William Graham Sumner’s famous essay “The Forgotten Man”

“I PROPOSE in this lecture to discuss one of the most subtile and widespread social fallacies. It consists in the impression made on the mind for the time being by a particular fact, or by the interests of a particular group of persons, to which attention is directed while other facts or the interests of other persons are entirely left out of account. I shall give a number of instances and illustrations of this in a moment, and I cannot expect you to understand what is meant from an abstract statement until these illustrations are before you, but just by way of a general illustration I will put one or two cases“. - William Graham Sumner, 1883 (1)

Above is the opening paragraph of William Graham Sumner’s famous essay “The Forgotten Man” written in 1883. And what did Sumner propose to discuss as a widespread social fallacy?

“These illustrations bring out only one side of my subject, and that only partially. It is when we come to the proposed measures of relief for the evils which have caught public attention that we reach the real subject which deserves our attention. As soon as A observes something which seems to him to be wrong, from which X is suffering, A talks it over with B, and A and B then propose to get a law passed to remedy the evil and help X. Their law always proposes to determine what C shall do for X or, in the better case, what A, B and C shall do for X. As for A and B, who get a law to make themselves do for X what they are willing to do for him, we have nothing to say except that they might better have done it without any law, 'but what I want to do is to look up C. I want to show you what manner of man he is. I call him the Forgotten Man. Perhaps the appellation is not strictly correct. He is the man who never is thought of. He is the victim of the reformer, social speculator and philanthropist, and I hope to show you before I get through that he deserves your notice both for his character and for the many burdens which are laid upon him“.

　

“Whenever A and B put their heads together and decide what A, B and C must do for D, there is never any pressure on A and B. They consent to it and like it. There is rarely any pressure on D because he does not like it and contrives to evade it. The pressure all comes on C. Now, who is C? He is always the man who, if let alone, would make a reasonable use of his liberty without abusing it. He would not constitute any social problem at all and would not need any regulation. He is the Forgotten Man again, and as soon as he is brought from his obscurity you see that he is just that one amongst us who is what we all ought to be”.

　

A politico by the name of Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR) used the phrase “the forgotten man” in many of his campaign/political speeches. Roosevelt used the phase in a diametrically opposite context/meaning. That is, Roosevelt co-op-ed the phrase and possibly, and possibly meaningfully, rewrote history regarding the phrase “the forgotten man“. Roosevelt basically switched the position of “the forgotten man” within Sumner’s formula. Roosevelt merely moved the forgotten man from C to D or X and elimiated C. (2) In other words, the formula was turned upside down to generate a different meaning by eliminating C from the formula, and now A and B are providing for “the forgotten man”.

However, the essay remains and for those who would enjoy some 1883 insight, insight that remains today, the link to the essay appears below.

Note: once you reach the link scroll down a bit and the essay appears below the fold.

http://oll.libertyfund.org/?option=com_staticxt&staticfile=show.php%3Ftitle=2396&chapter=226423&layout=html&Itemid=27




Notes:

(1) William Graham Sumner, The Forgotten Man and Other Essays.

(2) Amity Shlaes, The Forgotten Man, a New History of the Great Depression.

Duke Power Rate Hike? –Or- Rate Hike by Politicos through the Mechanism of Government?

 
Buried in Duke Energy's rate hike are two items: legal monopoly position of Duke Power and the coercive acts by politicos through the mechanism of government to cause Duke to purchase from uncompetitive, subsided energy sources.

Public utilities such as Duke Energy are legal monopolies caused by policies and legislation sponsored in part and promoted in full by the FDR administration. Power was produced privately in a robust competitive market before the policies of the FDR Administration.

Monopoly practices speak for themselves. However, it is worth pointing out that certain politicos do not oppose monopoly; they only oppose private monopoly and welcome public or state monopoly.

The other item to consider is yet another government intervention into the market for electrical power, namely the coercive power of politicos through the mechanism of government to mandate purchase of electrical power from uncompetitive, subsidized energy sources e.g. solar and wind power. Solar and wind power cost per kilowatt hour are far above [in some case four times] the cost to produce power by other means: coal, natural gas, and nuclear where available.

Moreover, a second cost exists for consumers: the cost of tax payer subsidies to solar and wind power companies.

Hence the consumer of electricity is suffering from the effects of monopoly delivery, artificially inflated prices, and is subsidizing the artificially inflated price to boot.

Maybe consumers and taxpayers would be better calling for competitive electrical generation in the private sector, where private companies are free to choose their electric power supply source, and to end taxpayer subsidies to uncompetitive companies.

H/T Triadwatch blog

Does history repeat itself, or does history repeat itself due to purposeful intervention?

