Tag Archives: VALUE FOR MONEY

THE BEADY EYE LOOKS AT HOW MONEY SHAPES THE WORLD.

18 Monday Jul 2022

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(Eighteen-minute read)

How does money shape the world?

A daunting question.  Where does one start?

Perhaps it is possible to understand the significance of a medium of exchange like money by considering its absence.

If we want to create and live in a more fair, just, democratic, and morally advanced society with the least amount of poverty, crime, pollution, disease, and so on, we must learn the importance and value of voting with our money.

Before Money, we had Barter the exchange of goods, exchanged directly for other goods.14 Myths About Money: Are You Being Fooled?

 

What is money?

There are many myths surrounding money like Money doesn’t matter or it’s the root of all evil. People tend to make money mean what they believe it to be, not what it actually is. Time is not money. Tasks are money.

Money has little value to its possessor unless it also has value to others.

Teeth currency used to be common in the South Pacific and among native Americans.

To qualify as “money,” something must be widely accepted as a medium of exchange that is not backed by anything physical.  It relies on trust, it serves as a unit of account, which is a consistent means of measuring the value of things. However, it does not holds value over time and it is not the only thing that stores value.

Money is not a risk-free store of value, however. In periods of rapid inflation, people may not want to rely on money as a store of value, and they may turn to commodities such as land or gold instead. Because money acts as a store of value, it can be used as a standard for future payments.

But something need not have intrinsic value to serve as money.

Gold and silver are the most widely used forms of commodity money. One disadvantage of commodity money is that its quantity can fluctuate erratically.

The currency —paper money and coins—used in the world today is fiat money; it has no value other than its use as money.

What makes something money is really found in its acceptability, not in whether or not it has intrinsic value or whether or not a government has declared it as such.

Credit cards are not money. Gold is not money because it is not used as a medium of exchange. In addition, it does not serve as a unit of account. A Van Gogh painting is not money. It serves as a store of value. It is highly illiquid but could eventually be converted to money. It is neither a medium of exchange nor a unit of account.

Money is the medium of exchange for goods and services. It doesn’t literally make the world go around, but the economies of countries rely on the exchange of money for products and services.

Money, ultimately, is defined by people and what they do.

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There are really only two types of money: money that has intrinsic value and money that does not have intrinsic value.

To days society rewards you by giving you fiat money the most highly addictive substance on the planet: What’s most frightening about it is that you can’t ever physically overdose. Make no mistake about this. Like all addiction stories, wealth addiction is tragic with no boundaries. Like any addict in the throes of their addiction, there’s no limit to how far this can go.

The addicts will hijack human spirituality, exploit hatred, brainwash the masses, derail democratic politics, and tinker with fascism in their desire to have more.

Well, as strange as this is going to sound, there might be a pill for all this.

Imagine a world where every consumer, you and I, and everyone we know only supported transparent and ethical companies, and only bought products that were made by companies that stood by the same ethical standards we believed in, a world where businesses made sure they were “doing the right thing in the eyes of the majority”

But, if enough people were to unionize and demand ethical jobs paired with enough customers organized and demanding ethical products and services it could ignite a domino effect as companies struggle to supply what’s being demanded.

Trying to make it in this dog-eat-dog world we live in now needs more than just money.

Without money how can one afford to live?

Which measure of money is most closely related to real GDP and the price level?

As that changes, so must the definition of money.

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It would take a huge sacrifice on everyone’s part. 

Capitalism is an economic system in which trade, industry, and the means of production are controlled by private owners with the primary goal of making profits.

Just because the ideology of capitalism is only concerned with profits this does not mean it does not shape the world we live in.

In a globalized and dynamic economic system, there is a powerful and controversial organization that has the economic firepower to bail out entire countries:

The International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.

During the 1980s, the IMF took on an expanded role of lending money to “bailout” countries during a financial crisis. This gave the IMF leverage to begin designing economic policies for over 60 countries. Countries have to follow these policies to get the IMF’s “seal of approval” to get loans, international assistance, and even debt relief.

