On Nov 29, 2006, at 5:41 AM, Don Wilson wrote:
> Here's my opinion regarding collectible bike and parts
> prices spiking again recently: demand destruction in
> USA, emergency $1 trillion dollar Federal Reserve
> currency printing last summer, stagflationary central
> bank policy for USA.
>
> USA Demand Destruction: the USA is being put on a
> severe economic diet, while several other major
> regional economies are being grown rapidly. The
> rightness or wrongness of it can get rather political,
> so I'll skip that. Demand destruction is a euphemism
> for an economic strategy aimed at reducing America's
> share of basic resource consumption by about 25% over
> 5-10 years, so those basic resources can be shifted to
> rapidly industrializing economies with low wage rates
> and rock bottom social cost structures like China,
> India, etc. Why practice this rather Marxian strategy
> (to each according to his needs, from each according
> to his abilities)? Because China, India, etc., need
> vastly more oil, natural gas, cement, lumber, steel,
> etc., as they grow at between 9-15% per year. We on
> the other hand, with our relatively high standard of
> living and consumption can afford less of both, at
> least the central bankers think so. Reducing USA
> consumption of these basic resources and shifting
> their consumption to the places just mentioned helps
> avoid a global structural inflation that might
> overthrow the current global central bank system and
> plunge the world into economic chaos--at least that's
> what self-interested supporters of the current central
> banking system seem to think.
>
> The goal of USA demand destruction can be achieved one
> of three ways:
>
> 1) deflation--shrinking the money supply sharply,
> reducing credit supply sharply and causing a price
> deflation and declining consumption stemming from too
> little buying power;
>
> 2) inflation--increasing the money supply sharply so
> as to cause a price inflation and a decline in
> consumption from too many dollars with too little
> buying power; or
>
> 3) stagflation--raising money supply to inflate price
> and raising interest rates to strangle job/wage growth
> aimed at investing those additional dollars with the
> result being an inflated prices and money with less
> buying power and less employment expansion and so less
> consumption.
>
> Deflation is scary, because once prices drop sharply,
> depression sets in, unemployment shoots up, angry
> populism rises and the only way out for the supporters
> of the central bank system is usually some combination
> of money supply expansion, massive infrastructure
> expansion, tax cutting, and war driven job creation
> stimulus--all things which can destabilize central
> banking control through unforeseen consequences.
>
> Inflation is scary, too, because if unforeseen
> consequences propell the system into hyperinflation,
> then dollars are worthless, and everyone ceases
> supporting the central bank and the supporters of the
> central bank lose control of the gravy train; that is,
> being able to print one's own money and charge
> government and people for using it.
>
> Stagflation is the least scary for advocates of the
> central banking system, because its greater complexity
> of manipulation allows more dexterity and subtlety of
> coercion in shrinking an economy and its standard of
> living. And more ways to hide while doing it.
>
> For about two years now the Fed (the American head of
> the central banking hydra) has apparently been
> following a Stagflation strategy to move the USA
> incrementally at first, but with increasing speed down
> the path of demand destruction. The policy of
> increasing money supply, cutting taxes and increasing
> interest rates has increased real inflation (nominal
> inflation has not increased much because they have
> excluded many of the inflating items from the index)
> and stagnated capital investment, job growth with high
> pay, and worker productivity. Foreign made goods are
> getting more expensive (as prices rise on Accords and
> Civics we increasingly have to choose Civics or a
> Fit). Domestic made goods are getting ever fewer (Ford
> and GM teeter over bankruptcy and appear to be
> choosing to become Chinese companies after bankruptcy,
> merger, or both).
>
> $1 Trillion Federal Reserve Emergency Print Run Last
> Summer: The Fed recently quit counting M3 and then
> had an emergency currency printing of a trillion
> dollars. That's a big increase in money supply with no
> sudden corresponding increase in domestic goods and
> services produced by American workers; that spells
> price inflation whereever the new dollars went.
> Initially, the new dollars appparently were mostly
> shoveled out the Fed door by the President's Plunge
> Protection Team, which meant it probably went two
> places: 1) to service gov. IOUs to countries like
> China; and 2) to major investment and commercial
> banking players, which meant it was then invested
> mostly in derivatives, which meant it mostly floated
> stock prices up at home and abroad. Either way the new
> money wound up in very few hands and much of it
> overseas without an increase of domestic goods
> production. How do you spell: Stagflation?
