Category Archives: FIRE Economy

Robert Stark interviews Bay Area Guy about our Rigged Economic System

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Robert Stark and co-host Pilleater talk to Bay Area-based blogger  Bay Area Guy of Occident Invicta

Topics:

Bay Area Guy’s review of Dean Baker’s Rigged: How Globalization and the Rules of the Modern Economy Were Structured to Make the Rich Richer
How Baker along with Michael Hundson, were some of the few economists to get the housing bubble right
Why Baker does not praise of Bill Clinton’s budget surpluses, and his critique of conservative fiscal hawks
Rules and regulations are what make the market, and how America’s current inequality was caused by deliberate policies designed to redistribute income upward
Using Free Market talking points against apologist for the plutocracy
Professional Protectionism(ex. Nurses and Paralegals being barred from performing tasks of doctors and lawyers)
CEO to worker pay disparities, and Baker’s proposal that Shareholders should vote on CEO compensation; German and Japanese Stakeholder Capitalism
Copyright and Insurance Monopolies
How to rig the market in our favor
Zoe Lofgren and the H-1B Question
Winston Churchill on Land Monopoly
Michael Hudson’s article Trump Infrastructure Plan Is Developer Welfare
Robert’s point that cohesive urban mass transit is necessary, but must be funded by either taxes on the FIRE sector or a Public Infrastructure Bank
The importance of sustaining an urban middle class
Scattered Thoughts on Political Violence


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Robert Stark talks to Anatoly Karlin about his return to Russia and Predictions for 2017

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Robert Stark and co-host Pilleater talk to Anatoly Karlin. He blogs at The Unz Review

Topics:

Anatoly’s Predictions for 2017
Anatoly’s 2016 Prediction Calibration Results
Anatoly’s return to Russia, and his article Go Back to Russia about his detractors who accused him of defending a totalitarian regime while living in the comfort of the West
How Anatoly’s objective is to provide a balanced and accurate portrayal of Russia
Anatoly’s observations on how Moscow and Russia have changed since he was last there a decade ago
Anatoly’s observation that Moscow has become more civil, but also more diverse, despite still be around 90% Russian
Russia’s Demographics, a rise in the Russian birth rate, and Russia’s Muslim population
Anatoly’s interview with Zvezda TV about Trump and the relationship between the US and Russia
How Russians have a more positive view of the US than of the EU(latest Levada poll at: 60%), and generally hold a more positive view of Trump than the rest of the world
Anatoly’s prediction that the Alt Right acrimoniously splits into Trumpists and anti-Trumpists, a prediction that dates back to to May 2016
The fascinating Putin/Trump parallel, how Putin’s Solovyev/Starikov are Trump’s Milo/Cernovich, while the ethnats have at best a “mixed” relationship with them
Anatoly’s point that an American Nationalist can get a long better with Russia than an American Globalist, and how the main battle in the future will be between Nationalism and Globalism
How Trump has divided the Neocons
Anatoly’s prediction a year ago that Assad will stay in power in Syria, and his predictions about wars in the future
The short term decline in migrant arrivals by sea into Europe, Islamisation, and the long term effects of migration, including a European exodus out of Europe
Anatoly’s London Impressions, the Minority status of the British in London, the recent building boom, and 60’s futurist architecture including Centre Point and the BT Tower
The Transit systems of Moscow’s Metro and London’s Underground
The FIRE economy, the effects of the financial sector on the economy, and how the FIRE sector takes away cognitive capital from more productive endeavours
Dating patterns, the K/R Selection theory, and Pilleater’s comment on Roger Devlin’s speech on Sexual Competition


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Robert Stark interviews Prince of Queens about Economics & the Alt Left Movement

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Robert Stark and co-host Pilleater, Bay Area Guy, and Rabbit talk to alt-left YouTuber Prince of Queens about Alt-left philosophy and economic issues.

