INVESTORS’ INSIGHTS “NEWS ALERT MARKET WARNING” Cyprus Rejects Deposit Tax Click Above for today's Wall Street Journal Article ...
Thank God! They came to their senses at the last moment. However, the idea of even pushing the button that could have caused a nuclear financial collapse is disturbing. Who will invest or save money in Cyprus ever again? How will their Banks retain current deposits? What will be the implications on EU bond markets and banks? There is little doubt many reconsiderations are underway relative to the EU - and there will be an impact on capital flows and borrowing costs. A price will be paid at the worst of possible times.
Yet we need to look beyond the "Cyprus Crisis" and underscore the bigger issues here. First, how many more EU nations could possibly consider these most desperate financial tactics. Let's count them; Spain, Italy, Portugal, Greece,and Ireland could be readily added to the pool, bringing the total to six. In percentage terms that calculates to over 35% of the EU. So far! Trending has not been good and the fact that these countries do not have their own currencies and thus monetary policy control is not helping matters. \
Yep, they cannot pull the FED's famous "invisible deposit tax trick" and debase their currencies by printing more money. People don't notice it and rarely turn to social unrest when it is applied. People don't understand it and some probably even believe that it is a good thing. So governments will continue to use this quieter confiscation of wealth because the direct tax approach makes the theft so much more obvious and really gets people upset.
For a moment let's turn back to what the real problem is here - Neo-Classical Economic Theory, or better described as the positive-sum abstract game. Whereas, what these countries are truly confronting is the physical algebra and negative-sum game of Meta-Economics; meaning their populations have over shot the resource capacities of their geographic jurisdictions. Moreover, with each passing day the matter is made worse as more people are added while resources dwindle. So when we ignore all the typical abstracts and concepts of economists, it is really easy to see what the problem is here. With fewer inputs per capita - you produce fewer outputs - that cannot be increased by imaginary economic devices of any sort.
What is also clear, is the direction that each of these nations is heading, particularly if they continue to adhere to the Wizard of Oz's positive-sum economic theories. They are returning to a post-industrial society that will not be able to sustain the same numbers and outputs as in the past. That is, if social and political upheavals do not interrupt a smooth transition. Historic probabilities suggest the transition will not be so smooth.
So again keeping an eye on events is essential. What is interesting to note, is that many of the high profile trouble spots are island nations; Cyprus, Iceland and Ireland, that became Banking Center (Abstract) Economies when their underlying real physical economies overshot the populations they could support. So arguably are Japan and the UK. So were Nauru and Easter Island; of course, largely minus comptemporary banking and economists' abstracts.
Sort of makes you wonder if there is a pattern here?
Dr Peter G Kinesa
March 19, 2013
The Fate of Island Nations