>
> So other countries' economies are booming and USA is
> sinking increasingly into stagflation in order to
> avoid a global structural inflation (aren't we being
> good chaps?) caused by spiking global demand for basic
> resources, which are themselves relatively inelastic
> in supply in the short and mid term, given the rapid
> growth rates in places like China.
>
> The result of all this is that foreign collectors have
> more and more money to spend and their money has more
> and more buying power, while we have dollars with less
> and less buying power, declining real wages, and what
> money we do have increasingly is sponged away by our
> purchases of foreign made goods by foreign owned firms
> staffed by foreign managers and workers.
>
> So: bike prices appear to us to be sky rocketing,
> while for overseas collectors, the prices paid are
> probably not considered outrageous at all. They are
> experiencing the kind of relative prospertity that
> Americans once experienced vis a vis Europeans in the
> first three quarters of the 20th Century. Recall, we
> were once oversexed, overpaid and over there, as the
> British used to say. Today, we need Viagra, aren't
> paid well, have increasingly lousy benefits, and yet
> increasingly have to be "over there" in an elaborate
> foreign basing system in central Asia, the Middle
> East, Africa and South America just to keep from
> losing our oil backed central banking system, which is
> itself seeking to lower our standard of living via
> stagflation induced demand destruction. What a deal?
>
> It was more fun being prosperous, I suppose, but an
> old rule holds still.
>
> If you have more money than the other guy, buy his
> stuff at a right price and hold it till there's a
> profit to be made. If he has more money than you, sell
> him everything he'll buy. Over time it makes the world
> go round...if you don't guess wrong.
>
> You don't hear Hilary Stone in the UK complaining
> about not being able to afford the high prices certain
> collectors from certain countries can. He's too busy
> selling everything he has and can find to them.
>
> Don Wilson
> Los Olivos, CA USA
>
>
>
>
>
> --- oroboyz@aol.com wrote:
>
>> Larry wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>> << Whether the seller is legit or not, who is
>> foolish enough
>>
>> to pay the prices listed? $689 (or even $389!) for
>> a pair of
>>
>> hubs that generally go for about $225
>>
>> NOS,NIB (less than $125 in excellent used cond.) is
>> LUDRICROUS!!!!
>>
>> JEEEZ! I guess I should start charging more....NOT!!
>>>>
>>
>>
>>
>> You know.... Sometimes I also cough and guffaw when
>> I see some of
>>
>> the prices asked in vintage stuff sales/auctions...
>>
>> But I just caution everyone to be very careful in
>> doing that.
>>
>> ?
>>
>> The time is rapidly approaching when those bikes or
>> parts
>>
>> we think are no-big-deal suddenly will approach
>> "unobtanium" status
>>
>> and what do you know, they are all of a sudden more
>> expensive than
>>
>> we ever dreamed.
>>
>>
>>
>> There are collectors and aficionados in other
>> countries in
>>
>> particular who already are vastly more knowledgeable
>> and
>>
>> sophisticated in their hobbies than we are here in
>> the states and the UK.
>>
>>
>>
>> The good old fellows who think rare and
>> irreplaceable bits and
>>
>> pieces ought to just be swapped about with jovial
>> generosity and
>>
>> if money changes hands, it ought to be at 1945
>> prices... well,
>>
>> let's just say they are in sweet delusion.
>>
>>
>>
>> So I don't know if Mario Girasa has 100 pair of high
>> flange hubs
>>
>> or not, but I am willing to let him try to fetch the
>> price he wants...
>>
>> If their not worth that amount, he will find out
>> soon enough. If
>>
>> they do sell in that monetary region, some of us
>> will have to eat our hats!
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Dale Brown
>> Greensboro, North Carolina USA
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: curmudgeon1957@yahoo.com
>> To: classicrendezvous@bikelist.org
>> Sent: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 12:16 AM
>> Subject: [CR]e-Bay scammer
>>
>> Whether the seller is legit or not, who is foolish
>> enough to pay the prices
>> listed? $689 (or even $389!) for a pair of hubs that
>> generally go for about $225
>> NOS,NIB (less than $125 in excellent used cond.) is
>> LUDRICROUS!!!!
>> JEEEZ! I guess I should start charging
>> more....NOT!!
>>
>> Larry Myers, Portland, Oregon, USA
>> curmudgeon1957@yahoo.com
>> PS- anybody need a NOS NR R. Derailleur?
>> BUY-IT-NOW; only $900!
>>
>>
>> ---------------------------------
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>
> D.C. Wilson dcwilson3@yahoo.com
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Prices going up? Chuck Schmidt South Pasadena, Southern California United States of America
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