Friday, November 28, 2008
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
Thursday, November 20, 2008
Platinum and Diamond Encrusted Golden Parachutes
Normally I steer away from political observation on this blog. But these bailouts are really starting to bug the crap out of me. Yesterday the CEO's of this huge car companies show up asking for a $25 billion bailout for their industry. And they get their by taking three separate private jets at a cost of $20 thousand per trip per plane. In fact, I'll just post a clip I was watching yesterday to better illustrate my point:
I'm starting to think that the "let the record show, no hands went up." Is going to be one of those lines that defines 2008 in history. Maybe "showing up at the soup kitchen in a top hat and tuxedo" will be used as well. I'm glad that these old white congressmen are being such hardasses on these CEO's, honestly it reminds me of asking my dad for money. And I think that this is what they are doing. Asking mommy and daddy to help them out of a bad financial situation. Except it isn't just them that need some money, its a multi-national corporation. And it isn't their mommy's and daddy's, its the goddamn country of the USA (and not to offend anyone, I don't mean the USA is goddamned, I use the phrase as an adverb to describe my frustration, not in the Jeremia Wright sense of it).
In what way is this not socialism? Oh, wait, I know in what ways it isn't. If it were socialism the taxpayers, upon having their money used in these companies, would own a piece of the companies. Would be getting part of any profits made from their money being used to finance a private company. Also, it wouldn't really be a private company any more. Granted, my knowledge of socialism is pretty rudimentary, but my understanding would be that the idea behind both socialism and communism is that the workers own the means of production. Not the country pays for other people to continue to own the means of production.
Bush said something the other day to the effect of "we've failed the free market system, but it is still the best market system in the world." My understanding of how the free market system works, according to people who think like Bush, is that it can't be failed by a government. That it is a very Darwinian process that enables the companies most adaptable and the others die off. The only way to fail it in that model is to get involved in it. This sort of confuses me, as by this logic I am agreeing with republican ideals. But there is a reason why I insist on registering independent.
The breakdown of any government bailout is, as far as I can tell, a risk assessment exercise. Is it worse to let this company fail and have a chink of our economy fail along with it, or is it worse to soak up more debt as a country that could ultimately lead to an even larger financial failure of the country if we mismanage said debt? I honestly don't know the answers to those questions. But these companies are failing for a reason. And yes, it has to do with the fact there is simply less money to go around and therefore they are doing less business. But these companies are based on pure greed. A corporation, in American law, is considered a "person". As a person the corporation has certain rights and privliges under the law that other real people have. It also means that the corporation, the entity, is somehow in charge of running itself. Its sort of an odd notion at first, but the more you think about it the more it makes sense (or the more insane you go and the more it seems to start making sense, I'm not one hundred percent sure which). The corporation, as an individual entitiy, has certain needs and desires, like any person. Although its needs and desires aren't for food, water and shelter. Rather it is for money. Every decision made by a board of directors and CEO has to be the decision the makes the most money for the company. I've often thought of it as though starting a corporation is the same as unleashing a hungry newborn demon child. The child is pure unbridled Id. So what if they have to lay off half the workers? So what if they have to dump waste illegally? So what if they have to brie congress to get certain restrictions lifted? As long as it is making the demon's money for it then the corporation will keep doing what it is doing. And by bailing out the companies we are simply enabling the Id to keep going. So what if we got $25 billion from the government? It's not where the money came from, only that money was still coming in.
Now, the problem with that metaphor is that clearly a corporation isn't alive. Not in any real way. And it is run by people. People who have (theroretically) some sort of human emotion. Some sort of desire to not destroy the world only to make more money must exist within them. But all they can really do is just walk away from the company if they don't like what its doing, not actually change its business practices. Their hands are tied by the very nature of the beast they have created.
And if this Id driving demon child is going to the government to ask for money, and the government gives them said money, then what does that make the government? The government can't compete with the market, it isn't the governments place and has been wholly against the law since the beginnings of this country. What they can do is loan out money. But like all who loan money, they will expect a return. So should we start looking for signs that the government is breaking the kneecaps of corporations when they haven't gotten their money back? It would seem that we should, because much like the need of the corporations to make more money, the government is run by its need to get as much money back as it possibly can, through whatever means necessary.
Again, granted, I don't really know much about this stuff. I'm just frustrated with it and trying to figure it all out. I think everyone is, though. You can flip to eight different news channels and watch eight different experts give eight different expert opinions on what should be done. The real problem comes down to figuring out what is going to happen in the future. I'm sure that there is something we can do now that would be the right choice for later. But we don't know that right choice. Does that mean we should do something? If we honestly don't know then I think the best thing to do is nothing and wait for more evidence of what we should do. I think the real way to solve these problems isn't by blindly giving or not giving, but by doing a series of tests to see what the problem is. Take a hypothesis and test it. And see if that gives you the answer you need. Find a control group. Find a few variables. Find out something so that we at least have an idea of what we are doing and we aren't just throwing money into a bottomless pit of debt.
Of course, this whole thing could be solved if we just really took these CEO's to task and made them appear on the Suze Orman show.
I'm starting to think that the "let the record show, no hands went up." Is going to be one of those lines that defines 2008 in history. Maybe "showing up at the soup kitchen in a top hat and tuxedo" will be used as well. I'm glad that these old white congressmen are being such hardasses on these CEO's, honestly it reminds me of asking my dad for money. And I think that this is what they are doing. Asking mommy and daddy to help them out of a bad financial situation. Except it isn't just them that need some money, its a multi-national corporation. And it isn't their mommy's and daddy's, its the goddamn country of the USA (and not to offend anyone, I don't mean the USA is goddamned, I use the phrase as an adverb to describe my frustration, not in the Jeremia Wright sense of it).
