Stacy Summary: Funny how ‘socialists’ like Switzerland and Finland always place so high in competitiveness rankings; but then when you compare their healthcare, education, poverty, etc. numbers against US, they blow the competition away. So this crazy summer to me is much ado about nothing. None of the crazy stuff adds up to truth in the real world; so re: the craziness, ask yourself this: Qui Cui bono? The Washington fight, conducted mostly behind closed doors, has been overshadowed by the noisy debate over health care. That’s fine with investment bankers, who for years quietly wielded their financial and lobbying clout on Capitol Hill to kill efforts to regulate derivatives.
Ironically, the Swiss, who are well known for their welfare-type system which provides long annual vacation leave for all employees, generous benefits for workers who are terminated, and extended maternity leave, have competed strongly over the years with the USA, which is characterised by a more rugged free-market culture.
Under this US brand of capitalism, employees work more hours annually, with shorter vacation periods, and enjoy less-generous maternity leave or termination benefits. Yet, their high degree of social cohesion, high efficiency levels and top-of-class policy and regulatory framework allow the Swiss to achieve productivity rates that are in line with the greater compensation levels that their citizens enjoy.
Update:
“How can we get digital cable and Internet in our homes, but not clean water?” said Mrs. Hall-Massey, a senior accountant at one of the state’s largest banks.
She and her husband, Charles, do not live in some remote corner of Appalachia. Charleston, the state capital, is less than 17 miles from her home.
“How is this still happening today?” she asked.
When Mrs. Hall-Massey and 264 neighbors sued nine nearby coal companies, accusing them of putting dangerous waste into local water supplies, their lawyer did not have to look far for evidence. As required by state law, some of the companies had disclosed in reports to regulators that they were pumping into the ground illegal concentrations of chemicals — the same pollutants that flowed from residents’ taps.
But state regulators never fined or punished those companies for breaking those pollution laws.
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@Stacy .. Coincidence …. just noticed that you also chose to quote this paragraph :
… ” Under this US brand of capitalism, employees work more hours annually, with shorter vacation periods, and enjoy less-generous maternity leave or termination benefits. Yet, their high degree of social cohesion, high efficiency levels and top-of-class policy and regulatory framework allow the Swiss to achieve productivity rates that are in line with the greater compensation levels that their citizens enjoy. “…
I can concur , knowing many Swiss that have a standard of living we in Germany can only dream of, not to mention comparing to the US.
A friend of mine works for the Swiss state in a fairly low-level position and made 13,000 Euros per month in ca. Y2000. Taxes are 20% ; Social & Medical Security is Top.
One hears about the many German workers that try to or do get jobs in Switzerland. Typically, a German nurse gets twice the pay in Switzerland and pays half the tax !
It surprised me that they were allowed to work there, because AFAIK, the Swiss only allow(ed) foreign workers “in” if they have a University degree.
Maybe you know more than I do ; maybe things have changed recently.
Similar story with Luxembourg .. which now overcrowded with Germans in particular ( there is now a dire housing problem due to the population expansion in that very small space called a country ). And then we have Guernsey ( 20% flat tax), which is still a feudal system ( from the 1600s ). Their people ( 60K ) and state (12 ) are in no dire straights either.
Bottom line : those countries with the low tax rates and a solid financial backgrounds ( Switzerland/Guernsey = Gold in the banks ) are doing well it seems, while those countries that are taxed to hell and have massive Governments are in big trouble.
Those countries with the
Somebody wasn’t paying attention in Latin class
“Cui bono”
I don’t buy into the “exposure/dependency” model of China’s US dollar reserves.
At present China is dumping, by way of foreign investment, about $50 to $100 billion USD per month. In two years, with some strategic buys of treasuries along the way, China will cut their dollar reserves to a paltry $300-$400 billion and pretty much avoid any serious losses, at which point they can simply dump them and send the US into inflationary hell while internalizing their own economy into domestic projects and SE Asian and Russian trade.
Remember the Soviet Union at it’s height? They achieved technological equality and in many cases outright superiority without any reliance on the “west” or “foreign investment” – first satellite, first man in space, first 10,000km ICBM, the best submarines on earth, the most advanced air defence systems, public works projects on a scale unheard of, and so on. If they can do it, so can China.
This is what the “tariff” threats against China are all about: trying to blackmail China to keep buying US debt. It’s amusing to me how amateur the supposedly brilliant US economists are in respect to China. They’re WAY out of their depth. China has been around for six thousand years and they will be around six thousand years after the US bumbling “empire” is long gone.
My predictions for the next 20 years:
1. Russia will have the highest per capita GDP by 2 times at least.
2. Venezuela will have the highest per capita GDP in the western hemisphere.
3. The US will disintegrate into 6 states and Mexico will re-take some of their stolen lands: New Mexico, Arizona, parts of California; Russia will re-take Alaska.
4. China will, by far, be the world’s biggest economy.
5. India will disintegrate.
6. The US will start and lose a nuclear war.
According to polyglot Michel Thomas, Chinese is one of the world’s easiest languages to learn. I suggest you take his Mandarin course.
@Adam Gibson – oops, wrote in French without reali(s)zing . . .
