Where is all the money?

It's seems to me that after this credit crunch the only people who appear to have lost their shirt is the ordinary bloke. Taxpayers and the governments are footing the bill while at the same time banks and investors are being bailed out. Bonuses still get paid to the very people who *****d up in the first place.

The investors and bankers who created this mess keep their swimming pools whilst ordinary people lose their jobs and pensions. In the Uk we are facing what's called a "deficit" and cut backs might mean health jobs and care jobs going.

But who do we owe all this money to ? If the banks are so badly off how can they lend to Governments? If Governments are so badly off how can they bail out the banks? If all the developed countries owe all this money to the banks how can the banks be that badly off? Maybe we all owe the money to each other? - if so why don't we just right it all off and get on with our lives?

So where has all the money gone? If major G8 countries are in debt and the banks are strapped - who has got it? Aliens? Maybe much of the money the money never existed in the first place? If so how can non-existent money create so much havoc if it dissappears?

Consider this. No comet has hit the planet. No major plagues or world wars. No crop failures or massive oil shortage. It seems to me that the world is in financial crisis because some people have leant money (that maybe never existed) to people who couldn't pay it back. Given that all this "money" only really seems to exist as 0s on a computer or bonds , equities and loans it's bizarre that this "money" has thrown us all into debt.

A picture emerging in the UK is one of the Royal Bank of Scotland . The RBS (one of the contributors to the whole mess) gets bailed out by us (the government+ taxpayer) and then loans money to Kraft who buy Cadburys and then it looks like British workers might lose jobs. Cool!

I can't help feeling that someone is cashing in here and it's not the ordinary bloke. It also feels to me like some horrendous con trick is being pulled on us all by those with money and power. Capitalism has sold us on boom-bust and market forces , but it's not the capitalists who go bust - they get bailed out at our expense - and what for? - so they can just go and do it all again in 10 years time?

Wake up people , the Emperor has got no clothes on!

Originally posted by knightmeister
It's seems to me that after this credit crunch the only people who appear to have lost their shirt is the ordinary bloke. Taxpayers and the governments are footing the bill while at the same time banks and investors are being bailed out. Bonuses still get paid to the very people who *****d up in the first place.

The investors and bankers who creat ll again in 10 years time?

Wake up people , the Emperor has got no clothes on!

There is only one way to fight back. Support small government and small business. Begin to pull your money out of the stock market and begin to live a simpler life. In fact, I feel we need to begin to barter more with neighbors. What needs to be done is cut the middle man out of our affairs, which are big government and big business.

BTW: Did you see the 1000 point plunge in the market today? What a joke it has become.

Originally posted by whodey
There is only one way to fight back. Support small government and small business. Begin to pull your money out of the stock market and begin to live a simpler life. In fact, I feel we need to begin to barter more with neighbors. What needs to be done is cut the middle man out of our affairs, which are big government and big business.

BTW: Did you see the 1000 point plunge in the market today? What a joke it has become.

I used to care about what the market did, but now I don't. Better to control what you can by investing in yourself rather than getting ulcers worrying about something you cant control.

Originally posted by Scotty70
I used to care about what the market did, but now I don't. Better to control what you can by investing in yourself rather than getting ulcers worrying about something you cant control.

I say it is better using any extra money you have getting out of debt than it is "investing" it with hoodlims. Then if you have any money left over put it in a small local bank or invest it in other people around you.

Originally posted by whodey
I say it is better using any extra money you have getting out of debt than it is "investing" it with hoodlims. Then if you have any money left over put it in a small local bank or invest it in other people around you.

I don't trust banks.....credit unions are better. Getting yourself out of debt is the best first step tho.

Originally posted by Scotty70
I don't trust banks.....credit unions are better. Getting yourself out of debt is the best first step tho.

I say the Amish have it right. Create a community that disdains government and corporate involvement and live within your means. If they can do it so can we!!

Originally posted by whodey
Support small government and small business. [...] What needs to be done is cut the middle man out of our affairs, which are big government and big business.

Two questions.

I can see how (and why) Big Government could be reduced. But how do you propose to go about dismantling Big Business?

How will U.S. small businesses compete globally with Big Businesses operating out of east Asia, south east Asia, Europe and so on?

Originally posted by knightmeister
It's seems to me that after this credit crunch the only people who appear to have lost their shirt is the ordinary bloke. Taxpayers and the governments are footing the bill while at the same time banks and investors are being bailed out. Bonuses still get paid to the very people who *****d up in the first place.

The investors and bankers who creat ...[text shortened]... ll again in 10 years time?

