#so I make my lessons funny

[lordadmiralfarsight]

Economy lesson : Money Velocity

Greetings my dear little Tumblrans, it is I, that guy that keeps making vaguely meme-y economy posts ! Today with horrible news : I have decided to teach outside of work hours ! On the plus side, unlike my IRL students, YOU can block me if you don't want the lesson.

And today's topic will be Money Velocity. What is money velocity ? It's not a bike city populated by sentient cash, despite what some might believe, no. It is the speed at which money moves inside an economy. What's that got to do with anything ? A fucklot ! Let me explain.

Money velocity is, like I said, the speed at which money moves in an economy between actors. Like consumers, banks, the State, companies, NGOs, etc. The faster that money moves, the better, because it means that money is being used for economic activity, powering various parts of the system and thus creating wealth.

Or, in the wise words of one of the few monarchs I am not physically incapable of tolerating, King Julian : we like to move it move it (it being money).

To illustrate, allow me to introduce a character : a random €100 bill. Yes, euro, not dollar, I'm European, you can't stop me. That €100 bill, which we will call Billy going forward, is used to buy a load of groceries at the market, let's say veggies for a restaurant. Billy is now in the hands of a farmer, who uses it to buy fertilizer to keep his farm going. The producer of the fertilizer then uses Billy to pay a worker, who then uses billy to pay for a new piece of furniture, and then Billy is used to buy more lumber, then to pay for repairs on a chainsaw, then to buy spare parts, then to ... You get the idea, Billy is on a grand journey through the economy, how delightfull.

When he's doing that, Billy is keeping the economic waterwheel going, round and round, and that economic waterwheel then powers society. A waterwheel that goes vroom means that the economy is healthy, which means you can safely invest in a house, new tools, a car, whatever, and it's likely that the investment will go at least OK-ish. It means banks can feel safer about lending, which is kind of a central part of our current economic model and one of our primary tools of wealth creation.

Now, if you've read my other two economic posts, you're probably thinking I'm going to explain how everything's fucked and how we're all doomed, which is a gross exaggeration and I...

Why everything's fucked

I could apologize for that easy joke, but I asked myself if I should just because I could, and my answer is no.

So, in short : money move fast, is good. So logically, if money move slow, is bad, right ? Exactly. So the question then is : what makes money go slow ? Well, a bunch of stuff can.

For instance, a low amount of existing money, AKA the money supply. People like hoarding what's rare and what has value, so valuable rare stuff is prime hoarding material. Keeping in mind that TOO MUCH money can also be bad due to hyperinflation, something that causes shudders of horror in prudish teenagers prowling DeviantArt (no, I will not change my joke) and in Germans in general (I use "cahs wheelbarrow" in attack mode to trigger generational trauma).

Another factor would be how easy it is to pay for stuff. For instance, if you have to go to the bank to take money out of your account each time you need to pay for something, unexpected/impulse buying is far less likely, if only because of the hassle. If you can pay with a credit card (and even more so if you can check your account in real time), you're more likely to feel confident buying things, which in turn means you'll buy stuff, which keeps the money moving.

Last big factor we'll see is economic actor behaviour. "Can I start blaming billionaires now?" Patience my dear, I'm giving you a reason. So, how economic actors behave has an impact on the economy, amazing discovery, next, scientists claim ocean is made of water. But more seriously, if you're putting money aside you're reducing money velocity by creating, I guess you could call it an economic drainage lake which you fill with your savings.

Now, that money isn't entirely out of the system, since you're most likely shoving it into a savings account which can then serve as a backing for banks to loan money (how did you think interests were accrued?) so it's still going through the system, even if far slower than if you spend it.

Those bank loans can still be given to consummers buying big things (like houses) and to companies looking to develop, and that still keeps the economy running, right ? Normally, yes.

"Is it time to blame Capitalism and billionaires yet?" you ask, and yes, yes it is.

