A More Imperfect Union

Inflation and an addiction to debt characterize the U.S. economy, but a debt-based financial system is incompatible with a truly competitive economy. Yet our system exists by choice, not the dictates of immutable economic laws; and it is leading the U.S. to financial collapse. The author highlights essentially ignored inequities and fallacies inherent in major aspects of our economy and of economic theory. The text explains how the system is skewed to big government and a dominant financial sector and undermining our standard of living. Policies directed at avoiding deflation have yielded income and wealth redistribution and inequities; inflation; inordinate growth in government, the financial sector, money supply, and debt; currency debasement; fragility in the financial system; loss of international competitiveness; and distortions in interest rates, currency ratios, trade, labor and product pricing, and asset valuations. Whether through currency depreciation, unjust wage and price increases, the absence of real income gains for all through maximum price reductions from efficiency and technology gains, or other means, the unblessed are relatively impoverished by the wealth redistribution of the system courtesy of the distributional coalitions, big government, and the financial sector. The author provides a critical look at fundamental economic theory and practice in a nonmathematical, common sense presentation. He offers a new, insightful challenge to aspects of Keynesian and monetarist theories.