Re: shuttle disaster
On Sat, 2003-02-08 at 12:18, David P James wrote:
> Travis Crump wrote:
> > Ron Johnson wrote:
> >
> >> On Fri, 2003-02-07 at 20:57, Gary Turner wrote:
> >> [snip]
> >>
> >>> eg. Actually, all goods and services come from the government...Try
> >>> producing your own goods and services.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Maybe I'm missing something, but what are you talking about. People
> >> and corporations produce their own goods and services every day.
> >>
> >
> > People and corporations produce their own money every day as well; have
> > you ever written a check? Try coming up with a difference between
> > checks, iou's, deeds, stock certificates, bonds, etc. and government
> > produced money that isn't circular, ie "the first set isn't money
> > because it is not government backed" Have you ever gone to a fair or
> > arcade where you have to buy 'tokens' to pay for the games/rides? What
> > are the tokens if they aren't money?
> >
> >
>
> I'll give you a difference: liquidity. There are also differing degrees
> of transferability and risk associated with all the forms of assets that
> you've listed. I can't just use the tokens anywhere; they are probably
> only redeemable at that particular arcade, though I might be able to
> sell them to another arcade-goer at par or at a discount.
>
> --
> David P. James
> 4th Year Economics Student
> Queen's University
David,
You're missing the point, which is that "money", when it has no
intrinsic value (or backed by that which has intrinsic value, for
example, precious metals), become only, as another on the thread aptly
put it, "a means of keeping score", and is based on faith. I don't
know what Canadian Dollars say on them, but greenbacks say this right
above the dead President's head "Federal Reserve *Note*". So if I
go to Fort Knox, they won't give me gold in exchange for my cash,
they'll just give me different US currency, who's face value equals
my original amount of cash. (Well, either that, or laugh me off the
base...)
--
+------------------------------------------------------------+
| Ron Johnson, Jr. Home: ron.l.johnson@cox.net |
| Jefferson, LA USA http://members.cox.net/ ron.l.johnson |
| |
| "For me and windows it became a matter of easy to start |
| with, and becoming increasingly difficult to be produc- |
| tive as time went on, and if something went wrong very |
| difficult to fix, compared to linux's large over head |
| setting up and learning the system with ease of use and |
| the increase in productivity becoming larger the longer I |
| use the system." |
| Rohan Nicholls , The Netherlands |
+------------------------------------------------------------+
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