Jaggerian Lucritis

Have a gander at this. It's an article from January 2020 that suggests a minimum 22 thousand dollar income for Canadians to end poverty and shrink inequality.  The article makes clear that it will come at a cost. 134-637 bill. That's quite a range! Immediately the right wingers start with their "free money" complaints. "Take money from the supposedly hard-working rich and give it to the supposedly lazy poor." But that's not the way things are in Canada. Has it ever been that way? If people are genuinely concerned with the dispensation of free money, Evelyn Forget, a University of Manitoba prof. interviewed for the article points out,

“But what this report also shows, is that we give people free money all the time through the tax system in ways that aren’t really very efficient,” she said.

“We say we want to do something about poverty. And yet we give away $122 billion worth of tax expenditures every year to people who aren’t anywhere close to the poverty line. This report says it’s time to have that conversation.”The report defines a basic income as “an unconditional cash transfer from government to individuals to enable everyone to meet their basic needs, participate in society and live with dignity, regardless of work status.” That 22 grand is after taxes, by the way, and is based on a lot of numbers crunched by StatsCan in their Social Policy Simulation Database and Model. If the top 10% of earners see their disposable incomes drop by an average of 8.5% to pay for the added equality in the country, the obvious questions should be, what do they get for it and is it worth it? But MY first question was, "What about the hundreds of billions Canadian rich people have hidden in overseas tax shelters?" My second was, "And what about the tens of billions in taxes corporations routinely dodge every year?" If the CRA sacked up and collected on just what they KNOW ABOUT, while cancelling the 122 billion mentioned above, the 8.5% could be significantly lowered. At any rate, rich Canadians will be able to clearly see what they are getting for their taxes. The instance of most crime will significantly drop immediately since crime is undoubtedly income-based. The enrichment of the lower and middle classes, who are not going to invest the money or save it, will also be an immediately visible impact increasing the economy, jobs, and, yes, increasing the incomes of those rich probably enough or MORE than enough to offset that 8.5% extra tax payment. How long have the poor been promised that if the rich were given tax breaks, surely some would trickle down? Well if we could find a government with the minerals to try this, for once the rich would be promised that if the lower and middle classes were given tax breaks, surely some would trickle UP! Only difference being, some WOULD trickle up. So the rich win yet again! The system is rigged in their favour. Nonetheless, this way everybody would be happy! In short, it'd be a nicer, healthier, wealthier and happier Canada. Well worth it, no? I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for this to happen. It's the simplest and the best solution, but it's the least likely to happen.Now, just in case you've forgotten, Canada's CERB payments are 2000 bucks a month. After taxes, that'd work out to about 22 grand a year. This is what it costs to live a life of dignity in Canada. That's why the number was chosen. If this just became a permanent thing, to help all Canadians live lives of dignity, It really wouldn't hurt the rich that much. But as I said, this is terribly unlikely to happen. There is already speculation as to how Canada is going to have a hard time digging itself out of this "Covid hole." The Central Bank of Canada, which is a complete sham, newly appointed mouthpiece, Tiff Macklem assures us that Canada is in a deep hole and it will take a long time to recover. He says the Central Bank will keep its interest rates low, 0.25%, to "help." Well as we SHOULD know but don't seem to, this will only help investors. The rich. For everyone else, this just raises inflation and there will be NO employers who won't use this disaster as an excuse to freeze or even LOWER wages, so that's one way the little guy is gonna get fucked. Here's how THAT works.Statistics Canada also noted that foreign investors bought $49 billion in Canadian securities in April, the largest monthly purchase on record. You can bank on May, June and July being similar because low interest makes money cheaper. The rich, who can GET loans, are investing more. They're not worried about Covid19. But like Tiff Macklem, they're already starting to PRETEND to be. Another way low interest rates screw the poor and working class.My point is, in these times when people are trying to rush us back to work saying things like workers are getting lazy and the economy is in dire straights, don't believe a word of it. This is the rich people trying to talk their way out of paying their fair share. And they've been highly successful in Canada to this point. There's no reason Canadians shouldn't expect prices to go up, wages to go down and probably a new tax to be added to pay for the CERB. In short, a not so healthy and wealthy, more miserable Canada. But Canadians have become accustomed to this sort of treatment. We are the Uncle Toms of taxation. We've become what Frederick Douglass calls "restive" in our national ability to put up with crap from our government, mostly in the form of taxation. We've accepted the "hedonic treadmill of consumerism" like good little lab rats. But we're still human and I have a feeling if things get too bad, maybe these Covid days will yet be a blessing. Maybe they will mark a turning of the tide for us in Canada.

If there's anyone more quotable than Bertrand Russell, with the possible exception of Oscar Wilde, I don't know who it might be. He (Bertrand) won a Nobel Prize in 1950 and I'd like to offer some fascinating points from his acceptance speech as food for thought. These observations of his, you'll find, despite being 70 years old, are quite timely.Russell posits that man, unlike lab rats or other animals, has some desires that are "infinite" or cannot be fully gratified. It may not be disagreeing with this statement to say that I believe not only CAN man learn to subdue urges of gratification, but we must in order to deserve titles like "civilized," or "gentlemen." I think he's saying the urges will never completely go away. He lists four of them in an order that I believe has changed since 1950, but are as follows: acquisitiveness, rivalry, vanity, and love of power. I believe the first, which Russell considers the weakest of the four, has risen to the top to be at least equal to the love of power or stronger.

