Category: Economics
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George Floyd and America’s Collective Unconscious
The protests centered upon the death of George Floyd are fed by a deeper stream of discontent. The discontent is not specific to any one issue, but by multiple inconsistencies with democracy and touted American values. Fundamental premises that underlie the Declaration of Independence, “that all men are created equal and endowed by their Creator…
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A way forward from the Covid-19 morass
The likelihood is Covid-19 is not over and done with at the end of May or June. The curve may be flattened, but unless new cases are identified through testing followed by contact-tracing, the US will be buffeted by the continuing emergence of hotspots. The most likely places for new hotspots are the same heavily…
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Exchanges should require naked shorts to buy back shares
Equity short sellers come in two basic varieties: First, “naked shorts” who borrow shares from another account to sell the shares to be repaid later, and second, “sellers against the box” who possess the shares they sell short. Sellers against the box are hedging a position, holding the shares that are sold. The bulk of…
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Is the Securities and Exchange Commission asleep at the wheel?
During the past three weeks, shorting of stocks and indices has increased tenfold to twentyfold. Shorting is selling a stock or index not owned, but presumably “borrowed” from an account of a person or entity. In this way, presumably, the number of shares sold “short” cannot exceed the number of shares available for public trading.…
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Physical, Social, & Environmental Consequences of Big Agriculture & Big Money
The fate of “Fly-over America” was set by Federal policy changes in the early 1970s. Policies championed by the Secretary of Agriculture, Earl Butz, during the Nixon administration eviscerated protections for small farmers and land use. The consequence was a bubble in grain and land prices with vastly increased farm debt followed by oversupply and…
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Capitalism and the Fate of Big and Little
You rightfully may wonder why does a shrink concern himself with social-political issues. Culture, society, and its trappings are interdependent. We live within the matrix, and just as the characteristics of water effect the health of fish, so the social-political matrix effects human physical and mental health. At the onset of this essay, I declare…
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Limits of Binary and Zero-sum Mindset
The binary framework has deep roots in Western culture. The binary framework applies to systems defined by restricted logics such as board games and to science and digital applications, such as Newtonian physics and programing. Binary logics rely upon axiomatic, self-referential, closed systems. Inputs to the system must accord with the system, otherwise inputs are…
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The World on Edge
The variables and forces that are influencing or determining the future direction of national and international politics, along with the practice of professions, with emphasis upon psychology, are presented. Plausible outcomes of the current “world order” are described.
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US Foreign Policy: A Brief Outline
The Roman formula for governance was “bread and circuses”. The modern equivalent is “Walmart, online shopping, media, the NFL, and threats to well-being.” Fear that promoted docility was no doubt present in the Roman era as well as concern about barbarian invasions. But fear was constrained by belief in the gods and antiquity’s clearly defined…