The Scam

Here's another way to look at economic systems. Again, a gentle reminder that economics are a physical concept and a free creation of the human mind. Economics does not exist on its own in the natural order.

We share this small planet, orbiting the sun, with approximately 7 billion humans and untold other living species. To the best of our knowledge, we have clawed our way to the top of the food chain and can even protect ourselves from some natural calamities.

The planet is full of resources that need to be responsibly managed. We have not, however, developed a system of living to do this. Instead, we have gone far in the opposite direction and aligned the resources of our planet with human greed. The result is we have most of the 7 billion human inhabitants living in abject poverty and suffering, and a small percentage enjoying an exorbitant lifestyle.

We have done this by legalizing the feudal system. We've artificially carved up the land areas into countries, and within countries even further stratified the land with private ownership tied directly to our economic system. Political systems, particularly in the US, are tilted far in favor of the wealthy minority through a disproportionate representational system. Even within this system, the rules are further skewed to favor the minority, for example the use of the filibuster in the US Senate.

Compounding this, of course, is the corruption of the political and economic systems. They are so integrated in the 21st century that you cannot see where one begins and the other ends. Corporate captains are writing our public policy and paying off legislators through campaign contributions and independent expenditures. Hell, the Koch brothers are pumping hundreds of millions of dollars in to the system to get the results that benefit them.

The wealthy elite benefit tremendously from austerity policies and privatization. One leads to the other. So the defenders of this system, the protectors of the status quo, continue the propaganda about national debt without pause, including the myth of the rugged American individual. You know, if you can't make it, it's your fault, not the system.

We're left with a system that produces exactly what it was designed to produce. More money for them and screw the rest of us.