Harry Potter Morning Light

Many young people who have just arrived in New York, when they see the bustling metropolis, will have such a feeling: If you come to New York, you will conquer the world.

It may take some experience to realize that what was once taken for granted is not so taken for granted.

How can the American police not have the obligation to protect the public from criminals? It's not like that at all on TV.

Perhaps the process of the police solving crimes in the movie is very exciting, using a lot of high technology or psychological analysis, which is almost magical, but the rate of solving crimes by American police is really not high.

As long as no case is filed, the number in the denominator will become smaller, which is also a way to increase the detection rate. What's more, the laws of different states vary in sentencing. Some states retain the death penalty, while others do not. A good lawyer can make all the hard-earned evidence useless for law enforcers, and the process of cross-state case handover is no different from cross-country. Invisibly increased the difficulty to solve the case.

The obstacles brought about by the administration and the judiciary have tied the hands of the police. Moreover, the American political system does not support dictators. Many dictators will use the power of the judiciary and the police to eradicate dissidents, unless citizens are tainted witnesses in a major case. The police will provide safe houses and protection personnel, and will fake new identities to live elsewhere. The probability of this happening is so low that it can almost be the subject of a movie. Only when citizens are killed, the police will arrest and shoot the perpetrators based on criminal cases.

Anyone who agrees with the rules of the game must vouch for the actions of the authorities. If you feel unsafe, you can buy a gun. It is legal to own a gun in the United States. Of course, New York State is a Democratic Party, and they are against guns. They feel that they would rather fight with each other when they encounter gangsters than fight with guns like cowboys.

Will those polite-looking white-collar workers who come in and out of the office building with briefcases fight with gangsters whose arms are as thick as their thighs?

People desire to be a white-collar worker not only because of their dignity, but also because of the working environment. At least the office buildings in Manhattan will not become battlefields in the Persian Gulf, or mines, which may be buried alive in the ground at any time.

In March, when BP's Texas oil field exploded, the company had known for years that the refinery's equipment had serious aging and safety problems. But every successful business has to control costs, and companies are more willing to risk production until the refinery blows up than to replace aging equipment.

Gore has already gone to the United States to deal with this matter. Although BP is now a subsidiary of American Petroleum Corporation, the Malfoy family also has an industry there. As early as last year, some workers in the oil refinery claimed that "I can't survive today", And it's a common phenomenon.

People who used to work in office buildings didn't have to worry about this problem, but the 9/11 incident made this sense of security disappear, and they were shrouded in the cloud of "the king of terror descending from the sky" at any time.

Before the incident, Merrill Lynch had an entire floor in the World Trade Center as an office, as well as Bank of America, Deutsche Bank, and Morgan Stanley. After the building collapsed, the company was rebuilt. Originally, the homeless man could go to other places in Merrill Lynch to continue working, but he eventually became a homeless man. He had to rely on a homeless immigrant who could not speak English to cut his hair and shave him. Not as scruffy as other bums.

Let's call the homeless man Yamazaki for the time being. This name is essentially the same as the source of the Pentagon who did not want to be named. He was once responsible for the field related to the Export-Import Bank of the United States.

In layman's terms, the bank's operating model is that the government takes money from taxpayers and hands it over to the Export-Import Bank, and the Export-Import Bank hands over the money to "obedient" companies, such as Company B and Company G, when other countries want to buy planes from Company B, promises to return the money to Company B and repay the loan from the Export-Import Bank at a rate lower than the market rate.

Wait, why did Export-Import Bank and Company B agree?

Yamazaki-san would say that Company B is not the only aircraft manufacturing company in the United States, but Company B has a "special relationship" with the Pentagon. If these orders are handed over to Company B, other companies will not be able to receive orders, and the shareholders of Company B can get Some other producers can also create benefits, and Company B will receive import and export subsidies from the US Treasury Department, which is also issued by the Export-Import Bank. In order to manufacture more aircraft, Company B will create a few limited jobs for those who can People who find other jobs.

So won't this form a monopoly? What about small and medium-sized import and export enterprises?

Yamazaki-san would say that the Export-Import Bank must spend 10% of the gold fee to those small trading companies every year. Of course, these small companies are also attached to Company B, either its upstream raw material suppliers or downstream service providers, forming this kind of The emergence of the system was related to Roosevelt’s New Deal in 1934. At that time, the president was planning to provide subsidies for enterprises exporting to the Soviet Union. However, some private financiers saw that the new government of the Soviet Union refused to recognize the debts left by the former Tsarist regime, so they were unwilling to provide these funds for the Soviet Union. Exporting companies provide financing. On the other hand, the New Deal implementers smelled the opportunity and the accompanying business interests, and they asked the Treasury Department to provide credit to these international traders, especially many foreign countries and individuals were reluctant to fund domestic companies that trade with the United States, although The political situation later made the Soviet trade loan program aborted, but the Exim Bank was retained. At that time, the bank's first business was to allow Cuba to buy silver. Since then, the bank has continued to implement politically charged loans, such as railroads and heavy equipment. Industry provides credit. But with the rise of Japan, American excavator company K encountered Komatsu as a competitor. Because of efficiency problems, K company had to lay off employees. At that time, the chairman of K company was named Lee Morgan. In the 1960s, there was a famous His trumpeter is also called by this name.

But he was that Morgan.

Yamazaki-san said, yes, that Morgan, he and his friends talked about this topic when they were playing golf together, and then they collectively lobbied the government to ask the government to introduce policies to force the yen to appreciate.

What about the Export-Import Bank? What can't they do?

