Friday, April 20, 2012

Debt-Financed Wars Ruin any Country....


The US Founding Fathers Knew that Debt-Financed Wars Ruin the Country, every Generation should pay its own Debts as it goes...?

Thomas Jefferson said:

It is incumbent on every generation to pay its own debts as it goes — a principle which if acted on would save one-half the wars of the world.

He was right....

Wall Street as organized crime....

And the fails just keep on coming.

They will toss the small fry while the big wheel keeps on turning....

The father of modern economics – Adam Smith – agreed:

Were the expence of war to be defrayed always by a revenue raised within the year [instead of financing it with long-term public debt], the taxes from which that extraordinary revenue was drawn would last no longer than the war. The ability of private people to accumulate, though less during the war, would have been greater during the peace than under the system of funding. War would not necessarily have occasioned the destruction of any old capitals, and peace would have occasioned the accumulation of many more new. Wars would in general be more speedily concluded, and less wantonly undertaken. The people feeling, during the continuance of the war, the complete burden of it, would soon grow weary of it, and government, in order to humour them, would not be under the necessity of carrying it on longer than it was necessary to do so. The foresight of the heavy and unavoidable burdens of war would hinder the people from wantonly calling for it when there was no real or solid interest to fight for. The seasons during which the ability of private people to accumulate was somewhat impaired, would occur more rarely, and be of shorter continuance. Those on the contrary, during which that ability was in the highest vigour, would be of much longer duration than they can well be under the system of funding.

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.

***

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 $9 trillion debt, and 200 Trillion$ in unfunded liabilities, $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.

***

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.

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.

***

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.

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.

***

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.

***

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.”

James Madison said:

In time of actual war, great discretionary powers are constantly given to the Executive Magistrate. Constant apprehension of War, has the same tendency to render the head too large for the body. A standing military force, with an overgrown Executive will not long be safe companions to liberty. The means of defense against foreign danger, have been always the instruments of tyranny at home. Among the Romans it was a standing maxim to excite a war, whenever a revolt was apprehended. Throughout all Europe, the armies kept up under the pretext of defending, have enslaved the people.

Madison also noted that never-ending war tends to destroy both liberty and prosperity:

Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes; and armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few. In war, too, the discretionary power of the Executive is extended; its influence in dealing out offices, honors, and emoluments is multiplied: and all the means of seducing the minds, are added to those of subduing the force, of the people. The same malignant aspect in republicanism may be traced in the inequality of fortunes, and the opportunities of fraud, growing out of a state of war, and in the degeneracy of manners and of morals, engendered by both. No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.

Many have said that “war is the health of the state”, and Thomas Paine wrote in the Rights of Man:

In reviewing the history of the English Government, its wars and its taxes, a bystander, not blinded by prejudice, nor warped by interest, would declare, that taxes were not raised to carry on wars, but that wars were raised to carry on taxes....

And George Washington – in his farewell address of 1796 – said:

Overgrown military establishments are under any form of government inauspicious to liberty......


After spending all of this year ignoring the fiscal disaster that the US is facing at the end of 2012, markets are finally taking off the blinders. That might explain why the S&P 500 has dropped 4.3% so far from its April 1 peak and why it may have more to come....

Remember the debt ceiling crisis of the summer of 2011? You know, the one that triggered a 25% collapse in US stock prices? The compromise that was struck required major progress in deficit reduction by November, or drastic measures would automatically kick in.

Well guess what? Zero progress has been made. None can be expected until after the November 6 election as long as both parties expect to win. That allows just eight weeks for the president and congress to repair some of the most serious fiscal damage ever to strike the country, three of which will be vacation weeks.

Add up the numbers and the potential impact on the economy is particularly grim. If congress takes no action by year end, a series of tax increases and spending cuts will automatically take effect that will squeeze the life out of the economy. Think Austerity with a capital “A”. Think Spain with a capital “S”. Even Federal Reserve Chairman, Ben Bernanke, a man normally disposed to making cautious, taciturn statements has described the problem as “A massive fiscal cliff”.

Here is the forbidding breakdown in terms of their effect on annual GDP growth:

-0.2% Expiration of unemployment benefits
-0.8% Automatic spending cuts required by sequestration
-0.8% Expiration of payroll tax cuts
-1.0% Expiration of Bush tax cuts

-2.8% Total

The big problem is that the economy doesn’t have much economic growth to give away. My own forecast for GDP for 2012 is still at 2%. But that is based on the assumption that corporate earnings would bring in 5% growth, down from last year’s torrid 15% growth. My calculator tells me that 2% -2.8% = recession. Danger! Danger! Current stock prices are not reflecting this reality.

It gets worse. The 15% of companies that have reported Q1, 2012 earnings so far have delivered a much more modest 1% growth, well below my own minimal expectations. That is with the earnings cycle front loaded with the most profitable companies in technology. It also reflects a lot of business pulled forward into Q1 from Q2 and Q3 by the warm winter. Yikes!

It’s hard to see how this ends happily for the stock market. The best case scenario would be for a lame duck president and congress, no longer worried about reelection, to cobble together a deal in December. Some sort of resuscitation of the “grand bargain” that was on the table last summer, but suffocated in its crib by the Tea Party because it included tax increases, might work. Alternatively, if one party or the other sweeps the election, it could ram through something. But that outcome is unlikely. A divided country gets the dysfunctional government it deserves.

The headache for equity investors and risk investors in general is that even the mere discussion of the weighty matters triggers a huge “RISK OFF” trade. Confidence withers, business and consumer spending slows, and the economic data takes a hit. That’s what happened last summer, when the markets discounted a full blown double dip recession that never actually happened. It’s a given that the Zioconned US & EU representatives in congresses don’t understand this....



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