/lit/ - Literature

>>10435797
>modern capitalism is good mmkay

>>10435797
Pic unrelated.

>>10435797
>inb4 faggots try to claim thomas sowell has been debunked

>>10435797
Sculpting in time by Tarkovsky and most Biographies

>>10435800
...ya

>>10435797
Henry Hazlitt's 'Economics in one lesson'.

>>10435797

>>10435797
Economics: The User's Guide by Ha-Joon Chang

>>10435914
>look ma, I posted it again

>>10435800
And what's wrong with private ownership and honoring contracts?

>>10435954
they get worshipped by spergs like sowell

>>10435800
Yeah, it is.

>>10435954
that’s not what techno-capitalism is at all

>>10435797
I like this thread

*blocks your path*

>

Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith.

its very readable, no jargon

>>10436025
burn every copy of this printed cancer you can

>>10435873
>>10435954
>>10435994
Shills out in force

>>10436547
You have to be a shill to understand that capitalism is the better, and indeed the only major functioning economic system?

>>10436547
Great argument dude

any non memes? in my opinion this is the most entertaining normie friendly chemistry book out there for example

>>10435954
>>10436566
>>10436590
>supply-side economics

>>10436651
How's that economic calculation problem treating ya?

>>10436368
My Econ teacher made us read this or else drop his class

>>10435797

>>10435797
My diary desu

>>10435797

>>10436545
why do you say this? I just picked it up

>still shilling this coon's "books"
/pol/acks, everyone

>>10435954
Nothing. The problem is when capital is kept scarce so that the benefits flow to those who supply it rather than those who do the productive work.

>>10435797
The Bible

>>10435897
That's as flawed as what Sowell wrote!

everyone on /lit/ should read The Golden Bough

>>10437656
This

>>10435797

>not posting the god tier wealth of nations

>>10437698
thanks
been looking for an alternative to that hack Campbell

What are some of the issues with Sowell's thinking? Why are you guys against him?

>>10438034
>What are some of the issues with Sowell's thinking? Why are you guys against him?
His book is nice, but "basic economics" is retarded. You will learn useful things and also that markets are perfect (since you couldn't study them otherwise), only afterwards can you learn that markets are far from perfect and there is much more to economics than markets.
If you are really interested in economics it might be better to begin with Macroeconomics by Mankiw, and follow with Varian for microeconomics, Gruber for public economics etc... The classic by Adam Smith, Ricardo, Keynes, Marshall, ... are also nice but are not easy to read.

>>10438034
>>10438049
When I say "basic economics" I mean the concept not Sowell's book.

>>10438049

Thanks I was actually looking for a good intro and thought he'd be a good place to start but I'll check out your recs as well. I was particularly interested in Sowell because of his comments regarding the nature of race in relation to economics and would like if anyone could rec something on a similar topic here. Thanks all.

>>10436665
>hurr durr we cant possibly know the outcome of anything that isn't decided purely by the Market
How's that 40 years of a runaway wealth gap treating us?

>All this stupid garbage
There is a tendency for the rate of profit to fall. All the ideology spewed by vulgar economists rests in the shadow of this. And it all functions to obfuscate this.

>>10438066
just read
>The Making of Modern Economics: The Lives and Ideas of the Great Thinkers
and/or
>A History of Western Political Thought
then
> Modern Economics by Jack Harvey

>>10435797
can you post an example?

based /leftypol/rades correcting the record!

>>10435954
die jewish shill

>>10438075
>cites a literal non problem
Good actually, what with all the functioning economy. Sorry sweetie, but red ideals don’t work.

>>10435797

>>10437654

/thread

>>10437654

Define capital because the way you're using the term doesn't make any sense to me. If you mean money or property then it can't be anything other than scarce. There's only so much land and we can only print so much money.

>>10438470
Are you a literal retard?
>>10437654
>the benefits flow to those who supply it rather than those who do the productive work

>>10438259
>functioning economy
>at least its not the gulag
You're right. The working class has never had it better. We can't hold all this prosperity.

>>10438473

I'm not retarded, I just don't understand what he means when he says the problem is capital being kept scarce so I'm asking for a clarification. Capital is typically defined as a scarce resource so it doesn't make any sense to assert that it's being kept that way by some force.

>>10438488
>>10438494
>I'm not retarded
Yes, you are. The "scarce" amount of capital available is kept away from the people that do the productive work, making it more scarce for them.

>>10438507

What does it mean for capital to be kept away from people who do productive work?

you dumb niggers should go argue somewhere else

>>10438480
should I start with something else before Aquinas? or is it a good starting spot?

>>10438517
they’re not allowed to access it, apple’s source code is for apple only, amazon’s machinery is for amazon only, google’s algos are for google only. idiot

>>10438522
die you fucking bookfag

>>10438533

Are you against private property then? There's no need to insult me by the way. I'm only asking questions to learn what you believe in why so you shouldn't feel like you're under attack.

>>10438529
What is your goal? And how much philosophical terminology do you understand?

The book does a good job of explaining a lot of the terms and relating them to previous philosophers.

If you want to learn philosophy I would start with some introductions on Plato and Aristotle.

However, you can never go wrong with Aquinas. The book does a great job of distinguishing what Aquinas actually argues, from people commonly think he argues. It is also a introductory guide, so you should be okay.

>>10436547
>capitalist society lers me make a living shitting up 4chan
>its bad

>>10438578
I have a compilation of both of these. Also, I just finished Letters From A Stoic. I also own The Nature of Things

>>10438592
Well, definitely give the book on Aquinas a try.

>>10438475
You are correct, standard of living continues to rise, working class indeed has not had it better. Are you going to tell me that the hell of the USSR, was better?

>>10438543
He is against voluntary trade and property. His ideal is born out of envy and jealousy. Literally the thinking of those that pester the hen for her bread.

>>10438075
The runaway wealth gap isn't because of the market, consider the federal reserve.

