Happy Belated Birthday

Yesterday, a great economists was born... Happy Birthday Ludwig von Mises. Unfortunately, I don't get many chances to post a blog during the day, therefore missing the chance to post this earlier today. No explanations today. No stories. Just a link to describe to you a great man.

If you like what you read you should read the book written by his wife. No economics, just a wonderful story of a hero. He did not wish to write an autobiography, but as many were asking for his story, his wife decided to tell of what she knew.

Happy Birthday Ludwig von Mises...

The rise of the Urban Society

A year ago, I had taken real estate classes. It was the real estate boom in the DC metro area and it seemed to be a promising area to enter. I did not take the classes to become a realtor. I was interested in the why's and how's. After completing the courses to be a realtor (I took the semester plan at a community college to learn more rather than the free two week course at the realtors), I took classes on Real Estate Appraising. Fascinating course that helped strengthen my resolve on the free market economy. For those who do not know, appraisers compare a property with other similar properties, in other words the look at the competition and give the value from the market data. The real estate is a competitive market, therefore the prices are given, you can set the price to what you wish when selling, but the appraiser will set the value to what the market claims it to be; the real estate does not set its own price but is a price taker as the market gives it the value. All these classes were fascinating, but what I overheard discussed was the possibility of Tysons Corner, an area in Northern Virginia that is home to many corporations, was to lift the limits on the height of buildings to allow Tysons Corner to be viewed as a Downtown Chicago.
Tysons Corner currently is a mess. As many corporations have their headquarters located there, but there is hardly any housing available near by causing long commutes. Along with the traffic problem, the sidewalk is almost nonexistent. Thus, the plans for the urbanation of Tysons Corner have emerged showing the expansion in height for the buildings and a creation of residential areas surrounding the area. With the Metrorail expanding its routes into Tysons Corner, you can only imagine the growth that will be expected.
I have been speaking to others about something like this to occur in airplanes, in lines when shopping, whenever the topic leads to the direction of real estate or business. Of course, next on the list is Roslynn and Pentagon City. Two more hot beds that are home to many corporations and with the departure of the military leaving the private buildings, we can expect a large increase of private industries that will try to push for expanding the tower limits. Especially since they are around the corner from Ronald Reagan Airport.
Northern Virginia, its slogan should read, Not Just for Politicians anymore....

Unspoken American Heroes

As September draws to an end, I realize that most people saluted the military, the law enforcement agencies, and emergency units (fireman and ambulances) as their heroes. I did not spend September 11 this year reviewing footage from a few years ago to cause a fire inside me to burn nor did I join the many in declaring the men who took action as heroes. We know they are heroes, if we have forgotten then I am glad that we have so many in the blogging community to remind us. For this reason, in the end of September I will declare who I salute as heroes for this year, for the past three years, and on September 11.

These unspoken heroes are the immigrants that live in this wonderful Nation of ours. They only wish to find work in order to raise their family yet some have found only hardships. Let it be the illegal immigrants, those with green cards, on a student visa, or just became a United States Citizen; these men and women are heroes as they face an uphill struggle just like many other immigrants from this nations past. The day laborers deserve an utmost respect as in heat, cold, rain, and snow they wait out in the open in hopes of finding some work. Not only the day workers but all immigrants who learn english in order receive a larger wage an raise their own marginal production to those who find work doing the dirty jobs that most American citizens do not even wish to do. These men and women deserve the title of hero as they leave their home countries for a New World, hoping for the American Dream to further bless their families with the subsistence that they need. Some come alone leaving their families behind, others have no families nor friends spending birthdays alone with only a cupcake they bought themselves to celebrate. There is no race in the term immigrant. They are of every race and to me all the races are my heroes.

So for today, as the new television show Heroes is viewed for the first time, I am giving my salute to the immigrants of today, of old, and of the future. Let them always be welcome in our Nation for without them there would be a large decrease in heroes.

The Devil in the flesh?

