1. Did the IMF really wreck Jamaica? There were some things that I heard that I didn't like. Didn't they encourage massive hyperinflation?
2. Wait, what happened with Jamaican bananas? Why aren't they producing as many of them?
3. I want more information, what rulings did the WTO do in the past that were anti-free market and harmful?
I would like answers.
Also, when I watched a movie on how the IMF harmed Jamaica, I got tired of all of the pro-protectionist arguments. It gets old, and why do people keep singing this tune when its been refuted thoroughly over 10^4 times?
Schools are labour camps.
eliotn:It gets old, and why do people keep singing this tune when its been refuted thoroughly over 10^4 times?
Never underestimate the power of ignorance or reinforcment by repetition.
liberty student:Never underestimate the power of ignorance or reinforcment by repetition.
What about the power of logic? What about the power of reasoning? What about the power of truth?
Oh, and why do people also say that global warming is going to doom us all, we need government before we're doomed, and if we don't act, the news in 2044 will show disaster after disaster and "shortages" created by nature?
Its like I keep hearing: OH NOES! [Insert problem here]! WE NEED GOVERNMENT TO HELP US!
eliotn:What about the power of logic? What about the power of reasoning? What about the power of truth?
The illuminating power of knowledge is about shining a big light on dark places and showing that the boogeyman is a figment of imagination.
Most people are taught very early to fear and never overcome it. It's not always a question of courage when we're programmed. People are systematically trained not to think for themselves. As adults, it gets harder and harder to teach people to learn, something that would have been a natural evolution when we are young and our minds are so fresh and agile. This is why public education is so important in dumbing down a population.
eliotn:Its like I keep hearing: OH NOES! [Insert problem here]! WE NEED GOVERNMENT TO HELP US!
Problem, reaction, solution. Hegelian Dialectic.
Doublethink keeps a population unbalanced, and then the Hegelian Dialectic herds them where others want them to go.
The first step is to break down double think. Then people start attacking problem, reaction solution critically on their own. And before long, they have solutions of their own. And after awhile, they have reactions of their own. And ultimately, you end up with people defining for themselves what is and is not a problem.
Doublethink is essential to maintain a hierarchical political order. The thinking must only be done by a select few. Doublethink leads us to believe nothing, to think in conflict with reality, and thus remain empty vessels to be filled with reality as dictated by so-called experts.
liberty student: The illuminating power of knowledge is about shining a big light on dark places and showing that the boogeyman is a figment of imagination.
well-said
liberty student:People are systematically trained not to think for themselves. As adults, it gets harder and harder to teach people to learn, something that would have been a natural evolution when we are young and our minds are so fresh and agile. This is why public education is so important in dumbing down a population.
I wonder, what if we could stop public education?
liberty student:Doublethink is essential to maintain a hierarchical political order. The thinking must only be done by a select few. Doublethink leads us to believe nothing, to think in conflict with reality, and thus remain empty vessels to be filled with reality as dictated by so-called experts.
No wonder I hear many comments, economically speaking, that are in conflict with reality.
I'd ask Virgil Storr or look through his papers to see if he has written any that may help you.
Roy Munson:I'd ask Virgil Storr or look through his papers to see if he has written any that may help you.
very interesting read. Found is website and will read more.
Thinking is a bourgeois vice and truth doesn't exist.
This is the propoganda that the state strives on, if right wrong don't exist the state cannot be immoral. Moreover, if there are no economic laws that are always and everywhere true the state can do as it pleases, the state is not bound by laws it can do whatever the people wish is to do. And with positivism the only way to tell what is and is not going to work is to try it out, to not do so would be unscientific and close minded, the state will have to try out whatever scheme it's pseudo-intellectuals come up with, and if they should fail it is simply possible to blame it on some other variable and claim it will work if that particular variable is controlled, since in reality there are countless variables the state and it's intellectual body guards will always be able to find excuses for why their scheme did not work.
Utilitarianism is the perfect compliment for this of course, since it is forever within the power of the state to attempt to maximise utility.
If you wish to argue against statism you have to defeat these two assumptions. Fortunately, the statist intellectuals have made things very easy for us through their bankruptcy and the dire state of economic science. The statist intellectuals have failed to predict anything throughout the last century.
"You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows"
Bob Dylan
GilesStratton:Utilitarianism is the perfect compliment for this of course, since it is forever within the power of the state to attempt to maximise utility.
I am curious. I heard about utilitarianism and maximizing utility. I can't think of it at the moment, but where is utilitarianism deficiant? Or ,is it a valid philosophy used to trick the public into supporting the almighty state?
eliotn:I can't think of it at the moment, but where is utilitarianism deficiant?
Interpersonal comparisons of utility are not possible, moreover, act utiliarianism simply would not bring about the result it was intended to and rule utilitarianism is praxeologically unstable, see Roderick Long on these I think the article is called "Why Justice has Good Consequences", Henry Veatch has some good works on this too, from what I know, although the only work of his I've read on the subject is Human Rights: Fact or Fancy in which he devotes the first 50 pages to addressing the flaws in Kantianism and Utilitarianism.
Can someone please comment on the story itself? Why indeed Jamaica's situation has deterioriated after the removal of its protectionist policies?
The IMF has a pattern. It arranges huge loans to banana republics and encourages them to adopt more free trade policies and yet at the same time massively increase spending. When the politicians realize that they don't want to pay it off, they hyperinflate. This is exactly the same thing that happened to Argentina. You would almost think that it is an underhanded trick by the socialist IMF president to discredit free trade.
And what about Jamaica?
From wikipedia:
Rising foreign and local debt, accompanied by large fiscal deficits, resulted in the invitation of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) financing from the United States and others, and the imposition of IMF austerity measures (with a greater than 25% interest rate per year). Economic deterioration continued into the mid-1980s, exacerbated by a number of factors; the first and third largest alumina producers, Alpart and Alcoa closed, and there was a significant reduction in production by the second largest producer, Alcan. In addition, tourism decreased and Reynolds Jamaica Mines, Ltd. left the Jamaican industry.
Rising foreign and local debt, accompanied by large fiscal deficits, resulted in the invitation of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) financing from the United States and others, and the imposition of IMF austerity measures (with a greater than 25% interest rate per year).
Economic deterioration continued into the mid-1980s, exacerbated by a number of factors; the first and third largest alumina producers, Alpart and Alcoa closed, and there was a significant reduction in production by the second largest producer, Alcan. In addition, tourism decreased and Reynolds Jamaica Mines, Ltd. left the Jamaican industry.
Any idea why alumina producers closed and tourism decreased? I doubt this has something to do with government spending.
In this case it looks like the main problems preceded the IMF, though hyperinflation did follow.
And the alumina and banana manufacturers have failed after the IMF reforms. I don't know if the reforms caused it or not, but unfortunately I can't find anything beside the propaganda movie on this subject.