>>10438075
Who cares if some people are more rich than others? Wealth gap isn't a problem, poverty is. And in countries like America the poor are extremely few and far better off than many well-off people in other countries.

Håller ni med om att det äts för lite katt i Sverige?

>>10437185
>>10436025
Any and every book that is written to help people with social interaction is trash unless you are some rare human being that lacks basic social skills you learn by the time you are a teenager

basic econ isn't going to help most people because most outcomes are also non-deterministic, you only start to learn actually good practices at the higher level, accounting for variance.

If you read Zombie Capitalism carefully, you will have a better understanding of economics than an Econ major. It has wonderful figures and charts describing useful trends. Sure, ‘muh capitalism’, but fuck you. If you are pro capitalism, you don’t comprehend the extent or effect of our levels of wealth inequality. If you have a grasp on wealth inequality, you do not support our present form of capitalism. I’m an Econ major that worked for Art Laffer of the Laffer curve, Reagan’s Economic advisor.

>Read this one book and you'll know much more than somebody who studied it for years.

What a perfect characterization of the typical college socialist you are.

>>10439319
meant for >>10439243

>>10439243
Wealth inequality doesn't matter in the slightest and you don't have a better understanding of economics than someone that hasn't taken a course, let alone a major.
Working as a janitor in a building with Laffer doesn't change anything.

>>10435797
>nigger nogics

>>10439645
>Wealth inequality doesn't matter in the slightes

This. Socialists want equality, but that just means that everyone is in the shit.

>>10438470
It means money.
We can print more money, or cut interest rates to enable the private sector to create more money, but it may require taxation to be increased to control inflation.

As there's only so much land, it makes sense for the burden of tax to be (gradually) shifted onto the unimproved value of land.

>ITT: books that put people on Mt. Stupid

>>10439645
>wealth inequality doesn't matter
until you get 1789'd again

>>10439813

Just print more money so everybody can have some. You would fit right in as an economics advisory to the president of Zimbabwe.

>>10439828
>implying wealth inequality was what caused 1789
If anything, 1776 will commence again.

>>10439758
Equality is really asinine concept. You have to level the playing field but after this is done, with a linear currency scheme, people are going to have more or less again as time moves on. In the future, if ideas are respected more, then hopefully this sort of thing won’t be a problem, but as it is, it is almost like we live in a feudalistic era with the serfs WANTING the ruling class to live recklessly and licentiously instead of abhoring wasteful processes

>>10439821
Any high school calculus book

>>10439821
Guns, Memes, and Steel

>>10438533
No, that's not what I mean.
What I mean is: supplying the money is more lucrative than actually working.

>>10439841
You're displaying your ignorance of economics.

Firstly, it was you, not I, who said "Just print more money so everybody can have some".

Secondly, I mentioned the need to control inflation and the solution that may need to be implemented.

Thirdly, it may surprise you to learn that printing money is never sufficient to cause hyperinflation. All recent hyperinflation episodes have been the result of the government trying (and eventually failing) to hold the currency value above its real value. Zimbabwe also persecuted its main export industry while discouraging foreign investment!

There are other possible causes of hyperinflation. Printing money and immediately selling it to meet foreign currency repayment obligations can cause hyperinflation, and so can the lack of an effective taxation system. But printing money alone won't cause hyperinflation except maybe if the country is blockaded (as the Confederate States of America was).

>>10439645
>Wealth inequality doesn't matter in the slightest
it matters politically. allowing such drastic economic inequality always has repercussions in other areas. it dosen't matter what group it is,but oligarchs will always buy the political system, militant groups, natural resources, communications, etc. allowing anyone group to control these things puts a time limit on civilization.

>>10439972
>if only we control the inflation and hold it to some arbitrary goal, then it will work
You're displaying your ignorance of economics. Central planners cannot know what the "correct" monetary supply would be.

>>10440021
Economic inequality and political inequality are two different things. One is an issue, the other is not. Though Political inequality inherently leads to inequality, and I would consider that a problem.

>>10435797
On Women

>>10440050
'Tis much better than letting central planners, rather than markets, determine the value of the currency!

And so what if central planners can't know what the correct money supply would be? Nor does anyone else! But fortunately we don't need to know in advance - we can monitor the effects in real time. Inflation is one of those effects, and is usually regarded as the biggest problem. Unemployment is sometimes worse, but it's rare for the two to be at significant levels simultaneously (though it can happen when there's a supply shock).

>>10440100
>'Tis much better than letting central planners, rather than markets, determine the value of the currency!
This is historically very wrong. We're seeing a move away from government controlled money to market determined levels as we speak, look at the cryptocurrency movement.
>we can monitor the effects in real time
Except this is what differentiates bad economists and good economists. You only look at the seen (unemployment numbers lowering in the short run), you don't look at the unseen (altering of the stages of production leading to a long term bust).

>>10439645
>Wealth inequality doesn't matter in the slightest

Prove it

>>10440131
https://ourworldindata.org/a-history-of-global-living-conditions-in-5-charts/
Read this through while keeping in mind that income inequality is increasing. The gap is expanding, but the bottom is raising rapidly.

>>10440131

The economy isn't a zero sum game where if somebody wins it means somebody lost. The simple reality is that some people create wealth better than others and then is why some people have more than others. You're not entitled to the wealth other people create just because they have more than you.

>>10440162
Will give it a read, thanks.

FWIW I've never really thought it was a massive problem, always thought income inequality was worse.

>>10440201
So what level of income inequality should you have?

>>10440189
>The economy isn't a zero sum game where if somebody wins it means somebody lost.
Except it actually is, because there's a finite amount of wealth. If a handful of people possess multiple billions of that finite amount, simple maths dictate that someone, somewhere is getting less than they need to survive. Extreme wealth, existing alongside extreme poverty, produces dangerous instabilities - and if the gap continues to widen, the system can't survive.

