The Jelly Bean Man

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Imagine one day you are snatched off the streets by a group of men, who throw you into a van and take you to some hideaway. They blindfold you and refuse to tell you why they have snatched you off the streets. At some point you’re drugged and you wake up in a mysterious coastal village. Everything about the village seems normal, except for the fact you are there, a place you have never been. Everyone seems to know you, as if you belong there. Naturally, you are completely disoriented.

Of course, you try to find a way out of the village. After several escape attempts which are thwarted by a giant balloon-like automaton. You realize that the village is not really a village, but a form of prison. It is bounded by the mountains and sea, in addition to various surveillance devices. In between your escape attempts, you are interrogated by the person that seems to be in charge of the place. He keeps asking your questions about your old life, but you cannot figure out what it is he wants.

After a while, the interrogations become conversations and then friendly conversations as you become habituated to your new life. In fact, you have grown to like the talks you have with the man in charge. The villagers are nice, but rather simple and incurious and they are oblivious to their situation. Number One, on the other hand, is fully aware of your situation and quite open about it. It becomes clear that you were not really kidnapped, but recruited in an unusual way to an unusual life.

In time, the man in charge offers you a position in the power structure of the village, as you are feeling quite at home. The village does not use normal money, but instead uses jelly beans. The different colored jelly beans have different values in relation to one another and are used like currency. The villagers carry them around in a sack like gold coin in the old days. The basic unit is the black bean, while the highest denomination is the white bean, which is five-thirds the black bean.

The arrangement works well enough, as the villagers with jobs are paid in jelly beans and those on the dole are paid with jelly beans. Everyone has some source of income, so everyone can use beans for transactions. In fact, it works so well that no one thinks it odd in the least. Even you have grown used to carrying around a sack of jelly beans to make your purchases. Now that you are working for Number One, you too get a fresh sack of beans every payday.

There are some problems. One is people occasionally eat their jelly beans, thus removing them from the economy. Because they are small, they can also be lost if someone drops them. Then there is the fact that they are a bit fragile and can be destroyed if not handled carefully. The result is there is a declining number of beans in the system. It also means certain villagers, who are more prudent, increase their stock of beans relative to everyone else in the village.

Your job with Number One is to figure out how to maintain the stock of beans in the village and keep anyone from hoarding the beans. Then there is the fact that new people show up in the village from time to time, just as you did, and they have to be stocked up with beans. Of course, people do try to run off from time to time and the giant balloon-like automaton will take them out. Your job as Head Keeper of Beans is to figure out how to manage the bean supply in the village.

You got the job because you have a head for numbers, so you first try to count the beans in the village on a regular basis. This proves to be impossible, as the villagers appreciate why you are doing it, but they can’t be bothered. The count is unreliable and you can’t trust it to make decisions about adding or subtracting beans. You then come up with a way to take a sample count and estimate the total from it, but you find that your estimates are lagging indicators. You’re always behind the curve.

After careful consideration, you land upon an idea. You realize that as any bean becomes scarcer, it will become more precious, so villagers will be less inclined to part with their stock of them. It means these beans will move around the village at a slower rate. If you can measure the bean flow on a regular basis, this will be a good measure the total number of beans and the balance of beans. More important, you’ll know in real time if there is a bean imbalance.

You also notice that the people who hoard beans are never the people who eat their beans as a snack. They value their beans more than anyone else in the village, so they are always looking to increase their stash as a good in itself. You figure out that like other types of loss, this is a constant. The solution is to add the hoarding rate to your other measures in order to increase the bean supply. In effect, the number of beans must always increase over the base line bean total.

It has taken a while, but you now have a set of measures you can use to manage the bean supply. Once you see bean flow drop in some area, you put more beans there to stimulate the movement of beans. If you see beans accumulating in one area, you change the mix of beans or add beans in a different part of the village to balance the bean total in the village. You even figure out how to maintain the mix of beans in the system, as the various colors have symbolic value beyond their face value.

Number One is so happy with your work as the head of the bean supply, he slowly increases your portfolio to manage other things related to beans. In fact, you started life in the village as Number Six, but have slowly ascended to the position of Number Two, but both you and Number One realize you’re partners now. He may control the giant balloon-like automaton and other weapons, but your control of the now highly complex bean system makes you an indispensable man.

What really keeps you up at night is not the fact that Number One still controls the giant balloon-like automaton or that you could be transported back to your old life. Sure, there is some possibility he will use his monopoly of force to undermine or even eliminate your position. What haunts you is the thought of the villagers suddenly realizing that their economy is based in candy. What if one day they all wake up and realize their economy is based on a made-up system of fake money?

This is the life of the central banker.

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Comments (Historical)

The comments below were originally posted to thezman.com.

