Corporate Power and Expansive U.S. Military Policy
Abstract supplied by Wiley Publishing: Military defense is generally treated in economics texts as a “public good” because the benefits are presumed to be shared by all citizens. However, defense spending by the United States cannot legitimately be classified as a public good, since the primary purpose of those expenditures has been to project power in support of private business interests. Throughout the course of the 20th century, U.S. military spending has been largely devoted to protecting the overseas assets of multinational corporations that are based in the United States or allied nations. Companies extracting oil, mineral ores, timber, and other raw materials are the primary beneficiaries. The U.S. military provides its services by supporting compliant political leaders in developing countries and by punishing or deposing regimes that threaten the interests of U.S.-based corporations. The companies involved in this process generally have invested only a small amount of their own capital. Instead, the value of their overseas assets largely derives from the appreciation of oil and other raw materials in situ. Companies bought resource-rich lands cheaply, as early as the 1930s or 1940s, and then waited for decades to develop them. In order to make a profit on this long-range strategy, they formed cartels to limit global supply and relied on the U.S. military to help them maintain secure title over a period of decades. Those operations have required suppressing democratic impulses in dozens of nations. The global “sprawl” of extractive companies has been the catalyst of U.S. foreign policy for the past century. The U.S. Department of Defense provides a giant subsidy to companies operating overseas, and the cost is borne by the taxpayers of the United States, not by the corporate beneficiaries. Defining military spending as a “public good” has been a mistake with global ramifications, leading to patriotic support for imperialist behavior.
DetailsKeeping Land in Capital Theory: Ricardo, Faustmann, Wicksell, and George
Abstract supplied by Wiley Publishing: Most economists today live in a two-factor world: There is just labor and capital. Land, so central to classical political economy, has been swallowed into capital and “disappeared.” This paper surveys some of the better historical treatments of land and capital, their interrelations, and how they support modern Georgists and Greens who want land to reappear. This paper was originally written for the annual meeting of the History of Economics Society (HES), Grinnell College, June 25, 2006. The writer thanks Robert Dimand for generous references to the literature; Mary M. Cleveland for editorial advice; and Marianne Johnson for insightful suggestions about integrating the materials.
DetailsMoney, Credit, and Crisis
Abstract supplied by Wiley Publishing: The financial crisis of 2008–2009 has antecedents in earlier crises, including the Great Depression. In order to understand how the current crisis arose, we must review the most fundamental principles of banking. Doing that, we find that the main service performed by banks is the creation of liquidity, a collective good that can be destroyed by the behavior of individual financial institutions. The key element in creating liquidity is the monetization of various types of collateral. When collateral takes the form of land or capital that turns over slowly, banks lose liquidity. That is why major banking crises have frequently been associated with real estate lending. The best way to restore health to the financial system is by restoring the principles of the “real bills” doctrine that requires loans to be self-liquidating.
DetailsNature, Economy, and Equity: Sacred Water, Profane Markets (Chapter 3: Water in California: How It Can Help Us Understand the World)
Abstract supplied by Wiley Publishing: Numerous conflicts over natural resources can be overcome by restoring reciprocity between public and private sectors of the economy. Chapter 3 shows problems created by California's water tenure laws. California's 19th century equitable solution (the Wright Act) is examined, along with inequities in legal regimes of India, Pakistan, South Africa, and the Philippines.
DetailsNature, Economy, and Equity: Sacred Water, Profane Markets (Chapter 6: Conclusion)
Abstract supplied by Wiley Publishing: Numerous conflicts over natural resources can be overcome by restoring reciprocity between public and private sectors of the economy. Chapter 6 concludes with four principles derived from the foregoing analysis.
DetailsNew Life for the Octopus: How Voting Rules Sustain the Power of California’s Big Landowners
Abstract supplied by Wiley Publishing: The concentrated ownership of farmland has influenced rural life in the state of California for more than a century. Reformers have introduced measures to counteract that concentration, such as acreage limits on farms receiving water from federally funded projects. Large landowners have fought back with policies that have protected their ability to amass and maintain their empires. In the first part of this article, Mason Gaffney presents this historical background in broad outlines. In the second part, Merrill Goodall explains an important policy that preserves the power of entrenched interests: water districts that are governed by a board elected by a voting system that allots one vote to each dollar of land value. In these districts, a tiny handful of landowners is able to control a public agency without opposition and without the need to persuade other voters. Author of After the Crash: Designing a Depression-Free Economy (2009) and The Corruption of Economics (1999). Goodall: Deceased 2002. Goodall taught political science at Claremont Graduate University. Two of his areas of research interest were water policy in California and public administration in Nepal.
DetailsThe Role of Land Markets in Economic Crises
Abstract supplied by Wiley Publishing: It is widely recognized that the economic crisis of 2009 was caused by unsound lending for real estate. Largely ignored, however, is that this contraction was easily predicted on the basis of a well-established pattern of land speculation, premature subdivision, and excessive building on marginal land that recurs approximately once every 18 years. Capital locked up in projects that are started during a land bubble is effectively lost during the downturn, leaving the nation without sufficient capital to finance ordinary business operations during the recovery period. The best instrument for avoiding this boom-bust cycle is the property tax and, more specifically, the portion that falls on land. We explore here the ways in which the property tax influences the intensity, timing, and location of development. We also examine why frequent and accurate assessment are essential to make the property tax an effective method of preventing speculative real estate bubbles.
DetailsContact
View as table
Share via email
Share via Facebook
Share via Twitter