>>10440462

Why do you believe wealth is finite?

>>10440462
You're thinking about wealth comes from a mercantilism standpoint that's been demonstrably false since Adam Smith. Wealth is more than just money, and extreme poverty is DECREASING, while inequality is increasing.
Your assessment has literally never come true, and never will. But you will never admit, and only move the goalpost of the gap estimate further.

>>10440462
>there's a finite amount of wealth
lmao

Imagine if we'd have had the same amount of wealth today as we did a hundred years ago.

>>10440462

I always wondered why Thomas Sowell got so much shit by people on this board but when this is the level of economic literacy it explains everything

>>10440117
>This is historically very wrong.
Your conjecture doesn't fit the facts. Fiat money is superior in every way!

>We're seeing a move away from government controlled money to market determined levels as we speak, look at the cryptocurrency movement.
Look at it yourself: high transaction costs and wild oscillations in value! Completely unsuitable to replace real money.

>>we can monitor the effects in real time
>Except this is what differentiates bad economists and good economists.
No, what differentiates them is that bad economists make incorrect assumptions and fail to reality check their work!

>You only look at the seen (unemployment numbers lowering in the short run), you don't look at the unseen (altering of the stages of production leading to a long term bust).
That looks very much like meaningless drivel! If it is not, perhaps you'd care to explain exactly how government intervention to reduce unemployment alters the stages of the business cycle in a way that leads to a long term bust. Protip: you can't without relying on false assumptions!

Government stabilisation of the economy will not cause a long term bust, but can usually avoid a bust and always recover from one quickly!

>>10440603
>Fiat money is superior in every way!

Look, the fact is not even Keynes thought this. Take your radical opinions elsewhere. Leftist or rightist, doesn't matter. Everyone agrees the current system is not stable.

>>10440603
>Fiat money is superior in every way!
>doesn't include a single one
It's inflationary compared to gold, got you there.
>high transaction costs and wild oscillations in value! Completely unsuitable to replace real money.
There is more than one Cryptocurrency, many with lower transaction costs than fiat.
It's replacing "real money" already in certain markets such as Venezuela.
>what differentiates them is that bad economists make incorrect assumptions and fail to reality check their work!
So check your premises...
>That looks very much like meaningless drivel! If it is not, perhaps you'd care to explain exactly how government intervention to reduce unemployment alters the stages of the business cycle in a way that leads to a long term bust. Protip: you can't without relying on false assumptions!
Government manipulation of the discount rate for short term fixes. A Nobel laureate was won over this.
>Government stabilisation of the economy will not cause a long term bust, but can usually avoid a bust and always recover from one quickly!
Hahaha. Surely this is bait.

>>10440623
You're correct that Keynes did not think that. But do you really still believe the system of managed centrally planned exchange rates that Keynes advocated was better?

>>10440696
>doesn't include a single one
How many do you need? Fiat is cheaper to set up, you don't have to kowtow to external creditors, and there isn't the risk of hyperinflation when you run out of gold.

>It's inflationary compared to gold, got you there.
...except when the price is falling.
Plus it's better to have a bit of inflation than to have the danger of hyperinflation.


>There is more than one Cryptocurrency,
Of course.
>many with lower transaction costs than fiat.
How do they manage that?
>It's replacing "real money" already in certain markets such as Venezuela.

The Venezuelan government, which has a track record of monetary incompetence, announced a cryptocurrency but it's likely to end badly.

>So check your premises...
I do. Can you honestly say the same?

>Government manipulation of the discount rate for short term fixes.
That's not even a sentence - it's just a phrase!

I think the problem here is that you expect the short term fixes to cause or exacerbate the long term problems - you fail to comprehend how their long term effect could be neutral or positive. In terms of employment, a short term fix is likely to alleviate the long term problem, as work tends to be the best place for people to develop skills for future work.

>A Nobel laureate was won over this.
Which one?

>Hahaha. Surely this is bait.
No, I'm serious. What made you think it's bait?

>>10440867
>>10440696
>>10440603

You autistic fuckers need to learn how to type. Sentences run together to form paragraphs.

>>10440867
Clarification:
>...except when the price is falling.
Should be:
...except when the gold price is falling.

>>10440872
Where do you think you are? I got a hint from your spacing.

>>10440884

What does the spacing tell you?

>>10435797
Emerson's journals are really neat. Library of america has a good collection.

>>10440909
like Ralph Emerson?

>>10440496
So I guess the number of people in the world is also infinite?

>>10441331
No. There are physical limits to the number of people in the world. But there is no limit to wealth because ideas can have value.

>>10440505
/lit/ is pseud central
pro-tip: most people criticizing probably haven't read a single thing written by him

>Google this guy since I always hear him being meme'd.
>Turns out he has hot takes on everything.

It's easy to understand why /lit/ would trash him, looks like he despises NEETs and commies.

>>10441440
>hot takes
>posts objectively correct quote

>>10440369
No one should be paid below a living wage.

>>10435797
Here's a good one:

>>10436992
Unironically a good read, absurdly quotable and quite informative, bit flawed in some areas however.

>>10441440
>looks like he despises NEETs and commies.
Really? Because that quote sounds really communistic

>>10439821
>freakonomics
>marx capital vol 2&3
>>>10439896
>Salt: A World History
>On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft
>Collapse: How Societies "Choose" to Fail or Succeed
>The Shock Doctrine
>Homo Deus
>A People's History of the United States

>>10439821
not really. acting elitist about knowledge is pure cancer.

sowell's books about economics are informative and good

>>10439860
dis huehue

>>10440479
because there is a finite amount of computing power, matter and energy in our nearby viciniy you lunatic

>>10441928
there's an infinite amount of 1s and 0s

If you buy something for 10$, then sell it for 11$, you have increased wealth.

>>10441958
this is completely psychotic, even in form

>>10440917
Yeah I take building sciences and steel beams fuckin melt bruh

>>10435800
Yeah sounds about right.