So, why do we blame them now ? Easy : there's a second economic circuit that's going perfectly fine, the financial one. If we look at the entire system, there's plenty of movement of money on the stock markets, even without taking speculation into account which ... is a whole other subject I may have to look at later. The main issue is that this financial economic circuit is not as connected as the traditional one as it perhaps should be, which means the money injected into that circuit has a worrying tendency to STAY in that circuit. How ? Well ...

Investors put cash into a company, then they expect dividents. Those dividends are used to put more cash in the company or in other companies, and since monkey brain like number big, investors ask for MORE dividends, which means you need to cut costs somewhere, like for instance employees. That money is still pushing economic activity, it's still creating wealth, but that wealth is focused in a rather small group and is based on the inherently unstable stock markets, which means that it can evaporate whenever investors have a collective tantrum. There's also the fact that, despite the large sums of money involved, that particular mass of money moves far slower than the money used by consummers.

Second big issue : the drainage great lakes. You're not the only one to have savings, the 1% have savings too, except theirs are proportional to how much cash they have. Now, to be clear, most of their wealth is in assets, not in cash, but they still DO have cash, and as you are no doubt aware, they aren't too thrilled when asked to pay taxes. Taxation is theft and all that bullshit spewed by people opposed to snake BDSM.

Like I pointed out, savings aren't inherently bad, they slow down the flow of money a bit, but do not stop it, and in fact allow for crucial investments that produce new wealth. No, the main issue is where those savings are. Tax havens, a well known term for places where money is put to stay hidden and, sometimes, to be laundered. Well, these puppies form, in effect, giant financial retention dams, where rivers of cash are poured in and trickles come out.

Most of the money put in tax havens don't return to the economy they come from. And, to be perfectly honest, they don't go into the tax haven's economy either. It just ... sits there. Hoardingly.

Proportionally, the tax havens have less of an impact than the parallel financial circuit, but they are visible and, most importantly, symptomatic of a way of thinking, of acting, of hoarding wealth and value.

So yeah, that's money velocity, or how fast money goes in the economy. Put simply, our system is currently obsessed with the stock market due to a systemic gambling addiction and has forgotten that the basis of a consumption economy is the consummer, which uh ... is generally in a less than ideal situation right now.

Now, when this topic was suggested to me, "trickle down" economics was mentionned, with the suggestion that I show how it's a scam. Well, I think it's already done fairly well with the above, as the system set up to "trickle down" was what spawned the financial circuit and allowed wealth monopilzation that spawned the tax haven problem on its current scale.

But I feel I should go further.

Is trickle down economics doomed to fail in all cases ? No, it can work actually ! It's just like unregulated Capitalism or Real Communism(tm), it can work if you just do this one simple, cheap, easy thing : replace all humans with robots bound by a strict programming.

Like many other economic or political ideas, "trickle down economics", in its stated goal and ideal functionning, is predicated and dependant on being populated purely and entirely by good faith actors. Adding any degree of human interference leads to the idealized system collapsing in one way or another.

This leaves two options :

Reagan and co were unerringly naive and incapable of considering the possibility humans could act selfishly or in a way that didn't match their vision.

They knew and were counting on it, and only sold the ideal as a sugar coating for the bullshit.

I'll let you pick which one is more likely.

[mochiajclayne]

how do I even explain that law had been saying homosexual coded stuff about him and luffy as early as marineford like sir what do you mean your meeting with strawhat was fate 🤨

[slowmo-yo-yo]

Thinking about Chuckies speech at the end of the movie where Chuckie tells Will to leave and that he’s better off in California and Chuckie says “I don’t know much but I know that”. Something about chuckie accepting the fact that he’ll never be able to compete with wills intelligence and he’s not the sharpest tool in the shed. Meanwhile there’s Will, who advocates for Chuckies intellect almost every day and believes whole heartedly that he’s also a genius despite what everyone else says. Like he may not be a mathematical genius or know how to solve math equations the size of his torso but hes so selfless and empathetic and has a stellar way of articulating his emotions when he’s called upon and it just blows wills mind. And NO ONE sees it but him.

