1968 was an interesting year. In these parts where I live was a fatal fire that spread across the Victorian terraces houses from inside the roof spaces.Resulting in those spaces being bricked up and Ladders placed in the passage ways of the adjoining homes.
It was also a very interesting time in Mathematics, Edward Norton Lorenz was discovering that small changes in conditions can have big impacts on forecasts and outcomes. You have probably heard the idea that a butterfly can flap its wings in Africa causing a hurricane in America sort of thing. It sounds implausible but the maths behind it is solid.
This presents us with a big problem, the world is highly unstable and unpredictable. Not what we and especially our politicians want to hear. Lorenz's theory swept through the physical sciences. Engineers toughened up areas in critical systems making sure if one part of the system failed the other part continued to operate. When you fly across the arctic or oceans you do so in a Jet that's engines are independent of each other. The words and terms Fail-safe, Backup and stress test entered our vocabulary. Our world is not without risk but those risks are greatly reduced thanks to Edward Lorenz ground breaking work, we owe him a debt.
Strangely enough across campus the "social scenitists" carried on with their ideology that the world was wholly knowable and predictable. Safety in numbers they concluded, pool our power ect. They even invented managerialism to calmly steer their preferred predictable courses emasculating the democratic wishes of the people they were supposed to serve. A Common Purpose made any moral difficulties disappear.
Economists concluded that risk was now a thing of the past and as such encouraged financial institutions to take bigger and bigger risks. Politicians and Mandarins took banking regulation away from the Bank of England and invented the FSA to tick box its way to golden age of illusionary wealth. The "science" of politics ignored the physical unpredictable world of the butterfly.
And then a fire that burnt its way through the roof spaces of the worlds economies, and still alight and dangerous today. You would have thought the Social Scientists would notice that the world changed, Trail and error had come and gone and they been found to be at fault? Nope scapegoat the Bankers and continue in pooling and building the power bases.
So did the EU political elites learn their lessons? Nation states as backups, Currencies as firewalls? nope they wish to build an even bigger political system, a bigger currency system. They will take the power for themselves just in case of trouble and sort it out, they can still predict the future they think, They will be there next time.
So it seems we might be thankfully be given a choice in all this. A top down system of rules and regulations set from the centre with clever humans directing the course of events or a bottom up system of defuse power bases where good practice can be copied across the system, where a fire or problem in one part can be quickly identified and addressed so the other parts don't suffer damage. A system where human frailty is excepted and is part of the learning curve of the system. A new system for a new digital mass communication age.
I really do love my Neighbors, I could have easily left many years ago if it was not for their kindness, civility and humour, but I am mighty glad that those roof spaces are sealed between us and I have fire alarms.
2008 was an epic year, we are still to appreciate its importance. Its the year the world changed. three years after the 68 fire President Nixon closed the US Federal bank gold window and the super cycle of credit creation began which unleashed great wealth and growth which ended with the banking crash of 2008.
We now have to build truly robust systems around strong institutions. The world is a much less sure place than it was it seems, but it was never the case in the first place. There is no stronger institution on earth greater than the nation state don't let the social scientists and politicians kill it, you will regret it, sovereignty is much more than the Queens head on a coin its the moat around the castle, the bricked up roof space too.
Links
Butterfly Effect
Managerialism
Nixon Shock
Tuesday 15 January 2013
Saturday 29 December 2012
Safe In the Babyboomers Hands
A comment made here
The Beverage report and resulting welfare state were all set up on the model that 5 yrs after retirement you would be dead. Things you may have notice have changed. When I was at school in the 70s I was taught that men die at 69, now its pretty much 79, and there is no reason to not believe that in another 40 odd years with medical technology it wont be too far short of 89.
So we have now people looking for 20 plus years of retirement income plus increasing medical bills. So where do we get the bill payers, the earners? You might also have noticed that we are having less kids later (the workers of tomorrow) thru a rising costbase (taxes/regulation) young people are forced into their 30s before starting a family, by which time many will have given up hope. Immigration is one way around this but that also comes with a cost, we will have to build a new Birmingham every 5 years for the next 50 years at least.
Then of course we have this 1.4 trillion legacy debt around our shoulders brought from the false boom of the last decade which is a drag on growth and that does not include PFi. Yes John Major came up with the idea but did very few deals as they thought rightly that it was inappropriate in most cases, Gordon Brown and New Labour thought differently and the stats on PFi from 1997 speak for themselves.