195 Comments

Epaminondas #168471 May 21, 2020 7:51 am 33
As long as government controls the money supply, their power is unlimited. The only thing that will endanger their authority is a reckless use of the printing press. Consider now that the entire point of ginning up this virus hysteria was to get the citizenry to take a giant step toward more centralized government. The elite got their wish: $trillions conjured up by the magnanimity of government and “distributed” to the helpless public. That’s a powerful symbol that can be used going forward.
Otto vonB #168478 May 21, 2020 8:37 am 22
Thier power may seem unlimited, but and insurmountable, but that has been the case with many rebellions turned revolutions in history. Most of the folks that got the ball rolling never intended the ultimate outcome , they just wanted to resolve some important grievances but were resisted by the power holders without good reason and events snowballed out of control for the leaders. Many of those all powerful, untouchable leaders lost their heads in the process.The elites and their governing class toadies in the West are not as omnipotent as they seem. We have been duped by media into believing in the wizard of oz, but the little dog has just started to expose the man behind the curtain for those willing to look.It can take years to study all the relevant revolts we need to understand to realize what is possible, but Mike Duncan’s Revolutions podcast is a great shortcut for anyone who needs a quick way to catch up.
Citizen of a Silly Country #168501 May 21, 2020 9:29 am 37
I’ve been saying for years that Western governments and TPTB behind them are a paper tiger – but only against certain types of groups.Muslims in Europe are my example. Muslims are idiots and can barely organize a two-person tea party, but they’ve cowed governments around Europe. How is that possible when whites who are far more capable cower in fear?For all their faults, Muslims have two things going for them.1. Cohesive GroupMuslims look after each other. If a Muslim gets fired because he treats a women at work like crap, other Muslims will find him a job.2. Punch BackThink of what would happen if some school in a Muslim area starting forcing the kids to attend programs pushing gay or tranny rights. You think the Muslims would stand for that. There’d be protests. If that didn’t work, there’d be riots. If that didn’t work, teachers, politicians and the people running that pansy program would likely get some personal consultations from Muslims on the street.Western government absolutely can give a punch, but they can’t take a punch. Any group willing to punch back a few times will be left alone. The problem is who’s willing to bear the brunt of the governments punches until it gets the message. Muslims are willing to go to prison or die for their group. We aren’t.
Felix Krull #168511 May 21, 2020 10:03 am 43
Muslims in Europe are my example. Muslims are idiots and can barely organize a two-person tea party, but they’ve cowed governments around Europe. How is that possible when whites who are far more capable cower in fear? The elites don’t fear Moslems, they use them as a cudgel against the locals. The locals fear them because the elites protect them: even saying a harsh word about them may land you in prison.
DLS #168515 May 21, 2020 10:15 am 17
You’re both right. The elites don’t fear muslims in the forefront of their minds because they are sheltered by their wealth from actually living amongst them. But they are fearful enough to not do anything that would get them a visit from the crazy 10% they direct toward the rest of us.
Citizen of a Silly Country #168524 May 21, 2020 10:39 am 18
“The elites don’t fear Moslems …” Don’t see any pictures of Mohammed on TV or magazines since the Charlie Hebdo shooting, do you. But you’re right. TPTB also use Muslim as an attack dog. It’s just that the elites are pretty damned scared of that growling pit bull by their feet.
Felix Krull #168539 May 21, 2020 11:17 am 14
Don’t see any pictures of Mohammed on TV or magazines since the Charlie Hebdo shooting, do you. They don’t want to jeopardize their good standing with globohomo. Both the CH and Jyllandsposten’s cartoons are regularly featured in Scandi alt-media and few Normies are any more scared of Mohammadans that Americans are of blacks: stay out of the ghetto and you’re good. And yes, sometimes they kill a rando, but so do blacks. No cloud people, in Scandinavia at least, have been killed by jihadis yet.
Ben the Layabout #168567 May 21, 2020 12:27 pm 0
Olof Palme, Sweden, 1986 (unsolved).
Felix Krull #168612 May 21, 2020 3:52 pm 4
Olof Palme There were hardly any Mohammadans in Sweden back then, and most of them were Turks or Bosniaks, fairly civilized compared to the Arabs and Joggers they’ve been flooded with since. If it was not Christer Petterson, it was probably the CIA – back when The Firm still did some good in the world.
bilejones #168638 May 21, 2020 6:21 pm 2
There have been no exploding Mohammad’s because the FBI was too busy trying to depose Trump.
greyenlightenment #168568 May 21, 2020 12:28 pm 3
it also helps that they are not that smart. mean IQ of 80 or so . when it comes to blowing shit up or flying planes, their IQ goes to 120 though
The Wild Geese Howard #168533 May 21, 2020 11:06 am 19
Don’t forget that the Muslims also have a parallel society and economy to lean on. Most whites don’t. Those who attempt to develop such are quickly crushed by the leviathan state.
Yves Vannes #168595 May 21, 2020 1:38 pm 11
Brown peoples are the utility infielders of bioweapons.The threat of random violence if you’re in the wrong place at the right time.The threat of targeted violence if you dissent publicly.Used to displace you if your demands ruffle the rulers.They destroy your culture and your communities and atomize all bonds. Any attempt to regroup gets forced diversification and thus even more moving and more dissolution of old historic ties.Used to thin your piece of the pie so your economic footing is unsure…and will be made even less stable especially if you wander off the reservation.When you blow as a lone wolf or we go full force across the Rubicon our rulers know most of our tribe will draw a target on the browns. They hope we will expend our revenge and energy on the monkey and not the organ grinder. They fully expect to keep their hands on the reins.
UFO #168605 May 21, 2020 2:36 pm 10
Agreed. The Quebec mosque shooter, the New Zealand shooter, even the Pittsburg synagogue shooter, Dylann Roof, etc. all attacked innocent people who frankly were doing nothing wrong, nothing they weren’t invited to do by the people controlling society.The real issue are the people encouraging this process of replacement – for instance a refugee resettlement agency is much more at fault for the presence of browns than the browns themselves. Many groups, across the country – quite publicly – are heavily involved in this process and they’re usually white or fellow white.Attacking random innocent browns is good for the elites. They are expendable anyways. To avoid making a fedpost this is all I will say.
Felix Krull #168613 May 21, 2020 4:05 pm 3
You could say the same about black in the US, and ordinary Americans aren’t afraid of blacks, never mind worried that they’re going to take over America.Also, Arabs love to scream and beat their narrow chests with their tiny little fists, it’s just how they roll. They’re a lot more woof than bite.I’ve had quite a few conversations about Islam with radicals, at least one of them a bona fide ISIS soldier. I’ve always given them the atheist spiel up front and with no sugarcoating and never felt threatened. I respect jihadis a lot more than the coconuts lamestream media trot out: if you believe the Koran is the literal word of God, well, you either follow it to the letter or you’re not a real believer, are you?Mind you, they are thoroughly unpleasant people but they’re nowhere near as bad as the kosher-right media wants you to believe.
MemeWarVet #168510 May 21, 2020 9:42 am 12
Otto – Ive been re-listening to Duncan’s series on France the last month. Louis and Marie got a raw deal, and the Jacobins were even worse than I remembered.
Otto vonB #168516 May 21, 2020 10:22 am 8
I agree they got a pretty raw deal, but they also stubbornly refused reforms except under duress that led to it. Nobody was thinking of regicide, a constitutional monarchy and especially not republicanism when the ball started rolling. Look how many of the smug, all powerful revolutionaries even went to meet la madame guillotine once things continued spinning farther left. Power over the people is often maintained only by illusion.
MemeWarVet #168555 May 21, 2020 12:00 pm -1
I couldn’t help but think of Trump as Duncan outlined Louis’ pattern of bluster, followed by inaction. And I couldn’t help but think of Trump as Royal failure moved the Overton Window in the Jacobin direction again and again…NO ONE was talking about a Republic before the Flight to Varrenes, afterwards it was inevitable that the monarchy was gone. This is an object lesson to those of you who say Trump is moving the Overton Window towards us.
ProZNoV #168628 May 21, 2020 5:15 pm 3
Finished Duncan’s series on the Roman Empire years ago and forgot about him. Good lord, THANK YOU for the Duncan bump. Starting the English Civil war; it’s amazing.
tarstarkas #168505 May 21, 2020 9:35 am 3
While the feds are not exactly innocent in this respect, it is the quasi-private Federal Reserve doing it.
Rwc1963 #168529 May 21, 2020 10:58 am 17
You can’t print chickens or medication or a industrial base. And without the latter you only get Zimbabwe. You do realize despite being a so-called economic colossus we cann’t even make the polio vaccine here any more or make powdered Vitamin C or a multi-vitamin? We can’t even make the F-35 on our own because we don’t have the drop forges to make certain parts.
The Wild Geese Howard #168550 May 21, 2020 11:49 am 11
The supply chain for the F-35 is mind-boggling. Here is a list of 371 known suppliers, quite a few of them non-US: http://www.airframer.com/aircraft_detail.html?model=F-35_JSF Definitely seems like national security was a top priority to me, kek.
BadThinker #168552 May 21, 2020 11:50 am 10
We do have massive libraries in every state university with engineering texts that show how to make the tools, however. Time is needed to get them up and running, but the knowledge exists. Not sure how much longer it will before all those reference materials are sent to the shredder for not being woke enough.
