Great - depressing piece. Another cause of degradation is surely debt and the inability of the ruling classes to provide enough bread and circus for the masses. The social gap - wealth, health, opportunity etc will widen and so will the resentment.
The first of the Homestead acts wasn’t passed until May 1862, over a year after the Civil War began. It may well have not passed into law had the Southern states not seceded and their congressmen had been in place to block it.
Yes, but one can see how a Republican President, able to appoint Republican organisers to federal positions throughout the South, could build a threatening, to the plantation elite, political alliance.
Absolutely. Perhaps the most immediate threat was that Presidents appoint the Postmasters General. Up until Lincoln, the Postmasters had obligingly censored the mail, ensuring that abolitionist pamphlets did not make it south of the Mason-Dixon Line. With Lincoln in office, the censorship would almost certainly have stopped.
It’s important to note that Lincoln’s predecessor, James Buchanan, vetoed a precursor to the Homestead Act in 1860 - a bill that Lincoln would likely have signed. The South may well have feared that a second attempt would succeed. With northern settlers pouring into the western territories, few of the resulting states would have come into the Union as slave states, putting the South at a disadvantage in the House, the Senate, and the Electoral College.
On the other hand, it’s also very possible that a second bill would not have passed Congress after Lincoln took office. Although Buchanan was from Pennsylvania, he was sympathetic to the South and his veto was expected. A congressman, therefore, had the luxury of voting in accordance with his conscience - or with his constituents’ wishes - knowing that his support for the bill didn’t matter. Many congressmen may well have thought twice before voting for a bill that would have certainly been signed into law and that could well have pushed the South into secession.
Without knowing very much about it my fear is that ‘civil war hysteria’ just provides another excuse to lock up opponents. I don’t really understand why the ability to vote Republican doesn’t provide the needed democratic safety valve.
Thought provoking, but the geography is not right. The partisan divides are not geographic.
The sleeper issue is housing. Like Aussie, UK, Hong Kong, and other regions, housing is unaffordable in US. Canada has it worse. Globalism is not working for people who work for a living in developed nations.
I agree the US is in decline. DEI has been institutionalized and institutions never die. Housing is not being built. The borders are de facto open, with wage-bashing labor.
The media has become party-mouthpieces, much like newspapers in old-time city machine politics days.
But shooting in the streets? Seems unlikely. Just a long downhill slide.
I don’t understand how globalism (global trade?) leads to unaffordable housing. I would think that competition from more producers, whether from here or abroad, would tend to drive prices down. Instead, I think that rising home prices are a function of zoning laws, strict building codes, and land use restrictions.
Yes, but non-voting migrants drive up demand for housing while skewing the policy response towards more restrictive zoning and building regulations, as the interests of housing entrants is politically discounted.
I was referring specifically to global trade and not to open borders. (The term “globalism” is a bit vague). As I said below, I oppose open borders - especially when our leaders have decided that illegal immigrants should (1) not be allowed to work, and (2) should be provided for.
It's primarily the open-borders aspect of globalism that's to blame, although the "free trade" aspect has also hollowed out America's industrial base, since foreign manufacturers don't have to bother with all the government-imposed red tape and DEI mandates and payroll taxes and so forth, amounting to essentially a tariff on domestically-produced goods; and all of that leads to lower wages for America's working class. But the real driver of unaffordable housing is the mass-immigration. Importing large numbers of 3rd-world low-skilled workers lowers wages for working-class Americans while driving up housing prices because of increased demand for housing. The only Americans benefiting from globalism are the bankster class and the politicians they own.
American manufacturing output has been steadily rising in this country for decades, so our industrial base has hardly been “hollowed out.” Yes, the military is having issues obtaining munitions, but problems with the military’s procurement processes have been an open secret for decades. The issue isn’t free trade but government bureaucracy.
There were drops in manufacturing output during the (government created) Great Recession, in 2019 in the wake of Trump’s tariffs on industrial inputs, and during the COVID pandemic and lockdowns. Other than those blips, output has steadily risen.
Though there are still plenty of manufacturing jobs available (some four or five hundred thousand manufacturing jobs are currently going begging in the U.S.), the sector has become less important for job creation as automation has increased - just as the country’s agricultural output has grown even as the number of farmers has drastically declined. The so-called China Shock accounted for the loss of an estimated half million manufacturing jobs between 2000 and 2007 - far less than the churn in the country’s total employment numbers in an average month.
