Wal-mart Defends Controversial Food Drive For Employees

[southern california guy]

The government is not permitted to simply print unbacked notes. Assuming it's a real gold standard, and not some fractional reserve nonsense. This is why the ruling class doesn't like the gold standard. It's also why the bankers dislike it.

 

You'll find plenty defending fiat currency, too. When specie money was common, the means of inflation was debasement. When notes were issued, the means of inflation was fractional reserve. Now money is created with a printing press or a the push of a button (you spend the same dollar that's earning interest in your checking account). Supply and demand applies to every commodity. You might not like his philosophy, but Murray Rothbard's history of money and banking in the United States is a good book.

 

Is that why Franklin D. Roosevelt seized peoples gold during the Great Depression?

[NotreDame]

Is that why Franklin D. Roosevelt seized peoples gold during the Great Depression?

 

He confiscated it because they wanted to devalue the dollar and spend a bunch of money because they thought that by destroying people's savings and forcing them to spend money before it becomes worth less they are "spurring the economy" and helping people...

 

...and by "people" I think they mean Wall Street and the ultra-rich that own productive assets, because that is who inevitably gets helped.  Same thing that famously happened in the Weimar republic.

 

https://www.google.com/#q=why+did+fdr+confiscate+gold

[NotreDame]

...and by "people" I think they mean Wall Street and the ultra-rich that own productive assets, because that is who inevitably gets helped.  Same thing that famously happened in the Weimar republic.

 

As an example of this reverse Robin Hood effect... McKinsey calculates that - looking at interest income alone - Central banks have taken $1.6Trillion from private citizens and distributed that money to wall street and corporations and, of course, Government:

 

http://nextbigfuture.com/2013/12/us-and-european-governments-gained-16.html

 

[Ice_nine]

Is that why Franklin D. Roosevelt seized peoples gold during the Great Depression?

 

they forgot to tell me that one in history class

 

 

[southern california guy]

 

they forgot to tell me that one in history class

 

I just found a link. The Great Gold Robbery of 1933

[NotreDame]

 

they forgot to tell me that one in history class

 

Yeah, they left a lot out for me too.  I can't imagine what they are not teaching nowadays.

[southern california guy]

Yeah, they left a lot out for me too. I can't imagine what they are not teaching nowadays.

Why do you suppose they leave out the "Emergency Banking Act of 1933"? Edited December 5, 2013 by southern california guy

[Ice_nine]

Why do you suppose they leave out the "Emergency Banking Act of 1933"?

 

b/c they wanted to make FDR seem like the baddest most nazi-stompingest prez in the biz so we can think it's cool for the executive to overstep its bounds when it's for the good of murican economy  and cracking the skulls of evil SOBs.

 

Just a guess.

[NotreDame]

b/c they wanted to make FDR seem like the baddest most nazi-stompingest prez in the biz so we can think it's cool for the executive to overstep its bounds when it's for the good of murican economy  and cracking the skulls of evil SOBs.

 

Just a guess.

 

The above would be more or less in line my thinking as well.   Stuff like the chart below... And I'd have a lot more contraversial things to say about his foreign policy as well, but they'd be a bit off-topic.

 

 

 

Funny how the prolonged unemployment then is similar to what we are experiencing now, though the press doesn't talk about it:

 

 

I mean, if the job market was great, why would we have a thread about people needing to support families with entry-level jobs at walmart?

[Ice_nine]

Idk, they say everybody has a right to an opinion, but seeing as I'm still almost entirely depended on my parents financially (ouch my ego, it hurts) I don't really have the knowledge nor life experience to really comment on these broad economic issues, nor do I have the time to unravel these newfangled graphs and such and what they mean.

 

I don't really have the right to an opinion here, but I enjoy watching people throw down over economic debates. Sometimes I even the blood spatter when I get seats close enough to the action!

[Winchester]

I wonder what the paychecks would look like if the entire payroll (including executive compensation) were distributed equally among all Wal-Mart employees. I'm not sure many people Wal-Mart directly employs. I've heard 1.7 million. Wiki says that net profit is 16.999 billion. I don't know how much of the operating cost includes payroll, but the operating costs are 27.801 billion. It says there are 2.2 million employees. That probably doesn't include executives. We could pretend all of the 27 operating cost is payroll, ad the 16 to that. Round up, so 28 plus 17 is 45. How much is 45 billion divided equally among 2.2 million?

 

This doesn't account for shareholders. Let's pretend for the sake of this that shareholders wouldn't be compensated for investing in the company. They'd just receive nothing.

 

I'm not positive that's all the money that would be available. We can't go with revenue, but I'm really not sure at what point stock dividends are removed. I wouldn't think it would come from revenue, but from profit, which shouldn't include payroll, since that's an expense. 

Edited December 8, 2013 by Winchester

[4588686]

The above would be more or less in line my thinking as well.   Stuff like the chart below... And I'd have a lot more contraversial things to say about his foreign policy as well, but they'd be a bit off-topic.

 

 

 

Funny how the prolonged unemployment then is similar to what we are experiencing now, though the press doesn't talk about it:

 

 

I mean, if the job market was great, why would we have a thread about people needing to support families with entry-level jobs at walmart?

 

 

I dont mean mean to be too snarky because you seem like somebody with whom an interesting conversation could be had.  But in what world are you living that any makor force or the right or the left is saying that the job market is great?

[NotreDame]

Good point.  Using round numbers, if income is about $20B and there are 2M employees, then spending all the profit on equal employee bonuses would get them to about $10K/employee.  Is my math right? 

[NotreDame]

I dont mean mean to be too snarky because you seem like somebody with whom an interesting conversation could be had.  But in what world are you living that any makor force or the right or the left is saying that the job market is great?

 

Could you take a 2nd pass at that last sentence so I could understand it before I answer it?
 

[4588686]

Could you take a 2nd pass at that last sentence so I could understand it before I answer it?
 

Autocorrect.  In what world is any major force (political parties, news networks et cetera) on the political left or right claiming that the job market is great.  Even MSNBC has tons of stuff on how bad the job market is.