Like we know Chuckies a great story teller and an unapologetic loud mouth but underneath it all he’s got this bleeding heart that has kept Will safe his entire life (maybe maybe not stealing that line from one of my fav fics wink wink). Saving him from every close call with his foster father, bandaging every cut and icing every bruise, wrapping him in his own clothes and blankets and offering him a place in his bed until he was an old enough to move out on his own. He’s never not looked out for Will. That same empathy that helped feed him and keep him warm has always amazed Will. There are some days where Will cant believe how lucky he was ending up with a guy like chuckie, someone who can see straight through him and love the gross messy parts of Will that he believed couldn’t be loved. His kindness and his sincerity are seen in every little thing he does when you’re actually paying close attention and his selflessness and unconditional love for all that Will is will always be more impressive then any math proof on the planet.

And sometimes Will has enough of people reducing Chuckie to just some nobody because he’s seen this side of Chuckie that’s so well rounded, so warm, so intelligent, and people have to gaul to compare the two of them and call him an idiot when Will knows the truth. And Chuckies not bothered by it either, because that’s the box he’s been put in all his life, meanwhile Will is beyond insulted on behalf of Chuckie because he KNOWS Chuckies one of a kind and a genius in his own right.

I can picture some of the upper crust Harvard staff reducing Chuckie to the blue collar all braun no brains stereotype and asking him shit like “what do you see in that guy” and you can see Will physically seething because where the fuck do you get off insulting him like that in front of someone who would lay his life down in an instant to protect him. Someone who’s so deeply infatuated with him and his brain and how his mind works. Someone who’s so in love with him that he considers every part of Chuckie to be worth studying. It’s almost a shame that other people can’t witness Chuckie for Chuckie but he wouldn’t have it any other way. He takes pride in the fact that he gets to see this side of chuckie no one else sees, and that he gets to keep it forever.

[milimeters-morales]

Miles like 95% of the time: i should be taken seriously way more often, i’ve been through a lot and learned a ton from these things i’ve gone through. There are times where I wanted to give up, and I did, but I came back with a better sense of self. I’ve gotten better control over my powers as well, and accepted that things won’t always work out, and how to make the best out of those situations. I’ve learned that not everything has to be black and white. Also i’ve helped save the world a few times

Miles that other 5%: (annoying orange accent) hey! hey! hey Misty Knight! hey! hey Misty Knight!

[chainsawl]

ID: A tweet by @/salivasisters, reading: "if i Had a wife in My arms id be So happy and kicking My feet every morning but i Dont so instead i Hit my head reallyHard against the wall and Scream WHY until My neighbor call Police". Below it there is a screenshot from the adventure time episode "Bmo Lost", showing bmo on his knees ripping out grass with her bare hands while Finn and Jake watch unbothered and entretained. End ID

[batsplat]

@matchvedev I'll find actual presser clips at some point, but here's jorge bringing up race bans at le mans 2013 (race after jerez)

and more mention of it after aragon 2013 (where marc caused dani to crash)

and in the context of assen 2015 (obviously not one of the instances where jorge brought it up, but still narratively kinda fun so I'm including it)

and for old time's sake, jorge did bring it up again after argentina 2018

[melancholic-pigeon]

Okay this is the *actual* last comment, for real, but I just found out Spider is now smearing me as a convert and accusing me of being involved with drama I was not involved with because he mistakenly attributed my apologies for his public temper tantrum as being about something unrelated.

THIS IS A FALSE ACCUSATION and I do not appreciate having yet another bit of fake malicious intent falsely ascribed to my actions and* attributing a completely unrelated attack to me.

Also, it's very sad and disappointing whenever a Jew gets mad at a convert because something else is going on in the Jew's life and the convert happens to be in the splash zone and the Jew falls over backwards to smear the convert and invalidate her faith.

