Russian Ukraine shenanigans

[raimius]

7 hours ago, Random Guy said:

What did you want to dialogue?

This is a forum... dialogue is the point.

[SurelySerious]

This is a forum... dialogue is the point.

Sir, this is a Wendy’s.

The AI bot probably wants a substack where it just publishes its copy and paste bs while it doesn’t have to deal with all of us stupid people, but seems to have gotten sidetracked.

[ViperMan]

The only point of taxation is to generate demand for dollars.

Demand for dollars forces you to work for dollars so you can pay the government in their currency. You know, render unto Caesar and all...

MMT makes the case that you can print an unlimited amount of currency and pay all of your debts in it. That's a sophistic truism, and is the core of @Random Guy's world view.

It's alien to the rest of us because the rest of us understand that we don't live in a vacuum. Once other people stop accepting FRNs, or start denominating transactions in something else, the game is up. That's it. It's that simple.

You are a chicken on a tax farm. For the time being.

Edited August 16 by ViperMan

[Random Guy]

11 hours ago, raimius said:

This is a forum... dialogue is the point.

Yeah, what did you want to talk about.

[Random Guy]

9 hours ago, ViperMan said:

It's alien to the rest of us because the rest of us understand that we don't live in a vacuum. Once other people stop accepting FRNs, or start denominating transactions in something else, the game is up. 

Everyone understands. You understand that. I understand it. 

Why is there any discussion of "can we afford it?" or "how do we pay for it"?

No one is interested in the change to acceptance of USD, instead people here are b*tching about nominal quantities of USD created by the gov. People don't even bother to think about the nominal quantities of private debt for financial transactions. 

What's up with this? None of you are in a vacuum, right? 

[Lord Ratner]

4 hours ago, Random Guy said:

Everyone understands. You understand that. I understand it. 

Why is there any discussion of "can we afford it?" or "how do we pay for it"?

No one is interested in the change to acceptance of USD, instead people here are b*tching about nominal quantities of USD created by the gov. People don't even bother to think about the nominal quantities of private debt for financial transactions. 

What's up with this? None of you are in a vacuum, right? 

That's because you (not really you, but your troll persona) are quite apparently dumb enough to think that anyone here means "we won't be able to print enough currency to cover these bills" when they say "we can't afford it."

 

Absolutely nobody is referring to the Federal Reserve's ability to create dollars. No one. Not one single person here. Because humans don't speak semantically in raw literal declaratives. 

 

What they are saying is that the process of printing money (issuing new debt, creating it out of thin air, adding it to the ledger, however you insist on portraying it) to cover these expenses will, as it always has, destabilize the currency in a way that will at a minimum negatively impact the purchasing power of the population, or at the extremes, destabilize the entire society such that the status quo falls apart.

 

"We can't afford this" is no more a statement of monetary capacity than it is when a military/airline parent says "I can't afford to miss another soccer game or dance recital."

 

Normal people don't have to explain such simple context to the participants of a conversation, but apparently we would have to dumb it down for you keep up. Fortunately, your participation is neither necessary or beneficial to the conversation, so I doubt we will spend too much time trying. I'm taking a shit right now, so I have a little free time to indulge. 

[disgruntledemployee]

If money is what you want....  let's just take it from the enemy.  Make a top 10 oligarch list and seize it all; land, boats, biz, drug and prostitution rings... all of it.  Then tell the olis that their money will now fund the Ukrainian Defense Fund.  Then name the next 10 olis.  Two things might happen.  1, Zelenski gets guns, 2, Putin gets the boot.  And MAGA can stop whining about defeating Russia.

[Random Guy]

2 hours ago, Lord Ratner said:

What they are saying is that the process of printing money (issuing new debt, creating it out of thin air, adding it to the ledger, however you insist on portraying it) to cover these expenses will, as it always has, destabilize the currency in a way that will at a minimum negatively impact the purchasing power of the population, or at the extremes, destabilize the entire society such that the status quo falls apart.

A bank just created a loan to buy stock. This money is new, written to the bank ledger. It happens every second or so with lots of banks. Lots of new money. Every. Second. When destabilize? Now? Now? 🤣 Seriously dude, when does the sky fall? Cause these banks are pumping out new money every second, and it seems like the currency is not being destabilized. I guess you need to define 'destabilize'?

 

2 hours ago, Lord Ratner said:

"We can't afford this" is no more a statement of monetary capacity than it is when a military/airline parent says "I can't afford to miss another soccer game or dance recital."

A soccer game is a unique event. There is no duplicate. A widget has lots of duplicates. A dollar created to purchase a widget isn't very similar, unless you want to talk about path dependent research outcomes, for example. Honestly though, I'm not sure where you are trying to go with your analogy.

Did you have any blood in your stool?

