The Mayan Economic Forum

As the elites, that brought us to the outskirts of economic armageddon, fly into Davos in their private jets and helicopters, stay in $1000 a night hotel rooms and have $500 dinners, I just thought that a few of the hurdles they'll have to jump over in the next day or two include:

225 million people unemployed around the world

A third of the people on the planet either poor, unemployed or both
1% of the world's families own 40% of the wealth
Wages as a percentage of GDP at an all-time low
Corporate profits as a percentage of GDP at an all-time high

Jump over them they will with the usual clap-trap - austerity, non-regulation, free-trade, market-forces, more loans, less debt and all the usual conflicting advice all wrapped-up and tied-off with a neat bow of "confidence" cheer-leading. Undoubtedly the word "innovation" will be bandied about until it becomes even more meaningless. Also expect to see the brief rise of the "Austrian School" of economic gibberish.

What is missing from the debate in Davos is the Mayan School of Economics. A school that predicts the end of the world this year and therefore, by definition, offers no pie-in-the-sky long term solutions. The best feature of the Mayan School is no matter what advice they give they simultaneously admit that, given the circumstances, it is totally pointless. In contrast, the other Schools of Economics won't admit to the pointlessness of their advice even after it has proven disastrous. Given that the Mayans have vanished well prior to their expected 2012 departure date it would seem appropriate to call the present deluded fiasco "The Mayan Economic Forum" as the attendees world will end about the same time.

Just to add to the upcoming potential for even greater misery the Gulf Arabs are planning – along with China, Russia, Japan and France – to end $US dollar dealings for oil - the last guy who attempted this was Saddam and shorthly thereafter a heavily armed $US dollar invaded him. The old "weapons of mass destruction" fable is raising it's ugly head about Iran and Seal Team 6 is at it again. All in the cause of driving stakes through the hearts of imaginary evil empires.

Possibly we should be hammering imaginary stakes through some of the 1%'s hearts - in the manner of one of those cocktail hors douvers with several comestibles impaled on one stick. Banker - cheese - politician - green pepper - economist - olive.

While we all descend into poverty and deprivation preventing us from affording either the weed killer or alcoholic beverage of our choice I leave you with the enlightened view of one Henry Ford who chose voluntarily to raise the pay of his workers — so they could afford to buy his cars - unfortunately he was a Nazi.

Financial Costa Concordia

There's a modicum of attention being paid to the apparent US economic resurgence in comparison to the UK et al. Attributed to the efficacy of assorted US economic policies. I want to get in early and disabuse you of such thoughts.

While, on paper, the UK's total debt burden is 5 times GDP as against the US's less than 3 times GDP and UK financial institutions have, on paper, 5 times as much debt as US ones - it is actually a load of bollocks. This is because the US banks are not marking to market by using access to cheap Fed money and are relying on Credit Default Swaps to deny and hide inevitable losses. Granted that US national coffers are benefitting from repatriated money and illusionary safe-haven status - as is the UK - but this won't protect either of them from a global financial collapse - France, Italy, PIGS and latterly the BRICs, Australia and Asia in general will succumb to fear.

When, not if, there is a default on a large national debt the CDS market will implode and there'll be a global Costa Concordia moment. The critical moment is when does the Captain leave the ship - Captain Greece, Captain Portugal and Captain Ireland are at the rail and Captain Italy, although a little behind them, could well accidently fall off on purpose. Captain France will go down with the ship while blaming Britain. Captain Germany, like the Captain of the Olympic, will not answer the distress calls.

I'd also like to steer the proletariat towards understanding that overpayment of CEOs and Bankers is a symptom not a cause - a few billion is neither here nor there in the present catastrophe. And that it's present high profile is just a ruse to divert attention away from the real problem - that the system itself is beyond fucked.

Incredibly, for example, General Motors, a company that never made a car worth owning, is claiming to be back in profit. In the usual manner they have achieved this by lending cheap money to purchasers to buy their products and then counting the money they've borrowed then loaned as profit. Even you and I can see the flaw in this as would a blind man on a galloping horse. Bearing in mind that there is no remaining ecosystem to support, never mind grow, manufacturing as the route out of recession. There is no supply chain outside China, nor are there enough low-wage workers; so celebrating the survival of a company based on lower wages and benefits to support more consumer debt doesn't appear to solve anything.

Your belief that one can - with generous public cash donations of course - Innovate out of the abiss is counter to all accepted business methodology. If a widget can be made in China for $8 or made in the UK for $80 then how many UK workers will benefit from the $250 profit made on the widgett? Answer: none. How many CEOs? Answer: one.

Stoking my higher than usual level of Outrage are the Hedge Funds that bought Greek debt for cents on the dollar that now want paid out at face value before agreeing to any deal. They bring to mind the last thoughts of the Mr. Black Husband spider when he asks Mrs. Black Widow "How was that for you"?