Thus, the IMF has enormous influence not only in structuring the global economy but also on real-life issues such as poverty, environmental sustainability, and development.

The IMF has created a system of modern-day colonialism that SAPs the poor to fatten the rich. (SAPs were developed in the early 1980s as a means of gaining stronger influence over the economies of debt-strapped governments in the South. To ensure a continued inflow of funds, countries already devastated by debt obligations have little choice but to adhere to conditions mandated by the IMF and World Bank.)

(SAPs) ensure debt repayment by requiring countries to cut spending on education and health; eliminate basic foods and transportation subsidies; devalue national currencies to make exports cheaper; privatize national assets, and freeze wages.

Why because they represent a rich country’s dominance in decision-making.

Nearly 80% of all malnourished children in the developing world live in countries where farmers have been forced to shift from food production for local consumption to the production of crops for export to industrialized countries.

The IMF also requires countries to eliminate tariffs and provide incentives for multinational corporations – such as reduced labor and environmental protections. Small businesses and farmers can’t compete with large multinational corporations, resulting in sweatshop conditions where workers are paid starvation wages, live in inhumane conditions, and are unable to provide for their families. The cycle of poverty is perpetuated, not eliminated.

The IMF is funded with taxpayer money, yet it operates behind a veil of secrecy.

The IMF works with a select group of central bankers and finance ministry staff to decide policies without input from other government agencies such as health, education, and environment departments.

Furthermore, the IMF has resisted attempts to open up to public scrutiny and independent evaluation.

The IMF has made elites from the Global South more accountable to First World elites than their own people. Assets such as forestland and government utilities (phone, water, and electricity companies) are sold off to foreign investors at rock bottom prices.

IMF loans and bailout packages are paving the way for natural resource exploitation on a staggering scale.

The IMF, along with the WTO and the World Bank, is directing the global economy on a path of greater inequality and environmental destruction.

So this justifies that IMF is bad for the world. Whoever started these institutions had a vision of a Devil. It is no coincidence that the official ideology of the sponsors of the IMF and the World bank is called “Capitalism*

These two institutions can’t do anything without Washington’s ok, as the US is by far the largest contributor to their budgets.

The problem is, that a lack of IMF could be even more harmful. When a country calls the IMF, it means it can no longer pay its economic commitments. That is, it is about to go bankrupt, and fall into social chaos.

So, as bad as the IMF recipe is, it beats the alternative, of financial default.

The intention of capitalism and the free market is to reduce any normally operating, anarchic society full of diversity and opportunity to a power pyramid where everyone is able to find their place according to how much money they have and entrepreneurship is the only goal.

Banks create money by issuing loans to borrowers.  

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There are other factors to consider beyond just profits, individual wealth, and cheap products?

What about protecting the land, air, and water,

The steady growth of the cryptocurrency industry over the years has drawn more attention to its carbon footprint. Bitcoin mining is currently estimated to account for about 0.5% of global electricity consumption, using up more power than Sweden does in a year,.

Have you ever considered what went into creating the product you are purchasing?

Imagine how much is thrown away because it’s cheap and easily replaceable. But why is it so cheap, how often do we ask ourselves these questions?

Imagine not just jobs that provide a paycheck but jobs that are benefiting society in positive ways it will motivate us to realize how dependent we have become on unethical and unfair practices and businesses in the name of profit. I hope we will begin to educate ourselves and make more ethical decisions as they relate to all aspects of business and not wait for our government to do it for us.

We can talk about changing the system in many ways through government change and through legislation change, but until then what can we do as individuals?

Well, I have some bad news because things are about to go pear-shaped. 

Money is disappearing being replaced by Data and digital payment platforms.

because of this current economic models will come off the rails at some point. 