>>10441977
that it wasn’t a controlled demolition does not vindicate the theory that Al Qaeda brought down those buildings with no assistance from clandestine actors anon. You’d do well to assume suspicion when the alpha community wants you to believe something so absurd.

>>10440867
>But do you really still believe the system of managed centrally planned exchange rates that Keynes advocated was better?
Keynes never thought that. He advocated a couple of different things, but planning exchange rates was not one of them. The interest rate being modified by the Federal Reserve is just about as far as Keynes goes in that direction. That and government investing in industries to either prevent an inescapable downward trend or to spur employment, or both.

That's just about it. Either you didn't understand Keynes or did not read his actual work, just secondary sources.

You don't 'run out' of Gold. That's not how a Gold standard works you idiot. No one actually has Gold in a Gold standard, holy fuck you are dumb.

Look kid, maybe economics isn't for you. I mean there are other things you can study. You might just not have the comprehension and logical faculties to be discussing these sorts of things.

>>10436998
Stfu you dumbass plebtier arse. "Haha I used an overused joke haha love me haha why did u leave me Karen I have no-one to be with on Christmas haha".

Just kys we hate you and ur dumb me-me.

>>10436025
This has done miracles for me. People are really simple to please after all.

>>10441974
t.

>>10437654
Fucking moron

>>10438075
You can easily blame the government for that.
That's really the main problem we have right now imo.
the government intervenes sometimes like in '08 bailing out the banks and GM, but not othertimes like breaking up the many oligopolies that we have in our 2017-2018 economy.
We also just went though 8 years of insane money printing and it doesn't look like it's gonna stop anytime soon.

>>10436566
>indeed the only major functioning economic system?
Yeah, right? I can't wait for those automated systems to replace all the minimum wage jobs so the lower class gets absolutely obliterated and we break out the guillotines again to eat the rich.

Wait... that's what you meant by functioning, right?

>>10442230
>robots are gonna take our jobs
SO STOP MAKING THE FUCKING ROBOTS
THIS WORLD HAS FUNCTIONED JUST FINE WITHOUT ROBOTS AND AI. WE DON'T FUCKING NEED THEM

Does anyone know of any decent books on miscellaneous topics? I'm looking for something that's similar to Schott's Quintessential Miscellany.

>>10435811
>>10435800
>>10436547
Even if you don't agree with our current system of economics, understanding how it works is still useful. I'm not going to avoid reading Marx or Hitler because I don't agree with authoritarianism.

>>10442289
I'd rather have R2D2 make my Big Mac than an arts major, thanks though

>>10440117
>crypto will replace fiat!

>>10442382
>being a salty no coiner
Give /biz/ a visit and realize how wrong you are. It fits all the principles of the advancement of money that was outlined by Carl Menger in his Origins of Money.

>>10442411
>Give /biz/ a visit

Only pink wojaks screaming about the price crashing lmao
Keep dreaming cryptocultist

>>10442436
Browse /biz/ for a few weeks, realize which coins aren't meme shill coins, read their white papers, buy ones you like.
I've doubled my money, or more, on every single coin I've ever bought.

>>10442507
>I've made money out of an speculative frenzy, therefore fiat money is doomed

>>10442516
Fiat isn't doomed because of cryptos, cryptos are an answer to the faults of fiat. It may be speculative to some, but others realize how important of an addition blockchain technology is to money. It is the future, whether or not that blockchain money is bitcoin is irrelevant.

>>10442525
>It may be speculative to some, but others realize how important of an addition blockchain technology is to money.

Speculative "to some"? Anyone financially literate knows stocks skyrocketing because the companies changed their name to include blockchain is speculation. Not to mention the ICOs and countless shitcoins pumped and dumped on the daily. Yes, blockchain will change the industry, but you must have your head in the sand to believe this is healthy, rational market behaviour.

>>10442230
Yes Luddite as if that will happen.

>>10442551
It's speculative to the people that treat it as a financial instrument. It's entirely speculative to value it monetarily. The technology behind it as a money going forward isn't speculative. I think most alt coins will plummet to nothing, not all though. Blockchain tech could create a bigger paradigm shift than the internet for undeveloped areas in ecommerce.

>>10442029
>Keynes never thought that. He advocated a couple of different things, but planning exchange rates was not one of them
You're wrong - see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bancor

>You don't 'run out' of Gold. That's not how a Gold standard works you idiot. No one actually has Gold in a Gold standard, holy fuck you are dumb.
I'm well aware of how a gold standard works - and to say nobody actually has gold is quite ridiculous - central banks had huge vaults full of the stuff. Many still do, of course, but they no longer actually need to.

Where countries had hyperinflation under managed exchange rates, it was preceded by running out of gold. Eventually President Nixon ended the Bretton Woods system because the USA was running out of gold.

>>10442170
Why? Do you want everyone to remain in thrall to the financiers?

Man it would be great if we could get book suggestions instead of another capitalism marxism debate... seriously go to fucking /pol/ you autistic retards

>>10436025
It's a bunch of non-scientific anecdotal evidence.

>>10443185
Bancor's exchange rate is literally not fixed, worst example to give too because it is not even possible to trade this currency, due to it being mostly an accounting system.

Congratulations, you have spotted my hyperbole. You are correct sir, it is hyperbolic for me to assert that no one had gold under the gold standard, but that's if we are talking about everyone. Your average citizen? No, he wasn't holding MUCH gold at all.

Now for your other claim? I say it is patently false. The United States wasn't running out of Gold, everyone else was. Other countries had holdings in the Federal Reserve, and as a result, to do business with other countries through resources, or any other sort of good traded, was to trade in bank notes of the federal reserve. You are correct, that the amount of Gold in America was going down, but that is only relatively as we were still the world's leader in Gold.