I live near Houston and housing prices are still quite reasonable because we don’t have strict zoning restrictions. Houses are springing up all around me, largely being built by laborers from Mexico and Central and South America.
Of course, in some ways you are right. I think the aforesaid nations might be able to build their way to lower housing costs (although the US would still have to get control of its southern border).
There is a question: Should first world nations, who have built comfortable environs, be "obligated" to accept migrants. And in what number?
Do first world nations, who are first world by virtue of cultural norms, have anything to preserve? Language, culture, work ethics, meritocracies, religious tolerance?
There is an argument that nations that run large trade deficits have, as a result, inflows of capital that find their way into housing, boosting house costs.
Lastly there is a book, "Trade Wars are Class Wars" by Michael Pettis. Worth a read. Short story---factory locations are often (well, almost always) subsidized, in one way or another.
Your own former RBA top gun said wages were rising during C19 as immigration was cut off. Almost overtly he liked the idea of immigration to flatten wages. Really?
I don’t believe that we have any obligation to accept migrants any more than I believe that the rich are obliged to “give back” to the community. Under a free market system, people typically get wealthy by producing goods and services that others want at prices they’re willing to pay.
Similarly - and despite Marxist ideology - rich nations aren’t rich because other nations are poor. They’re rich because their citizens are productive. Poor countries are far better off for our inventiveness, productivity, and wealth.
That said, I also believe that we benefit by immigration. We should, however, decide who we allow in - not all immigrants are the same. Some come with the ability and the desire to make better lives for themselves and their families through gainful employment. Others come to traffic in drugs, weapons, illegal immigrants, and sex workers. Still others hope to take advantage of our country’s generous welfare system.
But I do wonder: Suppose there is a culture, a language, a religion and traditions that a people want to preserve? These goes beyond simple macroeconomics.
There seems a premise that Western nations cannot choose to preserve their cultures, either under the hoof of globalism and a macroeconomic orthodoxy that demands open borders, and also because they are white or yellow (East Asian) or Indian (brown?) "supremacists."
The RBA guvvie:
RBA Governor Says International Border Closure Could Fuel Surge in Wages
Australia could face a surge in wages growth and inflation if the closure of the country's international borders to foreign workers continues for some time, Reserve Bank of Australia Gov. Philip Lowe said Thursday.
In a speech to economists, Mr. Lowe said the most significant challenge to labor supply in the country was the closed border, which has normally been a major source of skilled workers for the economy over many decades.
Sounds good but higher wages doesn't seem to be the issue. My next door neighbour complained he cannot get heavy equipment operators for what to me sounds like a very good wage. Where are they, he and I wondered? Perhaps working in the mines for even more money but there is plainly a shortage. Or perhaps they are dying off of the jab as they are the young healthy ones. Already, every delivery I get or service call for various things is performed by people with brown skin. I always ask, and they are Sri Lankan, Indian, Afghani. Handymen charge $50AUD/hour but you cannot get them to fit you into their busy schedules even at that price. I don't think wage growth and fewer workers is an outcome devoutly to be wished - it sounds disastrous. I don't know if American readers understand Australia strictly does not have an open border policy for asylum seekers, and instead imprisons them to put off any others from following them. Largely successful but cruel. I also do not know if Americans understand that Australia has an all-encompassing socialised medicine and pharmaceutical system which anyone but above mentioned refugees who have made it into the country can access. You can get private health insurance if you prefer. Even if you are living in your car, you can go to a doctor or hospital and in some cases get dental care as well. Yes, there is a housing shortage but I notice the zoning and building restrictions are being eased up considerably in my Shire. There are many townhouses and additional house springing up on what were once one-dwelling blocks. They also are in the process of easing the restrictions on how buildings can be used. Small buildings allowed on a property for an elderly relative may shortly be allowed to be rented out after that relative's death rather than have all the facilities that made it liveable removed, which was bureaucratic overreach of the most ridiculous sort. I might shortly be allowed to occupy a small studio in my shed legally or let someone else do so. So it is not all doom and gloom, just most of it.
If DC wants war, and DC Green Zone means yes it did, DC gets war. Everyone else in Red Zone, GZ guarded by mercenaries- perhaps. They don’t have soldiers or police they trust in DC, so they have mercs already as security. That was true Jan 2021.