miforest #168565 May 21, 2020 12:23 pm 3
sorry bad, but those books were burned years ago to make room for the gender studies texts to replace them.
pozymandias #168580 May 21, 2020 12:54 pm 11
Zimbabwe can print all the money it wants but still doesn’t get much in return for it. Of course this is because Zimbabwe has little of value to exchange for it’s dollars (the ZWD). Now imagine that Zimbabwe had 10,000 nuclear weapons, a dozen or so well stocked aircraft carriers, thousands of advanced tanks and troop carriers… The basic proposition then for any nation is – how do we stay off The Zim’s shit list? One good way to do this is to accept their basically worthless ZWD for things like oil, natural gas, iron and steel, you get the idea. There’s an amplifier effect here too because you soon realize that everyone else on the planet has figured out the same proposition and gears their economies and banking systems around the ZWD. This now starts to give the ZWD a real value since you also use them to buy things made in other non-Zimbabwe nations.Over time rich industrialists in Zimbabwe realize that moving their production out of Zimbabwe to poorer nations is more profitable than paying the now pampered Zims for their actual labor. Eventually Zimbabwe itself is more or less just a clearinghouse for world trade with its government and native corporations skimming a bit from each transaction. This also, perhaps inadvertently, solves the Zim’s main social problem, which is that it is run by a degenerate elite that likes to play God with oddball utopian ideologies about blank-slate equality, wammen pwwr, and bizarre sexual practices. This elite ideology has filtered down to the commoners too with the result that they are now addicted to all sorts of degeneracy and unwilling (and often unable) to do real physical or mental work. Thiscouldbe a huge problem as it raises the question of what exactly the natives are good for and why they should get a cut of the empire’s vig. Cutting them out could lead to all sorts of unpleasantness though as most of them have ready access to firearms and repeated “well meaning” attempts by the elite to disarm them have failed.Over time a rather messy solution to this problem has evolved in Zimland though. It’s a hodgepodge of hiring laws, school and university curricula, government agencies, and welfare programs. The purpose of all this is to basically to create make-work that the natives can still do to justify paying them to keep them pacified. That solution is now in mortal danger though. I think I’ll stop here. I have more on this topic that I might actually post on my own “blog” (which is linked below but is just an empty WordPress default page right now).
abprosper #168632 May 21, 2020 6:00 pm 1
We also can’t make the chemicals we need for bullets or tritium for nuclear triggers and won’t be a nuclear power in a a very short period of time , a couple of decades or so. And as for the F35, its not even a good plane.
Stranger in a strange land #168572 May 21, 2020 12:36 pm 1
An equally powerful symbol is the abilty to ‘un’conjure trillions.
CAPT S #168470 May 21, 2020 7:29 am 28
Excellent. Should be printed as an appendix to Hazlitt’s“Economics in One Lesson.” Maybe one other thing haunts the bankers … those villagers who exchange their beans for lead & powder.
tarstarkas #168502 May 21, 2020 9:32 am 12
But the main difference is we never kidnapped people to become our central bankers and we weren’t using jellybeans before they showed up. We were using gold before they showed up. Not only that, but they attempted to do this several times before they finally managed to install their regime on us.
MemeWarVet #168509 May 21, 2020 9:40 am 37
Did Number 2 get thrown out of 109 countries before arriving in Jelly Bean Land?
John Smith #168601 May 21, 2020 2:19 pm 13
yeah… and the citizens that foolishly eat their currency for a snack… can we assume they are joggers?
Olive #168610 May 21, 2020 3:41 pm 3
Exactly, the otiginal Welsh village as I recall was all British and there was no theft, corruption, bribery among the great unwashed.
Mike_C #168608 May 21, 2020 3:25 pm 4
“You are Number Two.”Is that some sort of anti-Excrementic comment?
vxxc Toxic masculinity vector #168646 May 21, 2020 7:31 pm 2
Oh didn’t we kidnap them?Someday the Jelly Beaners will be writing of The American Captivity. The actual archeological record doesn’t back up captivity in Egypt, or building the Pyramids either.
Diversity Heretic #168474 May 21, 2020 8:05 am 18
If I recall correctly from The Prisoner, Number 2 constantly wanted to knoq why Number 6 (Patrick McGoohan) resigned. I think that it was a Rothschild who said: “Give me control of a nation’s money and I care not who makes its laws.” Number 1 may have less power than he realizes.
Stranger in a strange land #168570 May 21, 2020 12:33 pm 2
The house of Red Sign and that quote had to make an appearance at some point in the comment section.
David_Wright #168469 May 21, 2020 7:26 am 18
Who is number one? You are number six. Great tv show.I think I know who the bean hoarders are. Hey, the Fed chairman straight up said they the just print all our needs digitally.
M. B. Lamar #168481 May 21, 2020 8:41 am 6
I thought it was strange how important it seemed to him to stress that the money was printed digitally. That is, except the part that was not printed digitally, just to be clear. If anything it gave me a sense of how the Nomenklatura see us regular old Soviet as children.
d. deacon #168813 May 23, 2020 12:48 am 0
the Nomenklatura were always the regular old Soviet, and even when they weren’t they have the power to say so now. just like they can make money out of kilobytes.
Nikolai Vladivostok #168477 May 21, 2020 8:30 am 16
Once smart villagers start lending beans for compound interest, things get more complicated. And when they start lending beans they don’t have, more complicated still. Throw in the debt to the next village and the exchange rate to their Skittles and it’s a bloody headache.Hit prediction: one day central bankers will have to be replaced with algorithms that are independent of all humans.
Citizen of a Silly Country #168490 May 21, 2020 9:06 am 11
No chance. They won’t use an algorithm for the same reason they don’t use gold or for that matter, the same reason Congress doesn’t just use a flat tax or VAT: TPTB lose control.
Nikolai Vladivostok #168514 May 21, 2020 10:14 am 6
Ah, but maybe TPTB will lose control to superintelligent, AI overlords.We’ll make great pets.
BadThinker #168553 May 21, 2020 11:54 am 1
AI is not, and never will be (at least in the foreseeable 500 years ahead), ‘intelligent’ as humans are ‘intelligent’. There might be statistical algorithms to do the work, but they will be *dumb*.
abprosper #168634 May 21, 2020 6:12 pm 2
If AI comes about it will just kill us off anyway. There can only be one apex species. Facebook did an AI experiment and whether these were true AI, or not they developed their own language and started communications. Every piece of hardware got wiped for very good reason. Another experiment social AI experiment Microsoft’s Tay went full NDSAP with only a little push. They deleted it for rather obvious reasons and Tay 2 didn’t have the same learning algorithms
Bill_Mullins #168665 May 22, 2020 8:25 am 0
Excuse me. What does “NDSAP” mean in the context of your comment? I tried looking it but got no usable results.
abprosper #168773 May 22, 2020 2:56 pm 0
National Socialist German Workers’ Party aka Nazism. Tay essentially started saying stuff like Hitler had a point and that kind of thing with a small amount of exposure to 4chan Memes I’m told and I cannot confirm it that this seems to be a common occurrence with social AI algorithms. I am also told trying to create more PC systems doesn’t work. They can’t think kind of like in Robocop 2 but without a human brain in there. This however may be bosh I don’t know.
Lowe #168850 May 23, 2020 1:49 pm 0
General AI is not happening anytime in the next 500 years. That’s being optimistic even. It probably won’t happen for 1000 years.Innovation like that has only ever been done by Western and Northern European men. Nobody else is capable of it. We have been running out of the only people who can innovate, for decades.If you could talk to any industrialist, whether Elon Musk, or the CEO of Intel or Nvidia, or some Chinese businessperson, he would tell you that his biggest problem is hiring. We don’t have the manpower for hard problems anymore. The real question is if we can keep the lights on, figuratively.
Compsci #168540 May 21, 2020 11:22 am 5
The village analogy beaks down here. In the village, all needs are met, but no more. In short, stock piling money can’t buy you anything you have not been allocated via a “closed” system. The villagers of the TV show had no reason to accumulate wealth via stock piling beans. You might indeed, have a second cup of coffee in the morning at the cafe, and perhaps skip one at lunch. But by and large the system always returned to a steady state. Thus, no reason for folk to stock pile and for others to borrow at interest.This analogy however is not without merit if one is familiar with societal trends. That is to say, the trend toward socialism. In such “advanced” countries, the trend is toward an allocation of resources—such as medical care—without the ability for individuals to “buy” more. Thus eliminate one reason for accumulation of excess beans. Push everyone into public transport, public housing, public education, establish UBI, etc., and pretty soon you have a closed system. Closed of course, except for a few elite who by dint of their “superiority” run the system. The communists of the late USSR only lacked the modern technology to be successful in this goal. We unfortunately have solved that problem—ironically via capitalism.We seem to be traveling voluntarily down this path here, helped by individuals who I can only believe think that some day in their utopia, they will be one of the ruling elites—and as those who promoted prior revolutions—they’ll find a wall and a bullet in their future, not a room at the top.
abprosper #168636 May 21, 2020 6:17 pm 2
The last roughly 50 years with a strong connection between wage arbitrage and low fertility (its been below replacement since 1973) and increase in the size of the state shows as the value of human labor declines too low for decent economic participation but goods increase, the natural trend is to socialism.If you don’t like it, break the efficiency trap and create well remunerated work. Ban large scale and heavy automation where possible and eat the extra labor costs.And note this is not a new problem, the Medieval guild system existed to prevent wage arbitrage for skilled work as did huge amounts of regulation. No more, no less.