It was done away with because thought unstable. But many economists are rolling in their grave, because the system we have now, while stable, does not have an equalizing ability that a gold exchange-standard did.

That, by the way, is an important distinction. The Bretton-woods agreement did away with the gold-EXCHANGE standard, not the Gold Standard. Huge difference. Under the gold exchange standard you literally couldn't exchange your money for gold at banks, under the gold standard you could if it were fiat money.

We would never have run out of gold, they were just scared of short term profits.

The other anon posting about digital commodities being similar to gold and silver is correct in so far as we integrate this system into our lives. It is my opinion the government has to actually make an investment into this area of infrastructure for any significant change to happen to our lives. You aren't going to see any change from just letting Sowell's magical 'free market' take care of anything, trust me. That's what actual economics teaches you.

>>10443205
Book suggestions?

Have you read The Wealth of Nations?

Now pick one
-Malthus Principle of Population
-Ricardo Principles of Political Economy
- Mill Principles of Political Economy

Now read this
-Henry George Progress and Poverty
-Carl Menger Principles of Economics
-Leon Walras Elements of Pure Economics

Then read maybe some Pareto, Keynes' General Theory and boom you are caught up to the best economist you see around here.

Bonus points if you understand Keynes enough to summarize the entire work in your own words after reading (this should be something you do with most non-fiction books anyway)

>>10438621
Absolutely. Living standards have declined after the USSR was dismantled in Russia and most former Soviet republics, and the majority of those old enough to remember living in the USSR want it back in Russia, Belarus, Georgia, Uzbekistan, Armenia, etc. It's actually the younger generations who never lived in the USSR that are most hostile to it. Things also got significantly worse in the Balkans after Yugoslavia was dismantled, much of the populace wishes it never collapsed, and Tito is still widely revered.

>>10444721
bullshit

>>10435800
truuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu

>>10438016
That's the boy

>>10444755
Read it and weep.

http://www.pewforum.org/2017/05/10/views-on-role-of-russia-in-the-region-and-the-soviet-union/

>>10435797
Does anyone have a pdf of the fifth edition? All I can find is what I'm guessing is the second, originally "expanded" one. I just wanna learn basic economics!

>>10444803
This literally only says they said it was a bad thing that the USSR broke up, it says nothing about them wanting it back when political systems drastically change bad shit happens so you're still literally just a retard.

>>10444096
>ancor's exchange rate is literally not fixed, worst example to give too because it is not even possible to trade this currency, due to it being mostly an accounting system.
It was not possible to trade Bancor because it DID NOT EXIST! Instead they chose a system of fixed exchange rates that operated in a fairly similar way, but was entered around the US dollar.

I understand the name Bancor was subsequently used for one cryptocurrency, and I hope you're not conflating it with that.

Your hyperbole just highlights your lack of comprehension. I never claimed the average citizen was holding much gold under the gold standard. My point was that central banks had to, and they risked hyperinflation if they ran out.

As for Bretton Woods, while the USA wasn't in immediate danger of completely running out of gold, its gold supplies were dwindling so fast that it soon would be if they did nothing.

WTF do you mean by "equalizing ability"? I ask because I regard the current system as automatically equalising, which is why it is stable. And what's the point of what you regard as "eqalizing" if it doesn't produce stability?

And your supposed difference between the gold standard and the "gold exchange standard" looks to me to be a technicality about the role of banks.

>>10442230
>the only major functioning system
>clearly implying that it has functioned thus far
>something doesn't function unless it functions for eternity
"YEAH, WELL... WHAT ABOUT THOSE FUTURE ROBOTS???"
Fuck me dude, what's going to be the best economic system when we have to move to the next galaxy. Of course we don't have the fucking answer now, how could anyone be this autistic

>>10444721
>Things also got significantly worse in the Balkans after Yugoslavia was dismantled, much of the populace wishes it never collapsed,

Top fucking kek
Serbia still wishes it existed because they controlled it. Bosnia wish it existed because they received wealth they didnt produce. Croatia and Slovenia are happy as fuck because they're now independent and their economies shit over the rest of exyu.
The only people I've ever met who miss Yugoslavia are ethnic Serbs.
t. From ExYu

>>10442230
This is so stupid and you are such a fucking retard. How did this get so pervasive among bugman reddit le socialist automated utopia brainlets? There seriously needs to be an accredited neoclassical theorist writing something to shut fucking retards like you up once and for all. Right now the only counterarguments are, albeit true, not robust and only on like blogs and the Mises Institute site.

>>10436992
if you are not willing to commit to the whole book I would recommend his seminal article in National Review that goes by the same name. Although his predictions have not been confirmed yet, the analysis he makes of religious and ethnic roots of conflict is really interesting. I love pessimism.

>>10444860
>Instead they chose a system of fixed exchange rates that operated in a fairly similar way, but was entered around the US dollar.
Wrong. The Bancor system was simply a way to keep track of who was in debt to whom. Just because it is an intranational currency does not mean the 'exhcange rate' is fixed. (airquotes because the exchange rate doesn't exist for currencies which cannot be traded.)

As for Bretton Woods, I can guarantee you the Federal Reserve was not going to lose its shares of gold.

Okay. So. The idea of an exchanged commodity does make the currency it backs prone to sudden fluctuations, but one good part about that means it can check inflation. If the dollar undergoes a period of heavy inflation, it is checked by gold increasing in value relatively to it. As a result, all inflation that the dollar goes through is severely checked by the fluctuations and speculation of the value of gold under the gold exchange standard.

There is a huge difference between 'gold standard' and 'gold-exchange standard'. You could learn some history of the development and destruction of the two. Read Von Mises' books on it, his works are less economics and more just empirical history, considering his philosophy towards value comes from exchange value anyway, which is incredibly historically derived. I'm not faulting him, but I am. Still, his books are nice kind of refresher on history. The gold-exchange standard was abolished at the beginning of the 21st century and the gold standard was abolished after Bretton Woods, late 21st century. No technicality here, just because a bank won't change your fiat currency for gold doesn't mean a damn th- wait yes it does it means a lot of properties like severe fractional reserves kick in and the proliferation of unbacked fiat currency increases.