[Random Guy]

1 hour ago, disgruntledemployee said:

If money is what you want....  let's just take it from the enemy.  Make a top 10 oligarch list and seize it all; land, boats, biz, drug and prostitution rings... all of it.  Then tell the olis that their money will now fund the Ukrainian Defense Fund.  Then name the next 10 olis.  Two things might happen.  1, Zelenski gets guns, 2, Putin gets the boot.  And MAGA can stop whining about defeating Russia.

Seems like a good idea until you realize that most people don't actually know how to run any of those 10 conglomerates. I think Zimbabwe tried this. Better to capture them and keep them for knowledge transfer. If they are dead you can't learn and then improve their processes. See: China.

[disgruntledemployee]

4 hours ago, Random Guy said:

Seems like a good idea until you realize that most people don't actually know how to run any of those 10 conglomerates. I think Zimbabwe tried this. Better to capture them and keep them for knowledge transfer. If they are dead you can't learn and then improve their processes. See: China.

Run em?  No.  Take their money.  Sell the assets.  Guess how much you can sell a $100M megayacht for? See: forfeiture seizure.

[Random Guy]

2 hours ago, disgruntledemployee said:

Run em?  No.  Take their money.  Sell the assets.  Guess how much you can sell a $100M megayacht for? See: forfeiture seizure.

If you have 100m of some currency but there is nothing to buy, why do you want to hold the currency?

The gov has infinite money, didn't you listen whe Kashkari said exactly that? He wasn't joking. The game is creating the real resources you want at the time you want them. Money just organizes relationships in a decentralized way to produce those resources.

[ViperMan]

8 hours ago, Random Guy said:

A bank just created a loan to buy stock. This money is new, written to the bank ledger. It happens every second or so with lots of banks. Lots of new money. Every. Second. When destabilize? Now? Now? 🤣 Seriously dude, when does the sky fall? Cause these banks are pumping out new money every second, and it seems like the currency is not being destabilized. I guess you need to define 'destabilize'?

A bank didn't just create a loan to buy stock. There, fixed it for you. And now I see where you go astray.

Banks can't do that. Banks can't do what you're saying or what you think they can do. No bank is able to just issue a loan to buy something. Collateral must be put up. Either in terms of a hard asset or future productivity - usually both.

If the productivity that was promised to make good on that loan isn't delivered, the receiver of the loan has their (hard) assets seized.

[McJay Pilot]

So… anyways, this whole Kursk invasion wasn’t on the bingo card. I just hope the Ukes don’t overextend themselves, but it’s nice to see the Russians scrambling.

[SurelySerious]

So… anyways, this whole Kursk invasion wasn’t on the bingo card. I just hope the Ukes don’t overextend themselves, but it’s nice to see the Russians scrambling.

I’m sorry are you trying to talk about Russia and Ukraine in this thread?

[disgruntledemployee]

1 hour ago, Random Guy said:

If you have 100m of some currency but there is nothing to buy, why do you want to hold the currency?

The gov has infinite money, didn't you listen whe Kashkari said exactly that? He wasn't joking. The game is creating the real resources you want at the time you want them. Money just organizes relationships in a decentralized way to produce those resources.

Dafuq?  It's not about having money on hand to buy something.  It's about taking theirs, and not just the money.  You think Putin is going to just print some money and give it to his Olis if we take it?  A simple googs gets you 156 Oli properties valued at $5.6B with a B.  Take them.  Now the Olis don't have them and that's a tangible loss.  I've often thought the biggest punishment to a richie is to make them poor.  And therein starts another pressure upon Putin.  Make enough of his supporters poor and change may come.  It worked on Biden when the donors pulled their money.

35 minutes ago, McJay Pilot said:

So… anyways, this whole Kursk invasion wasn’t on the bingo card. I just hope the Ukes don’t overextend themselves, but it’s nice to see the Russians scrambling.

Someone's been reading up on maneuver war.  The key is to get out by winter.

[Lord Ratner]

43 minutes ago, McJay Pilot said:

So… anyways, this whole Kursk invasion wasn’t on the bingo card. I just hope the Ukes don’t overextend themselves, but it’s nice to see the Russians scrambling.

It's obviously an escalation, but it seems unlikely the Russians can fight on more than the current number of fronts. Maybe? I doubt the Ukrainians have much spare capacity either.

 

If this is purely a military play... Good luck. But if this is an attempt to create some incentive for ending the conflict, it could be a brilliant move. 

 

Apparently the US decided to take the handcuffs off.

[Random Guy]

7 hours ago, disgruntledemployee said:

Dafuq?  It's not about having money on hand to buy something.  It's about taking theirs, and not just the money.  You think Putin is going to just print some money and give it to his Olis if we take it?  A simple googs gets you 156 Oli properties valued at $5.6B with a B.  Take them.  Now the Olis don't have them and that's a tangible loss.  I've often thought the biggest punishment to a richie is to make them poor.  And therein starts another pressure upon Putin.  Make enough of his supporters poor and change may come.  It worked on Biden when the donors pulled their money.