Consider history repeating itself

Say one lived during the Great Depression and made a list, a check list as it were, of policy, politics, antics, regulation, etc. that occurred during the Great Depression under the FDR Administration. The check list would be a "tree" in that each point would have sub-points e.g. how a series of policies failed to improve unemployment, how certain policies were merely class warfare related, union thuggery, regulation and over regulation, general government mysticism, etc.. One then took the points and sub points and turned each item into puzzle pieces that when put together said: Great Depression - FDR Administration. Around 1946 the puzzle pieces were placed in a box and stored away.

Around the inauguration of Obama and the ensuing Obama Administation  one went to the closest shelf and removed the dusty old box from 1946. Each time a policy, politic, antic, regulation, etc. that occurred similar to an item in the Great Depression, you removed the corresponding puzzle piece from the box. As time went by the puzzle pieces would begin fitting together and would begin to shape the word picture: Great Depression - FDR Administration.

As the puzzle began to fit together some puzzle pieces remained in the box: protectionism, subsequent stimulus plans, and socialist marches. However, in short order the puzzle is finished: Senate China bashing bill, Obama jobs bill, and "occupy".

There you are, history repeated itself!


Consider history repeating itself due to purposeful intervention


Yes, history does have a nasty habit of repeating itself. Not only repeating itself, repeating itself in almost verbatim fashion. However, history may very well repeat itself because certain institutions, politicos, pundits, talking heads, social groups, etc. have revised history in such a way that the history is cloaked and doesn't seem to be actually repeating itself.

James and Jane Goodfellow might have great difficulty standing back and reflecting on events and seeing the common thread through the fog of revisionism. Which then begs the question: are the supposed astute, supposed educated, and supposed informed leaders of the revisionist movement merely insidious time bandits who purposely revise to cover up and distort so future generations can not benefit from the knowledge that history repeats itself ?

Stated alternatively, does history repeat itself, or does history repeat itself due to purposeful intervention?

Buffett Tax: “This is not class warfare, it’s math.”

'This is not class warfare, it's math,' challenges the president. (1)  

Obama loves class warfare. He has played the class warfare card over and over again to the point of a broken record. Obama frames the class warfare argument with the answer to the argument being tax increases.

Keep the above in mind for a moment.

FDR loved class warfare. He played the class warfare card over and over again to the point of a broken record. FDR framed the class warfare argument and answered the argument with multiple tax increases.

In Jim Powell’s book FDR’s Folly he points out the following:

(a) during and after the 1937 “recession within a depression” FDR continued to bang the drum of class warfare rhetoric,

(b) after the 1937 the real live, real time people living in the depression began to reject FDR’s class warfare rhetoric as FDR had been banging the drum for years [the depression was the doing of “rich” people] yet the depression lingered on and got worse [1937 recession].

(c) after 1937 congress began passing tax decreases and that congress became more and more Republican (voters electing those representing the opposite argument to FDR’s class warfare/tax argument). (2)

 


Notes:

(1) Obama proposes $1.5 trillion in new taxes        http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44578820/ns/politics-white_house/

(2) FDR's Folly, How Roosevelt and His New Deal Prolonged the Great Depression, Three Rivers Press, NY, NY 2003

The 1920–1921 Depression and Coolidge - Harding vs. The Great Depression and FDR economics

Please take a moment and play the above video regarding Standard and Poors down grade of U.S. debt. There is a wealth of information in this eleven and one half minute video. U.S. debt is real and something needs corrected post haste and straight away.

Uncharted economic waters



One must remember we are in uncharted economic waters. One must further remember that much empirical study of past depressions/recessions, and there has been many deep recessions aka depressions in the U.S. economy, are based on the study of U.S. recessions/depressions when household and government debt was small and/or non existent. That is, we are in uncharted economic waters within an environment of hyper-debt. Hence past empirical studies have a component in common of studying many recessions/depressions in which low debt was the norm.



However, take a special look at 10:08 until the end of the video. Especially 10:08 until 10:48. What is eluded to is that Great Depression economics of the FDR administration did not work in this current economic environment of uncharted waters.. Larry Kudlow may well be contrasting the FDR economics with the 1920–1921 depression and Coolidge - Harding economics.



Note: if you have never heard of the 1920–1921 depression and Coolidge - Harding economics you are not alone. Its glossed over in history books. However, well known in the field of economics.



Friedman and Schwartz



One might trace back QE1 and QE 2 to Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz. That the Fed’s tight, tighter, tightest money policy deepened and prolonged the Great Depression. Hence the money supply clearly needs expanded when cataclysmic financial shocks occur. Hence Bernanke is following Friedman-Schwartz.



Coolidge - Harding or FDR



On the other side of economics, aside from monetary policy, we have fiscal policy. If you deploy Schwartz-Friedman do you deploy Coolidge - Harding or FDR? The strategy chosen was FDR economics.



The FDR strategy has failed for a second time. Friedman and Schwartz appears to be working. However Friedman and Schwartz is temporary and meant to find a soft economic landing zone. Coolidge - Harding?