So yes the old model of Bevens NHS is dying in front of our eyes, it has been since at least 1976 when the IMF bailed us out, but if if its the current Model what you want it was not Dave and Co who killed it. They are the ones trying to salvage a concept of a public health system which if not reformed urgently will go the same way as big banks, bankrupt.
And strangely enough the analogy is a good one. its not really a left/right issue its like the banks a size issue. The NHS is way too big, I suspect in the future hospitals will be only for the seriously ill, most minor operations will be done in community surgeries. One thing I am sure off is universal health provision through the state is finished. I suspect both opposite inefficient models that are Our NHS and the United States hotchpotch system will morph into something like the German health system, which is the oldest public health system in the world from the 1860s.
You will purchase a insurance product and if you cant afford one the state will purchase one for you. The state will act as universal insurer. You will need to work and get yourself a good policy which of course the babyboomers who stole from their children will not be able to do.
Maybe if they stuck to saving and spending instead of just borrowing their kids would not be at the loan sharks doors?
The Beverage report and resulting welfare state were all set up on the model that 5 yrs after retirement you would be dead. Things you may have notice have changed. When I was at school in the 70s I was taught that men die at 69, now its pretty much 79, and there is no reason to not believe that in another 40 odd years with medical technology it wont be too far short of 89.
So we have now people looking for 20 plus years of retirement income plus increasing medical bills. So where do we get the bill payers, the earners? You might also have noticed that we are having less kids later (the workers of tomorrow) thru a rising costbase (taxes/regulation) young people are forced into their 30s before starting a family, by which time many will have given up hope. Immigration is one way around this but that also comes with a cost, we will have to build a new Birmingham every 5 years for the next 50 years at least.
Then of course we have this 1.4 trillion legacy debt around our shoulders brought from the false boom of the last decade which is a drag on growth and that does not include PFi. Yes John Major came up with the idea but did very few deals as they thought rightly that it was inappropriate in most cases, Gordon Brown and New Labour thought differently and the stats on PFi from 1997 speak for themselves.
So yes the old model of Bevens NHS is dying in front of our eyes, it has been since at least 1976 when the IMF bailed us out, but if if its the current Model what you want it was not Dave and Co who killed it. They are the ones trying to salvage a concept of a public health system which if not reformed urgently will go the same way as big banks, bankrupt.
And strangely enough the analogy is a good one. its not really a left/right issue its like the banks a size issue. The NHS is way too big, I suspect in the future hospitals will be only for the seriously ill, most minor operations will be done in community surgeries. One thing I am sure off is universal health provision through the state is finished. I suspect both opposite inefficient models that are Our NHS and the United States hotchpotch system will morph into something like the German health system, which is the oldest public health system in the world from the 1860s.
You will purchase a insurance product and if you cant afford one the state will purchase one for you. The state will act as universal insurer. You will need to work and get yourself a good policy which of course the babyboomers who stole from their children will not be able to do.
Maybe if they stuck to saving and spending instead of just borrowing their kids would not be at the loan sharks doors?
Friday 14 December 2012
Where Did All the Money Go?
THE No1 question people ask about the crash and subsequent great recession from 2008. I will attempt to answer it.
People talk about the whole issue being about Greed, but its not its a story of pure ignorant stupidity from the very top in Government, central banks thru banks and financial institutions.academia right down to the voters and borrowers. Remember my golden rule? people do not always act rationally to their own needs.
Imagine a cargo ship that was licensed to carry 1000 tones of cargo, it did this day in day out. Then suddenly over a few years the ship that was only supposed to carry 1000 tones started carry a little bit more every time to clear the ever increasing amount of goods on the key side. One day with way too much cargo on board the ship is in a storm, the kind it had faced many times in the past and unsurprisingly sunk without a trace.
Remember those £20 DVD players in the supermarket? They came in the main from Asia and in particular China. When you handed over your £20 note for yet another player you did not need but was too cheap to pass by, some of the money made its way to the Chinese workers who worked in the factory. They saved a lot of it, they have too they don't get the state goods that we get in education and health care or pensions. That money thru the interconnectedness of the global banking network arrived in the West looking for a home to grow. Remember the 6 times earnings mortgages, the endless credit card offers? The source of the money was the rise of the East.
Traditionally banks would take your money and turn that money into loans, this is called fractional reserve banking. Those loans are then turned when paid back into future money creation. (I borrow you a grand you pay me back £1200 in a year, we have created £200 of new future money) But seeing as the banks now had a new source of credit thru other banks pumping money around the world from Asia they and we did not have to bother about saving and investment anymore.