Everything is proceeding according to Color Revolution plan, just as it has been in America since 2020. They’re kind enough to publish you know.
It may not seem likely to you, but they decide. When passive , others decide. Norm Eisen, TIP and the State Department (which now runs our 🇺🇸 elections too) have not changed or wavered from this course. As I have seen them do it abroad I see the same here 🇺🇸. Nothing we are seeing indicates any change except the doubt and hesitation among their factions (like California declining to kick Trump off ballot) - while there’s hesitation, doubt, defectors, that’s the only sign of relenting.
At this point they may not be able to stop it if they want to - their own instruments and clients will not stop.
Or they may lose heart and walk away- the problem being they don’t quite have a replacement government you know...
there was a need to special system to repress those of African descent, as free Africans were quite common, and sadly this was done. There was a massive shift prior to the civil war, that was even apparent in the churches: where churches had previously been mixed (even the slaveowners had approved of this, as it helped them keep an eye on their slaves) were forcibly segregated.
My understanding is that free blacks were rare in the slave States outside Louisiana. It was hard to free slaves in most slave States and became harder over time.
Very much hope that things turn around in the US.
Brilliant article, thanks and saved!
Great - depressing piece. Another cause of degradation is surely debt and the inability of the ruling classes to provide enough bread and circus for the masses. The social gap - wealth, health, opportunity etc will widen and so will the resentment.
According to Phillips, it would be the Fourth Civil War starting with the English Civil War.
Indeed, but counting in the Wars of the Three Kingdoms seemed unnecessary for a post on the US.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wars_of_the_Three_Kingdoms
That is true, but I couldn’t help but mention Phillips and “The Cousins’ Wars” for its idiosyncratic analysis which I found appealing.
Yes, I enjoyed it too.
Yes, these things happen from time to time. In some countries the Civil Wars never end.
The first of the Homestead acts wasn’t passed until May 1862, over a year after the Civil War began. It may well have not passed into law had the Southern states not seceded and their congressmen had been in place to block it.
Yes, but one can see how a Republican President, able to appoint Republican organisers to federal positions throughout the South, could build a threatening, to the plantation elite, political alliance.
Absolutely. Perhaps the most immediate threat was that Presidents appoint the Postmasters General. Up until Lincoln, the Postmasters had obligingly censored the mail, ensuring that abolitionist pamphlets did not make it south of the Mason-Dixon Line. With Lincoln in office, the censorship would almost certainly have stopped.
It’s important to note that Lincoln’s predecessor, James Buchanan, vetoed a precursor to the Homestead Act in 1860 - a bill that Lincoln would likely have signed. The South may well have feared that a second attempt would succeed. With northern settlers pouring into the western territories, few of the resulting states would have come into the Union as slave states, putting the South at a disadvantage in the House, the Senate, and the Electoral College.
On the other hand, it’s also very possible that a second bill would not have passed Congress after Lincoln took office. Although Buchanan was from Pennsylvania, he was sympathetic to the South and his veto was expected. A congressman, therefore, had the luxury of voting in accordance with his conscience - or with his constituents’ wishes - knowing that his support for the bill didn’t matter. Many congressmen may well have thought twice before voting for a bill that would have certainly been signed into law and that could well have pushed the South into secession.
More depressing possibilities for the US and its evolution. Excellent piece!
Without knowing very much about it my fear is that ‘civil war hysteria’ just provides another excuse to lock up opponents. I don’t really understand why the ability to vote Republican doesn’t provide the needed democratic safety valve.
Depends a bit on whether voting Republican improves anything.
In 1860, voting Republican threatened to do too much, as far as the plantation elite was concerned.
Thought provoking, but the geography is not right. The partisan divides are not geographic.
The sleeper issue is housing. Like Aussie, UK, Hong Kong, and other regions, housing is unaffordable in US. Canada has it worse. Globalism is not working for people who work for a living in developed nations.
I agree the US is in decline. DEI has been institutionalized and institutions never die. Housing is not being built. The borders are de facto open, with wage-bashing labor.
The media has become party-mouthpieces, much like newspapers in old-time city machine politics days.
But shooting in the streets? Seems unlikely. Just a long downhill slide.
But housing markets vary by geography.
Yes, but what has happened first in California, then the West Coast (and Northeast) has spread. If you know Kevin Erdmann, he has been covering this.
