Economic  Sanity 101

When one examines the various aspects of the financial crises, the same fundamental cause shows up time after time --  lack of money.   The infrastructures are still sound.   The workers are still there ready, willing and able to produce all the necessary goods and services.   The homes, the factories, the transportation system, the sewer system, the electrical system, the educational system, et cetera, et cetera are all still there and functional.  What's always missing is one thing and one thing only --  the medium of exchange -- the money that makes the system function -- the money that allows all these pieces interact with each other in a harmonious and productive manner.   The potential buyers of goods and service are there also, but many of them have no money anything but the bare essentials.  

This brings up some logical questions:  The money was there, so when, where, how, and why did the money get pulled out of the system?   We are about to answer that question, but there is  another more pressing question:  "Is money  still being taken out of the system?"   the answer is a resounding YES!   Then we ask:

How is it being taken out?   

How do we stop the outflow?   and  

How do we recover or replace the missing money?   

Using a medical analogy, imagine an injured person bleeding.   One of the first steps in saving his or her life is to stop the bleeding.    

Empower Working Class           Empower Working Class        ...

Now transfer this analogy to the working class.   The lifeblood on the economy is money.    The working class is seriously hemorrhaging money from at least nine major wounds and dozens of lesser ones.       

1**   Real estate Lending:   The unrealistic lending practices in the financial industry primarily expressed in the collapsing real estate market is taking billions of dollars and millions of homes away from the working class.  

Reference:  

How to End the Home Foreclosure Crisis

2**   Manipulative, corporate borrowing practices are another major problem.   Using corporate stocks, the super-wealthy are silently siphoning billions of dollars out of corporations.  This prevents corporations from financing health care and paying fair wages.

Reference:  

http://www.New-Corporate-World.info#39  ²  

3**   The wars in Iraq, and Afghanistan, and the global war on international terrorism are pulling  more than 10 billion dollars each month out of the nation's economy.  The money that the working class used to have to care for their families is now being secretly stolen by inflation and redirected to create the tools of war.

4**   Usury-level interest rates charged by  credit card lenders is the cause of billions of additional dollars to move from the pocket of the working class into the bank accounts of the super-wealthy.  

Reference:  

http://www.EconomicSanity101.com/funding-state-governemtns.html#83 

5**   The Federal Reserve:   Billions of dollars have been and still are being siphoned out of the public treasury and into the twelve private banks of the Federal Reserve as interest payment on the loan of non-existent money that we refer to as the national debt.

Reference:  

  http://www.Money-God-Money.info/federal-reserve.html#55 ²  

6**   Bank Interest rates for Depositors:    Investment options presently available  for general public offer very low rates of return -- one to five percent, with the more common rate being on the low end of that scale.   Many of them are quite risky.   Any professional investor that worked for a bank or other financial institution that didn't bring in at least ten percent, would get fired.   This indicates that billions of dollars are being made using bank deposit money, but the depositors are getting almost non of the profit.   

Reference:  

http://www.Choose-To-Save.com#54 ²

7**   Auto Parking:   Parking fees, parking fines,  petty moving traffic violation fines, and unnecessary parking restriction are  not only major nuisances, they are a serious financial drain on the working class.  For example, billions of dollars go into the pockets of parking garage owners because of unnecessary no-parking restrictions on nearby public streets.  Billions more go into the pockets of cities because of fines for overtime parking.   If these extortion fees are not paid, the government ups the anti and in some municipalities, they  confiscate cars and/or arrest people for petty traffic fines that are unpaid.    

The Police:   There have been thousands of incidents were governments have sent their police out as roving tax collectors with instructions to come back with a certain number of traffic tickets.  Some agencies even, secretly, demand that the police come back with a minimum quota of traffic tickets.

Reference:   Go to any Internet search engine and type in Revenue  "Traffic Fines."   
(3 Mar 09 -- Google responded with 29,300 links to this entry)  You'll read hundreds of horror stories.   You'll read testimonials about how, during these tough economic times, governments are attempting in increase their revenue by traffic and parking fees and fines.   Here's just one link I stumbled onto: 

http://gritsforbreakfast.blogspot.com/2009/02/dallas-county-looks-to-traffic-ticket.html

8**   The Public Airwaves.   The misuse of the public airwaves is another major tool for ripping off the public.   The Federal Communication Commission is supposed the regulate the licensing or radio and TV stations for the people.   Instead, it is dominated by the big money interests.   The public media has been turned into a propaganda machine for the status quo, a tool for manipulating public opinion, and a venue for snake oil salesman to peddle useless foo foo.   Real truth speakers are simply not given a fair voice, and in many cases, no voice at all.  

Mass communication is an area that clearly should be a public service industry.   Unfortunately, it isn't, but fortunately, this problem can be solved with grace and ease.   Simply give the media owners one year to convert to  The New Corporate World Foundation's Win-Win Business Structure or lose their broadcasting licenses.

Reference:  

9**   Drugs and the Law:    The prohibition of certain declared-to-be-illegal drugs causes huge increases in the prices paid for the drugs.  ^**msc1   It is the major source of money for financing of terrorism.    It causing seventy percent of all crime.   It makes the least ethical people on the planet the wealthiest people on the planet.   Created and maintains  a multi-billion-dollar police state and prison system.   And it's dismal failure at accomplish its publicly stated  goal.   This make the prohibition of drugs one of the most expensive holes in the working class people's finances.   

Reference:  Drugs and the Law  at:

http://www.truth101.org/vs-drugs-and-the-law.html  

You could also think of these money-leaks as a dam with several gaping holes in it, or as a security fence with breaks in it, or like trying to run a ship with holes its hull.    Imagine  trying to heat your home in the winter with the open windows.   In order to function properly, these fundamental flaws, these money leaks must be acknowledged and dealt with responsibly.    Anything else is "whipped cream on garbage."   For more on this, readers are directed to the page titled:   Where Have All the Dollars Gone?