>>10437654
So doctors and scientists aren't making $200K+ per year and living in beautiful homes?

>>10444916
Under the Bancor system, countries would have fixed their exchange rates against the Bancor (so any two fixed against the Bancor would've effectively been fixed against each other). Though value adjustments would have been possible, they would have been actively done like governments (as under Bretton Woods, hence the similarity) rather than real time responses of the market. Hence my description of it as "a system of managed centrally planned exchange rates".

>As for Bretton Woods, I can guarantee you the Federal Reserve was not going to lose its shares of gold.
Considering European countries were demanding to buy gold from the Federal Reserve, how could it not?

>There is a huge difference between 'gold standard' and 'gold-exchange standard'.
I've checked and the latter is merely one form of the former. So I won't comment on it further unless this discussion moves into the relative merits of different gold standards - which is unlikely as they're all bad.

The idea of using gold to check inflation is stupid: it's expensive to set up, it creates arbitrage opportunities for speculators to get rich at your expense, and instead of the mild inflation you'd get if you let the market devalue your currency in real time, you'll get severe inflation when circumstances force you make a much bigger devaluation. Or even worse, hyperinflation when you run out of gold if you try to ignore the circumstances that are forcing you to devalue.

And fractional reserve banking is little more than a meme. In reality the amount banks can lend out is never limited by the reserves they hold. Instead it's limited either by the Basel capital requirements or the ability to find profitable customers to lend to.

>>10444970
Doctors probably are, but I doubt many scientists are.
However even if my doubts are unfounded, it doesn't mean the problem's not real. There will always be some highly skilled people who buck the trend.

>>10441440
>Quote is literally anti surplus extraction
nice meme

>Best non-fiction books

>No guns germs and steel


Did u even check pulitzer non-fiction list?

p.s. das kapital and the capital in xxi century are good too

>>10445128
Holy mother of lord. Lets get some things straight here. With sources.

I would like to see the quotes which have the exchange rate being fixed. No where in this wikipedia article you have showed me is there any mention of fixing the exchange rates against the Bancor, which by the way was simply a way to track the flow in and out of the country, instead of trading around Federal Reserve deposits of gold.

>Considering European countries were demanding to buy gold from the Federal Reserve, how could it not?
Because there was always close to an equivalent amount coming back to the United States. What I imagine happened is that for once they weren't making a big inflow so they decided to do away with a system where they were losing gold, and profit in the short-term by capital injections into the economy using quantitative easings with unbacked fiat currency. After all, they were in a recession at the time when they ended the gold-exchange standard

>I've checked and the latter is merely one form of the former.
Don't. There is a huge difference. If I could exchange my money for gold, and I could, then you actually do have commodity money being used. Which is a huge difference to someone concerned whether or not gold is actually being held by citizens. This seems to be the type of standard most want through digital commodities, but I would happy with simply an exchange rate set up to check heavy inflation to honor long-term contract payments, which is the first of many reasons why the fiduciary system you currently have is flawed.

Now time for some sources. You are right, I guess I worded my post incorrectly. Inflation is not checked and happens no matter what. But look here (https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/currency)) and you will a dollar whose value used to be much more stable than it is today. So rather, inflation is just a rate at which things lose value, so inflation is really not such a great measure of the purchasing power of your dollar. This graph is.

Furthermore, please take a look at this chart.
https://www.thebalance.com/gold-price-history-3305646

Guess what stabilized each other's values? Gasp! That's right, Gold and the USD actually stabilized each other's value because a period of heavy inflation was checked through a set exchange rate on a long buy through Gold's exchange rate. Good lord, what do you have now to check the heavy inflation and fluctuation of money? Nothing?

>>10445128
Finally, fractional reserve used to mean something when the USD was backed by actual deposits, but it is no surprise to me that econometrists such as yourself will no doubt ignore the fact that you are just carelessly issuing unlimited amounts of unbacked fiduciary media.

Now, I am not saying it is the end of the world immediately, but what WILL happen immediately will be an extreme amount of variation and utter chaos as regards buying price and futures in general.

>>10442289
We're on the brink of ecological collapse with 20% of the world engaged in decadent hedonism while the rest is already starving. Such fine

>>10438066
Regarding the relationship between economics and race:
Edward Banfield's "the unheavenly city"
Harold cruse "crisis of the Negro intellectual"

I'd read "Basic Economics" first as the other two books are broader in scope. Sowell studied under banfield and a lot of what conservatives look for in him -especially concerning urban problems- is better articulated in Banfield.

Cruse is concerned with the same stuff as Sowell, but explores it from a left perspective. He is writing before the discussion of race stuff in America had crystallized into competing pieties and his account reflects that.

>>10445662
>I would like to see the quotes which have the exchange rate being fixed.
http://www.monbiot.com/2008/11/18/clearing-up-this-mess/

>Because there was always close to an equivalent amount coming back to the United States. What I imagine happened is that for once they weren't making a big inflow so they decided to do away with a system where they were losing gold, and profit in the short-term by capital injections into the economy using quantitative easings with unbacked fiat currency.
And that's your problem: you're too lazy to find out what really happened, and too stupid to admit you're wrong (especially when the guy you insulted for what he originally said turns out to have been right all along) so instead you try to imagine a scenario where you could still be right. But it's so easily refuted! If you'd bothered to follow a few links from the Bancor page, you'd have reached https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nixon_shock which explains what really happened.

For the USA, the gold (exchange) standard produced short term stability but long term instability. My criticism stands. Goodnight.