Just....the childish aggression is making me so, so sad and disappointed, from someone I used to think very highly of, who is now lying about me and publicly smearing me with false accusations based on a conflict he started because he misinterpreted something I said and I went out of my way to give him the benefit of the doubt when trying to clear up the mistake HE MADE that led him to decide bullying and attacking me for three fucking days was appropriate and okay and that I'm the bad guy for saying it's wildly unprofessional to behave like this in public to a former customer face.

Sorry, but facts, reality, linear time and the truth of what I actually said and did are on my side here, and I will not stand for being smeared and attacked and shat all over because I had the gall to try to kindly resolve his uncalled for, unjustified temper tantrum.

I am also not sorry that I left a side note in the tags that it was also unacceptable for HIM to drag his daughter into a stupid internet slapfight based on his own reading comprehension failure. Because it was and is unacceptable, and she needs to hear that message from someone.

End of story. Keep digging that hole as long as you like, Spider. It's not helping your case and is continuing to make you look progressively worse and more unreasonable, and the only person you have to blame is yourself.

*revised for clarity

[skitskatdacat63]

"average person creates 3 new AUs per year" factoid actually just statistical error. average person makes 0 AUs per year. Alternate Universes Catie, who lives in cave & makes over 2 each month, is an outlier adn should not have been counted

[belle--ofthebrawl]

I wish I could make major (positive) changes in my life without being violently pissed off first.

[obliqueletterkennyreference]

i think what bothers me about zukka is it just feels like such a reach. it feels like a crackship that everyone treats like its not and it's everywhere. like yeah they have some interesting parallels and some funny ship-bait moments in the show, but otherwise they dont really... interact meaningfully... at all...

[unionizedwizard]

small headcanon of the day: long before The Actual Yearning and Years-Long Complex about it (kickstarted before she joined the scions, but in a sort of hopeful way; it only soured after she joined the scions), sharlayan was the #1 destination/port to deal with for irma as an assessor of mealvaan's gate. first of all you KNOW they had all the relevant paperwork ready and signed in advance and with an extra copy, printed with the neatest Mammet-Powered Copy Technique to ensure perfect legibility & legal duties, with everything in the cargo properly labelled and accounted for and the manifest in an alphabetized list. also while i know the conservative factions (like the bibliothecs) have been gaining influence within the forum for the past few years, and their main thing is that they refuse to share their knowledge & interact with the world, realistically speaking i still think most of their export (and economy) would involve (general) books (nothing too advanced, but like. basics of every topic. you know? SUP. sharlayan university press. do you see my vision) which would of course be super interesting to her & also easy to inspect and unload. not to mention sharlayan boats are smaller than other ships so they'd be quicker to inspect & unload (always appreciated i think). ALSO the gleaners would definitely see her & the other assessors as (distant) colleagues - not even only because of the arcanima part, but because they're (underpaid and overworked) civil servants and basically their lominsan counterparts. so they'd be pleasant to deal with & competent too, definitely a far cry from the average lominsan sailor lmao. would be funny if she actually dealt with erenville at, like, 15 also. "hey i remember you" "hm?" "you delivered a cargo of books and got a load of la noscean flora and fauna in return" "what the hell are you talking about"

[flamboyant-king]

i put pokemon card mystery packs on my etsy just now. just a stack of bulk from my year of collecting pokemon cards. i'll be turning in a bunch of bulk to the card shops, but I thought wouldnt it be fun to make my own mystery packs? i always loved goodie bags, grab bags, blind bags, and gacha. its a thrill of opening something and getting something unexpected more than the items themselves.

altho getting a $100 card is pretty neat. Here's the link if you're interested~ https://www.etsy.com/listing/1717302949/pokemon-tcg-bulk-mystery-goodie-pack-of

[oh-meow-swirls]

sometimes i think about the jibanyan's secret quest and cry.

[rainingincale]

.

[leafy-m]

So I hit my 700th edit for the WHA wiki today, because I am a totally normal person

[camels-pen]

uso-chan....... uso-san....... uso-swan.........

<- reminded of old sanuso fics they used to read and getting nostalgic