Before this point, I think that we have to see that the corporations of the world have abandoned people long ago. That we will have to build our own economies and democracy as a living democracy in a world driven by technology. Corporations belong to no land no country no people. They have no loyalty to anything apart from profit and if we don’t start regulating profit algorithms and make them transparent profits will become on an unimaginable scale, becoming illegitimate, criminal at the cost of life as climate change takes a whole.

Changing the world for the better is not just a one-time grand heroic act, maybe it’s best described as the small but consistent decisions we all make every single day.

As the old saying goes…

“We blame society, but we are society”

Becoming financially fit has a cost and there aren’t any shortcuts from becoming a slave to it a master of if. 

All human moments are appreciated. All like clicks and abuse chucked in the bin.

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THE BEADY EYE ASKS. WHAT IS BORROWING? WHAT IS MONEY?

22 Friday Jan 2021

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(Fifteen-minute read)

 

As you know the workings of the world of finance are screaming compilated.

All money is created as debt and destroyed when repaid.

Money originated as commodity money, but nearly all contemporary money systems are based on fiat money. ( Fiat money does not have intrinsic value and does not have use-value.) 

It has value only because a government maintains its value, or because parties engaging in exchange agree on its value.

There are three major theories regarding the origin of money:-

1 Money was created for trading purposes;

2 Money was created for social purposes;

3 Money was created for religious purposes.

Money is an unconditional means of payment, a token for wealth, worthless of itself, but symbolizing wealth because it is enshrined in law. It is then administered by Governments as a public resource, for and on behalf of the People.

Money today has no connection with earthly resources, and actually many earthly resources are diminishing while money (or at least the number on the pieces of paper) gets bigger and bigger.

I think we’d soon find out how money has stopped us from appreciating the true value of the earth we live on.

In the coming years, we need to get this reality of money out to everyone.

I imagine the scenario whereby ‘money’ in its present form disappeared in a flash, there would be no physical change in anything, just a lot of renegotiation.

With Facebook’s Libra looming on the horizon and the Covid-19 pandemic further depressing the use of physical cash perhaps it’s time for Central Bank digital currency (CBDC) to be introduced.

To give policymakers more effective tools to support the economy, particularly during times of crisis, while maintaining financial stability. Allowing central banks to distribute newly created public money directly to citizens rather than going through financial markets. 

What happens if the world does not return to normalcy within, say, a few years?

If so, governments will find themselves writing enormous cheques every month to sustain comatose economies. If that happens, all bets are off.

The bottom line is, we are not at the mercy of just a virus but a world economic depression with governments issuing epic amounts of debt. For now, confronted by an overwhelming emergency, governments have little choice but to engage in deficit spending on a giant scale, embarking on one of the greatest peacetime borrowing binges in history.

This is and should be raising many questions when it comes to borrowing, severely tests the question of how much the governments can borrow.

Apart from the tragic human consequences of the COVID-19 coronavirus epidemic, the economic uncertainty will likely cost the global economy trillions. 

In fact, the urgent question isn’t whether countries can afford to take on more debt. It’s whether they’re taking on enough debt to fund the stimulus programs necessary to avert an even deeper downturn.

There’s a degree of anxiety now that’s well beyond the health scares which are very serious and concerning. No matter how expensive an outpouring of government aid may seem right now, it is cheaper than dealing with a depression down the road.

After all, it consists of one arm of government creating money in order to buy debt issued by another arm of government,  which looks perilously close to a shell game in which central banks monetize government debt and distort markets. 

The amount a government can borrow depends on many factors, such as

  • Does it print its own currency?
  • Do markets trust the government to maintain low inflation and not default?
  • What is the interest rate on government bonds?
  • What is the state of the economy?
  • What is the purpose of government borrowing?
  • To what extent is the government borrowing from domestic or foreign investors?

Should we worry about the long-term effects of this new borrowing?

Without question, the new debt will leave taxpayers with a significantly larger burden to carry in years to come.

