http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/sheeple

noun

derogatory People compared to sheep in being docile, foolish, or easily led: "by the time the sheeple wake up and try to change things, it will be too late"

Lots of people have used that word, and I tend to expand upon that to say Zombie Sheeple, as in brain dead. The "Black Sheeple" phrase has nothing directly to do with human races, except perhaps by indirect coincidences. Rather the traces of that idea go back to basic English nursery rhymes, such as Baa, Baa, Black Sheep:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baa,_Baa,_Black_Sheep

There are various common English phrases, such as the "Black Sheep of the family" to refer to the nonconformists, or troublemakers, etc.. I am NOT using the phrase "Black Sheeple" to refer to human races, but rather to refer to what I call the reactionary revolutionaries, or the controlled opposition groups. They are "Black Sheeple" because they are different enough to be relatively non-conformists, and troublemakers, but only up until a point. My objection to the controlled opposition "Black Sheeple" is that they still operate too much inside of the biggest bullies' bullshit world view.

It appears to me from your comment, MontgomeryScott, that you profoundly misunderstood what I had written in my comment. Oh well, no surprise there! The only surprise is that you would bother to reply at all. ... I suppose I could be amused by your misinterpretation, since, IF you were right that I was implying something based on superficial racial characteristics by my choice of words, then, within that kind of use of language, then "SERIOUSLY talking SHIT" would be a compliment. Hah!

Thu, 07/03/2014 - 21:35 | 4923581 RMolineaux
RMolineaux's picture

Radical M:  Let´s give MS the benefit of the doubt and assume that his note was irony.  Speaking for myself, most of my relatives consider me to be the "black sheep" of the family and have said so, although we are all of northern European origin (as far as I know). 

I found your post to be very interesting, although IMO lacking in the human dimension.  The scientific and technological revolution of the last two centuries (along with resources available) has indeed changed the human condition and ideology immensely in most countries.  But, concurrently with these changes have come a flowering of uniquely human potentialities for empathy and a sense of justice.  When western civilisation freed itself from the dominance of the Roman church in the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, to the foundation of the American constitutional democracy in the 1790's, great achievements in literature and the arts became possible, and inter-personal justice flourished.  But these accomplishments were threatened concurrently with the concept of total war - first demonstrated in the American civil war.  I agree that the present situation requires immediate changes in attitude that normally require generations.  While the vestiges of religious fanaticism remain all too much alive.   

Fri, 07/04/2014 - 12:28 | 4924716 Radical Marijuana
Radical Marijuana's picture

Thanks for your reply, RMolineaux. I often miss detecting sarcasm, but make the mistake of taking it at face value. Perhaps I did that with respect to MS's reply.

A problem with the human dimension tends to be that more and more people are so disgusted with politics that they quit participating, which reminds me of these two famous quotes:

“The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.”

 

"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 19:33 | 4919612 Kina
Kina's picture

Our economy isn't doing very well, lets go out and kill a few million people, bomb all the worlds factories....then it will be good for our economy, because we just murdered the competition....literallly.

 

The new paradigm in US competition reaches its full Mafia state.....kill the competition....it is good for you.

 

This is what these Fuckwit economists are promoting.....the murder of millions of average everyday human beings to help the local economy.

 

Well why not the US just murder and bomb itself....then the rebuilding would be great for all.

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 20:47 | 4919818 grunk
grunk's picture

Sad to say, I think there are those in power who think that way.

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 22:40 | 4920134 MontgomeryScott
MontgomeryScott's picture

You are CORRECT!

Tell him what he's won, Johnny!

(An all-expense-paid free pass to ZEROHEDGE! YES, 'ZeroHedge', the home of the mythical 'Tyler Durden', and a different way of looking at the way that you perceive so-called 'REALITY'!)

Take that bag off of your head, and learn to LISTEN to those who are giving you TRUE knowledge!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wXcdYBh3hgg

MURDER.

DEATH.

KILL.

(Another) Idiot Economist Says We Need "Major War" to Save the Economy

 

Choose now whom you serve.

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 20:32 | 4919787 kita27
kita27's picture

I don't give a damn about the economy. We need a world war to save our damned souls.

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 22:51 | 4920128 Bear
Bear's picture

War saves souls?

Fri, 07/04/2014 - 06:06 | 4924200 Optimusprime
Optimusprime's picture

it does, when it is under the leadership of St Michael.

Wed, 07/02/2014 - 23:00 | 4920175 MontgomeryScott
MontgomeryScott's picture

Minitruth states that rations of Chocolate will be increased from 30 grams per week to 25 grams, rectroactively, starting on the next '2 minutes of hate'.

The master knows, and you need to learn correctly.

WAR not only SAVES SOULS; it lionizes them and makes them in to heroes and people who are to be REVERED.

'SECRET' and 'SPECIAL' operations in the name of the 'STATE' (whatever 'state' that you live in) are a DOUBLE-PLUS GOOD when burying the bodies in the 'national cemetaries'.

Henceforth, rations of Chocolate will be doubled to the unprecedented amount of 20 grams per month, in celebration of our heroic war-fighting veterans.

 

...

Hannity.

Hero, Patriot, and corporate Schill

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