Max and Stacy, A question: when you guys look over here and see how the health care “debate” is going, are either of you really able to hold out ANY hope for us that we can do better where financial regulation and all things Wall Street are concerned?!
Another question: do either of you have any kind of a guesstimate of how many local currencies would be required to really start subverting the Federal Reserve’s monopoly currency? I recently learned that the most prosperous middle class ever actually lived during the Middle Ages, and the reason they were so prosperous was that they had multiple currencies and literally worked their money into existence. Back then, there was a central currency, but it was used for long-distance/international trade ONLY. (Hank Paulson warned about us being thrown back into the Middle Ages if the bailout didn’t happen . . . I guess he was unaware, as was I, that the plague and all of of the death that it dealt actually happened AFTER the central currency was institutionalized as a monopoly currency and impoverished everybody.)
I’m getting tired already of waiting for our politicians to smarten up and do something to reform Wall Street. As a graduate student, I don’t exactly have money to spend buying gold. But it seems to me that one way we can start rebuilding our communities and local economies is to create local currencies that will circulate through small businesses faster than will Fed Reserve notes, and will likely not be spent at our local corporate stores (e.g. Home Depot, Wal-Mart, and the rest of the big boxes.) Just wondering if either of you can humor me and guess at how many successful local currencies you think it would take to undermine the Fed and get its attention.
Yeah Switzerland’s stats look good on social benefits, but look at the size of the population. It’s a lot easier to do on small scale.
Luxembourg probably looks good too, but measurements can be misleading.
That Ilya Kuryakin!
It’s been a while…
Umm… the Swiss don’t field a global army nor accomodate millions upon millions of migrant workers who ship out their earnings to impoverished locales, pay no taxes, but utilize welfare services…
The Swiss also don’t do the R and D nearly as well as the US, and benifit on a second hand basis from US tech and medicinal leadership.
Trying to compare a small, relatively homogenious culture (Old Europe) with a sloppy place like the US is disingenous.
The US is a sick girl, overweight and diabetic, but she gets up every morning and still leads the parade…
@Scott from Oregon – US spending on R&D is less than Switzerland and many other countries for that matter, especially places like Iceland and Israel:
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/eco_res_and_dev_spe-economy-research-and-development-spending
Especially if you compare it on a per capita or per $GDP basis.
The numbers in that link are World Bank numbers from 2002. Couldn’t find more recent ones.
@ Scott – Watch “Health, Money and Fear” (located under the tab “Mad As Hell Videos”) and learn more about where our R&D money really comes from:
http://www.madashelldoctors.com/
Stacy, You don’t mean “especially if” but ONLY IF. No way Switzerland outspends the US in total on R and D (and if they did, they got ripped off for what they got in return).
Which is not to say Switzerland doesn’t outspend on a per capita or per GDP basis. Again, the Swiss don’t accomodate South America’s poor, nor do they stand between Taiwan and China or North and South Korea (or Israel and all the Arab nations who despise them).
Again, these comparisons are faulty for the two reasons already mentioned- Immigration laxity and military involvement. You can’t say one system is “better” if the other system pulls much more weight.
@mep…….you are so far behind the curve it is mind boggeling.
Start by reading this.
http://www.financialsense.com/fsu/editorials/2009/0501.html
Then spend time on youtube researching a wide variety of topics stemming from the creation of the Federal Reserve. etc……learn how the people controlling the money supply of the US dollar came to control every single aspect of it.and went on to establish most “world” organizations to expand the power of that control…….This will begin your ongoing enlightenment amd amazement of what is actually going on with the current deliberate financial collapse.
By the way…. Even being a graduate of Yale would not make any difference in the knowledge of what is going on….in other words….what you will learn through research on the internet is not available anywhere else….and more profound is REASON why it has not been available. PS….Stay completely away from all forms of general media…..TV, Magazines, Newspapers, Radio etc etc …..You will learn why as time goes on with your research. Concentrate on YouTube.
Take care…. no hostility intended….. accept the fact you need time to get up to the curve.
@scott and stacy….. R&D is total irrellevant useless information for the current times.
The redneck in West Texas agrees with that Ilya Kuryakin feller (thats person in English). I am attempting to prepare for just that.
“@scott and stacy….. R&D is total irrellevant useless information for the current times.”
Ummm, tell that to the old lady in the ambulance who had a stroke and will be given a medicine called a “clotbuster” which will essentially melt away about 90 percent of the strokes effects, giving her another five years of functional life…
Tell that to the deaf man whose implant allowed him to hear his grandchildren’s giggles for the first time ever…
Tell that to the soldier who had an ear regrown for them because their other one was blown away…
Tell that to the hippy who lives “off the grid”, because he can afford high tech solar and battery devices with his pot proceeds…
Here is an interesting talk about “the economy” and R and D…
http://www.dailypaul.com/node/106525
It is funny too!
Any new US programs are doomed due to two factors:
1. Crushing debt levels.
2. Third world corruption levels.
Unless and until huge audits and fraud waste and abuse investigations happen, the US is toast. Please note this covers both parties Washington D.C. and Wall Street (FedGov.Inc).