Topics:
Prince of Queens’ discovery of the Alt-left
The “Milo of the Alt Left?”
Prince of Queens’ vote for Jill Stein, and why he viewed Clinton as much worse than Trump
Rabbit appears 6 minutes in
A foundation for the Alt-left
Is the Alt-left, “the left-wing faction of the Alt-Right?”
Rationalism and the skeptic community
Bay Area Guy’s point that the Alt-Right has neglected economic issues, which are crucial to millenials
Books on economics including Michael Hudson’s Killing the Host, Ha-Joon Chang’s 23 Things They Don’t Tell You About CapitalismDean Baker’s Rigged, and Throwing Rocks at the Google Bus
Why corporations must have incentives to invest in their communities
Prices for housing and causes of the housing crisis
Prince of Queen’s personal story about renting in the Bay Area
The FIRE Economy, and the importance of distinguishing between productive earned income and parasitic unearned income
Corporate control and private-sector oppression
Mundane working, productivity, and income
The Basic Income
Student loan debt
The need for debt forgiveness
Slavery to work, Job distribution, and Ponzi schemes
Economic trolling


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Robert Stark interviews Bay Area Guy about the SF Bay Area and the FIRE Economy

killing-the-host

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Robert Stark, Rabbit & Alex von Goldstein talk to Bay Area-based blogger Bay Area Guy of  Occident Invicta

Topics include:

Bay Area Guy’s article The Bay Area and the FIRE Economy, which reviews Robert Stark’s interview with Laura Foote Clark of Grow SF
How as a renter in the Bay Area this issue personally effects Bay Area Guy
The role that Banks and the FIRE sector play in driving up the cost of real estate
Bay Area Guy’s point that he does not want the Bay Area to become like SoCal: an environmental eyesore characterized by track housing and strip malls
However Bay Area Guy does endorse Laura’s proposal of having Silicon Valley become more urbanized
The role that mass immigration plays in the housing crisis on top of the FIRE economy
Bay Area Renters Federation’s Sonja Trauss: Advocating for Housing Development in San Francisco
San Francisco Bay Area Renters’ Federation‘s lawsuit against the city of Lafayette over a development
The argument that white NIMBY’s oppose development because of diversity, and Bay Area Guy’s article, “Diversity” is Simply Code for “Non-white”
Bay Area Guy’s review of Killing the Host by Michael Hudson
The FIRE economy, which is an economy based on Finance, Insurance, and Real Estate sectors
Michael Hudson’s proposal to tax unearned income(ex. Tobin tax)
The goal of a fair tax policy should not just be to redistribute wealth, but also to punish predatory behavior, and incentivize productive behavior
How Michael Hudson invokes the arguments of Classical Liberals such as Adam Smith, and John Stewart Mills, who distinguished between earned and unearned income
Unearned income is any wealth not generated by production or labor
Debt and living paycheck to paycheck is the road to serfdom
How the majority of people’s income goes towards unearned income(ex. rent, insurance, mortgages)
How lower wages are bad for the economy, because consumers have less money to spend
Wikileaks: Hillary Clinton Calls Bernie Sanders Supporters Basement Dwellers, and that she viewed Wall Street as best to manage the economy
The Calvinist mentality in American culture, that your worth is based on your wealth
What makes Hudson’s book so brilliant is he points out that the ultra rich make their money through unproductive or predatory ways
Examples of countries that have moved away from the FIRE economy include Germany and Japan, who have a high end manufacturing base
In contrast the FIRE economies of the United States and the United Kingdom became dominant using protectionist and mercantilist measures, but liberalized their economies later on
Why Universal Healthcare and Public investment in infrastructure benefit the economy
Michael Hudson debunks supply side economics by pointing out the rich spend most of their extra income on products they already own, or lend their money out at interest
How the concept of a free market has been twisted from freedom from the rentier economy, into letting the financial sector do what ever they want
Michael Hudson’s point that the primary function of banking is not to fund business or stimulate the economy, but to bid up assets already in place, and attach debt to rents


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