Some commentators believe debt-challenged governments may eventually be forced to go even further and turn to “helicopter money,” a maneuver in which central banks would simply create money, without issuing any corresponding debt, and the government would funnel the new cash to people and businesses.

The lender of last resort.

If there is no lender of last resort. 

The nightmare scenario where the virus continues to suffocate the global economy for a year or more would lead to the unpardonable sin of blurring the distinction between fiscal and monetary policy.

Disaster Capitalism.  

But until we win the battle against COVID-19, and revive our battered economies, we are in uncharted territory. Best to not rule anything out.

The economic impact of the COVID-19 coronavirus will be different than anything we have seen before. 

This is the calm before the storm.

How far can a currency fall before the government has to protect its citizens from the effects of a worthless currency? 

STIMULUS DOES NOT NECESSITATE EXTRA DEBT.

Money should become Man’s servant rather than his master.

In fact, central banks act as a broker between the governments and private bankers who lend the nation its own national currency at interest.

It does this by issuing gilt-edged bonds.

Markets are allowing all the major countries to borrow plenty at ultra-low rates of interest, underpinned by Central Banks buying up a lot of the debt.

This only has to change where inflation picks up, which so far it has not.

Inflation reduces the real value of the government debt, but, that means people will be less willing to hold government bonds.  

Inflation will require higher interest rates to attract people to keep bonds. In theory, the government can print money to reduce the real value of debt; but existing savers will lose out.

If the government creates inflation, it will be more difficult to attract savings in the future.

But in an economic depression, inflationary pressures vanish so it is much easier to finance a deficit by borrowing.

So do government debt and deficits don’t matter.

2021 will be the first year where the three main economies or trading blocs of the world – the US, the European Union (EU), and China – will refocus their efforts on fighting climate change.

Can the world afford this avalanche of new borrowing?

With the coming economic depression and the need to redefine our association with nature, while addressing climate change, and getting control of the pandemics there is no choice. 

It sticks out like a sore thumb if we are to win the war against this virus inequality has to be addressed by paying for the protection of our ecosystems.

In other words, to make it less profitable to destroy rather than to create. 

This can be achieved without the need to borrow with the technology we have at our disposal by placing a 0.05% World Aid Commission on all activities that generate profit for profit’s sake. ( See previous posts) 

All human comments appreciated. All like clicks and abuse chucked in the bin.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Once society gains control of the issue of money, it cannot let the bankers issue money ever again. 

 

 

providing a safe public form of money and breaking the oligopoly that banks currently have on the digital money and payments system.

 

It does need standards and global agreements but the potential advantages clearly outwiegh the disadvantages.

endorsed digital currency is the way forward> this potentially is a great (and cheaper) way to distribute money to where its needed and this is more importnat than ever right know for obvious reasons.

Created money is already inflationary,

 


BORROWING COMES IN FORTY SHADES OF GRAY

a surge in misleading and unsubstantiated medical advice since the Covid-19 outbreak.

The first is that borrowing has been historically high in recent years following the financial crisis in the late noughties,

the deficit

GDP reflecting the need to spend and borrow to win the war.

Bank of England is buying in substantial quantities of the debt.

There is no need to count the interest paid on the debt owned by the Bank of England, as taxpayers and government get that receipt.

The debt taken on by the UK now has to be serviced by the following generations. And what are they getting in return for that debt? Just about nothing.

Quantative easing, which is bond buying by central banks

as it’s known in the jargon –

 

Covid is going to be around in the world for decadesa

possible total deficit of £7 trn by 2050.

By hoovering up domestic bonds, these central banks are creating artificial demand for bonds and thereby driving down interest rates (which move in the opposite direction to bond prices).

Central banks’ balance sheets are expanding furiously as they gobble up government bonds and other forms of debt.

 

 

Capitalism is growing increasingly unfit for purpose.

09 Thursday Oct 2014

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The present global economy is caught in a catch-22 of its own making.

