Tapsearch Com EditorGreenspan an Orchestra without Drums (LINK)
December 25th 2007 20:39
Bizarre Politics Reports:
Greenspan an Orchestra without Drums
A view of Greenspan from the trenches continues....
Alan Greenspan started out playing a saxophone in a band. He ended up playing the economy without drums. All the instruments of money played their own tune without any syncopation.
Greenspan's economics is based on the Free Market and laissez-faire doctrines for everyone except the Federal Reserve Bank. He reserved this part as a monopoloy for private master banks to control the instruments of money. The Free Market stops at the front door of the Federal Reserve Bank.
The early 1960s - Greenspan promotes Objectivist Rand while I served the last merchants left in the USA
I wonder what Adam Smith would have said if he watched the closing down of our mercantile communities starting in the early 1960s. I was in my own business as a rack jobber to super markets and hardware stores. In Cleveland, Ohio, there were hundreds of stores throughout the city including the inner city. For the most part, the super markets were family owned and dotted the neigbhorhoods surrounding the main avenues of commerce. Many small grocers and hardware stores were still thriving although many took a fatal hit during this time due to unfair trade where survival depended on who had the most money to outlast those who did not. The Free Enterprise system took a big hit as the lost leader economy was taking over. Profit margins went to those who knew how to manipulate the situation.
For example, cigarette companies would offer big discounts to the store owners if they took in new brands of cigarettes to sell. The stores were allowed to trade in the brands if they did not sell after month or two and in exchange receive the top branded cigarettes. The store owner would invest a large amount of money buying the new introduction brands at a radical discount and then later trade these items for fast selling brands. On a given weekend, they would load the check out lines on both sides with shelves of top brand cigarettes at state minimum prices. They would have a vast lost leader sale on many everyday items during this time to draw in a mass of customers. All the customers had to go through the racks of cigarettes in the check out line. The check out lines with the new volume of customers had to wait in line for some time looking a just cigarettes. Most customers picked up a pack or carton of the cigarettes in the process. The profit margin was very high even though the cigarettes were sold a state minimum prices. The promotion was a way to beat the state minimum pricing too without the state losing taxes on the cigarette purchases. Many of store owner clients said they were able to make a large enough profit in just one weekend to support their total operations for the next quarter until they thought up some new promotion. It was the end of marking up individual products at a fair rate of profit. Stores would also sell milk at these time near or under costs because their profit depended on volume rebates from the milk companies and not on a markup of the individual product.
These manipulations predicted the end of the small merchants. Still, during these years I serviced many accounts among hundreds of stores in the inner city. I went into the worst sections of the city. I was careful but never afraid.
However in a ten year period, about ten store owners were killed in robberies. This also marked the ending of freely doing business in the inner city.
The situation became worst by the year. During the 1990s when President Clinton and Alan Greenspan were proclaiming prosperity, virtually all these family owned super markets were gone. The city was depopulated too. It had only about half the population it had during the 1960s. There were still some smaller grocery stores but they represented only a fraction of the stores that once dotted the main streets in the inner city. However during the 1990s, about twenty store owners were killed in the process of robberies with most of the store owners being Arab American. They were the only ones brave enough to have stores in the inner city. This rate considering the number of stores being much less, did definitely qualify these areas as war zones.
Today there are miles of main streets with empty storefronts and empty factories. Some areas do have pockets of national chain drug stores but there are just a few super markets to serve the inner city. Residents have to travel for miles to get to the stores they prefer to shop in.
Alan Greenspan did the talk during this time about the Free Market but he never did the walk.
He proclaimed prosperity while the American Dream was Burning. ( I will cover the actual burning of the mercantile communities during the Hough Riots in the latter 1960s in the next post. I was in the center of it. )
( Main Tapart News and Art that Talks Site
Main Flat World Review Site
Alan Greenspan started out playing a saxophone in a band. He ended up playing the economy without drums. All the instruments of money played their own tune without any syncopation.
Greenspan's economics is based on the Free Market and laissez-faire doctrines for everyone except the Federal Reserve Bank. He reserved this part as a monopoloy for private master banks to control the instruments of money. The Free Market stops at the front door of the Federal Reserve Bank.
The early 1960s - Greenspan promotes Objectivist Rand while I served the last merchants left in the USA
I wonder what Adam Smith would have said if he watched the closing down of our mercantile communities starting in the early 1960s. I was in my own business as a rack jobber to super markets and hardware stores. In Cleveland, Ohio, there were hundreds of stores throughout the city including the inner city. For the most part, the super markets were family owned and dotted the neigbhorhoods surrounding the main avenues of commerce. Many small grocers and hardware stores were still thriving although many took a fatal hit during this time due to unfair trade where survival depended on who had the most money to outlast those who did not. The Free Enterprise system took a big hit as the lost leader economy was taking over. Profit margins went to those who knew how to manipulate the situation.
For example, cigarette companies would offer big discounts to the store owners if they took in new brands of cigarettes to sell. The stores were allowed to trade in the brands if they did not sell after month or two and in exchange receive the top branded cigarettes. The store owner would invest a large amount of money buying the new introduction brands at a radical discount and then later trade these items for fast selling brands. On a given weekend, they would load the check out lines on both sides with shelves of top brand cigarettes at state minimum prices. They would have a vast lost leader sale on many everyday items during this time to draw in a mass of customers. All the customers had to go through the racks of cigarettes in the check out line. The check out lines with the new volume of customers had to wait in line for some time looking a just cigarettes. Most customers picked up a pack or carton of the cigarettes in the process. The profit margin was very high even though the cigarettes were sold a state minimum prices. The promotion was a way to beat the state minimum pricing too without the state losing taxes on the cigarette purchases. Many of store owner clients said they were able to make a large enough profit in just one weekend to support their total operations for the next quarter until they thought up some new promotion. It was the end of marking up individual products at a fair rate of profit. Stores would also sell milk at these time near or under costs because their profit depended on volume rebates from the milk companies and not on a markup of the individual product.
These manipulations predicted the end of the small merchants. Still, during these years I serviced many accounts among hundreds of stores in the inner city. I went into the worst sections of the city. I was careful but never afraid.
However in a ten year period, about ten store owners were killed in robberies. This also marked the ending of freely doing business in the inner city.
The situation became worst by the year. During the 1990s when President Clinton and Alan Greenspan were proclaiming prosperity, virtually all these family owned super markets were gone. The city was depopulated too. It had only about half the population it had during the 1960s. There were still some smaller grocery stores but they represented only a fraction of the stores that once dotted the main streets in the inner city. However during the 1990s, about twenty store owners were killed in the process of robberies with most of the store owners being Arab American. They were the only ones brave enough to have stores in the inner city. This rate considering the number of stores being much less, did definitely qualify these areas as war zones.
Today there are miles of main streets with empty storefronts and empty factories. Some areas do have pockets of national chain drug stores but there are just a few super markets to serve the inner city. Residents have to travel for miles to get to the stores they prefer to shop in.
Alan Greenspan did the talk during this time about the Free Market but he never did the walk.
He proclaimed prosperity while the American Dream was Burning. ( I will cover the actual burning of the mercantile communities during the Hough Riots in the latter 1960s in the next post. I was in the center of it. )
( Main Tapart News and Art that Talks Site
Main Flat World Review Site
| 51 |
| Vote |
Add To: 
Subscribe to this blog
