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 [分享]美国经济的秘密 (英文) |
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LHS
头衔: 海归少校
声望: 学员
性别:  年龄: 44
加入时间: 2009/07/12
文章: 32
海归分: 22490
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作者：LHS 在 海归商务 发贴, 来自【海归网】 http://www.haiguinet.com
What is the secret of US economic strength?
The fundamental problem of modern capitalist society, just like socialists pointed out, lies in fact that production is carried out not for use but merely for profit. Profit seeking encourages people to readily violate any social or moral laws known to mankind. The secret of profit accumulation depends largely on two factors: the private ownership of the mean of production and how much the cost of the production could be reduced. The private ownership of capital guarantees capitalists the absolute power in dictating the purpose of production and the prices of the goods they produced. This is why corporations constantly reveal new models of products and capital will always flow to wherever the cost of production is the lowest.
The shifting of traditional manufacturing jobs in the US to overseas explains how this profit seeking mechanism works in reality. The corporations invest in those countries where the average wage is only a fraction of that in US and then sell the goods in the world market. The lower wages will be translated into lower cost and the higher profit on the balance sheet. By doing so, the stock holders and those top executives will see an increase in their value either in form of raise of salary or bonus or dividends. Despite the complexity contrived by the economic theories of all sorts, the very essential secret of wealth accumulation remains as simple as it has always been. However, the unpleasant side of this capitalist scheme is ordained to make itself felt. The private ownership of means of production and the social purpose of production are logically incompatible to each other and thus eventually seal the fate of capitalism.
The goods are produced so someone will be able to buy and consume. Thus the demand and supply may reach equilibrium and economy could continue its path. However, majority people, especially those in the poor countries, whose buying power is very limited, can not afford to buy these goods because of the concentration wealth in the hands of the few and the low wages. In a sense, capitalism seals its fate of failure by contradicting its deed against its purpose. In order to seek profit, the capitalist produced the goods that people did not need or could not afford. The prices of most durable goods are not determined by the force of market or the so called “unseen hand”. Instead, they were mostly determined by the whims of the few monopolies that possess certain competitive advantages over others. The high price and low purchasing power will wither the demand of the industrial goods. The result is an increase in inventory and a subsequent slow down in financial circulation. This will be the beginning of the economic crisis or the so called business cycle. Although most economists, feared of being labeled as Marxist, are reluctant to use the word of surplus or saturation but merely describe the situation as lack of demand. Nevertheless, the very essence of the two scenarios is the same. For example, a person with full stomach after eating could be described either as having saturated or as having shortage of demand. In any case, the result of this ill planned production is the huge surplus of consuming goods, and the inevitable economic depression ensued.
Promoters of globalization insist the positive effects of globalization, claiming it had improved the life of the local people by providing them with jobs and opportunities. However, a thorough analysis reveals otherwise. Explicitly, globalization did not make people's life better because improving people's life has never been the purpose of the whole scheme. The workers were not paid enough to be able to afford the products they made. Additionally, the loss of nonrenewable resources and high cost of production due to backward technology and management make globalization a losing game for those at the bottom of the economic food chain. In short, industrialization for the purpose of profit has been the source of all evils, it has polluted the environment, turned people into robots, produced the goods people did not need or could not afford, and most of all destroyed whatever left in the cultures of the rest world. If you take a tour in third world countries like China or India or Mexico, you will realize that the devastating situations described by many critics of globalization are not just some old fashioned socialist propagandas, but vivid reality still existing today.
It is sad to point out, as we enter 21st century, the gap between poor and rich countries does not shrink but is expanded to an unprecedented scale. In short, the world will not be a safe and prosper place unless there is a universal equality in terms of people’s livelihood, and true equality will not be achieved unless the unjust monopoly in technology and natural and financial resources by powerful nations is diminished. Obsession with profit and materialistic satisfaction, to a great extent, embodies the real source of evilness, somewhat like the biblical interpretation of a Pagan worship which has deviated human’s soul from his Godly nature of goodness.
Globalization orchestrated by Western powers did not improve the life of average people in the third world countries because it is a new form of slavery. Globalization is just a tool of big corporations to increase shareholder's' value so the top executives can buy more mansions and boats. Majority of American people are not benefited from this scheme either. As more well paid jobs were shifted overseas, more and more people in this country were robbed the opportunity of providing their families with decent and respectful life. What happened to average people in this country is not only the lost of jobs but also a huge blow in moral and self esteem. In an attempt to justify this perverted economic prosperity, the corporate elites promote a culture of unrestrained wasting world resources and being indifferent to the suffering and struggling of the majority poor population on this earth. When shopping at Wal mart, few people will give a thought on what is the average wage of workers in third world countries. It is sad to point out that the disease suffered by the whole Western industrial society is a disease of incurable.
US News and media such as Hollywood are mainly controlled by the people who are the beneficiaries of this unjust international economic and financial food chain. As result, what they intend to do is to brain wash people with propaganda junks that promote chaos and glorify callousness and selfish wrong doing. Through the window provided by Hollywood and news media, people start to believe in if not worship to this extravagant life style being not only a choice but much more as an "unalienable right".