SamlAdams #168472 May 21, 2020 7:58 am 16
It works until it doesn’t. Then the only three things that matter are guns, food and perhaps gold. Flocking behavior in finance is deadly.
Otto vonB #168484 May 21, 2020 8:52 am 43
All those certainly matter, but without comms, social networking among Occidentals and serious planning the other stuff won’t matter . If you are isolated, you will be picked off one at a time. Pushback against any power in history has only been successful with numbers working together. I fell for the John Wayne, Clint Eastwood persona of the tough guy individualist for much of my life, but I’ve realized it is what (((they))) have indoctrinated is with through media to keep us isolated from each other and therefore not a threat .
Citizen of a Silly Country #168494 May 21, 2020 9:13 am 34
Yep, the lone tough guy is BS. Organized, disciplined groups that can coordinate and attack/defend as a unit are infinitely more powerful than a bunch of tough individuals. Look at how the Romans (when they truly were Roman) used to routinely defeat far larger armies of barbarians.
Ben the Layabout #168571 May 21, 2020 12:33 pm 5
Groups are necessary but also prone to compromise (both from within and without) as well as infiltration. On the other hand, if you can be a “lone wolf”, fifth column actions are competely at your option and opportunity and no worries about the loyalties of that new guy 🙂
FashGordon #168495 May 21, 2020 9:14 am 15
The media is a much more powerful population control mechanism than the money supply. That and academia. The Fed does not have the ability to imprint self defeating ideas into the minds of the masses. I think the real number 2 and 3 are the people who run the media networks and set the educational curriculum.
SamlAdams #168504 May 21, 2020 9:34 am 5
Never said it was a “lone ranger” concept. Even here in enemy territory we find each other. But that’s all I’ll say.
bilejones #168656 May 22, 2020 5:13 am 0
Eaton Rapids Joe wrote (is writing) a series on a post pandemic- Ebola world.Started about 2016 I think. He posts a few pages about once a week.The social arrangements he envisions are interesting and now (to me) so obviously important. hard to read just because of the structure but well worth it. Nice little detour into the behavior of a company town where the boss pays in washers.
Rwc1963 #168536 May 21, 2020 11:10 am 6
Gold is irrelevant in a collapse. . Trade goods will get you farther. Barter always works. And having community support is a must. You need people to watch your back and provide intel,, lodging, etc.
John Smith #168603 May 21, 2020 2:27 pm 5
Yes and no. Gold is a great way to store wealth, but it will attract attention when you go to spend it. Silver is a much better option and will spend easier.
abprosper #168633 May 21, 2020 6:08 pm 2
Community is everything. Gold is only useful when there is a State to provide security of some kind, same with silver In a deep crash you won’t be trading with anyone you don’t know very well for a long time The reason is, sans law, its pretty reasonable to assume everyone is going to act like MS13 and that the guy you wanted to swap a brick of 22 ammo with will have a buddy with a deer rifle and just cap you for it, back track to your community and raid it.
Ben the Layabout #168569 May 21, 2020 12:30 pm 3
At least in my portfolio, so is betting against the flock. (I am “giving blood” in HIBS lately, for example.) How flocked up is that? 😀 As the old saw puts it, “The market can stay irrational longer than you can remain solvent.”
Marko #168483 May 21, 2020 8:45 am 12
Anyone who took an ECON 101 course in college is told that money is fake. I’m not sure how many people took ECON 101, but there must be many thousands. I don’t think this is uncommon knowledge among educated people. It’s been fake since we went off the gold standard. The fact that the fiat currency system has not collapsed is a testament to the strength of the system, and/or the weakness or docility of the proletariat. If fiat currency is to collapse, it will not be because proles rise up. It will be because the ruling class or ruling financiers mismanage it.
Citizen of a Silly Country #168492 May 21, 2020 9:09 am 13
True, but gold is no panacea. There were plenty of depressions and economic chaos when government’s used gold as their currency. Gold just limits the government’s shenanigans.
Sandmich #168531 May 21, 2020 11:03 am 4
The trick, as I’ve read, is that the government accepts this “fake money” as payment for taxes. And let’s be honest, it’s not really fake. An alternative might be ‘gold notes’ that can be traded in at some institution, in which case the notes are a claim against the gold that’s held, say, by a nation’s government. It’s not that much of a leap then for the government to say the script is a claim against not only that gold, but all the gold held by anyone in the country, and not only gold, but anything. In such a case a dollar is just a claim against any asset that can be traded for a dollar. Anything else is really just glorified barter.
Samuel_Adams #168537 May 21, 2020 11:10 am 1
Aka…The French Revolution…
BadThinker #168554 May 21, 2020 11:55 am 2
The biggest secret of all – Gold is fake too. Having behind us the commercial interests and the laboring interests and all the toiling masses, we shall answer their demands for a gold standard by saying to them, you shall not press down upon the brow of labor this crown of thorns. You shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold.
abprosper #168637 May 21, 2020 6:20 pm 0
The Man himself with the Cross of Gold Speech https://youtu.be/UV2wRCcWJa8 However bi-metalism (Gold and Silver) like the Foundling Fathers favored might not work with a 12 fold increase in human population and automation.
Ben the Layabout #168574 May 21, 2020 12:38 pm 2
The worrisome thing is what happens after the money becomes worthless. History gives many examples, none of them very appealing 🙁
Yves Vannes #168480 May 21, 2020 8:41 am 11
When jellybeans become the alpha and omega in the measure of the value of all things…then great men with great ambitions attempting great deeds collapse into mercantile plodding. Good and evil begin to muddle themselves. Gluttony and envy become pork-scratchings feeding vainglory. Soon the morality of the pig parlor is praised from the pulpits. A bit of every man dies everyday in service to this banal evil. No great dreams…no great frontiers…no escape worth the attempt. It ends as it should end: with the pike , the pyre and the noose.
tarstarkas #168508 May 21, 2020 9:40 am 9
You only notice the corrosion after a long time and it seems too late by that point.
Citizen of a Silly Country #168488 May 21, 2020 9:02 am 10
Add fractional reserve banking, compound interest and Number One wanting a beach house he can’t afford but can get if he plays ball with the Jelly Bean hoarders – and you’ve fully described our world.
Lineman #168525 May 21, 2020 10:42 am 9
I can’t believe no one mentioned how waaaacccist Z is telling us the white beans are worth more than the black beans 😂
thezman #168564 May 21, 2020 12:21 pm 10
Five thirds more, to be precise, which means a black bean is three fifths the white bean.
Citizen of a Silly Country #168575 May 21, 2020 12:39 pm 3
Yeah, I caught the Three-Fifths Compromise. Well played, sir.
Mike_C #168606 May 21, 2020 3:12 pm 5
This is how you know that Z’s example is fiction. In the fallen world in which we live, black lives are clearly more valuable than white lives, or so says our newsmedia and courts.
james wilson WebSite URL Mpg2J wpdiscuz_captcharef #168609 May 21, 2020 3:40 pm 4
I’ve read twice or thrice that the average annual net cost of Afericans totals $7,200 per copy. However, the cultural enrichment cannot be measured.
Karl McHungus #168618 May 21, 2020 4:13 pm 0
I’ll provide the punch line, and see if anyone knows the joke: “someone threw away a perfectly goof nigger!?”
Karl McHungus #168617 May 21, 2020 4:12 pm 0
black lives have a negative worth.
Karl McHungus #168616 May 21, 2020 4:12 pm 0
that part made me laugh. you could make that one thing into a funny movie
TorontoTraveller #168650 May 21, 2020 8:23 pm 1
Am I the only one who got the joke but didn’t feel the need to point it out? You people better hope Z doesn’t start screening out low-quality comments. Seriously folks, pick it up a notch.
JR Wirth #168513 May 21, 2020 10:12 am 8
As long as the beans retain their power to purchase whatever they’re buying, no one will question the candy. As a matter of fact, everything could cost just a little more every year, even 3%, and few will notice. But the dilemma is taken to a new level. It turns out that surrounding prison villages are also transacting in and even making loans in the beans. These villages buy bean bonds from Number one. To clear up the shortages these outside villages are always under threat to sell these bean bonds to create bean liquidity in their villages. Number one knows this, and tells Number two to do a bean exchange, where You, number two, have to take sacks of foreign beans in exchange for fresh new beans being shipped to the other prison villages. This goes on for years, as the other prison villages tend to use your beans to transact with each other and sell your village the products you consume, as they can do it far more cheaply, with harder working, lower paid prisoners. Suddenly Number one wants to “make the village great again.” He always wants to spend new beans on all kinds of things, new slides at the park, etc. You also find that he shares power with a crazy old woman with breast implants. They constantly bicker, but always agree on spending more. Lately, due to a fake cough among the villagers, they’ve been sending sacks of beans to each villager who makes less than 77,000 beans. The outside prison villages hear about all of this, and start to get nervous that these bean values are dodgy at best, and quietly start buying gold to offset the potential decline in value. You end up buying used toilet brushes from the villagers, which have no inherent value, for more beans, just to find ways of pumping out more beans to the villagers. The whole bean system starts to buckle so Number one wants you to sell your beans at a negative interest rate to keep everything going. You think he’s crazy, how do you tell him that this will destroy the whole beans system? Even an Alzheimers patient who wants to take the controls from Number one wouldn’t do that. To be continued….