So the banks took the new money and multiplied that thru the reserve banking system and multiplied it again thru mad mathematical models with whiz bang new financial instruments. In effect banks had created their own currency that they controlled and could skim tiny percentages off the top that added up to massive salaries and bonuses. But the problem was this new currency was not backed by equal valued assets it was backed by a property bubble. Don't for 1 minute think this was just an American thing or even a British thing, property bubbles appeared through out the Western world, the first banking collapse actually happened in Germany. The Europeans actually made the whole thing a lot worse with the Euro, we took the money and just sunk it into the ground, they sunk it into the ground as well but they also lent massive amount to each other mainly thru German banks financing other people buying their goods, and French banks creating billions to lend to "ultra safe" governments.
In most industries when work dries up, the industry gets smaller to remain efficient. Small returns in banking lead to stupid risks being taken and it this dearth of suitable investments that is the key to the crash. In simple terms the West got big, lazy and unproductive, nothing much to invest in, and a lot of money chasing nothing much.
Its easy to blame bankers and blame they deserve, but more of the blame goes to the politicians they are the ones who developed and legalised the system, and were supposed to police it. They were the ones who allowed the ship to sail. Banks paid hundreds of billions in tax revenue and supplied endless cheap credit to voters who gave the politicians their jobs. Not a very virtuous circle was it?
Tens of millions if not billions are spent analyzing the world economy by Governments and private institutions and pretty much everyone was a sucker. Money is the drug and we got hooked on it big time. Cold turkey is proving hard. Blaming Dave & Co for locking the sweety tin is a bit childish. The sweety can is not coming out for a long time to come.
So where did the money go? its owed on a balance sheet for goods at the bottom of the ocean.
People talk about the whole issue being about Greed, but its not its a story of pure ignorant stupidity from the very top in Government, central banks thru banks and financial institutions.academia right down to the voters and borrowers. Remember my golden rule? people do not always act rationally to their own needs.
Imagine a cargo ship that was licensed to carry 1000 tones of cargo, it did this day in day out. Then suddenly over a few years the ship that was only supposed to carry 1000 tones started carry a little bit more every time to clear the ever increasing amount of goods on the key side. One day with way too much cargo on board the ship is in a storm, the kind it had faced many times in the past and unsurprisingly sunk without a trace.
Remember those £20 DVD players in the supermarket? They came in the main from Asia and in particular China. When you handed over your £20 note for yet another player you did not need but was too cheap to pass by, some of the money made its way to the Chinese workers who worked in the factory. They saved a lot of it, they have too they don't get the state goods that we get in education and health care or pensions. That money thru the interconnectedness of the global banking network arrived in the West looking for a home to grow. Remember the 6 times earnings mortgages, the endless credit card offers? The source of the money was the rise of the East.
Traditionally banks would take your money and turn that money into loans, this is called fractional reserve banking. Those loans are then turned when paid back into future money creation. (I borrow you a grand you pay me back £1200 in a year, we have created £200 of new future money) But seeing as the banks now had a new source of credit thru other banks pumping money around the world from Asia they and we did not have to bother about saving and investment anymore.
So the banks took the new money and multiplied that thru the reserve banking system and multiplied it again thru mad mathematical models with whiz bang new financial instruments. In effect banks had created their own currency that they controlled and could skim tiny percentages off the top that added up to massive salaries and bonuses. But the problem was this new currency was not backed by equal valued assets it was backed by a property bubble. Don't for 1 minute think this was just an American thing or even a British thing, property bubbles appeared through out the Western world, the first banking collapse actually happened in Germany. The Europeans actually made the whole thing a lot worse with the Euro, we took the money and just sunk it into the ground, they sunk it into the ground as well but they also lent massive amount to each other mainly thru German banks financing other people buying their goods, and French banks creating billions to lend to "ultra safe" governments.
In most industries when work dries up, the industry gets smaller to remain efficient. Small returns in banking lead to stupid risks being taken and it this dearth of suitable investments that is the key to the crash. In simple terms the West got big, lazy and unproductive, nothing much to invest in, and a lot of money chasing nothing much.
Its easy to blame bankers and blame they deserve, but more of the blame goes to the politicians they are the ones who developed and legalised the system, and were supposed to police it. They were the ones who allowed the ship to sail. Banks paid hundreds of billions in tax revenue and supplied endless cheap credit to voters who gave the politicians their jobs. Not a very virtuous circle was it?