Hendrix may not have invented this quote, but he's probably WAAAY cooler than the person who did! I believe the opposite to be true and so probably does Bertrand Russell. This is a bit confusing. While there are those who don't mind us fighting each other, these people, a very few, very powerful people, want peace. Peace between us and them that is. So I am sure Russell would agree with me that it is more accurate to say, "When the power of love overcomes the love of power, there will be violent revolt that leads to peace." We'll get to that. Russell says that man will gladly and cheerfully face impoverishment to secure a rival's ruin. I dunno if this is any longer the case. In fact, nowadays it is said that the best way to annoy your enemies is to let them see you succeed. Money pretty much equals success in the minds of the majority as we can tell by all the cultures that revere the rich knowing full well how they came by their ill-gotten gains. He says that what vanity needs to satisfy its "look at me!!!" impulse is glory, and it's easy to have glory without power. Again, maybe not as easy as in 1950. I think that acquisitiveness has longsince overcome vanity though it must be said that one must think incredibly highly of oneself to not be embarrassed at being a multi-millionaire. A billionaire? What kind of swollen ego do you need to believe you DESERVE to be a billionaire? But there have always been these narcissistic egomaniacs who believe they are that much better than others. Mental weaklings, but revered in spite of THAT by most cultures as well.The love of power is where it gets very topical. Russell says this is especially the vice of energetic men. This was in 1950 so let's just assume all his "men" and "man" meant women as well. No matter how despised, you gotta admit that a lot of filthy rich people had to work awfully hard. Even Donald Giant Douche Trump is said to only sleep 4 hours a night. This, I imagine, is because boredom doesn't keep him in bed. We'll come back to that too."The causal efficacy of love of power is out of all proportion to its frequency." This explains how the shit rises to the top. Energetic people who love power can put a lot of hours into making sure they get it. This energy may come, paradoxically, from the flight from boredom, which leads to too much excitement, which causes desensitization, undermines the health, and dulls the palate for all types of pleasure... causing boredom. This explains why the rich and powerful are so very often complaining about being bored and are now pharmaceutically fleeing it. Bertrand Russell stated that, "...at least half the sins of mankind are caused by the fear of it." (boredom)A certain power for enduring boredom is essential to a happy life. This is one of the things that should be taught to the young. Russell, like a Taoist or Buddhist, believed that only in an atmosphere of quiet can true joy live. He coined the term "fruitful monotony" which invites inventiveness and imaginative play in children. Passive pleasures should be kept to a minimum. Children should extract pleasures from their environments through some effort and creativity. Not through Ipads.Imagine what he'd think of modern man walking down the street transfixed by a glowing rectangle in his hand. He'd call them a generation of little men unduly divorced from the slow processes of nature, in whom every vital impulse slowly withers, as though they were cut flowers in a vase. Cut flowers in a vase. Uncle Toms. The "restive." It's exactly what a very few, very powerful people who run things and basically own us want. Domestication. It makes us easier to earn from. Getting back to Canada, you're gonna start hearing all kinds of propaganda, I mean news stories, about how much money has been lost by this company and that. You're gonna be asked to return to work long before it's safe because every minute you're out of the ratrace, you are closer to self-actualization. Violent self-actualization. Embrace the boredom of Covid19. Use it to learn about yourself and your environment. Maybe to break free of the chronically futile "hedonic treadmill of consumerism." You're gonna hear how the country is suffering, and it's true, but not the rich. They're doing fine. And they're right now, as they are wont to do, planning a barrage of belly-aching that will make you feel it's your patriotic duty to tighten your belts and save the economy. Really, they are the only ones who can do that. And it wouldn't be hard and they wouldn't even lose money. But because of 4 symptoms of their pathological lunacy, they don't want it that way. And they hafta get what they want. Even though it is never enough. If I may, I'm going to choose a name for this pathology. I'll call it Jaggerian Lucritis. It only affects those Lucritians who have way too much filthy lucre and much like Mick Jagger, they can't get no satisfaction. Boo hoo…In closing, I'd like to offer an alternate solution that, believe it or not, was offered by the great Bertrand Russell himself. "Civilized life has grown altogether too tame, and, if it is to be stable, it must provide harmless outlets for the impulses which our remote ancestors satisfied in hunting... I think every big town should contain artificial waterfalls that people could descend in very fragile canoes, and they should contain bathing pools full of mechanical sharks. Any person found advocating a preventive war should be condemned to two hours a day with these ingenious monsters. More seriously, pains should be taken to provide constructive outlets for the love of excitement. Nothing in the world is more exciting than a moment of sudden discovery or invention, and many more people are capable of experiencing such moments than is sometimes thought." Words for any teacher to live by. I mean possibly without the sharks. And the canoes. Though canoeing is good, just not over waterfalls. But for tyrants and megalomaniacal CEO's and politicians, yeah, the waterfalls and shaky canoes and sharks. Especially the sharks. Maybe with lasers on their heads.