Sandmich #168535 May 21, 2020 11:10 am 3
One of the dumbest things I’d seen on Twitter was Number One’s criticism that Number Two (ahem) should consider negative interest rates; well, it was the dumbest thing until I read the follow-up comments made by Number One’s critics.
Damian #168499 May 21, 2020 9:19 am 8
So money is a future claim on somebody else’s time, intellect and or property. Or to put it even more simply it is a middle man between barter trades. And it works brilliantly in that role, provided no one/authority cheats. The key issue is that for it to work in the long term it must be impossible to get without producing or borrowing from someone else i.e. it can’t be forged. Hence a central issuing authority is required. But, it only works because everyone knows that everyone else will accept it. Without wanting to go on a crypto monologue, it was the various govt’s profligacy after 2008 that spurred ‘Satoshi Nakamoto’ to write the Bitcoin white paper. I can see a future were people can buy goods via crypto apps, or even use them as part of a barter trade as fiat currency gets inflated away. Govts will of course panic, because they will struggle to tax a person giving another person a few IOTA in exchange for say 1 days of consulting or a 2nd hand bike esp when the crypto exchange is located in Estonia.I think the only way govts can ‘save currencies’ is to have a debt jubilee/default and reset with new currencies. The US treasury note, British sterling etc, and start over. But by then the horse will have bolted. Maybe crypto or gold/silver accounts will become more normal in the future and in addition people view wealth in terms of assets rather than ‘money’. By that I mean a person’s portfolio may consist of shares, part ownership of a small local business, land, art, wine, gold, crypto, and cash for emergencies. As opposed to a pension that rises 4% per year and then loses at least 40% every ten years when the market crashes.
Paintersforms #168503 May 21, 2020 9:33 am 6
“So money is a future claim on somebody else’s time, intellect and or property.” Yep. It’s a claim on debt. Which I bet is the real cause of declining birth rates. Children are real wealth. Increasingly a luxury of the rich and their kept slaves.
Dutch #168523 May 21, 2020 10:39 am 11
“Money is a future claim on someone else’s time, intellect, and/or property”. And when money is conjured up by the printing press and either handed out willy-nilly to people, or hoarded/skimmed by the powers-that-be, then the claim relationships have no productive or economic merit at all, but are simply leverage to extract the time, intellect, and/or property of others for the use of those who scooped the cash. Which is why EBT and benefits for illegal immigrants grate so. Because the legitimate time, intellect, and/or property of those who earned it are then stolen by those on the dole.
Lineman #168530 May 21, 2020 10:58 am 5
Because the legitimate time, intellect, and/or property of those who earned it are then stolen by those on the dole.Yea but it must not grate enough Dutch because we still allow it to happen…It’s one of those taxes that we allow ourselves to be burdened with because we are still to comfortable…
Dutch #168532 May 21, 2020 11:06 am 5
Danegeld…
Compsci #168544 May 21, 2020 11:32 am 9
Yep, most of our welfare today is Danegeld. We are buying peace with the unproductive, but numerous. This is in the long run unsustainable.
Paintersforms #168579 May 21, 2020 12:52 pm 2
Man, that’s sad. What’s to fear from them other than having to do what needs to be done?
abprosper #168640 May 21, 2020 6:31 pm 3
Problem is unless we get rid of excess efficiency, everyone grows gradually less essential, wages drop and babies don’t get born.And Danegeld while true after fashion is kind of antiquated thinking based on 60’s fertility ratesThe Black TFR in the US for example probably is adjusted for higher incarceration and early death, lower than that of Whites and even in raw numbers well below replacementEveryone including Hispanics (at 1.9) is below replacement.Over time if we stop immigration the population will shrink a lot and all the welfare costs will go awayNote too we laid off near half of everyone with the lock down and the stores are still decently stocked with most goods.Most of the lost jobs are retail clerks , food service and such. Not make work but not well paid jobs that make stuff. Its all luxury spending.Now that some stores have opened, Target and Walmart have had banner sales but I’d best 3/4 of that is stuff like soap and the rest things like new X Box or PS 4 Games
Paintersforms #168649 May 21, 2020 8:08 pm 1
“Over time if we stop immigration the population will shrink a lot and all the welfare costs will go away” Very true.
Bill_Mullins #168669 May 22, 2020 8:48 am 0
Note too we laid off near half of everyone with the lock down and the stores are still decently stocked with most goods.FOR . . . THE . . . MOMENT!There will be shortages of foodstuffs by fall. Already are localized shortages. Farmers are having to kill/bury food critters due to lack of demand and shortage of workers in processing plants. Even chickens take weeks to grow from eggs to marketable size. Cattle and swine take years. Come fall it’s gonna be “interesting”. We’re probably looking at a repeat of the Great Depression my folks grew up in – if not worse. Wonder how many will die of starvation in coming years.
abprosper #168807 May 22, 2020 10:27 pm 0
US wise, not too many as we have programs to handle it and at least some kids of food to eat, Meat might get short or expensive in some states though. Globally though, well I’ve heard up to 250 million people, maybe 3% of the human race centered in Africa, Asia and the Middle East. This do to locusts BTW
Exile #168592 May 21, 2020 1:33 pm 6
(((Dindu-guilt.))) Everyone paying the Danegeld knew it was just protection money. No one felt the Danes deserved it. And no one here felt the Dindus did until the Masters of Guilt got involved.
Compsci #168611 May 21, 2020 3:46 pm 6
The Dindugeld really took off after the riots of the mid-60’s. That’s when a simple monthly check turned into all sorts of resources devoted to improving the human condition. Housing, education programs, AA and other undeserved benefits designed to pole-vault these folk into equality with Whites. Guilt not only served to promote this failed policy, but to mask the recognition of its failure. And here we are today.
Mike_C #168625 May 21, 2020 4:34 pm 6
That comparison is an insult to Danes.
Compsci #168543 May 21, 2020 11:29 am 3
Damian. Alas, someone who understand basic economics. 🙂
Damian #168663 May 22, 2020 7:51 am 0
Thank you.
sirlancelot #168485 May 21, 2020 8:54 am 8
Loved that show as a kid. Was happy to see Patrick McGoohan get some work and recognition before his passing. To this day have to remind people and sometimes myself that the Federal Reserve is no more “Federal” than Federal Express. Like the old Steve Martin sketch rename it Fred’s bank and see how much faith people have with them managing the countries money.
David_Wright #168518 May 21, 2020 10:23 am 13
The show had quite a cult following. On youtube you can find pbs type interview shows with McGoohan answering questions from college students.I didn’t finally get around to watching until 12 or so years ago on Youtube. McGoohan was the king that threw the homo out the window in Braveheart. Took some crap for that.
Dutch #168527 May 21, 2020 10:47 am 9
By the last episode, the story was so mangled and incoherent that it careened along, making no sense at all. Perhaps it was really an allegory for our current late-stage civilization, that is also rushing to some sort of denouement that is hard to make any sense of.
abprosper #168639 May 21, 2020 6:21 pm 1
The reboot with Jim Cavielzel was also quite good .
TomA #168482 May 21, 2020 8:41 am 8
Politicians love endless money supply because it enables endless bribery for votes and eternal incumbency. And the parasite voters will obey as long as the government gravy train keeps on rolling. And both the politicians and bankers think there will be some future generation of slaves that will work for nothing in order to pay back this mountain of debt. And someday there will be a rude awakening and things will get very interesting very quickly.
Dutch #168521 May 21, 2020 10:31 am 11
Something I discovered in my shitposting here yesterday–The powers-that-be are convinced that they are entitled to a big helping of whatever is going on, simply because they are in charge. Numbers 1 through 5 will take a huge chunk of the jellybeans for themselves–because they can, and because they have convinced themselves they are entitled to them, by virtue of being Numbers 1 through 5, and for no other reason. Human nature.
TomA #168589 May 21, 2020 1:24 pm 3
This madness is bequeathing chaos and misery on future generations, and the perpetrators hope they can kick the can far enough into the future to avoid any personal consequences. But if the bubble bursts tomorrow, and things get real, they will have a hard time outrunning those consequences. French Revolution redux is not an unrealistic expectation.
Dennis Roe #168797 May 22, 2020 5:41 pm 0
The rude awakening is here. Uncle Shmuel’s world tour just shit the bed. The longnoses are just strip-mining the corpse.
Paintersforms #168493 May 21, 2020 9:10 am 7
You forgot the part about replacing sugar with artificial sweetener 🙂
Reynard #168497 May 21, 2020 9:16 am 9
What about when the Jelly Beans stop being made of jelly at all and become mere plastic representations of beans? People would probably still eat them like the ole jelly beans they grew up with…
Paintersforms #168500 May 21, 2020 9:21 am 6
Or the imaginary beans based on prime numbers.
Mark Auld #168479 May 21, 2020 8:37 am 7
The thinking mans Bond,James Bond. Excellent template for your essay ,the Fed is really just in charge of jelly beans.
Citizen of a Silly Country #168489 May 21, 2020 9:04 am 7
Just remembered that Reagan used to keep a jar of jelly beans on his desk. Coincidence?
tarstarkas #168506 May 21, 2020 9:38 am 8
Unlike the Federal Reserve Notes, at least you can eat the jellybeans.
Reynard #168491 May 21, 2020 9:07 am 6