 

Why are you quoting assets in dollar terms for Russians who use Rubles. Do you mean Russian oligarch US assets? 

You realize you can't take Rubles from Russia, they have their own ledger. That's like saying you want to confiscate the points of a basketball game. 

[disgruntledemployee]

2 hours ago, Random Guy said:

Why are you quoting assets in dollar terms for Russians who use Rubles. Do you mean Russian oligarch US assets? 

You realize you can't take Rubles from Russia, they have their own ledger. That's like saying you want to confiscate the points of a basketball game. 

Why are you worrying about colors of money?  Let me mansplain this for you.  This is about warfare.  It's not about confiscating points, it's about taking their basketball court.  For example, there's a mansion in NY bought by an Oli.  He's trying to hide it in a shell Co.  Fuck that.  Knock on the door, kick em out, and turn it into an AFVC/MWR AirBnB.  That's a tangible asset lost.  And then keep on doing it over and over, all over the world with our allied nations (at least those that have the stomach for it).

Stop being so academic on the concepts of money; it doesn't matter.  Next you'll be trying to tell us about some insight into the evolution of the market economy in the southern colonies

[Random Guy]

1 hour ago, disgruntledemployee said:

Why are you worrying about colors of money?  Let me mansplain this for you.  This is about warfare.  It's not about confiscating points, it's about taking their basketball court.  For example, there's a mansion in NY bought by an Oli.  He's trying to hide it in a shell Co.  that.  Knock on the door, kick em out, and turn it into an AFVC/MWR AirBnB.  That's a tangible asset lost.  And then keep on doing it over and over, all over the world with our allied nations (at least those that have the stomach for it).

Stop being so academic on the concepts of money; it doesn't matter.  Next you'll be trying to tell us about some insight into the evolution of the market economy in the southern colonies

Yes. Do this. Freeze all accounts with all US banks for all foreign nationals and all foreign businesses. End use of the US Dollar by foreigners. Bring the boys home.

[MCO]

13 minutes ago, Random Guy said:

Yes. Do this. Freeze all accounts with all US banks for all foreign nationals and all foreign businesses. End use of the US Dollar by foreigners. Bring the boys home.

He’s either a troll or an idiot, why is everyone arguing with him?

[Random Guy]

4 hours ago, MCO said:

He’s either a troll or an idiot, why is everyone arguing with him?

The US can buy anything denominated in dollars, and people here are losing their minds over it.

If the US wants to give Ukraine trillions of USD to buy stuff on global markets, it can. The US gov can give Ukraine money to buy your car, your house, and your wife! It's just a political choice.

[Boomer6]

5 hours ago, MCO said:

He’s either a troll or an idiot, why is everyone arguing with him?

 

[Random Guy]

Framing your disagreement with the Ukraine conflict in money terms ("we can't afford it, the debt/interest is too high, we must raise taxes, etc") is incorrect.

The US can always afford anything denominated is dollars (including people, who are paid wages), if those things exist or projects can be implemented to create them. Reallocation of those resources may mean the gov pays above the going rate paid by the private sector, which you experience as inflation. Bonds and taxation are not required--war bonds, for example, are a method to remove the public from competing with the gov for real resources. The cash you would otherwise spend is removed from your account and you get a bond which you can't use to purchase anything. The gov doesn't want your money, it want to stop your spending temporarily. It's a way to drain money from the economy.

If you disagree with the conflict, frame your arguments in real terms. You think the conflict is wrong because X, Y or Z. But saying we can't afford it is simply wrong.

The implications for all other gov spending on programs and projects, the CBO, everything anyone says about the budget, should be obvious. It's all just politics. 

Boomers struggle with this, because they lived under a gold standard which no longer exists. Boomers cannot comprehend economic systems without fixed exchange rates. Unfortunately.

[Random Guy]

On 8/17/2024 at 6:05 AM, ViperMan said:

A bank didn't just create a loan to buy stock. There, fixed it for you. And now I see where you go astray.

Banks can't do that. Banks can't do what you're saying or what you think they can do. No bank is able to just issue a loan to buy something. Collateral must be put up. Either in terms of a hard asset or future productivity - usually both.

If the productivity that was promised to make good on that loan isn't delivered, the receiver of the loan has their (hard) assets seized.

What Is a Margin Account?

The term margin account refers to a brokerage account in which a trader's broker-dealer lends them cash to purchase stocks or other financial products. The margin account and the securities held within it are used as collateral for the loan.

[Random Guy]

What's the collateral for a credit card, @ViperMan?

I mean, the owner of the card has a right to an unsecured loan, that's the idea behind unsecured loans. The creditor has rights by law, but there's no collateral?

And what about all the leverage buyouts for equity stakes? The 'collateral' is the firm you purchase, but does a bank seize the firm when the shareholders don't pay their debts? What's the bank do with the firm?

I get that no one here works in finance, but banks create unsecured credit at every moment of every minute of every day. Saying "banks don't work that way" is incorrect.