Throughout the media, we are repeatedly hearing the term "the Devil" today, as President Hugo Chavez speaks about President Bush. It is not like the comment was unexpected to come out at one point in time especially from the President of Columbia who has already proclaimed his dislike for President Bush, but what is interesting is the rise of supporters of both sides.
President Bush had almost conceived his own policy years ago, "You are either with us or against us." I have spent over an hour reading blogs that were either in full support of President Bush attacking President Chavez with out reading what he claims. In the other side, there are the blogs who cheer on the term Devil applied to President Bush. Certainly I can say harsh things between both sides, but show me someone who you can't chastise?
I don't support President Chavez' claim that President Bush is "the Devil", but I do not view President as any type of saviour; he is human after all.

The point I want to come across is that we are all stubborn in a form or another, but we have to open ourselves at some point, unless we have the proof as to oppose it. i.e. socialism, interventionalist economic policies(including a foreign government intervening with another's policies) On a good note, FED leaves the interest rate alone, oh, and the rise of U.S. and China 'economic dialogue'.

Fiat money

In the United States and in many nations, we have embraced the notion of fiat money,(link included for those who do not know what fiat money or gold standard are) leaving behind the classic gold standard. Most citizens in this nation know that only the United States Treasury has the ability to increase the amount of currency, but I, like many others I am sure, have that there has been a form of currency that has been minted, the "Liberty Dollar". It is made of silver and gold, bringing back the gold standard. The only problem, it was not minted by the U.S. Treasury. So what seems to be the problem, does the government want to have a monopoly in the form of payments we must submit? By this new form of currency, we create another competitor to the dollar. The website for Liberty Dollar claims that it is "America's Inflation Proof Currency" as it is backed by real gold and silver.

With fiat money, central planners within the government are able to increase inflation or decrease inflation depending on the amount of money they mint or on selling and buying government bonds. With the Liberty Dollar it depends on the amount of gold that enters or exits their vaults. A point for Liberty Dollar.

Many organizations have a form of play money. I have been to one church who sells coupons for money, these coupons are used as real currency that would be accepted at a nearby participating store, yet the coupons have never came into scrutiny as illegal. Why not have some competition to the might U.S. dollar. It will keep the central planners from playing with inflation so much. Besides, it would be a price to pay for the citizens to choose to have the Liberty Dollar as not all stores may accept it, let alone any banks would accept its. Does government just have a fear of losing its monopoly, but aren't they against monopolies? Perhaps just another question of morals and values...

Actions

Trying to fight supply, we find politicians trying to increase their own power so they can attack the mass amount of supply let it be terrorists, drug traffickers, or even immigration.

"If there's any comparison between the compassion and decency of the American people and the terrorist tactics of extremists, it's flawed logic," Bush said, his voice rising. "It's unacceptable to think that there's any kind of comparison between the behavior of the United States of America and the action of Islamic extremists who kill innocent women and children to achieve an objective."

Are our values that different from others? Reading a blog from earlier this week we find the topic to be upon just that American Values, but more importantly is how much power must we give the government until we are safe? Are we to lose all freedoms so that we can feel safe?

If I had a prize to give out it would definitely be to the Armed Services Committee in the Senate for their alternative military tribunal bill proposed to help the United States maintain its morals and values. If I had a second prize it would be given to General Powell for his letter expressing his fear that the world will lose their faith on us. Read the blog on values as it is fascinating; I do not reccommend reading all the comments as there are many, but scroll to the bottom where you will find a few comments worth reading, my picks are from Mike Bailey(Sept 14 10:35 pm) and Hap Stokes (Sept 15 7:17 am)

Attack on Supply

I was listening to my favorite link for podcasts, Mises.Org, when I heard Joseph Salerno's lecture on June 15, 2006 upon Price Control: Case Studies. What I am getting to is a very interesting perspective he had brought to my attention through simple economics. He was pointing out how blockades and embargos never accomplish what they are sent out to do. They are meant to decrease the amount of goods a nation, or any land mass, can receive. By keeping resources such as fuels or food the nation will crumble, yet what the embargo really causes is an increase in price. Thus, as Joseph Salerno pointed out there will be heroic entrepreneurs who try their hand at smuggling the goods in to receive the reward of the high price. This has occurred time and again throughout history. Think of our history when alcohol was illegal...