After all, they were in a recession at the time when they ended the gold-exchange standard
>>I've checked and the latter is merely one form of the former.
>Don't. There is a huge difference. If I could exchange my money for gold, and I could, then you actually do have commodity money being used. Which is a huge difference to someone concerned whether or not gold is actually being held by citizens. This seems to be the type of standard most want through digital commodities, but I would happy with simply an exchange rate set up to check heavy inflation to honor long-term contract payments, which is the first of many reasons why the fiduciary system you currently have is flawed.
>Now time for some sources. You are right, I guess I worded my post incorrectly. Inflation is not checked and happens no matter what. But look here (https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/currency)) and you will a dollar whose value used to be much more stable than it is today. So rather, inflation is just a rate at which things lose value, so inflation is really not such a great measure of the purchasing power of your dollar. This graph is.
>Furthermore, please take a look at this chart.
>https://www.thebalance.com/gold-price-history-3305646
>Guess what stabilized each other's values? Gasp! That's right, Gold and the USD actually stabilized each other's value because a period of heavy inflation was checked through a set exchange rate on a long buy through Gold's exchange rate. Good lord, what do you have now to check the heavy inflation and fluctuation of money? Nothing?

>>10445757
Apologies for the excess quoting that I forgot to delete.

>>10445757
But I’m right because the United States was in a recession at the time they switched off the gold exchange standard. You had no good response to anything except Bancor.

But let me ask you this about Bancor, if Bancor is a supranational currency which is not tradeable and has its exchange rates fixed against the countries who are trading, this really isn’t a fixed exchange rate for the currencies. It’s a fixed rate into a bookkeeping exchange. I think you missed the point of Bancor entirely: to make it easier for banks to lend more money because they would have less liability, being able to trade more receipts around if this clearinghouse worked faster to consolidate debt and assets. Let’s be honest here, that’s what he was after. Banks were less liable for the deposits they had, even less than the gold exchange standard.

>>10435914

The reddest pill

>>10445987
>But I’m right because the United States was in a recession at the time they switched off the gold exchange standard.
I think you're even wrong about that detail: there had been a recession but they'd just come out of it. My failure to greentext that line of yours should not be seen as an endorsement: I merely forgot it was there. Had I remembered, I wouldn't've just greentexted it, I'd've deleted it.

>You had no good response to anything except Bancor.
That's subjective - I think the point that fixed currencies produce short term stability but reduce long term stability is a good one.

>But let me ask you this about Bancor, if Bancor is a supranational currency which is not tradeable and has its exchange rates fixed against the countries who are trading, this really isn’t a fixed exchange rate for the currencies.
I hadn't realised you were deficient in basic mathematics! While two currencies are fixed against the same thing, their exchange rate doesn't move against each other.

>It’s a fixed rate into a bookkeeping exchange. I think you missed the point of Bancor entirely: to make it easier for banks to lend more money because they would have less liability, being able to trade more receipts around if this clearinghouse worked faster to consolidate debt and assets. Let’s be honest here, that’s what he was after. Banks were less liable for the deposits they had, even less than the gold exchange standard.
Let's be completely honest here: it never happened!

If you want to assign motivations then you should read up about it more. I'm not going to bother speculating, as that's irrelevant to my point.

>>10447680
> While two currencies are fixed against the same thing, their exchange rate doesn't move against each other.

I didn't realize you didn't know how bank notes worked! Essentially Bancor is a supranational system of bank notes, being able to clear. Where the bank is simply a ledger showing what has exported and imported and the excess or deficit. You know how our deficit increases usually? Our accounts would be in the negative with Bancor immediately under this system. Us having a service-based consumer economy is probably why Keynes' deal didn't exactly go through.

No, for a couple reasons.

First of all you have to think about things from the aspect of the consumer, not the merchant or wholesaler.

Next, the Bancor IS NOT TRADEABLE. Once you have Bancor, you cannot turn this into anything else. This is a sink, that has no way out. Just because of this though, the affect on money isn't gone. It just means that if it is unprofitable to do business with another country because of a fixed exchange rate that isn't agreeable, then it will not be done. Industry will be spurned for greed, to use the philosophy of Adam Smith, because the fixed exchange rates prevailed. What this means, is that if there were an affect of Bancor's fixed exchange rates it would have been to ultimately make inflation much worse, due to the industry lessened by less trade.

You see why they thought this too dangerous, even with Keynes' magic employment multiplier, you are not going to get around the job loss caused by unfavorable Bancor exchange rates. Hence why your money was turned inward as a country. They decided on pegged exchange rates, as I'm sure you know, for a good reason.

A few miscellaneous points

You're right about that statement regarding fixed currencies, I'd've is not a word, and the point isn't that it hasn't happened. I'm just telling you what the motive would have been for making this a popular idea.

This is pretty useful if you're trying to understand statistical analysis without much prior training.

>>10447843
this nate silver is that one statician who dared saying donald trump had a chance of winning, right?

>>10447891

Yes, on the day of the election they gave Trump a 1/3 chance of winning.

It was a popular narrative after the elections that “the polls were wrong!” But if you followed 538’s coverage they said again and again throughout the election that The Polls, when broken down by state polls and compared agaisnt the electoral college, very clearly said he had a very real chance.

In statistics terms, giving him a 1/3 chance seems like a strong hit, when you consider Clinton got the popular vote by a margin but lost the college. Especially when other outlets were saying 5 or 10%. I don’t know about you but I wouldn’t want to play Russian Roulette with a six-shot revolver loaded with two bullets.

538 is a great outlet generally if you are more interested in the facts and figures. The writers are generally a sort of inoffensive moderate liberal, but who by no means have ‘drank the koolaid’ of Democrat rhetoric.

Like for example they are all very skeptical about the idea that Trump is ever impeached, just because numerically there will never be enough democrats to do it, and it will probably not ever been clearly in republicans best interest to do so.