Wake up people , the Emperor has got no clothes on!

You are just discovering this now?? NEWS FLASH!! The rich have been shafting the poor since the dawn of time. This becomes much more clear during hard economic times.😏

which lobbyist is it that represents the little people?

think he (if he exists) gets as much face time with the pres and congress as the team that represents even just Goldman Sachs?

Originally posted by bill718
You are just discovering this now?? NEWS FLASH!! The rich have been shafting the poor since the dawn of time. This becomes much more clear during hard economic times.😏

I kinda knew this - however to many it seems that it's not clear at all . We dress it up in such complicated terms that we seem to forget what's actually happened. There's so much market gobbledegook and double speak and babble.

So I still ask - where exactly has all the money gone and who do we owe all this deficit and interest to? Does anyone know?

Originally posted by FMF
Two questions.

I can see how (and why) Big Government could be reduced. But how do you propose to go about dismantling Big Business?

How will U.S. small businesses compete globally with Big Businesses operating out of east Asia, south east Asia, Europe and so on?

I'm sure whodey envisages a world in which an ordinary Joe opens a corner shop to compete with Coca Cola, Intel, ASML, GM, etc.

Originally posted by whodey
I say the Amish have it right. Create a community that disdains government and corporate involvement and live within your means. If they can do it so can we!!

I'm not sure how many people want to give up everything that was invented after 1820. On the other hand, are any of us in our modern automobile-centered lives really any happier than the Amish people and their horse & buggy-centered lives?

Originally posted by knightmeister
It's seems to me that after this credit crunch the only people who appear to have lost their shirt is the ordinary bloke. Taxpayers and the governments are footing the bill while at the same time banks and investors are being bailed out. Bonuses still get paid to the very people who *****d up in the first place.

The investors and bankers who creat ll again in 10 years time?

Wake up people , the Emperor has got no clothes on!

The financial system is the circulatory system of the economy. Who is lending all this money? We ALL are. Who do we owe this money to? ALL of us. We ALL lend and borrow to and from everyone else continually in an extremely complex web. Even at the regular joe level - people are constantly making loans (bank deposits, checking accounts, IRAs, buying bonds etc.) and they are constantly borrowing (mortgages, credit cards, etc).

Underlying all of this massive web is a general faith that (except for rare exceptions) everyone is going to honor everyone else's debts in a timely fashion. As long as everyone trusts everyone else, credit keeps changing hands and the economy continues moving along. But the minute that trust is shaken (whether or not there's any real basis to the doubts), people suddenly become a lot more afraid to make or receive loans and the whole economy can implode.

Usually there's some catalyst (like the bursting of an internet bubble or the mortgage crisis) but even a mere rumor can set off a crisis even where the fundamentals of the economy are 100% sound.

You ask - why can't we just forgive all the debts and let bygones by bygones? But if we did that, people would be VERY wary about making new loans. How much money would you deposit in the bank if you believed the government could step in and declare that the banks didn't have to repay you? And how much money do you think anyone would ever lend you to buy a house if they knew that the government could step in declare that you didn't have to pay any of it back?

Originally posted by FMF
Two questions.

I can see how (and why) Big Government could be reduced. But how do you propose to go about dismantling Big Business?

How will U.S. small businesses compete globally with Big Businesses operating out of east Asia, south east Asia, Europe and so on?

Well if government had not intervened in the credit crisis the process would have occured naturally. Small business would have been in a position to take the place of business' that were "too big too fail". It would have been a painful process, much like a war is a painful process, but the upside would have been cathartic because we would have flushed the "poo" out of the system.

On a personal level we can CHOOSE to do business with ONLY small business and avoid corporate patronage in order to protest corporate control. However, this can only be done with varying success.

As far as how Big government can be reduced, I'm not sure it can be. I know at times it has been trimmed here and there over the years but by in large it continues as an overall rate of expansion, especially of late. Once power is acheived it is next to impossible to get it back. This goes for the private sector as well. So what can be done? Sit back and let them fail I suppose instead of artifically proping them up.

Originally posted by Melanerpes
I'm not sure how many people want to give up everything that was invented after 1820. On the other hand, are any of us in our modern automobile-centered lives really any happier than the Amish people and their horse & buggy-centered lives?

It would not necessitate a philosophy that all technology is "bad". You could simply choose to live "simply". This would mean perhaps buying a used car instead of a new one or buying a modest home etc. Then again, although technology empowers us to a large extent it often is somewhat of a task master. For example, how much cheaper was it to live only 30 years ago? You had no bills for cell phones or cable/satillite, or internet bills etc.