After the fall of communism, capitalism was left as the only show in town, and what a show it is turning out to be.

By the beginning of the 21st century the world’s environment was in critical decline.

Oceans are turning acidic from atmospheric CO2 threatening marine life, melting glaciers are flooding cities where soon little water will flow at all, species are disappearing from the Earth at a faster rate than during the dinosaur extinction 65 million years ago.

Much is being said about the importance of democracy and how it brings growth and prosperity, but the truth is that to date it has indeed enriched a few at the cost of the rest of us.

Economic growth these days is usually associated with technological changes, it is not for the benefit of the average person as is commonly believed. It is solely to create enough currency to keep the faulty global economy treading water so it doesn’t collapse.

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Politicians proudly report strong national economic growth statistics, perpetuating the illusion that this implies some kind of bonus for the average person, yet they systematically ignore ballooning national debt as though it is inconsequential.

The design of the global economy demands that by 2019 the economy will be twice the size it was in 2000.

At its present rate of growth, by 2059 the global economy will be ten times its 2000 size. But Earth cannot sustainable support a global economy the size it was in 2000. So in order to survive, the global economy is compelled to keep growing like a cancer, at an unsustainable rate that will kill its host.

This self-destructive design is a direct result of the flaw in the global money system which is guarded by Capitalistic profit to the dethronement of Values, causing vast inequalities which is the root cause of to days terrorism, and wars.

We we all know the scenario the more you grow the bigger the appetite till you either explode or there is nothing left to consume. Self destructive, not what they call sustainable growth.

The Capitalist economic plan we hear every day of growth, growth is running out fodder and nothing about the Internet, solar power, or 3D printing will change the fact that individuals have conflicting needs and desires and if it does not change courses soon, ( which it is incapable of doing so) it will leave all of us including the rich standing up to our necks in Shit.  ( See previous post on capturing greed at the heart of Capitalism)

The best stuff bubbles up from below, when will markets and technology be allowed to amplify the ideas of people and give voice and choice.

Real change requires that we address both the bottom-up and the top-down, that we design our efforts with beneficiaries front and center, and that we use evidence of real impact in the lives of the poor as the indicator of whether we’re doing it right.

But what do we see these days only an erosion of the public safety net, the increasing prevalence of low-wage employment, and decreases in low-wage earnings have combined to place low-income families under constant pressure as they struggle to work, to care for their families, and to maintain their access to public benefits.

Let’s assume, like most corporations and politicians do, that the world’s resources are endless and that no environmental threats exist. Even if that were the case, the global economy is self-destructive for an entirely different reason.

During the 20th century, subtle changes to global money systems turned currency from a sustainable means of exchange into one of the most destructive agents on Earth.

However, most of us were so busy struggling to get some money that this mutation of currency was mostly overlooked. The world is now obliged to pay back to banks more money than the banks ever create in the first place, an obviously impossible task.

Solutions exist, but the blindness that created the problem also stops the solutions from being seen.

Over the next 10 to 20 years, environmental destruction will escalate exponentially as we race towards the meltdown of civilization as we know it. Capital accumulation is driving ever-greater wealth inequality?

Ironically, the harder we try to alleviate this financial shortage, the faster we create it.

What is the solution?

Fundamental changes need to be made to align the global money system with reality. Money supply must be restructured into a sustainable means of exchange that serves countries rather than destroys civilizations.

The deadly aspect of our modern money system stems from the way money is now created.

Just look at the below example.

Modern money is created via credit  by the creation of debt.

If you borrow £100 from a bank, the £100 is not transferred to your account from existing currency held at the bank.

The £100 is created into existence by the loan.

You get £100 to spend, but you still owe the bank a £100 debt.

The money created is balanced out by the debt created.

As the loan is paid back to the bank, the repayments do not go into bank coffers but cancel out the original debt owed to the bank.

The repaid loan money is literally cancelled out of existence again.