Tens of millions if not billions are spent analyzing the world economy by Governments and private institutions and pretty much everyone was a sucker. Money is the drug and we got hooked on it big time. Cold turkey is proving hard. Blaming Dave & Co for locking the sweety tin is a bit childish. The sweety can is not coming out for a long time to come.
So where did the money go? its owed on a balance sheet for goods at the bottom of the ocean.
Saturday 8 December 2012
The Growth of Foodbanks. A Comment
A comment to this.
Mine seems to have strangely disappeared. How Odd......................
Cant remember soup kitchens in Darfield in the Miners strike.
I recall the WMC'S issuing food parcels, but I cant say it was an everyday sight, It was something that really kicked off when they got to Sept time and the 6 month mark and it was obvious that the miners had lost.
It was a disgrace that one of the most richest unions in the world at the time did not make strike payments. Scargill himself wanted them to suffer for his political aims.
The most sickening thing I saw was the "better red or dead" graffiti on the wall on the 90 degree bend, next to the old cinema/bingo. (Snape hill road) A few years earlier I had visited Poland to see relatives behind the iron curtain and before the Gdansk revolt, It stuck in my mind the atmosphere was exactly the same.
Soup Kitchens and Food Banks are one thing, standing in line for a can of meat and bread all morning like they did in Poland everyday is quite another.
AND TO ADD. We have contributed to a food bank every month for over 15 years, both here and in Australia. (here is a good place to start)
Mine seems to have strangely disappeared. How Odd......................
Cant remember soup kitchens in Darfield in the Miners strike.
I recall the WMC'S issuing food parcels, but I cant say it was an everyday sight, It was something that really kicked off when they got to Sept time and the 6 month mark and it was obvious that the miners had lost.
It was a disgrace that one of the most richest unions in the world at the time did not make strike payments. Scargill himself wanted them to suffer for his political aims.
The most sickening thing I saw was the "better red or dead" graffiti on the wall on the 90 degree bend, next to the old cinema/bingo. (Snape hill road) A few years earlier I had visited Poland to see relatives behind the iron curtain and before the Gdansk revolt, It stuck in my mind the atmosphere was exactly the same.
Soup Kitchens and Food Banks are one thing, standing in line for a can of meat and bread all morning like they did in Poland everyday is quite another.
AND TO ADD. We have contributed to a food bank every month for over 15 years, both here and in Australia. (here is a good place to start)
Sunday 2 December 2012
The Death of Childhood
Question. Child Abuses. Are we seeing something new, or now detecting something that was already there?
That is a very, very hard question to answer. For a start anything which is dealing with sexual behavior is going to come up against a wall of silence and lies. Its not something any of us really want to discuss. But it seems like we are going to have too in the post Savile, street gangs world.
My hunch, and it is a hunch after reading into the Child Commissioners interim report is we are seeing something new. The report is big on the new world of communication and the internet where gangs and individuals can more easily target the preferences they are looking out for.There is a lot in that. We know that venereal disease amongst the over 55s is rising as they are dating more easily through wider use of the internet. But I think there might be a much bigger problem emerging within society that could be a big driver in all this and will be very hard to combat and reverse.
Its a pretty much nailed on Granism that kids are growing up too soon and this is because of all the sex on TV. Half of that could well be true. In 1997 a study found that more kids were reaching puberty much earlier than thought and this trend is on the increase. This is called precocious puberty its being strongly linked to diet. We are eating too much, and that seems to be the trigger for what is now becoming a new normal, Doctors are seeing more and more children under 10 reaching puberty. Boys as well as girls.
If children are reaching puberty earlier and the trend continues the effects will be huge. When puberty is reached then sex itself comes into the equation. Yes you can chain them up if you like but my money is on mother nature. Sexual activity brings with it risky behavior. No 1 signal that a child has reached puberty is smoking, with it comes roaming, tantrums and misbehavior. This is I think the link to child abuse, if more young are having sex then ergo more of them are going to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, the instances will rise, as the numbers of sexually active children rise.
The other suspect in all this is stress. It seems there was a correlation with girls staying children longer by having Fathers in homes with male siblings, this is a very touchy subject for obvious reasons, it fly's in the face of the post nuclear family and the politics around it. Is feminism diminishing the natural role of men, sort of issue. Modern social Science says that the family unit is just a social construction. Thus the Fathers/males issue has been downgraded to "stress"
I think they got it right the first time, Happy children from happy homes have less stress. Stressed children comfort eat (especially Girls) and then we are back to the puberty trigger. An unhappy child is more likely to be in a unhappy situation and in the long run is going to have more chance of being one of the unfortunate children in the 16000 as being identified in the report as being at High risk of being abused. Its a self reinforcing cycle. And in the other direction we know that children from two parent families with siblings (if the parents stay together there is more chance of siblings) do better at school, especially in Language which is not surprising as they have more people to communicate with. Less chance of going on benefits and going to prison, the list is long. Thus in the long run you get the stratification of society with more of a gulf between the top and the bottom.
