Down The Rabbit Hole

I've always liked politics and have become awakened to economics by the circumstances over the last decade. Realizing these circumstances were not just a happening of the last decade but a series of events going back perhaps centuries to the beginning of this nation, I became fixated on it. Then I had to chose; which to pursue. Politics or Economics. I solved that problem when coming to my own conclusion- though not really- that economics is a facet of politics and politics a facet of economics. By studying either in depth, I will likely end up studying both.

There are many places to begin and instead of relying on the surface data presented to me by any number of people with their own bias, I wanted to try investigate beneath the surface layer and beneath he layer under that where most bias people tend to rely on their information, statistics, and other such things (also likely to be provided by or gathered from a biased agent).

So now I was wondering where to start. How to get a good grasp of the economy. Well, in all my research so far I came to the conclusion of whether good or bad, all the policies and operations of all faces of economy rely on the supply or retraction of either money and/or credit. Making a distinction between the two may take some time. At the heart of this system, banks are ultimately the genesis of new money and become the major valves which regulate it's flow. Looking into that you soon realize their is a hierarchy of banking. It basically goes up from the local level to interstate to international. And even the Central Banks of these countries are ultimately international in scope. And they may be beholden to the ultimate bank- the International Monetary Fund- which, by definition, functions sort of as a bank of final appeals in times of necessity, but still does normal transactions as well.

And here I became mystified. The IMF...it sounds so monolithic. An entity completely of it's own with no allegiance or connection to anything else and yet a definitive part of the process of things outside of itself. I chose to begin my study here at the crown. I have these initial questions I want to ask...

* where does it get it's capital from that it can bail out entire national economies and various banking systems from disaster all at the same time?
* what is it's role by definition and in practice?
* where does it stand in international hierarchy, both by definition and realistically?
* who is in charge of this bank?
* what are the interests that created it and the interests that it serves?
* is the IMF federal or private?

From here I am sure I will be brought up and down through history with a razor and thread, shaving away the fluff and trying to piece together the facts without being impeded by anyone else's or my own biases. Ultimately I expect to be studying the projection and effect of the movement of money, the politics and he effects on society it has and have no intention at arriving at a conclusion anytime soon. But I think it will be fun. It's like Indiana Jones...except just paperwork. But in the end I just want a little more clarity about what is going on around me and what is coming ahead and what are the natures and origins of the forces operating above and around me.

Well...down the rabbit hole I go.

 

[TNAR]

Before I go into a few issues I have with your premises I must congratulate you on coming to the realization that these economic issues run much longer than the past decade.

My first contention is your claim of politics and economics being "facets" of one another. Politics certainly attempts to control and cajole economics and must base many of its policies on economics (generally fallacious economics), but economics has no reliance whatsoever on politics. In fact, as the great Ludwig von Mises pointed out, economics is value-free. By this he means that, properly, economics can suggest potential effects of policy, but does not offer value judgments of those policies being either good or bad.

The next problem is with your claim that all economic policies rely on the money/credit supply. This is certainly the most apparent method to affect the economy and is obviously favored by contemporary politicians and (political) economists but is by no means the sole method. Many economists suggest that the best policy (i.e. the policy which would result in the greatest output/efficiency for the most people) is the one which allows the money supply to be simply another privately traded commodity.

I would recommend beginning your research into these areas by reading The Law by Frederic Bastiat. Good luck!

 

[makmugens]

True. In your first one I think I meant to say that politics is the discourse between the governed and the governors. The economy is the governor, though. It's policy determines the nations policy. Government and the politicians who represent it are nothing more than legal administrators and representatives of that economic policy.

For the second, I meant more on the terms of what I see in the current economy. Maybe I am wrong there too. I think currency is a privately traded commodity. It's dispersal or removal from the system- national or international- is governed by private entities. But I will read that book you suggested. Thanks for it, also.