So where do the banks get their profit from lending?

From the interest that is paid to the bank during the repayment of the loan.

The interest paid on loans is the fatal flaw in our modern currency systems.

Say during the term of the above loan, there is £200 generated in interest. This means that while the original hundred is created and then cancelled out, there is an extra £200 that must be found somewhere.

The only possible place this interest money can now be found is from circulating money generated by a different loan.

This, of course, means that even the capital of the second loan cannot be paid back, as there is now a shortfall of money in circulation.

The second loan amount – plus its interest – can only be repaid via money generated from yet further loans, and so on. (Quantitative Easing)

97% of the Money in the world is Debt, run by neoclassical economics which is divorced from reality. Giving us Socialism for the rich and Capitalism for the poor.   

Perhaps we could take a leaf from Muslim Banks.

Salam Islamic or sharia Banks offer interest free loan because the Bank gives loan through the method of buying and selling goods with an agreed margin which can be paid in installments

The question is where do we go next? ‘After Capitalism’  

The key to understanding development is to remain open to the true complexity of the global processes of innovation and diffusion and the myriad pathways through which politics, geography, economics, and culture can shape the flows of technologies around the world. 

An increase in the capacity of an economy to produce goods and services, compared from one period of time to another perhaps is not the best model, as we have ending up being governed by corporations debasing the value of currency.  

Automation is replacing (for lack of a better word) the working classes, The Internet and the resulting social media has caught all of our world organisations with their pant down. Antibiotics are being defeated, you have to live longer to qualify for a state pension, you are consistently pressurized to buy crap you don’t need, and our politicians don’t know where to turn next.

All of these developing problems will overthrow capitalism as the world’s dominant economic model.

The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: A modern brick school in more than 30 cities. It is two electric power plants, each serving a town of 60,000 population. It is two fine, fully equipped hospitals. It is some fifty miles of concrete pavement. We pay for a single fighter with a half-million bushels of wheat. We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 8,000 people. 

Our digital wallet will have to have a conscious if we are all not to end up hoodwinked into a lethargy of Sport, Celebrities cooks, and reality TV.

The age of Consequences has started.

What is left unsaid has, with the Internet no place to hide.  

Our inability to grasp the new world is coming to an end. Its goodbye to collective disillusionment and I don’t give a dam.

Its time to put a stop to Greed and distribute wealth fairly by Putting a 0.05% commission on all Sovereign Wealth Funds Acquisitions , on all High Frequency Stock Exchange Transaction and on all Currency transactions over $20,000. ( See previous Posts)   

            

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

THE COST: HERE A FEW MIND BLOWING VALUE FOR MONEY DETAILS THAT MIGHT MAKE YOU THINK.

17 Wednesday Sep 2014

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To end extreme poverty worldwide in 20 years, Sachs calculated that the total cost per year would be about $175 billion.

Get a globe and spin it. Jab your finger down at random and, without doubt, you will have located a spot entangled in war, revolution, rebellion, terrorism, famine, plague, drought, dictatorship, poverty and/or illiteracy.

If I told you the year was 1810, you wouldn’t be surprised. Tragically if I told you the year was 2014, you wouldn’t be surprised, either.

So are we getting value for money.  CAN WE AFFORD IT!  HAVE A LOOK:

INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION:

The cost of the International Space Station, including development, assembly and running costs over 10 years, comes to €100 billion.

The good news is that it comes cheaper than you might think.

That €100 billion figure is shared over a period of almost 30 years between all participants: the United States, Russia, Canada, Japan and 10 of the 20 European nations who are part of ESA.

The European share, at around €8 billion spread over the whole program, amounts to just one Euro spent by every European every year: less than the price of a cup of coffee in most of our big cities. NOT BAD

CERN:

The European Organization for Nuclear Research, commonly known as CERN, announced that its Large Hadron Collider had discovered a particle that’s consistent with that of the Higgs boson.