There are scant few places left in the US with affordable housing. Missouri, and some Rust Belt cities. Outback stuff.
the same thing happened in Aussie, no? Even Perth?
You will like Peter Thiel’s analysis.
https://youtu.be/lO0KH-TgvbM?si=GQ9bTCOhljlfJXSz
I don’t understand how globalism (global trade?) leads to unaffordable housing. I would think that competition from more producers, whether from here or abroad, would tend to drive prices down. Instead, I think that rising home prices are a function of zoning laws, strict building codes, and land use restrictions.
Yes, but non-voting migrants drive up demand for housing while skewing the policy response towards more restrictive zoning and building regulations, as the interests of housing entrants is politically discounted.
I was referring specifically to global trade and not to open borders. (The term “globalism” is a bit vague). As I said below, I oppose open borders - especially when our leaders have decided that illegal immigrants should (1) not be allowed to work, and (2) should be provided for.
It's primarily the open-borders aspect of globalism that's to blame, although the "free trade" aspect has also hollowed out America's industrial base, since foreign manufacturers don't have to bother with all the government-imposed red tape and DEI mandates and payroll taxes and so forth, amounting to essentially a tariff on domestically-produced goods; and all of that leads to lower wages for America's working class. But the real driver of unaffordable housing is the mass-immigration. Importing large numbers of 3rd-world low-skilled workers lowers wages for working-class Americans while driving up housing prices because of increased demand for housing. The only Americans benefiting from globalism are the bankster class and the politicians they own.
Like you, I oppose open borders.
American manufacturing output has been steadily rising in this country for decades, so our industrial base has hardly been “hollowed out.” Yes, the military is having issues obtaining munitions, but problems with the military’s procurement processes have been an open secret for decades. The issue isn’t free trade but government bureaucracy.
There were drops in manufacturing output during the (government created) Great Recession, in 2019 in the wake of Trump’s tariffs on industrial inputs, and during the COVID pandemic and lockdowns. Other than those blips, output has steadily risen.
Though there are still plenty of manufacturing jobs available (some four or five hundred thousand manufacturing jobs are currently going begging in the U.S.), the sector has become less important for job creation as automation has increased - just as the country’s agricultural output has grown even as the number of farmers has drastically declined. The so-called China Shock accounted for the loss of an estimated half million manufacturing jobs between 2000 and 2007 - far less than the churn in the country’s total employment numbers in an average month.
I live near Houston and housing prices are still quite reasonable because we don’t have strict zoning restrictions. Houses are springing up all around me, largely being built by laborers from Mexico and Central and South America.
RF--
Of course, in some ways you are right. I think the aforesaid nations might be able to build their way to lower housing costs (although the US would still have to get control of its southern border).
There is a question: Should first world nations, who have built comfortable environs, be "obligated" to accept migrants. And in what number?
Do first world nations, who are first world by virtue of cultural norms, have anything to preserve? Language, culture, work ethics, meritocracies, religious tolerance?
There is an argument that nations that run large trade deficits have, as a result, inflows of capital that find their way into housing, boosting house costs.
Lastly there is a book, "Trade Wars are Class Wars" by Michael Pettis. Worth a read. Short story---factory locations are often (well, almost always) subsidized, in one way or another.
Your own former RBA top gun said wages were rising during C19 as immigration was cut off. Almost overtly he liked the idea of immigration to flatten wages. Really?
I don’t believe that we have any obligation to accept migrants any more than I believe that the rich are obliged to “give back” to the community. Under a free market system, people typically get wealthy by producing goods and services that others want at prices they’re willing to pay.
Similarly - and despite Marxist ideology - rich nations aren’t rich because other nations are poor. They’re rich because their citizens are productive. Poor countries are far better off for our inventiveness, productivity, and wealth.
That said, I also believe that we benefit by immigration. We should, however, decide who we allow in - not all immigrants are the same. Some come with the ability and the desire to make better lives for themselves and their families through gainful employment. Others come to traffic in drugs, weapons, illegal immigrants, and sex workers. Still others hope to take advantage of our country’s generous welfare system.
We are likely largely in agreement .
But I do wonder: Suppose there is a culture, a language, a religion and traditions that a people want to preserve? These goes beyond simple macroeconomics.
There seems a premise that Western nations cannot choose to preserve their cultures, either under the hoof of globalism and a macroeconomic orthodoxy that demands open borders, and also because they are white or yellow (East Asian) or Indian (brown?) "supremacists."