So Gran was half right, but its not the skimpy tops for young girls that are causing it as protested by feminists looking for an excuse, that's the symptom. I am pretty sure if they were not approaching puberty early they would still be desiring dolls houses and action man (or is that just plain sexist?).
Yes we can catch and punish, especially organised child abuse but the forces in mother nature could well thwart our efforts to go further.
I really do hope I am wrong, If we cant look after our children properly we really have failed as a society and civilisation.
Two Parent Families are best - Labour
Silver separation - the surge in older divorce
Starting puberty very early carries risks of psychological problems, RCOG
Study: U.S. boys face early puberty, too
Early Arrival
STD 1 in 4 Teens. 40% in Sexually Active
Size Zero not to blame, GOSH
3 in 100k Children with serious eating disorders
Afro-Carib Girls & early puberty
That is a very, very hard question to answer. For a start anything which is dealing with sexual behavior is going to come up against a wall of silence and lies. Its not something any of us really want to discuss. But it seems like we are going to have too in the post Savile, street gangs world.
My hunch, and it is a hunch after reading into the Child Commissioners interim report is we are seeing something new. The report is big on the new world of communication and the internet where gangs and individuals can more easily target the preferences they are looking out for.There is a lot in that. We know that venereal disease amongst the over 55s is rising as they are dating more easily through wider use of the internet. But I think there might be a much bigger problem emerging within society that could be a big driver in all this and will be very hard to combat and reverse.
Its a pretty much nailed on Granism that kids are growing up too soon and this is because of all the sex on TV. Half of that could well be true. In 1997 a study found that more kids were reaching puberty much earlier than thought and this trend is on the increase. This is called precocious puberty its being strongly linked to diet. We are eating too much, and that seems to be the trigger for what is now becoming a new normal, Doctors are seeing more and more children under 10 reaching puberty. Boys as well as girls.
If children are reaching puberty earlier and the trend continues the effects will be huge. When puberty is reached then sex itself comes into the equation. Yes you can chain them up if you like but my money is on mother nature. Sexual activity brings with it risky behavior. No 1 signal that a child has reached puberty is smoking, with it comes roaming, tantrums and misbehavior. This is I think the link to child abuse, if more young are having sex then ergo more of them are going to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, the instances will rise, as the numbers of sexually active children rise.
The other suspect in all this is stress. It seems there was a correlation with girls staying children longer by having Fathers in homes with male siblings, this is a very touchy subject for obvious reasons, it fly's in the face of the post nuclear family and the politics around it. Is feminism diminishing the natural role of men, sort of issue. Modern social Science says that the family unit is just a social construction. Thus the Fathers/males issue has been downgraded to "stress"
I think they got it right the first time, Happy children from happy homes have less stress. Stressed children comfort eat (especially Girls) and then we are back to the puberty trigger. An unhappy child is more likely to be in a unhappy situation and in the long run is going to have more chance of being one of the unfortunate children in the 16000 as being identified in the report as being at High risk of being abused. Its a self reinforcing cycle. And in the other direction we know that children from two parent families with siblings (if the parents stay together there is more chance of siblings) do better at school, especially in Language which is not surprising as they have more people to communicate with. Less chance of going on benefits and going to prison, the list is long. Thus in the long run you get the stratification of society with more of a gulf between the top and the bottom.
So Gran was half right, but its not the skimpy tops for young girls that are causing it as protested by feminists looking for an excuse, that's the symptom. I am pretty sure if they were not approaching puberty early they would still be desiring dolls houses and action man (or is that just plain sexist?).
Yes we can catch and punish, especially organised child abuse but the forces in mother nature could well thwart our efforts to go further.
I really do hope I am wrong, If we cant look after our children properly we really have failed as a society and civilisation.
Two Parent Families are best - Labour
Silver separation - the surge in older divorce
Starting puberty very early carries risks of psychological problems, RCOG
Study: U.S. boys face early puberty, too
Early Arrival
STD 1 in 4 Teens. 40% in Sexually Active
Size Zero not to blame, GOSH
3 in 100k Children with serious eating disorders
Afro-Carib Girls & early puberty
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