The Large Hadron Collider took about a decade to construct, for a total cost of about $4.75 billion. There are several different experiments going on at the LHC, including the CMS and ATLAS Detectors which discovered the Higgs boson.

CERN contributes about 20% of the cost of those experiments, which is a total of about $5.5 billion a year. The remainder of the funding for those experiments is provided by international collaborations. Computing power is also a significant part of the cost of running CERN – about $286 million annually.

Electricity costs alone for the LHC run about $23.5 million per year.

The total operating budget of the LHC runs to about $1 billion per year.

Taking all of those costs into consideration, the total cost of finding the Higgs boson ran about $13.25 billion.

 

TRIDENT:

The combined cost of replacing the Trident nuclear missile system and building, equipping and running two large aircraft carriers will be as much as £130bn,

MOON LANDING:

The Apollo moon landings are considered the greatest achievement in human history and the beginning of humanity’s expansion into the universe. At its height over 400,000 people were directly or indirectly involved in the project. But what was the cost?

Apollo Spacecraft – $5.3 Billion
Saturn Rockets – $8.7 Billion
Other Costs – $11.4 Billion
The Total Estimated Cost in 1969 Dollars is $25.4 Billion and $145 Billion in 2007 Dollars.

Human costs: The lives of 3 astronauts: Gus Grissom, Ed White, and Roger Chaffee.

The US spent $20 to $25 billion US (in 1969 dollars) to fund all of the Apollo program activities.

IRAQ WAR:

The U.S. war in Iraq has cost $1.7 trillion with an additional $490 billion in benefits owed to war veterans, expenses that could grow to more than $6 trillion over the next four decades counting interest. 

The war has killed at least 134,000 Iraqi civilians and may have contributed to the deaths of as many as four times that number, according to the Costs of War Project by the Watson Institute for International Studies at Brown University.

The 2011 study said the combined cost of the wars was at least $3.7 trillion, based on actual expenditures from the U.S. Treasury and future commitments, such as the medical and disability claims of U.S. war veterans.

That estimate climbed to nearly $4 trillion

The estimated death toll from the three wars, previously at 224,000 to 258,000, increased to a range of 272,000 to 329,000 two years later.

Excluded were indirect deaths caused by the mass exodus of doctors and a devastated infrastructure, for example, while the costs left out trillions of dollars in interest the United States could pay over the next 40 years.

The 2011 study found U.S. medical and disability claims for veterans after a decade of war totaled $33 billion. Two years later, that number had risen to $134.7 billion.

The report concluded the United States gained little from the war while Iraq was traumatized by it.

The war reinvigorated radical Islamist militants in the region, set back women’s rights, and weakened an already precarious healthcare system, the report said.

Meanwhile, the $212 billion reconstruction effort was largely a failure with most of that money spent on security or lost to waste and fraud.

IRAQ AFGHANISTAN WARS COMBINED:

The cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan could reach as high as $6 trillion dollars – or $75,000 for every household in America – a new study from Harvard University has found.

Europe’s Rosetta comet-chaser satellite. 

On Jan. 20 awakened itself on schedule after a 31-month hibernation and began preparations for a spring rendezvous with a comet and a fall attempt to attach a probe to it. Rosetta cost ESA and its participating member states some 1.3 billion euros ($1.75 billion), a figure that includes the Airbus Defence and Space-built satellite, the Philae lander, launch aboard a European Ariane rocket and its planned operations.

THE COST OF 9/11.

Since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, Congress has appropriated more than a trillion dollars for military operations in Afghanistan, Iraq, and elsewhere around the world. The House and Senate are now considering an additional request for $33 billion in supplemental funding for the remainder of FY2010, and the Administration has also requested $159 billion to cover costs of overseas operations in FY2011.

In the face of these substantial and growing sums, a recurring question has been how the mounting costs of the nation’s current wars compare to the costs of earlier conflicts.