The RBA guvvie:
RBA Governor Says International Border Closure Could Fuel Surge in Wages
Australia could face a surge in wages growth and inflation if the closure of the country's international borders to foreign workers continues for some time, Reserve Bank of Australia Gov. Philip Lowe said Thursday.
In a speech to economists, Mr. Lowe said the most significant challenge to labor supply in the country was the closed border, which has normally been a major source of skilled workers for the economy over many decades.
---30---
Oh, how terrible. Higher wages!
Sounds good but higher wages doesn't seem to be the issue. My next door neighbour complained he cannot get heavy equipment operators for what to me sounds like a very good wage. Where are they, he and I wondered? Perhaps working in the mines for even more money but there is plainly a shortage. Or perhaps they are dying off of the jab as they are the young healthy ones. Already, every delivery I get or service call for various things is performed by people with brown skin. I always ask, and they are Sri Lankan, Indian, Afghani. Handymen charge $50AUD/hour but you cannot get them to fit you into their busy schedules even at that price. I don't think wage growth and fewer workers is an outcome devoutly to be wished - it sounds disastrous. I don't know if American readers understand Australia strictly does not have an open border policy for asylum seekers, and instead imprisons them to put off any others from following them. Largely successful but cruel. I also do not know if Americans understand that Australia has an all-encompassing socialised medicine and pharmaceutical system which anyone but above mentioned refugees who have made it into the country can access. You can get private health insurance if you prefer. Even if you are living in your car, you can go to a doctor or hospital and in some cases get dental care as well. Yes, there is a housing shortage but I notice the zoning and building restrictions are being eased up considerably in my Shire. There are many townhouses and additional house springing up on what were once one-dwelling blocks. They also are in the process of easing the restrictions on how buildings can be used. Small buildings allowed on a property for an elderly relative may shortly be allowed to be rented out after that relative's death rather than have all the facilities that made it liveable removed, which was bureaucratic overreach of the most ridiculous sort. I might shortly be allowed to occupy a small studio in my shed legally or let someone else do so. So it is not all doom and gloom, just most of it.
I do not know the Aussie wage and labor situation, except the usual stats.
They say the same thing in Canada. House painters making big money.
Well, we taught kids for two generations to look down on the trades....
And A$50 an hour? How much do lawyers charge? Why should a skilled electrician make less than a lawyer?
A nation with "labor shortages" is a happy country.
If DC wants war, and DC Green Zone means yes it did, DC gets war. Everyone else in Red Zone, GZ guarded by mercenaries- perhaps. They don’t have soldiers or police they trust in DC, so they have mercs already as security. That was true Jan 2021.
Everything is proceeding according to Color Revolution plan, just as it has been in America since 2020. They’re kind enough to publish you know.
https://paxsims.files.wordpress.com/2020/08/preventing-a-disrupted-presidential-election-and-transition-8-3-20.pdf
How we did it, by TIME Magazine Molly Ball 2/2021
https://time.com/5936036/secret-2020-election-campaign/
It may not seem likely to you, but they decide. When passive , others decide. Norm Eisen, TIP and the State Department (which now runs our 🇺🇸 elections too) have not changed or wavered from this course. As I have seen them do it abroad I see the same here 🇺🇸. Nothing we are seeing indicates any change except the doubt and hesitation among their factions (like California declining to kick Trump off ballot) - while there’s hesitation, doubt, defectors, that’s the only sign of relenting.
At this point they may not be able to stop it if they want to - their own instruments and clients will not stop.
Or they may lose heart and walk away- the problem being they don’t quite have a replacement government you know...
there was a need to special system to repress those of African descent, as free Africans were quite common, and sadly this was done. There was a massive shift prior to the civil war, that was even apparent in the churches: where churches had previously been mixed (even the slaveowners had approved of this, as it helped them keep an eye on their slaves) were forcibly segregated.
My understanding is that free blacks were rare in the slave States outside Louisiana. It was hard to free slaves in most slave States and became harder over time.
In 1965 Jim Snow ⛄️ was swapped for Jim Crow. 🐦⬛
It’s interesting it was already a problem for the elites before the Civil War of 1861-65.
This would be like the Horseshoe of Left and Right Working Class coming together- something a great deal is done to prevent.