>>10447891
Yup. If I remember correctly, he gave him a ~40% chance, which is basically a coin flip for something as hard to predict as a presidential election. Later on, everyone else realized that national polls were accurate (they tracked the popular vote closely), but state-by-state polls (which matter most for the electoral college) were of dubious quality and offered bad predictions. I'm not sure if Silver added that specific bit of uncertainty into his predictions, but most other news outlets didn't.

Another good book for introducing yourself to statistical material. It basically boils down the intuitions that you get out of some well-taught Stat I and II courses--good for casual or supplemental reading.

Between this and Silver, you can put together a decent toolkit for helping you discern bunk studies from good ones.

>>10435797
the real lincoln - history on the civil war and lincoln that youd never learn in any school/university. well cited and eye-opening

black rednecks white liberals - a compilation of essays by tom sowell on history and culture

Comfy af

>>10445292
>There will always be some highly skilled people who buck the trend.
Doesn't that mean there's always people who don't, then? It's a problem that has existed since the dawn of civilization, in other words.

>>10435914
I like poor prose, the book.

>>10445637

>>10444721
USSR collapsed because it's system was unsustainable. It's almost as if red ideals do not function. Yes living in a political system were I'd be sent to camps for not towing the party line, is sooo good plus waiting literal years to buy a car.

>>10436566
>It's a better system because fattened social darwinists in suits forced other systems out of power

Posted from my Musk connection on my iZucc. America truly is free :)

>>10448299
>Carcuck

Private transportation is a literal marketing tactic you fucking brainlet

>>10441440
He is right, those porkies are a parasite

>>10436025
Great book I really improve a lot of relations with people

>>10447756
Nothing I've posted could reasonably be taken as indicating I don't know how banknotes work. Your conclusion otherwise is evidence of poor comprehension.

However it is a basic mathematical principle that if A and C are both directly proportional to B, A is directly proportional to C. No amount of squirming can get you away from this fact - it's true whether or not B is tradeable!

Bancor would've been a bureaucratic impediment to international trade, and they were right to reject it IMO. But the Bretton Woods system they implemented instead was also bad. Floating exchange rates are inherently superior.

I'd've is a word: 'tis a contraction of "I would have".
And I don't think you're sufficiently knowledgeable of the subject for your speculation on motives to be of much value.

>>10448504
>However it is a basic mathematical principle that if A and C are both directly proportional to B, A is directly proportional to C. No amount of squirming can get you away from this fact - it's true whether or not B is tradeable!
But Bancor would have to be bought less by exporting countries and more by importing countries.

In this way, because we are running into deficits, we would have to buy more of Bancor, the countries with Bancor surplus would buy less. In this way, the direct exchange rate for the two currencies would be more affected by the Bancor exchange static rates in the importing countries than in the exporting countries. This would mean the countries that import more, do less trade overseas if the currency exchange rate for them is disadvantageous towards what their currency is worth, and for an importing country which suffers more inflation, due to capital injections typically necessary under high importing volume like the United States, we would be experiencing double the inflation we would have if not under the deal.

You see, perhaps you are missing the point, consumers can exchange currency freely. We are dealing with the countries through Bancor. If someone wants to speculate in currency they will easily be able to. So you see there are severe arbitrage opportunities in starting inflation so severe with a system like this.

For Keynes, someone who understood production to be a very fickle thing, that it goes through cycles both seasonal and decade-long, and understood that producers could fall into wholes as far as an initial cyclical downturn as part of the process of business and need more capital investment in order to continue; despite knowing all of this, to have someone say that this would be a feasible plan is kind of ridiculous. I like Keynesian economics, and I think they are practical. But I do not think I have deficient knowledge on this subject. In particular, I have pointed out a couple things that you were even unaware of. For instance, the recession the country was in at the time of the meetings on Bancor anyway.

I'd've is not a proper English word.

>>10448097
>well cited and eye-opening

>Consider this inflammatory assertion: "Eliminating every last black person from American soil, Lincoln proclaimed, would be 'a glorious consummation.'" Compare the nuances and qualifications in what Lincoln actually said: "If as the friends of colonization hope, the present and coming generations of our countrymen shall by any means, succeed in freeing our land from the dangerous presence of slavery; and, at the same time, in restoring a captive people to their long-lost father-land, with bright prospects for the future; and this too, so gradually, that neither races nor individuals shall have suffered by the change, it will indeed be a glorious consummation." One need not be a Lincoln admirer to recognize that DiLorenzo is making an unfair characterization. DiLorenzo actually gets so overwrought that at one point he attributes to Lincoln racist views Lincoln was attacking.

>But, Gamble notes that The Real Lincoln "is seriously compromised by careless errors of fact, misuse of sources, and faulty documentation," which taken all together "constitute a near-fatal threat to DiLorenzo’s credibility as a historian."

Libertarianism, not even once.

>>10438034
He's a nigger that reddit tier /pol/ fags dick ride because "le based black man says things a republican in 1983 would say!!!11!!!"

>>10449341
It's funny how the 'anti-racists' are always the most racist.

>>10441503
i randomly discovered that guy "laddering" chimneys on youtube

>>10442367
>I'm not going to avoid reading Marx or Hitler because I don't agree with authoritarianism.
Did I parse that sentence right? You're attributing authoritarianism to Marxian thought?

Benjamin Franklin's autobiography.

>>10450640
holy fuck delete your post russel brand

>>10447891
If you ignore when he said Trump had a 2% chance of winning the primary sure.

>>10449484
No I'm a just a racist pal I just think your "LIEbruls are the REAL RACIST!!!!" shtick is transparent, phony and gay. A liberal wants a black guy to fuck his daughter but a conservative insists he pays his taxes and wears a MAGA hat while doing it.

>>10437654
>me dumb prole me hammer screw into widget me productive u meaniehead boss u don hammer widget me mad me angry

>>10437654
why did you write "nothing" ? the sentence u wrote immediately afterwards says that you dont believe in private property or contracts.

>>10451407
Please be quiet anon, you're going to wake up Mom :(