In short, it is the innate nature of American economy and its extravagant life style that dictates the foreign policy of this nation. To sustain this luxuriant life style means an absolute domination in world nonrenewable resources and financial system. Any attempt to challenge the legitimacy of this dominating position poses a direct threat to the very foundation of the American empire. "You are either with me or you are against me" as said by US top officials. Obsession with luxurious and wasteful life style seals the fate of US being a bellicose empire that has to constantly engage itself in a series of wars in order to maintain its unchallengeable global position. The point here is not whether a war can be won or not, the point is that the war must be carried on.
America is so happy to engage in a war not only because it will help maintain the dominant position but also it is financed by the people of the rest of world. When a foreign government holds US dollar as the reserve and purchases US government bonds and securities as investment, it is indirectly helping US in its war efforts. Not surprisingly, United State government is the most financially indebted one in this world because most wealth of the world is flowing into this country. Yet it showed no concern of insolvency simply because its ability to print money to pay off its debt. However, everything must have a limit; US could not forever exploit the world by its financial hegemony if there is no demand for its currency or security. If this occurs, the power of the real economy will come into play, and whatever US owed must be paid back in tangible goods. The collapse of pseudo economy, namely the financial market, will reveal its effect in the real economy and America will suffer the consequences. It is safe to say that the collapse of the U.S. dollar system will mark the end of U.S. domination. However, unquestionably, U.S. will unflinchingly try to delay or prevent it from happening. Mostly likely, as we have witnessed in the past, this means war, and continuous war.
The end of the cold war also gave the U.S. an assertion of the invincibility of its military strength and subsequently the righteousness of its cultural superiority. It seems, just like these conservatives want you to believe, that the combination of free market economy and democratic system will eventually solve all problems we as human race are facing. And now this confidence has, as afforded by the hype from News and media, reached to a point of superstitious myth. Right wing conservatives have no hard time finding their disciples in the third world countries like China or India where about 5 percent of the population is living in a life style that could be labeled as civilized by Western standard. These faithful disciples of Western commercialism, who are comfortably living on top of an economic pyramid constructed by the blood and toil of the underprivileged majority, imitate their Western mentors on almost everything, from life style to rhetoric. Indeed, capitalism had created a mirroring image of its own in the world today where a culture of global consumerism has finally emerged and is being worshipped like religion. However, this conservative optimism has been proven short lived as world wide financial markets are ready to plunge。The truth is，history has repeatedly showed the brevity of rise and fall of mighty powers. When there is a prevailing belief that there is nothing could stop you, it is the beginning of the end. An empire might be able to defeat all enemies from outside but only to realize its own demise from the chasm within.
No great mason can be built on the basis of sand. Similarly, no great nation can establish itself on the foundation consisted of lies and deceits. The delusional prosperity of United States, to a large extend, attributes to the sufferings of the rest of world. Without international capital flowing into this country, and the unjust dominating position of U.S. dollars in the world financial system, (The ability that United States can literally create hard currency from a piece of paper, ) American will be forced to live in a much more frugal life style. That means no SUVs, less energy consumption per person. Most importantly, without this domination position, George W. Bush probably could not afford to finance the wars against Iraq and other "rascally" nations. The best way to stop a villain from doing more harm is to deprive him of the capacity of committing crime.
This election is not about partisan dispute between Democrat and Republican, the underlined repercussion goes beyond that. In a political system operated by group of oligarchies, it does not matter which one get elected. To certain extent, they are the same people. The Republican and Democrat can be viewed as two enterprises owned by a same owner, the owner of capitalism. They are in the same business with different operational tactics but same philosophy. Therefore, despite the seemingly firing conflicts as orchestrated during election season and in the news and medias, the differences between the two political constituencies are only tactical not philosophical. The very development of capitalist society has reached to the point that fundamental and structural change must be taken place in order to restore peace and freedom.
However, this task of change appears to be an extreme difficult one. The social and economic institutions and their ideologies and patterns of behavior as the results of past hundred years of accumulation are determined to stay. As matter of fact, they were legitimized and more or so had transformed into cultural norms for most people to take them for granted. Once people are so used to a life style of luxuriant consumption and easy gain, it is psychologically impossible to persuade them to adopt a frugal and thoughtful living. Changes will occur only if majority of people reach to an awakening that what has been going on is wrong and change is the only way out. Another obstacle to change lies in the hierarchical structure which ensures the existence of the capitalist society. In order to maintain its stability, this hierarchical structure demands majority of people remain in a status of poverty and ignorance.
History hitherto has been a chronicle of people's struggling for survival. History embodies itself in the battle between justice and injustice, humanity and callousness. Justice will not be served; peace will not be restored unless the majority of the people get an equal share of opportunity and genuine respect of their dignity. If a handful few want to build their luxury life at expense of the rest majority population, the chances are that they will lose sooner or later.
作者：LHS 在 海归商务 发贴, 来自【海归网】 http://www.haiguinet.com
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 [分享]美国经济的秘密 (英文) -- LHS - (13710 Byte) 2009-7-12 周日, 15:13 (1478 reads)
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