 

HERE IS THE COST TO USA IN getting involved in recent Wars. (Not the two world wars and all of its own wars since it founders.) 

In the 10 years since U.S. troops went into Afghanistan to root out the al Qaeda leaders behind the September 11, 2001, attacks, spending on the conflicts totaled $2.3 trillion to $2.7 trillion.The final bill will run at least $3.7 trillion and could reach as high as $4.4 trillion, according to the research project “Costs of War” by Brown University’s Watson Institute for International Studies.

 

COST OF USA SUPPORT OF ISRAEL 

All estimates are of the costs of military operations only and While it is commonly reported that Israel officially receives some $3 billion every year in the form of economic aid from the U.S. government, this figure is just the tip of the iceberg.

There are many billions of dollars more in hidden costs and economic losses lurking beneath the surface.

A recently published economic analysis has concluded that U.S. support for the state of Israel has cost American taxpayers nearly $3 trillion ($3 million millions) in 2002 dollars.

According to the Congressional Research Service , the amount of official US aid to Israel since its founding in 1948 tops $121 billion (adjusting for inflation, $233.7 billion as of March 2013), and in the past few decades it has been on the order of $3.1 billion per year this amounted to $8.5 million every single day.

MIND BOGGLING TO SAY THE LEAST.
This represents less than one percent of the combined income of the richest countries in the world. The military budget in the USA is about $680 billion per year.

THE UN:

VALUE FOR MONEY The UN hasn’t done enough good, and has caused enough damage for a top-to-bottom reconsideration of its future.

A full legal argument against the UN. would make a formidable document.

A snapshot of its failures will more than suffice.

Going back to its own charter, we see that the mission of the UN is split between peacekeeping and humanitarian efforts.

The cost of running the United Nations is substantial. According to its own data, “The UN system spends some $15 billion a year, taking into account the United Nations, UN peacekeeping operations, the programmes and funds, and the specialized agencies, but excluding the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD).

Around half of this amount comes from voluntary contributions from Member States, the rest from mandatory assessments on those States.

That comes out to a little more than $2 for every man, woman and child on the planet.

Cost of running THE UK Parliament:

Houses of Parliament.

The cost of running the Houses of Parliament fell by more than £30m last year to just under £500m. The cost of the House of Commons increased by more than £12m,

MPs’ wages and pensions were the biggest single outgoing which came to £157.2m this figures include wages for members and staff, building expenses, security and other administration.

The amount spent on MPs’ salaries and pensions rose by almost £6m.

The overall expense for taxpayers in 2008/9 came to £498.4m, down from £531.8m the previous year.

However the good news is that the cost of running the House of Lords was reduced by £46m.

The reason for this was that the amount spent on what is listed as “other administration costs” went down from £89.8m to £39.8m. However, the total cost of keeping the Commons going increased from £379.2m to £391.8m.
In 2008/9 the cost of running the Lords fell from £152.5m to £106.5m. A Lords spokesman said that the 2007/8 accounts included a final payment of £26m towards the purchase of 1 Millbank, a new addition to the Parliamentary estate.

They also included a £23m loss, following a revaluation of the entire Parliamentary estate, a process which is carried out every five years.

VALUE FOR MONEY? YOU TELL ME.

BELOW A FEW PICTURES TO REMIND YOU OF WHO YOU WALK BYE EVERY DAY.

 

This post I feel needs a personal statement.

“ As much as I appreciate that all of the above keep people off the street and that the landing on a moon or meteorite with or without the Higgs Boson advances mankind knowledge and brings benefits of all sort yet to be seen.

The whole lot seems to me to be useless until we put our own house in order.”

WITH 80% OF HUMANITY LIVING ON LESS THAN $10 DOLLARS A DAY AND 22,000 CHILD DEATHS EACH AND EVERY DAY SURELY IT IS TIME TO COP ON.

Advice is what we ask for when we already know the answer but wish we didn’t.