In what way is this not socialism? Oh, wait, I know in what ways it isn't. If it were socialism the taxpayers, upon having their money used in these companies, would own a piece of the companies. Would be getting part of any profits made from their money being used to finance a private company. Also, it wouldn't really be a private company any more. Granted, my knowledge of socialism is pretty rudimentary, but my understanding would be that the idea behind both socialism and communism is that the workers own the means of production. Not the country pays for other people to continue to own the means of production.
Bush said something the other day to the effect of "we've failed the free market system, but it is still the best market system in the world." My understanding of how the free market system works, according to people who think like Bush, is that it can't be failed by a government. That it is a very Darwinian process that enables the companies most adaptable and the others die off. The only way to fail it in that model is to get involved in it. This sort of confuses me, as by this logic I am agreeing with republican ideals. But there is a reason why I insist on registering independent.
The breakdown of any government bailout is, as far as I can tell, a risk assessment exercise. Is it worse to let this company fail and have a chink of our economy fail along with it, or is it worse to soak up more debt as a country that could ultimately lead to an even larger financial failure of the country if we mismanage said debt? I honestly don't know the answers to those questions. But these companies are failing for a reason. And yes, it has to do with the fact there is simply less money to go around and therefore they are doing less business. But these companies are based on pure greed. A corporation, in American law, is considered a "person". As a person the corporation has certain rights and privliges under the law that other real people have. It also means that the corporation, the entity, is somehow in charge of running itself. Its sort of an odd notion at first, but the more you think about it the more it makes sense (or the more insane you go and the more it seems to start making sense, I'm not one hundred percent sure which). The corporation, as an individual entitiy, has certain needs and desires, like any person. Although its needs and desires aren't for food, water and shelter. Rather it is for money. Every decision made by a board of directors and CEO has to be the decision the makes the most money for the company. I've often thought of it as though starting a corporation is the same as unleashing a hungry newborn demon child. The child is pure unbridled Id. So what if they have to lay off half the workers? So what if they have to dump waste illegally? So what if they have to brie congress to get certain restrictions lifted? As long as it is making the demon's money for it then the corporation will keep doing what it is doing. And by bailing out the companies we are simply enabling the Id to keep going. So what if we got $25 billion from the government? It's not where the money came from, only that money was still coming in.
Now, the problem with that metaphor is that clearly a corporation isn't alive. Not in any real way. And it is run by people. People who have (theroretically) some sort of human emotion. Some sort of desire to not destroy the world only to make more money must exist within them. But all they can really do is just walk away from the company if they don't like what its doing, not actually change its business practices. Their hands are tied by the very nature of the beast they have created.
And if this Id driving demon child is going to the government to ask for money, and the government gives them said money, then what does that make the government? The government can't compete with the market, it isn't the governments place and has been wholly against the law since the beginnings of this country. What they can do is loan out money. But like all who loan money, they will expect a return. So should we start looking for signs that the government is breaking the kneecaps of corporations when they haven't gotten their money back? It would seem that we should, because much like the need of the corporations to make more money, the government is run by its need to get as much money back as it possibly can, through whatever means necessary.
Again, granted, I don't really know much about this stuff. I'm just frustrated with it and trying to figure it all out. I think everyone is, though. You can flip to eight different news channels and watch eight different experts give eight different expert opinions on what should be done. The real problem comes down to figuring out what is going to happen in the future. I'm sure that there is something we can do now that would be the right choice for later. But we don't know that right choice. Does that mean we should do something? If we honestly don't know then I think the best thing to do is nothing and wait for more evidence of what we should do. I think the real way to solve these problems isn't by blindly giving or not giving, but by doing a series of tests to see what the problem is. Take a hypothesis and test it. And see if that gives you the answer you need. Find a control group. Find a few variables. Find out something so that we at least have an idea of what we are doing and we aren't just throwing money into a bottomless pit of debt.
Of course, this whole thing could be solved if we just really took these CEO's to task and made them appear on the Suze Orman show.
Monday, November 17, 2008
Sunday, November 16, 2008
Sunday, November 09, 2008
My brain is an Idiot
When I decided to go to UNR, I think I spent somewhere around seven minutes filling out a form on their website to gain admission. I've already spent a couple hundred times that seven minutes preparing stuff for my applications to graduate schools and I'm no where near ready to even send off the first of the applications. I don't mind doing it, it is just a lot more time consuming than I realized. Not to mention having to have my ex-professors help me through it all. I hate taking other people's time up for something that will only directly benefit me. I know that it is part of the job of being a college professor, but I still feel like a dick asking busy people to spend hours of their precious time focused on me. Granted, everyone has thus far been extremely nice about it. And most of the interactions with them take place via email. I can't imagine trying to get this all done without the internet. It probably took three or four times longer. Oh, I love technology.
I'm really getting excited though. I've been thinking about grad school for years. And now its finally starting to get closer to a reality. I'm also fucking petrified I won't get in anywhere. Because then I would be royally boned. Boned like a pop star. Boned like Sideshow Mel's hair. Boned like a... well you get the idea (I was going to say ...like a skeleton! HA!)
I was going to ramble on a bit more. But then I realized that it is already past four in the morning. And I think I blew my load on all those bone jokes. So much so that I'm not even going to make the obvious joke about bones getting their loads blown.
I'm really getting excited though. I've been thinking about grad school for years. And now its finally starting to get closer to a reality. I'm also fucking petrified I won't get in anywhere. Because then I would be royally boned. Boned like a pop star. Boned like Sideshow Mel's hair. Boned like a... well you get the idea (I was going to say ...like a skeleton! HA!)
I was going to ramble on a bit more. But then I realized that it is already past four in the morning. And I think I blew my load on all those bone jokes. So much so that I'm not even going to make the obvious joke about bones getting their loads blown.
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