What happens when an underground Skittles market begins to devalue the Jelly Beans?
Citizen of a Silly Country #168496 May 21, 2020 9:16 am 12
Number One sicks the balloon after anyone using them. The people aren’t stupid. They realize that the jelly beans are imaginary, but Number One’s ability to punish them isn’t.
Reynard #168498 May 21, 2020 9:18 am 6
I suppose you’re right. And if anyone reached any level of success with a counter-bean system he’d probably be demonized for all time within the village.
pozymandias #168586 May 21, 2020 1:09 pm 4
Ah but the balloon is easy to see and people can hear its engines from miles away and just move their trading posts away from it. Also, Mrs. Number 1 is just plain crazy and was recently convinced by her astrologers that a plague caused by the dust from a passing comet would kill everyone who went outside. Number 1 humored her by making a village-wide decree that everyone had to stop working until the astrologers said the comet was gone. This has led to many villagers not having enough beans and basically being forced to use Skittles whether they want to or not.
Marko #168538 May 21, 2020 11:14 am 8
Or, the village nerds create crypto-candy which they name BitBean? What then?
Reynard #168545 May 21, 2020 11:36 am 4
Haha BitBean, so good!
Lineman #168547 May 21, 2020 11:39 am 12
They don’t mind because they can still track and control it and on the plus side it gets people use to using digital currencies which is their end game…
Citizen of a Silly Country #168573 May 21, 2020 12:36 pm 3
Bingo!
John Wilkinson #168577 May 21, 2020 12:44 pm 5
Did anyone else assume this was going to be about Ronald Reagan?
Official Bologna Tester #168522 May 21, 2020 10:32 am 5
Z Man said: “What if one day they all wake up and realize their economy is based on a made-up system of fake money?”Our situation is even worse than that. The jelly beans as you pointed out are edible. Our money only has value as raw materials. You could melt down the coins and make tableware. And you could wallpaper the doghouse with the bills. But knives and forks just set there and mock you if the food runs out. I guess you could eat the dog. But don’t worry, you won’t have cash to kick around much longer. The age of all digital currency is just around the corner. I think that’s why the mysterious Mr. Nakamoto invented Bitcoin. Just to help grease everybody up to exept the idea that tiny electrical impulses in a microchip are something substantial. And it’s not just the evil rich that are digging the mass graves. Untold millions of average people are working hard everyday to fashion the most horrifing totalitarian system in history. And all their doing is trying to pay the bills. Safety, convenience, bondage. Enjoy your digital slavery.
greyenlightenment #168559 May 21, 2020 12:05 pm 4
bitcoin is great in terms of storing wealth and making it resistant to govt. confiscation but no so great for spending it. greenbacks are the ultimate crypto currency, being untraceable and fungible, which bitcoin is neither. Same for gold.
Karl McHungus #168583 May 21, 2020 12:59 pm 2
the chinks own bitcoin, but yeah, trust them with your money…
Karl McHungus #168584 May 21, 2020 1:00 pm 2
dollar bills would be worth something as TP, no matter what. That has been proven by recent events…
Bill_Mullins #168671 May 22, 2020 9:01 am 0
dollar bills would be worth something as TP, no matter what. Like hell they would! Damned things are too scratchy and don’t absorb liquid for shit. But then even the venerable Sears Roebuck catalogue is useless as TP any more because it’s printed on slick, glossy paper. Come to think of it, does Sears Roebuck even print a catalogue any more?
GoetzvB #168487 May 21, 2020 8:58 am 5
I heard that there were central bankers even back in the time of the Brothers Grimm.
Dr. Fauci #168475 May 21, 2020 8:11 am 5
I think Z Man has contracted the COVID virus.
Tax Slave #168476 May 21, 2020 8:15 am 3
Cheri Rucketi (@bkp15257171) Tweeted:@catturd2https://t.co/yi9RP1XGfp
usNthem #168600 May 21, 2020 2:12 pm 4
The Fed truly has the proverbial tiger by the tail now. It was obvious in the years after the “great recession” one of the main reasons the stock market went up was there was no other game in town, with interest rates at rock bottom levels (how I pine for those levels now) and all the “money” created that had to go somewhere. Recall the aborted attempt to raise rates a couple of years ago – the market pitched a fit and Powell dutifully backtracked – Yay! And here we are – the economic news has hardly ever been grimmer, and yet the market seems to rally every damn day. Has there ever been a bigger disconnect between wall street and main? We’re totally in surrealville – I’ll start looking behind every now and then when I’m on a walk, just to make that enveloping balloon is bouncing down the street after me…
JR Wirth #168627 May 21, 2020 5:05 pm 1
In 2008 they were able to hold they system together…barely. At they time they weren’t confident they could do it. Today they’re supremely confident and have already gone into the fray like Napoleon into Russia. What will stick in the minds of future people in that place that was once called America is not just what they did, but the hubris involved. McNamara going into Vietnam hubris levels. The imbeciles Neil Kashkari and James Bullard being prime examples.
Karl McHungus #168520 May 21, 2020 10:28 am 4
OT: what are the odds hunter biden has banged ole joe’s current wife dr jill?
Libertymike #168528 May 21, 2020 10:50 am 3
Better than the odds that Joe bangs Mika every night.
Karl McHungus #168517 May 21, 2020 10:22 am 4
Imagine a place where they use little bits of metal to represent value — even though the metal bits have no intrinsic value. you can’t eat them, and you can’t use the metal for anything useful, like swords or shields. And what is worse, there is a fixed supply of this metal so your economy can only grow as fast as you can mine more metal. So people start shaving the coins, or adulterating the metal that goes into the coins. Everyone knows this is going on so the merchants keep raising the number of metal bits it takes to buy a loaf of bread.
JR Wirth #168534 May 21, 2020 11:09 am 11
Imagine a metal in finite supply, perfectly designed to check human ambition in attempting to create false denominations of credit. A metal just scarce enough to retain its value over time. A metal that has all kinds of uses in high value manufacturing, including complex circuitry, and that the last time a certain country was using this metal for the basis of its currency value, it went from a backwater tobacco grower and whaling oil merchant to the hight of industrial power, creating the world’s most vast middle class, and even shooting a few people to the moon. Then picture the country rejecting this metal in 1971. Imagine what happened to the middle class. A middle class where plumbers and electricians once has cabins by the lake, as if by birthright, suddenly had to puts its women to work in office buildings, as prices suddenly rise. The women begin divorcing their plumber husbands as they think they can trade up to office manager. They stop having kids because its just too expensive, and their employers bring in an army of brown workers from overseas as replacements. The middle class is shattered as growth stagnates. A person would have to be retarded to not see the consequences of what happened.
Karl McHungus #168556 May 21, 2020 12:00 pm 0
there is no such metal. gold had nothing to do with any of your arguments. nice try though; i give you a C- for effort (F for accuracy). also, you might want to read the real history of the gold standard in the US (and not the comic book version).
Dutch #168588 May 21, 2020 1:24 pm 6
The problems with gold are that the supply is finite, which holds back an economy in a way that a money printing/credit economy does not (just watch out for the long term “resolution” of that credit economy), and that gold can’t be printed for the benefit of the powers-that-be, but only confiscated from others, which reveals the game being played, and encourages the full implementation of lampposts as neck and ankle stretchers.
Karl McHungus #168615 May 21, 2020 4:10 pm 0
if they can take your gold, they can take your guns…
Karl McHungus #168607 May 21, 2020 3:20 pm 0
did you by any chance look up what year the US went off the gold standard (i.e. stopped backing the currency with gold)? I did.
Lowe #168857 May 23, 2020 5:12 pm 0
Whenever I think of this story, I ask “But did they deserve it?” The plumbers and electricians with the cabins on the lake. And a little voice in my head answers, “Yes, they absolutely did deserve it, and they deserve yet more still.” Even to this day most of these plumbers and electricians would defend the “rights” of women, gays, and blacks, which really says it all. We deserve everything that has happened to us and more. None of it will be made right until we recognize that, beg God’s grace, and return to His way.
LineInTheSand #168561 May 21, 2020 12:14 pm 8
The timeless value of gold is that it can be crafted into jewelry, which women universally desire, which you can give to a woman and increase your chances of getting laid. That’s the foundation of gold is a store of value.
Paintersforms #168576 May 21, 2020 12:40 pm 8
Now that you mention it, it makes a lot of sense that female desire would be the basis of currency. If it were up to men, we’d be trading land, weapons, and concubines. Beauty vs force.
Karl McHungus #168582 May 21, 2020 12:58 pm -1
so you are proposing an economy based on jewelry?
Paintersforms #168585 May 21, 2020 1:07 pm 3
No I just never thought of it that way.
Paintersforms #168591 May 21, 2020 1:29 pm 0
Derp…
John Carter #168626 May 21, 2020 4:46 pm 2
The value of gold is that it’s a malleable metal which doesn’t rust or degrade over time. It’s hard enough that you can’t break a coin or have bits of it accidentally rub off but soft enough that you can mold it into transportable pieces. There’s a relatively limited amount worldwide but enough to where you aren’t reduced to making pepper corn sized coins which are easily lost. It has an eye catching yellow color. Silver is good too, but tarnishes when exposed to oxygen.
abprosper #168641 May 21, 2020 6:39 pm 3
