The $78 trillion free-lunch

Come off it. Do you know where you are, here?

In an Economics Forum. I teach economics.

Ever been to an EC101 university course? Thought not ...

PS: As for the name calling, go to a Message Board where users one-up one-another with trite sarcasm. All down hill, "God's country", all down hill - you (plural) deserve Donald Dork as PotUS ...

 

Funny. Essentially, what you're saying is that you believe you have authority. As in, because of your estimation of your "knowledge" and your position as someone who peddles a particular ideological philosophical view, that you find others who might challenge your authority to be intolerable. Clearly, this is the case.

So, you've demonstrated that you believe, deeply, in Malthusian and Marxist viewpoints. You seem to believe that these are the underlying mechanisms that truly effect the way economic interaction works around the globe. And for all of your faith, I'd simply point you to Venezuela and ask, how do you feel they're doing? Is that truly what your prescription is supposed to produce? Or, let's look at Cuba, or N Korea. And from those examples, you'd say what? It works? Closer to your own home, would you say that the Marxism that's been attempted in your neck of the woods was successful? Italy? Spain? France itself?

So from that very safe place from which you shelter in, perhaps the only effective way to demonstrate this to you is for you to attempt to actually transition from the closeness of your own personal safety and attempt to deal with the realities of the actual world around you. Teaching is so important, but not when it becomes an indoctrination of such a limited, puerile view of the world.

 

Better yet, a test case in one State, California perhaps. The States should be left free from Federal mandates to try different things which if they fail to produce desirable results does not result in costing all of us.
Repeal the 16th and 17th amendments, allow the 10th amendment to produce the experiments to take place which other States can adopt, modify, or avoid as a result of the success or failure achieved. We need to reduce the Federal government to providing only what each State is willing to fully fund, eliminating debt at the Federal level of government with the exception of times when the Nation is at war or a natural disaster occurs.

 

That is not a better idea since the experiment can't be confined to California.

 

Why not?

"Repeal the 16th and 17th amendments, allow the 10th amendment to produce the experiments to take place which other States can adopt, modify, or avoid as a result of the success or failure achieved. We need to reduce the Federal government to providing only what each State is willing to fully fund, eliminating debt at the Federal level of government with the exception of times when the Nation is at war or a natural disaster occurs."

 

Simply repeal the 16th and 17th amendments? Sure, that's easy!

Why not pull the experiment in a country that actually wants to do this experiment and doesn't regard it as insane rambling? I mentioned France because the OP is currently residing there, but it could be any number of other countries.

 

there are more Republicans conservatives and libertarians here than anywhere on earth so we are more likely to empower the states over the Fed than any other country, especially given that our Constitution is based on the concept of freedom from liberal central govt

 

That really has nothing to do with the topic. Although libertarians stupidly support this "78 Trillion free-lunch" it's far more popular on the regular left. The OP posted an article from The Economist and the teen reporters over at Vox also support the idea.

 

I think that's one of the issues that divide Libertarians into conservatives and liberals (the other being Abortion).

 

I wish it was. It would go a long way towards helping us fix some of the problems created by Federal government.

Is there a country that actually wants to do this?

The article begins with the "hundred dollar bill" story, and immediately follows with "If something seems too good to be true, it probably is not actually true. But occasionally it is."
Following that we are presented with simply fallacious claims ending with "If a world of free movement would be $78trn richer, should not liberals be prepared to make big political compromises to bring it about?"
Consider a GDP of $20 trillion in one year and government mandating all wages to be doubled the following year allowing prices to double as well. If everyone simply continues to spend as in the previous year the GDP would then become $40 trillion. Would we actually be $20 trillion richer?
In respect to the OP article quoted from The Economist, I would have no disagreement with anyone who regarded it as 'insane rambling'.

 

Writers in The Economist will come up with anything to justify open borders and barrier-free trade between countries. That's the neoconservative Liberal philosophy, which was so popular with many politicians on both sides of the aisle.

 

actually you brought it up as your quote proves you thought it had something to do with topic

 

very very dumb idea of course. 2-3 billion people would come to America and the American culture would die. American culture is the last best hope for liberty on earth. It must be preserved and strengthened not diluted.
Economically, the free flow of labor and and capital ( capitalism) would add $trillions to world wealth but little or nothing to current Americans' wealth.

 

Huh? I think you lost me. The only thing I put in quotes in my reply to you was this: "78 Trillion free-lunch."

That's the subject line of this thread by the way.

 

very very dumb idea of course. With open borders 2-3 billion people would come to America and the American culture would be diluted and then die. American Republican culture is the last best hope for liberty on earth. It must be preserved and strengthened not diluted.