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Cake day: January 3rd, 2024

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  • We have many alternate routes toward national self-reliance, but they aren’t neoliberal enough for bankers and oligarchs… Carney’s main clients.

    As a simple example, the housing crisis really started to hurt when the Mulroney and the subsequent neoliberal governments withdrew from social housing. This is not an isolated issue, look around the world and observe that the only governments dealing with the problem are actively committed to publicly owned housing on a grand scale.

    We can decommodify our way out of many false or unnecessary scarcity issues. An additional economic multiplier at a time of need would be the keynsian stimulus of unions building out our solutions.

    Of course, this is contrary to letting the Market decide, so nah. We get commodity solutions at fake discounts. More capital flowing upwards until it’s too late.











  • Now that you mention it, the lunatic fringe right wing that calls every social benefit or progress “communism” is a little bit correct.

    The state, and private ownership of the means of production, withers away the more we have things like retirement benefits and weekends and universal healthcare and livable welfare payments.

    Each increase in public services reduces the profits of the owner class. As we deal with the oligarchic stages of late capitalism there will probably have to be a lot of nationalizing, or monopoly breakups. Eventually, as governments take on more and more ‘essential’ services, including housing, public ownership becomes normalized.

    So, assuming continuing “progress” in economics away from capital worship, and that we survive both energy overshoot and rapid A.I. development:

    Co-operatives etc. will eventually take over as the most common economic organization, globally. Co-ownership in many variants. Nationalized industries and assets will likely devolve into more local control. Traded and private companies will have to adapt to less opportunity to skim surplus labour, and innovate more. Fewer rentier activities for passive income will likely be a common policy in many regions. Many will do just fine as gig workers with automated administrative systems, and that time freedom will come to be normalized.

    U.B.I. in some forms will be a bridge in a lot of regions, I expect.

    [note: this scenario does not appear to be the current timeline for much of the world… work to be done]