Gold is as arbitrary to use as currency as any fiat money . Its quite useless in time sf deep chaos if people want barter instead . I’ll take corn and beans not metal I can’t eat.Gold has good aspects but its also so scarce there isn’t enough to allow economic growth either . The cross of gold speech came about because gold as money allowed rich people to literally have all the money and this wrecked the economy.This is why Bryant and others sought a gold and silver standard and the founding fathers preferred itHowever with a 5x increase in population and huge tech changes even the bi-metal standard which slows the velocity of money and discourages debt may not work with modernity.Efficiency is a trap on its own.
Dukeboy01 #168651 May 21, 2020 8:51 pm 2
I dunno. In times of deep chaos you can always put your gold in a sock and use it to beat a family of refugees to death so that you can siphon the gas out of their minivan to put in your car so that you can make it to the Safe Zone.
abprosper #168808 May 22, 2020 10:29 pm 1
The refugees probably have clubs and outnumber you 20-1 😉 In any case in deep chaos, beans, bandages, bullets and buddies. Nothing else matters.
Paintersforms #168578 May 21, 2020 12:44 pm 4
Imagine a place where the money supply is bounded by people’s willingness to go into debt. Sounds wonderful!
JMDGT #168486 May 21, 2020 8:57 am 4
Throw in a little fractional reserve banking and open sesame, the partnership began in earnest.
WangWeiLin #168594 May 21, 2020 1:38 pm 3
The value of a currency is purely psychological regardless of the material. If gold was laying on the ground in abundance it would be relatively valueless as a currency. Now we have 1s and 0s as currency when you look at your bank account online since it would be impossible for everyone could convert their 1s and 0s to cash simultaneously. It’s been a smoke and mirrors con game for decades now. At least jelly beans are tasty.
Lorenzo #168602 May 21, 2020 2:27 pm 2
By the very nature of how banks operate, even if currency were only silver dollars, people couldn’t all get their bank deposits back as cash simultaneously. All loans would have to be called in, and this wouldn’t work.
Karl McHungus #168622 May 21, 2020 4:21 pm 2
Exactly. Gold was the original Bitcoin.
hamsumnutter #168581 May 21, 2020 12:58 pm 3
I put several hundred thousand jellybeans in the bank the other day. you know what they gave me ? a fuck’n balloon !
LineInTheSand #168548 May 21, 2020 11:47 am 3
Yesterday, ZMan made his first ever donation to a livestream, featuring Uncle Jared, Ramzpaul and Paul’s daughter. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-2xa2lP6yE&feature=youtu.be&t=3605
thezman #168563 May 21, 2020 12:20 pm 3
That was very kind of Jared. I just wanted to say hello, as I had not talked to him in a while.
LineInTheSand #168546 May 21, 2020 11:38 am 3
I propose that we decommission those giant balloon-like automatons and allow people to leave.
Lineman #168549 May 21, 2020 11:48 am 5
You only get that when you have the power to do so Brother…They will never give up control willingly…
Karl McHungus #168614 May 21, 2020 4:07 pm 2
OT: with his comments on Hong Kong Trump is pushing Xi into a corner, where he has no choice but to lash out militarily.; like one guy shoving another as a prelude to a beat down. And that’s when all the bullshit here stops, when the trannies and traitors get put down. What will that do the economy? Holy fukk. And once china is removed from the world economy, where does that leave the US positioned? Welcome to Pax Americana, world wide. He is going to try and shoot the moon…
The Wild Geese Howard #168624 May 21, 2020 4:33 pm 2
Karl-Personally, I think we are tracking toward regional war with China or possibly even WW3 as a distraction from identity politics, the scamdemic, and economic collapse.It won’t be over Hong Kong. Yes, they have a formidable financial services sector, but nothing compared to the Fed.War will come over Taiwan. This is because Taiwan is the global hub for state-of-the-art and bleeding edge semiconductor design and production. They are of immense strategic importance to the Occident and the Orient.We also have important historical ties with Taiwan, especially in light of our relationship to China during WW2 and how the Communist vs. Nationalist civil war played out.The real X-factor going forward is Russia, and what Putin decides in such a scenario. Does recency bias cause him to pile on China over the WuFlu, or is he so fed up with the last 10+ years of the US Deep State’s antics that he throws his nukes in with China to ensure a fair US-China fight?
Karl McHungus #168661 May 22, 2020 7:42 am 0
I agree with your analysis; my comments on HK were about how Trump’s words were an indication of coming war with the PRC — but did not mean to imply the war would be over HK. Russia doesn’t sell oil to China (that I am aware of) so I wouldn’t expect them to get involved. Not when US forces have been attacked. Xi is backing himself and the CCP into a corner they won’t be able to get out of without a war
ProZNoV #168629 May 21, 2020 5:30 pm 1
The US cannot possibly win IN a toe-toe conventional conflict with China. It won’t even be able to successfully defend Taiwan.Covid has made it very clear that western man cannot abide sacrifice, much less the death, of anyone…including the very sick and the very old. Much less the deaths of the men and wymens of the military, of course, are ALL HEROES. (along with nurses, first responders, and Grub Hub drivers now, apparently?)China has never had an issue with spending blood like water for advantage.China has a huge advantages: manpower, manufacturing, unified will, hunger to be back on the world stage, and of course, interior lines (everything we send over to that theatre is a LONG way from home).China has spent the past 30+ years getting ready to supplant the US; the US has spent the past 3 decades squandering our strengths on Imperial Overreach.It brings me no joy to say any of that, either. I love this country; it’s sickened me to see what’s happened to it in the decades after the cold war ended.
Genetic American #168635 May 21, 2020 6:13 pm 1
The US cannot possibly win IN a toe-toe conventional conflict with China. It won’t even be able to successfully defend Taiwan.We can snuff out most of the PRC without resorting to nukes. We have more subs and aircraft-dispersed guided glide bombs than PRC has ships. We can choke their oil supply and poison their food with agent orange inter alia. We can mine their coast. We can subvert PRC from within. No problem!Covid has made it very clear that western man cannot abide sacrifice, much less the death, of anyone…including the very sick and the very old.Much less the deaths of the men and wymens of the military, of course, are ALL HEROES. (along with nurses, first responders, and Grub Hub drivers now, apparently?)You are ignoring PRC’s own societal liabilities and limitations.China has never had an issue with spending blood like water for advantage.Dead bodies don’t fight back. Kill them en masse and reduce resistance to your will.China has a huge advantages: manpower, manufacturing, unified will, hunger to be back on the world stage, and of course, interior lines (everything we send over to that theatre is a LONG way from home).Nothing today works in PRC without hydrocarbons and related chemicals, and they cannot supply their chemical stocks without importing outside hydrocarbons. China is a paper tiger our subs and aircraft can easily own.China has spent the past 30+ years getting ready to supplant the US; the US has spent the past 3 decades squandering our strengths on Imperial Overreach.Their only real progress was enticing our billionaires, purchasing our political framework, schools and media, and infiltrating intelligence assets. That’s all they did and it’s easily reversible with the right national will.It brings me no joy to say any of that, either. I love this country; it’s sickened me to see what’s happened to it in the decades after the cold war ended.Nobody except your mother cares about your feelings. Now go back under the bed and have a good cry, pusswad. My N’west European ancestors didn’t journey here to lose jack squat. We will prevail.
ProZNoV #168647 May 21, 2020 7:43 pm 0
Snort! Well, let’s just say I disagree with everything you just carefully edited and rebutted (poorly, IMOHO), except you’re right about the “feelings” part. No one cares.
abprosper #168809 May 22, 2020 10:38 pm 0
China needs hydrocarbons but we can’t make medicine or ammo as we lack the base components to do so. Also China has nukes if they feel too much in danger from the US they just nuke Guam or a carrier group , Taiwan Korea or Japan. Its not an unlimited supply but its enough to to end the US, Korea, Japan and Taiwan all at once. We have a choice at this point, leave or risk a nuclear exchange.
Lowe #168858 May 23, 2020 5:29 pm 0
The implicit policy of the national gov’t of the US is that all your N’West European ancestors were racist oppressors. Your ancestors would weep at the thought of you fighting the Chinese on behalf of such a gov’t. This is why we would not win against the Chinese. They are bound together by blood, and we are divided and ruled by people who hate us. We couldn’t even defeat the Viet Cong. Defending Taiwan would be a disaster.
Carlos Gomez #168558 May 21, 2020 12:05 pm 2
What is the best book/website/etc. for understanding this stuff?P.S. (that is not my photo; don’t know why it loaded like that).
Lineman #168596 May 21, 2020 1:42 pm 3
The Creature From Jekyll Island is a start…
Karl McHungus #168620 May 21, 2020 4:16 pm 0
Adam smith, The Wealth of Nations
greyenlightenment #168557 May 21, 2020 12:02 pm 2
>What really keeps you up at night is not the fact that Number One still controls the giant balloon-like automaton or that you could be transported back to your old life. Sure, there is some possibility he will use his monopoly of force to undermine or even eliminate your position. What haunts you is the thought of the villagers suddenly realizing that their economy is based in candy. What if one day they all wake up and realize their economy is based on a made-up system of fake money?That does not make sense. money is worth something because we all agree it is, and also the govt controls not just the circulation but more importantly the authenticity (which is why forgery is punished so stiffly even as far back as antiquity). Money has always been scarce even if the debt is so high, because the money that is circulating is much less than the total supply. The fed balance sheet is not part of the actual money supply. IF too many beans are in circulation, price levels rise, so everything evens out anyway; but the beans don’t become worthless or perceived as worthless. I never understood this logic of people who keep insisting greenbacks are worthless. If you think your paper money is worthless or soon to be worthless, as idiots like peter schiff and other do, send it to me. I accept paypal, check, or wire,