That Frank Rich article was right on the mark.
Take care…. no hostility intended….. accept the fact you need time to get up to the curve.
What curve?
http://farm1.static.flickr.com/227/514727774_dba6cec995.jpg
@frances snoot – wow, that’s a pear shaped bottom if I have ever seen one!
@Stacy:
It would “put” one of fruit, that’s for sure.
A naked short on pears…
Perhaps this is the curve referred to?
http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_fjzkbNbtOS0/Rgi11PuWmTI/AAAAAAAAADo/v4p1c5uAd1s/s400/bako%2B004.jpg&imgrefurl=http://thejcurve.blogspot.com/2007/03/south-african-butt-plant.html&usg=__ZeOHTGlnD_yz1EtjyWGA7uYDMtA=&h=300&w=400&sz=27&hl=en&start=14&um=1&tbnid=fif05J0lIqk0TM:&tbnh=93&tbnw=124&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dcurve%2Bof%2Bbutt%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dsafari%26rls%3Den%26sa%3DG%26um%3D1
I’d have thought the migrant labour from Latin America artificially boosts US ‘productivity’ (output per input).
Moreover, I thought the general trend in the US has been to deny any benefits to a large proportion of migrant labour, since they enter the US and are employed as illegal immigrants. And a large proportion will leave the US before drawing any benefits.
So the US relies to a great extent on an underclass of migrant/illegal labour. That reservoir allows the US middle class to dispense with the labour of working class Americans, and to have little interest in their education or welfare. Thus the low productivity of both classes of American workers (considering GDP as a measure of development) is subsidised by migrant labour. Same applies in the UK and many European countries too.
Cheap labour is an artificial and short-term prop to boost generally low ‘productivity’ and skills.
What’s that you say? Well, you’re behind the curve. Eh? Speak up? Of course, she’s behind the curve as well….
http://estb.msn.com/i/49/DB735A1B4FFC94FE499CDC684A659.jpg
http://www.kissthisguy.com/8552misheard.htm
Mike,
I’ve done my research on the Federal Reserve. I’m merely thinking about ways to take away some of their power by using local currencies.
@Mep:
You’re right.
@scott from Oregon…. the point is…. the entity controlling the money supply does not care about those people and that entity is about to succeed in the most herendous plan known to mankind and we should all disregard the bullshit info out there like the issue you are talking about and focus on exposure of rellevant info that pertains to the agenda by the entity of establishing control over the citizens of the globe through financial collapse that they are deliberately implementing..
@mep…… learning about the feds is just one very tiny step in learning about what is going on…… keep researching.
Is far from being a true capitalist country.
When the U.S. needs to subsidize companies like
Amtrak, Boeing and too big to fail banks that gamble
other peoples money. Is it capitalism?
Our fall came from what Eisenhower warn us about
was the Military Industrial complex. Which bankers decided to
use the U.S. military to expand the bankers vision of the world.
in which Swiss bank account where flushed with money from Bankers, despots, drug dealers and Senators in which they would hide their ill gotten gains.
It’s no wonder that Switzerland makes the U.S.
look like banana republic.
Maybe the Swiss can come to the U.S. and run our country
for us.
Is funny how it is that the B.I.S. headquarters
is located in Switzerland. which Bernanke takes his marching orders from.
While the rest of the European countries dont expend the
amount of money that the U.S. does on the military
we will always be at a disadvantage. our R&D money goes into
how to destroy poor villages in other countries as opposed
to other type of research. Amerika decided to be the worlds
policeman and we are paying a high price in education,
health and personal freedom.
http://www.usdebtclock.org/
Switzerland is a curious model.
Didn’t they vote only a few years ago to give women the vote? And don’t you have to be a landowner or something to vote? You probably have to be over 35 as well. I know they’re really strict. It’s practically impossible to become a Swiss citizen unless so born. Even when you reside there forever and marry one of them, you’re still on the outer.
it serves all those right if they thought tourism was more important then clean water.
and who today does not think that is treu?
lets all just accept we have rotten teeth and not accuse anyone shall we?
we heard about this “we don’t want to sacrifice our modern wealth” too many times to still to have hope in a beautiful world.
You are trying to compare the Swiss with “Americans”? Please walk the streets of any major US city- if you dare. The Us is a 3rd world country BECAUSE of 3rd world peoples. Makes sense ,right? Walk the streets of Swiss anyday, anytime. Just experience the difference. Yet the corporate tax rate for most cantons are 10% or less! Tax rates for the equivalent people in the US are nearly 50%. so who is more communist Swiss or US? The Swiss are an aggregation of German and French are the most dynamic productive peoples in the world. The US is gonna compete with that? Are you nuts,sir?
Ilya Kurkin! The white Russian (weiss0orosische) people have had massive accomplishments and are a high IQ people. But make no mistake, many of the technological accomplishments in White Russia were courtesy of the German, hungarian, aistrian scientists they placed in death/work/detention camps after the war. No science meant no food, death, execution. Thanks Roosevelt, thanks churchill, thanks stalin- the 3 great criminlas of oour time. worse perhaps than goldman sachhs.