The Human Conspiracy Blog-space

Pretend that you own a company that used to make and sell beer, firewood and baked goods to all parts of the world.  Your grandparents started this business with a private horde of gold coins, at the time the largest in the world.  We’ll call it the Pot of Gold or POG for short. Traditionally the family business was conducted by writing checks and IOU’s that were backed by the POG. 

When your parents took over the business, about half of the sales were of re-branded goods made by some people down the road, the Cutthroat family.   You parents bought them cheap and sold them for more, under the family brand.  When Mom and Dad got older, they began to cut more corners.  All of the beer and most of the baked goods were made and sold by the Cutthroat family, using the family brand, paying your parents a reduced royalty, who had nothing really to do with creating those products at all. 

Because of their declining income, Mom and Dad started selling IOU’s to the POG, then reselling those same IOU’s to others.  Your parents no longer produced enough to make it.  The basic necessities were being supplied by the Cutthroats as amazingly low rates.  Mom and Dad had been living off the POG all these years because of Cutthroat generosity.

One morning you awaken.  Mom and Dad are gone. You have just taken over the family business.  You discover that the demand for firewood is negligible.  Even the Cutthroats don’t want it. Then you make two dreadful discoveries about the POG:  It was not a horde of pure gold coins.  They were mostly copper and tin, and their market value was never more than 40% of your parents’ figures.  You also discover that the unpaid IOU’s and checks exceed the value of the POG by a factor of six. 

My God, you think.  We have been living off the family’s reputation all this time.  And the word about the overvalued and over leveraged POG has gotten out.   But the Cutthroat family is still sending you goods and services for the IOU’s.  Thank god for their kind hearted generosity, you think.  But then you learn that the Cutthroat family has a practice of executing their own business people for minor offenses...like overstating assets and borrowing with no ability to pay.  You begin to worry....

Your trusted messenger arrives.  She has discovered a secret Cutthroat family communiqué.  Here’s what it says:  “Just a little more time, and we will have it all.”  You ask, “What does this mean?”  Your messenger tenders her resignation.  She has just been hired by the people down the road....

Our major strengths are in aerospace and agriculture, medical technology and cyber miracles.  Unless we act quickly and decisively, that list will shrink to agriculture and nothing new will emerge to add to the balance sheet.  Our current infatuation with paper assets a mass delusion, of a kind with the derangement of that homeless guy on the corner who honestly thinks that satellite spies have even noticed his existence.

More on this to come...

Stay tuned.

And Read - http://jaygaskill.com/AmericanDreamAmericanNightmare.htm