nous les 99%

Published on naked capitalism, by Yves Smith, May 19, 2015.

… Despite the neoliberal obsession with wage suppression, history suggests that such a policy is self-destructive. Periods of high wages are associated with rapid technological change. For example, after the scourge of the Black Death, which eliminated about a third of the population of Europe, the surviving workers were in a better bargaining position in terms of both wages earned and rents paid. Rapid technological change emerged as a means to cope with workers temporary advantage. The historian, Richard C. Allen, makes the case that wars in the late 18th century removed significant portion of the labor force, again creating higher wages. The combination of higher wages and the availability of cheap fossil fueled another burst of rapid technological change, which we now know as the Industrial Revolution.   Continuer la lecture de « The Dysfunctionality of Slavery and Neoliberalism – Michael Perelman »

Published on Counterpunch, by Bo Filter, May 15-17, 2015.

Don’t expect the concept of extinction or omnicide to roll off the lips of nuclear warriors. Their brains focus on the win-ability of nuclear war to the exclusion of all other possibilities. Let’s take a minute to examine the myopic mindset of nuclear strategists and what we should be doing about it … // Continuer la lecture de « Winning a Nuclear War? »

Published on Global Research.ca, by Jim Miles, MAy 17, 2015.

… There are some broad trends that should be obvious. Financially, the ‘western’ world is operating as a debt laden consumer society, competing with the rising strengths of China and Russia as co-leaders in an at best multi-polar world. Militarily, the U.S. and its allied NATO countries remain dominant, but that dominance is reckoned on the threats of a failed “full spectrum dominance” military, backed by an official first strike nuclear capability and policy. Continuer la lecture de « Over Reach of the Financial-Military Complex and the New Multi-Polar World Order »

… the US needs the Iceland option – Published on Dissident Voice (first on This Can’t Be Happening), by Dave Lindorff, May 16, 2015.

In a couple of days, the so-called US Justice Department will be announcing an “agreement” reached with five large banks, including two of the largest in the US — JP Morgan Chase and Citigroup, the holding companies for Chase and Citibank — under which these banks or bank holding companies will plead guilty to felonies involving the manipulation of international currency markets.   Continuer la lecture de « If Too-Big-to-Fail means Too-Big-to-Jail it should mean Too-Big-to-Be »

… of soft music, endless.