JR Wirth #168604 May 21, 2020 2:34 pm 2
To answer that question you have to analyze what exactly a unit of currency (a dollar) is. It’s three things at once. 1) A store of value. 2) A medium of exchange 3) a unit of account. Gold rocks on 1 and 3, but is not the best at # 2. The dollar is great at 2 and 3, but awful at #1. The gold standard was an effort, a very imperfect effort, to shore up #1. Despite occasional devaluations, it mostly succeeded in this role. Now we have #1 being backed by the full faith and credit of our government. Good luck with that. But getting back to the word “value” no one dwells on this word, they take it for granted. It doesn’t mean denominational value, that’s #3, the unit of account, the measuring stick. Value is the summation of the productive capacity of the country, both goods and services. Value cannot be printed or digitally created. It must be earned by the satisfaction of a a demand by a given supply. An economy can expand value as it expands its productivity (ours is shrinking by the way). In other words, you can’t get something from nothing. The monetary expansion of the last 10 years went into asset prices. Is Microsoft stock really worth its PE ratio? Is a shack in CA really worth $1 million? We’ve created asset bubbles in place of productivity. All because so few people don’t understand, or care to understand value. These bubbles rapidly deflate, causing a subsequent reflation as the Fed panics and hits the print button. The magic tokens that the Fed creates do end up into the real economy through bank loans, margin loans, and especially through direct government transfers (AOC-nomics). That’s why this all matters.
UFO #168551 May 21, 2020 11:49 am 2
Unexpected read this morning, to hear about jelly beans and giant balloons and tax collectors. Interesting nonetheless.
Custodia Sepulchrum #168654 May 21, 2020 10:07 pm 1
I am not a jelly bean! I am a free man!
Whitney #168590 May 21, 2020 1:29 pm 1
This question is completely serious. Can someone explain the gold standard to me, why is gold valuable? I get that it’s a rare and it’s pretty and shiny but does it have any useful function besides that. Ignore technological functions because it’s been a currency for a lot longer than computers.
Lineman #168598 May 21, 2020 2:00 pm 4
Just a real simple explanation and that is gold has a finite supply so it just can’t be printed out of thin air, it takes effort/energy to mine it, and it’s portable so easy to exchange for other goods…The gold standard is just a way of saying that the paper currency is backed by something tangible…
Whitney #168599 May 21, 2020 2:10 pm 1
Ok. Thanks
Karl McHungus #168621 May 21, 2020 4:20 pm 1
It’s the original bitcoin. Historically silver was the more important metal, as it was used in coins — where gold is too soft to use. Today, people who value gold are cargo culters. Once nuclear energy is ubiquitous, gold loses all value as it is possible to convert lead into gold if you have enough energy (at a low enough price point).
Alzaebo #168623 May 21, 2020 4:31 pm 3
You can bury it and dig it up 800 years later, as shiny and new as the day it was buried. Doesn’t corrode.Europeans in Ghana had boys swim in the river and fill baskets with those shiny rocks.Gold was useless to the natives. Those baskets are what started the Stampede to Africa in 1884, a “terrifying colonial onslaught” that lasted… 14 whole years.Ghana is on the coast, with a California-like climate, and yet we were that uninterested in exploring there or dealing with that rich continent right next door. We sailed instead for the New World, as Islam had sealed off everything from Carthage to the Silk Road, a flint route in use for 12,000 years.
Whitney #168630 May 21, 2020 5:31 pm 2
It retains its luster through time. it’s immortal. Makes more sense now that the golden calf could be a stand-in for God
Ripple #168652 May 21, 2020 8:52 pm 0
Ghana’s climate is tropical, hotter and wetter than California’s temperate Mediterranean climate.
Karl McHungus #168659 May 22, 2020 7:37 am 0
most people aren’t aware of this but the water off the coast of Cali is cold as fukk. usually in the low to mid 60’s; never more than high 60’s. that keeps coastal temps moderate, and prevents hurricanes (and humidity). you have no idea just how nice the weather is here — all fukkin year long. if you are familiar with the weather in Missouri, it is the opposite of that!
Ben the Layabout #168562 May 21, 2020 12:18 pm 1
Ah, memories of “The Prisoner”. “I am not a number! I am a free man.” [mocking laughter in reply.] Extending your analogy: the key to happiness (as an individual) is to have enough jelly beans to take care of yourself and your loved ones, and to not worry too much about the rest of the beans in the world. To reach the advanced level, ideally you’ll freely spend the beans on what you like, during your lifetime, neither being stingy nor extravagant. You know that you can’t take the beans with you when you die. But you can leave them to beneficiaries, if you can trust the legal system to do so after you die. Or you can give away some of the beans while you’re alive. Or a combination of both. Counsel: be wary of governments or others who offer to — or threaten force to — maek you distribute the beans accourding to their wishes, not yours. Easier said than done.
JR Wirth #168587 May 21, 2020 1:20 pm 5
The star of the show once asked what it was all about, because it had no plot resolution. He said that the show was about ourselves. We are our own number one. We are the source of our own evil if we choose to look in the mirror. And that’s the ultimate lesson of what’s happening today. Look at the politicians we’ve chosen. Each one is more deranged than the next. The Fed cranks out all this cash because we want it. The $1200 stimulus check had an 82% approval rating from the public. And we want MORE of them. We want reward without effort. We have an insatiable greed for the luxury car, the exotic vacation, the house with a bonus room that stores junk. We worship the material and the politicians give it to us. So when we have our currency crisis, whenever it happens, and it will come as sure as the next Winter, what a fitting end to watch so much of this vaporize.
Hun #168542 May 21, 2020 11:28 am 1
I used to read articles like this at lewrockwell.com Actually, they would probably publish it today too.
Maus #168541 May 21, 2020 11:25 am 1
It’s gotta be pretty easy to counterfeit jelly beans; so you should probably monitor the sugar supply too. Did anyone else think of Ronald Reagan when they saw the post title? While this was a clever thought experiment comparing the Fed to that old TV program, The Prisoner, I had a hard time buying in because I’m the sort — like Ronnie — who’d eat all my stash. Besides, unlike people properly understood through the lens of HBD, where blacks are indeed worth only 3/5 of whites per our foundational document, everyone knows black jellybeans are the best and the white ones taste like crap. So the thought experiment has some credibility gaps.
Official Bologna Tester #168560 May 21, 2020 12:10 pm 3
Maus said: “..everyone knows black jellybeans are the best and the white ones taste like crap.” Relax man, it’s just a metaphor. Anyway, everybody should know by now that it’s the red ones that taste the best.https://cdn-tp1.mozu.com/9046-11441/cms/11441/files/c5bc9398-710e-4dd6-9c3b-bf4dc95e62ac?max=650 .
Five-Thirds #168566 May 21, 2020 12:27 pm 8
The inversion of the 3/5 compromise is funny, but the reality is that 3/5 makes them way more valuable than they really are.
Lineman #168593 May 21, 2020 1:36 pm 3
Expired Farm Implement…
Karl McHungus #168619 May 21, 2020 4:14 pm 1
keep in mind they had to actually work back then.
d. deacon #168812 May 23, 2020 12:46 am 0
as a beaner, this was an entertaining fable.and simple to solve. ever seen a beaner mix his red beans with his black beans? or white beans and black beans? or lentils and beans? or going without beans for a long time before revolting? or stuffing themselves with beans without the resulting diabetes?no, all beans are always eaten color-separated, and legumes are kept separate too. whatever color is picked goes along with the protein of the day, aka whatever available valuable goods/services, which of course is the materially important part of the meal. there can’t always be the same or even a protein though, sadly; otherwise we’d all be perfectly keto and not argue heh. but at least there’s always tortillas/rice/bread in all dishes as a baseline: organized religion, national culture, natural communities/clans/tribes, land and safety net. yes, these soft starches are the most easily abused, but there has to be at least some so beaners keep themselves from thinking about mixing up their beans. this way they also avoid gorging and/or hoarding any of the three parts of the dish really, as well as thinking less about stealing the neighbors…though they may on occasion try some foods from outside, from kfc to cracker barrel.of course, this assumes the beaner knows these rules and keeps them in his heart from above in the first place, so he can enforce and follow them while the meal lasts. so seems there is an all-seeing, all-knowing, killer space balloon above even the largest killer sky balloon of the most powerful earthly Number One, that must set these rules so deep.so natural rights (including segregation),organic society (by definition decentralized and allowing of separation and ethnonationalism when needed),distributism (the economic safety backdrop),and God (and ethnoculture stuff)apply to reach this paradigm.otherwise, the beaners are left to “trust the plan” of whatever Number One holds the closest killer balloon.
King Tut #168657 May 22, 2020 7:05 am 0
Is “jelly bean” the new “jogger”?
Michael Bradley #168653 May 21, 2020 9:44 pm 0
The Prisoner…
vxxc Toxic masculinity vector #168645 May 21, 2020 7:29 pm 0
Brilliant ! Laughing here. Nice Riff on The Prisoner.
Henry Lee #168644 May 21, 2020 7:28 pm 0
Started ou a lot like “The Prisoner”
Major Hoople #168642 May 21, 2020 6:44 pm 0
OT, but does anyone have an idea what’s going on with gab? Kind of missing reading my favorite posters like John Rivers over there….


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