[lbo-talk] Fwd: More on comparing U.S. debt position to household

Julio Huato juliohuato at gmail.com
Tue Aug 9 07:26:15 PDT 2011


Bill wrote:


> If the U.S. debt is 90% of GDP, is it valid then to say that is
> similar to a household that earns $100K per year having a $90K debt?
> I realize of course that households cannot tax and cannot print
> money...

Thinking in terms of propaganda (and I can't avoid thinking that way), comparing debt (the structure of ownership over productive wealth) to output is part of the problem -- it's a very toxic ideology that traps people to the status quo.

No. To unleash the people's social imagination, the benchmark for output should be  *potential output*, i.e. the level of human development, individual freedom, happiness, whatever you wish to call it, that we can produce with the resources we have.  The benchmark shouldn't be the output (mixed with massive amounts of garbage) that a human society crippled by capitalism can produce in a given year.  To unchain our productive potential, we need to seriously disrespect private ownership -- better if in an organized fashion, of course. The point is that we have more degrees of freedom to shape up our social arrangement than we think.

We need more organization.  Pronto.   People who have summer vacations, use them for good:

http://district1.cwa-union.org/news/entry/verizon_workers_fight_for_middle_class_jobs_-_join_the_picket_line



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