Author Archives: mserratt

Click here for Part I Click here for Part II Part III: ANARCHY To quote Michael Malice, “The black flag of anarchy comes in many colors” and also in his summation anarchy can be summarized by the simple statement that “you don’t speak for me”. The differing flavors of anarchy represent differing economic approaches in a governance that requires individual explicit consent. Anarchism of a socialist bent has been part and parcel of the modern anarchist movement since its rebirth in the early to mid 1800’s. This movement began in earnest in the 1880’s with the arrival of Yiddish speaking Continue reading Public vs Private Ownership of Government: A survey of Dangerous Ideas in Three Parts (Part III)→

Click here to read Part I PART II: Monarchy The 20th century was a bad time for Monarchies and Monarchs. One of the myriad results of the “War to end all Wars” was the dissolution of many European monarchies, and the establishment of more democratic forms of governance. “From the viewpoint of economic theory, the end of WWI can be identified as the point in time at which private government ownership was completely replaced by public government ownership, and whence a systematic tendency toward increased exploitation — government growth — and rising degrees of social time preference — present-orientedness — Continue reading Public vs Private vs Individual Ownership of Government: A Survey of Dangerous Ideas in Three parts. (Part II)→

PART IDemocracy (Public Ownership) What would happen if we applied basic economic principles to various forms of governance in order to ascertain the most efficacious and stable governmental system? Where would democracy stand? Would the undoing of the old order brought about by the Great War still be considered an advance, or in hindsight would it perhaps be considered a mistake? Democracy has historically been given short shrift as a form of government by many political philosophers throughout history. To summarize the Greek (birthplace of democracy) thoughts on democracy let us turn to two quotes from Plato: “Tyranny naturally arises Continue reading Public vs Private vs Individual Ownership of Government: A Survey of Dangerous Ideas in Three parts. (Part I)→

Americans love bananas. It is the most consumed fruit by a factor of 3. The banana trade is worth a staggering 25 billion USD a year (Banana Link, 2021)! In the words of probable Economics enthusiast, Gwen Stefani, “This $h^t is bananas…” (Stefani, n.d.) and due to the few times she has been around the track, her potassium laden words are weighted with an air of authority. The giant of the banana industry is the Chiquita Fruit Company. In 2014, this Cincinnati based fruit firm merged with Fyffes and now move 180 million units of bananas per annum (ABC News Continue reading Gwen Stefani teaches us that Bananas are Bananas -B-A-N-A-N-A-S-→

A rising middle class is the yardstick by which emerging economies are measured, and there is no more widely analyzed middle class than China’s. Since China opened in 1979 her economy has had the air of inevitability surrounding it. Analysts and economists trumpeted the arrival of the Chinese century and told the western world to prepare to be eclipsed in both economic and military might. It seemed that China had been unleashed and that its pan-pacific destiny was soon to be manifest. With such an unstoppable juggernaut what could possibly go wrong……Perhaps a phenomenon economists label the “Middle-Income Trap” (MIT). Continue reading Paper Tiger by the Tail→

Beer is considered a “vice” by governmental bodies at all levels. Yet this vice acts like a “normal good” in the face of economic downturn. During the economic turbulence of the COVID pandemic, the large mass-produced domestic beer market got off reasonably unscathed, though not untouched by the market forced which they found themselves subject to. According to the Beer Institute the industry lost 568,040 jobs, close to 22 billion dollars in wages, and close to 20 billion dollars in lost sales revenue. These losses were felt most profoundly by independent micro-breweries. The beer industry finds itself in a place Continue reading The Brewer’s COVID Hangover: A Swig of the Pandemic Poison→