Re: Why Its Pointless To Argue With Global Warming Believers

In article <ybOdneoqlP0JaQTZnZ2dnUVZ_smdnZ2d@xxxxxxxxxxx>,
GreyCloud <mist@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

ZnU wrote:

In article <mNWdnQrlkMKDFQTZnZ2dnUVZ_t2dnZ2d@xxxxxxxxxxx>,
GreyCloud <mist@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:


ZnU wrote:


In article <euCdndwFq8u6WgXZnZ2dnUVZ_sKdnZ2d@xxxxxxxxxxx>,
GreyCloud <mist@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:



ZnU wrote:



A gold-backed dollar would also float in value.


You can say this, but you have no proof of this.


I have already demonstrated that the price of gold fluctuates
relative to the price of other goods. IOW, that the price floats.


The price floats because the USD is the so-called legal tender now,
not gold. The price didn't vary much when there were gold
certificate and silver certificate notes in circulation.


Take a look at http://minerals.usgs.gov/ds/2005/140/gold.pdf

Particularly, the 98$/t column. This column is in inflation-adjusted
1998 dollars. Inflation adjustments are made based on the consumer
price index, which means that the value in this column directly
represents a quantity of CPI goods and services. IOW, all of the 'float'
in the USD itself has been removed, and what you're seeing what quantity
of consumer goods you can buy with a ton of gold.

You may note that this number changes quite a lot, even prior to the
adoption of the paper USD.


I see you have no response. Please stop making absurd statements and
then ignoring me when I correct them.


Missed that one.

I'd say that the numbers, like statistics, seem to be jimmied up.

Look, you're being absurd here. This data is really basic, simple stuff,
coming from objective sources. You can't just dismiss it all out of hand
because it doesn't agree with your belief system.

Look at the current cost of postage stamps. Back then it took over 20
years before the 2 cent stamp bumped up to a 3 cent stamp. Today the
inflation pressures are far steeper than the past by a great deal. It
is the little things that give it away.

Postage stamps are not a useful measure of inflation, because for a very
long time the Post Office was subsidized.

I don't understand why you keep bringing up specific individual items to
make your case, when the consumer price index represents the actual cost
of living *far* more accurately than any one specific product or
commodity.

Well, I do understand. It's because the CPI doesn't back up what you're
saying. But you've offered no *legitimate* reason for ignoring it.

[snip]


I was thinking more along the lines of an economy where most people
don't work on farms.


But you need farms. Without them what will you eat?
All modern civilizations have as a base farming.


Yes, but in modern first-world economies, one or two percent of the
workforce is all that's necessary to grow the food for everyone. The
rest of the population is off generating wealth in other ways, which
creates a much more dynamic, fast-moving society, dominated by rapid
economic and technological change.

But no country ever moved from hunter-gatherer to a modern economy.

Err... huh? Hunter-gatherers don't farm, by definition. The United
States *did* in fact move from an agrarian economy to an industrial
economy, and is now arguably moving to an information economy.

The only reason that it only takes less than 2% of the population is
mainly due to corporate farming and better equipment.

Yes, better farming techniques, industrialized farming, a couple hundred
more years of selective breeding (and now genetic modification), neat
things like weather forecasts, etc.

In other words, the fact that things were more stable in pre-industrial
societies has very little to do with the fact that they often used gold
coins.


What pre-industrial society. Our society was industrial before the
civil war.

It was moving in that direction. At the start of the Civil war, only
about 1/3 of GDP was generated by industry, and 84% of the population
was still rural.

And yes you have shown this, but only during the reign of the Federal
Reserve. Before that inflation and deflation really was non
existent.


Actually, I showed it prior to the establishment of the Federal
Reserve as well.


Not much if you ask me... very little.


Nobody really asked you.


Just going on personal experience. Those graphs are really meaningless
until you actually had to live thru those years. A whole different story.

Once again, your personal experience is not a valid benchmark for the
performance of the US economy.

Look, I'm really done here. I've made detailed arguments, posted
lots of data... and it's becoming increasingly clear that you
simply don't comprehend some of the basic issues involved here.
There's no point in continuing this discussion.


I'm just pointing out that people are so deeply used to or familiar
with a system that is slowly sinking that the majority can't even
see the edge of the waterfall up ahead.


I have demonstrated that the system is not "slowly sinking", as
wage growth outpaces inflation.


Those figures do not show a sinking system tho. The fact that the
USD floats is a cause in not knowing when the ship is starting to
sink.


You have not made a coherent argument as to why the paper USD will
cause the system to sink.

Because of the USDs slow devaluation over time, which affects our
standard of living, along with inflation.


What? Inflation *is* "the USDs slow devaluation over time". These aren't
two separate effects which both must be taken into account. This is
*basic* stuff. How can you think you're qualified to argue these issues
without understanding it?

Oh, I understand it painfully and am quite aware of where the USD is
heading.

Could you please try to make some kind of actual argument, one of these
days?

Living near big cities tends to hide this from the working class.
But even the working class is feeling the pinch. That's why there
are two breadwinners in a family instead of one, like it used to be.


Once again, average inflation-adjusted income is *vastly* higher than it
was in 1900, or even 1950. The reason there are often two breadwinners
in a family today is *not* because individual workers have less buying
power, but because:

1) There's more stuff out there that one *can* buy now, and people are
willing to work for it.
2) Many women choose not to stay at home now that they actually have
other options.
3) The collapse of unions has reduced real wages for *certain types* of
jobs.

And for those that do not have a college education and are married, it
does take two bread-winners to make ends meet... like food, rent, taxes,
car payments, medical insurance payments, etc.

If you lived at 1950s standards, this wouldn't be the case. Food is
*cheaper* after adjusting for inflation than it was 50 years ago.
1950s-level medical care you can probably get for free (just don't get
cancer or something, because you'll die). A car of the quality available
in the 1950s, if you could still buy one new, would be dirt cheap. But
of course you can't buy one new, because it would horribly flunk modern
emissions and safety tests. There are a lot of other consumer goods
where advances in quality have been just as large; there's a reason "TV
repairman" was once a viable profession, but no longer is.

And, of course, in the 1950s, nobody had iPods, computers, Internet
access, flat screen TVs (or, usually, more than one TV, if any), cable
service, cell phones (or, usually, more than one phone line), DVD
players, and so on.

Housing is probably more expensive in real terms, but in general, people
can afford a lot more stuff than they could 50 years ago. They just
don't feel like they can, because there's so much more stuff that
everyone is expected to have.

Face it, the middle class is becoming squeezed out of existence.

The middle-class has lost out to the upper-class over the last 30 years
*in relative terms*. In absolute terms, people across the entire income
spectrum are doing better.

Note that none of these factors has anything to do with the value of the
USD.

Could have fooled me.

You're still not making an argument.

It is only a matter of time.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Us_real_gdp_growth.gif

Yes, I see the problem. We're in big trouble of things keep up like that.


If you believe in statistics... ;-)

Sorry, I guess I'm part of that special-interest political group they're
calling the "reality-based community" these days.

--
"Those who enter the country illegally violate the law."
-- George W. Bush in Tucson, Ariz., Nov. 28, 2005
.

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