This is a fascinating point for why do we attack the supply side of an economic equation? Does supply cause demand or is it because there is a demand for something that we find ways in supplying it? The second is proven by the black market smuggling of goods that are in demand yet unlawful to sell, yet we still find government's waging war against drug lords. Drug Lords are only there because there is a high demand. Terrorists rise and are supported because there is a demand. We attack supply which only decreases the supply of the good for a point which causes a higher price as there is no change in demand. This just gives an incentive to someone else to rise; causing a never ending war upon supply which we can claim to be inefficient as it never leads anywhere. As I heard from a wise Economist (credit to to Prof Caplan at Econlog.econlib.org even though he passes it to Bastiat), it is like the ancient myth of Sisyphus who is forever tortured in full employment as he is forced to roll a giant boulder to the top of a hill but right before he reaches the top, the boulder rolls away back down the hill where he must push it up once again. He is forever working but his effort is pointless as it leads to no gain. Are we to believe that the war on Poverty, war on Terrorism, and war on Drugs are to be any different? Of course, what other actions do we have?

Confusion

So it has been a week. I have kept myself at bay with endless amount of questions upon my own thoughts. The last commentor had asked if I was for more State rights which I can easily say no to, but what am I for became the question? I have fallen for Capitalism but encountered questions as in, "What do you want from the poor, to suck it up and stick through it? That it will only get better. How much more do they have to suffer?" And with this question I made myself suffer, as I thought maybe I am wrong, but I have come to the conclusion that I am not wrong, only right. Not for the reason that I can not be wrong, but that a government that governs most is definitely not the solution only more of a problem.

Capitalism denotes freedom, gives everyone the ability to choose, and it is not kind; it does bring suffering. Ronald Reagan had said it best, "If not now, when? If not us, who?" In order for the Third World countries to rise from their state they must bring capitalism into their society. Embrace the economic freedoms and also the misery it will first bring, because the government makes stability, but it will end at one point leaving it to be paid by who? The children or the grandchildren? The people want immediate changes, but those changes cause problems in the long run. Do we wish to be the cause of pain in our children's future, or the reason why they live a wonderful life? My own want for helping others began to pound upon my logic, but if I begin supporting the minimum wage to help the select few, I am also being unkind towards those it does not help. Let the market be the unkind one, which will also be the kind one as it rewards. For this reason do the rich become poor and the poor become rich, not because of any socialistic welfare state.

Government Corruption continued

So, the question we ended with was how does the NFL reduce the amount of corruption?
To begin I want to show why I am using the NFL to compare with government. The NFL is the league that unites different teams together. The Federal government unites different states together to form the United States. They both have rules and regulations to keep one state from abusing the other. They have police power which I shall also include military in. For the NFL, the police power are the officials during the game who do not let a player abuse another. Now I will not agree with everything in the NFl as in the salary cap and other programs they have, but for the most part is a regulatory authority that is easily compared to the government.

The NFL reduces the amount of corruption easily since the teams are independently owned, not owned by the league. This allows the teams to leave the league if there is an increase in corruption. Even the threat of the teams leaving the league would cause the NFL to decrease the amount of corruption. So, the United States once had states who seceded from the Union, but why? They wanted to reduce corruption. They wanted to reduce the control the Federal government had upon them, and increase the states own rights. But I am not only talking about the civil war, as before the Civil War there were many northern states that threatened to leave the Union. These states were threatened with backlash of military might as well, but in the end caused a change in government. Exactly what the threat of secession is meant to do. Unfortunately, although I do not agree with slavery but other issues were addressed when the Confederacy was formed and they seceded from the Union. The Union though did not change policies, perhaps increased them denying this form of reducing corruption. With the Union winning the war, the South had lost, and as they say, "To the victor the spoils." I won't put President Lincoln to blame for corruption, but at this point in our Nation's history did the corruption begin. The intervention of government and the economy began to rise, and the Federal government was able to increase their taxes without outcries of revolt.

So to reduce corruption we have to be able to revolt. Without this ability, the citizens have no power in reducing the corruption of the government. Yes, they will still be corrupted, but in fear that they will be the next Robespierre will cause the reduction. We don't even have to revolt. Its just the outcry of revolution, the cry for freedom, and the end to government intervention.