Yamazaki-san said that the low interest rate loans of the Export-Import Bank must be for foreign countries to come to the United States to buy goods. At that time, the Bank of Japan also followed the model of the Export-Import Bank of the United States and opened the Export-Import Bank of Japan to provide almost the same services, but in the mid-1960s , They transferred the export loan of complete sets of equipment to the development of overseas resources.

To make way for the Americans?

Yamazaki-san said that if the Japanese do this, American products still cannot win the competition, and they can only start with the exchange rate. Labor costs in the United States are too high, and taxes are also high. I once filed tax returns for a dual-career family. Compared with 1977, their income increased by 224%, but their tax revenue increased by 340%. Europeans will not sympathize with Americans on tax issues. Europe has always occupied a much larger share of national income than the US government, and most Europeans pay more taxes per capita than Americans. But even so, the US tax system Still the most greedy. In 2000, the government grabbed $3 trillion in taxes and shared it among 275 million men, women, and children. Each person had to pay $11,000. The revolutionaries during the Revolutionary War were very taxed. When I was young, I chanted the slogan "No taxation without representation". Workers are not represented in Congress. In contrast, the tax rate of the rich is very low. They will do everything possible to evade taxes.

How did the government handle it?

Yamazaki-san said the IRS added more than 3,000 officers who could carry out arrests with guns, and there was a Chicago gang leader, Al Capone, during Prohibition. He has countless blood debts, but in the end he was arrested for tax evasion. Those people have the power to collect taxes, which means that you will be hurt if you refuse to pay taxes. When it came to money, they refused to repay the debts to the French in the early days of the founding of the country, and they asked the new Soviet government for loans owed by the previous government during the Great Depression. But now, unlike in the Great Depression, the tax dollars are not being used for infrastructure, not just in New York, infrastructure needs to be renovated all over the United States, and the government's signing of contracts with construction contractors will make military contractors unhappy. Ten days after the attack on Pearl Harbor, President Roosevelt convened a meeting of dozens of employers and union members in Washington, demanding that they refrain from strikes or lockouts during the war and that the state intervene if unresolved disputes arose. At that time, military expenditures accounted for 40% of the gross national product, and many outstanding businessmen resigned and offered to provide free services to the government.

Is it really free?

Yamazaki-san said that the vast majority of NRA participants are followers of Rockefeller and DuPont. Because they become more and more intimate, the contract price set is no longer binding and can be changed at any time, and can be modified at will to avoid losses. The only important thing is to keep the production line running, and the only loss in this process is the taxpayer, because They are not represented in the government. In addition, their patriotic enthusiasm is high. The United States may not have those dictators who are good at speaking on radio and television, but the National Reconstruction Agency has used the methods of dictators to incite workers' labor enthusiasm in factories. Corporations, government regulatory agencies, spending and lending agencies, subcommittees on congressional policy oversight will emerge in a state of crisis, and all forces that stand in the way of corporate interests, macro and micro, will disappear, Kennedy's televised speech in 1961 It has been said on the Internet, beware of secret societies, they will use claims to increase social security to expand the power of covert official censors, cost is not an issue, secrets will not be revealed, societies in the military economy are eager to cover everything, the defense sector consumes A lot of resources, on the one hand the government exerts ubiquitous influence on these private contractor companies, on the other hand these companies use various means, participate in the rotation of personnel from the advisory board to the Pentagon to influence the military establishment, you can understand it as There is a never-ending revolving door between the big suppliers and the Pentagon, and every year thousands of senior military officers leave the military and quickly find a place in the defense business, and the top executives in the business leave Then went to the Pentagon to serve as a senior military officer. This kind of personnel exchange is not only between the Pentagon and contractors, but also research institutions, consultants and congressional staff. In this case, they can easily forget who they are working for. It is themselves , or usa. To a large extent, the performance of the weapon designed by the contractor has already met the military requirements. If the weapon system design is approved, the contract will be awarded, but this development process can sometimes be very long.

So the Ex-Im Bank needs to pay the taxpayers money to those contractors to develop new systems and then use export goods as a cover?

Yamazaki-san said that increasing military spending will bring great resistance, increasing credit from the Export-Import Bank, and improving previous export controls can lead to more trade and employment opportunities. Export bank budgets to reduce corporate welfare. After 911, these attacks disappeared. Remember the 10% of corporate trade funding targets mentioned just now? They not only play the role of landing goods on the beach, taking risks that private companies would not take to enter the field that is the most competitive for American companies and most protected by foreign governments, but also responsible for increasing the amount of appropriation and expanding the scale of credit, To ensure that US exporters are in an advantageous position in the international market.

Are you an auditor?

Yamazaki-san said with a smile, if I were, I would be dead. Military contractors are where it all started, raising tariffs on cars and imports not only won't protect American auto manufacturing, it's more risky, unions in Europe are more powerful than unions in America, the French tax the rich The income tax quota is 75%. High welfare and high labor costs have caused a decline in the competitiveness of commodities. A large amount of manpower has begun to move to government departments and strategic resource companies. The unemployment rate in France has always been higher than that in the United States. Unemployment is a normal state for French people , but young people in France are more willing to go to the UK on the other side of the strait to find a job, and they are not willing to go to a big company like Alstom, because they are more afraid of losing their ability to work than the job opportunities created by the government, and they will never be able to work.

Isn't it good to have a stable job?

Yamazaki-san said that every piece of work experience should make a person stronger. Alstom’s expansion of enrollment caters to the needs of some French people who rely on skilled bureaucrats to solve their employment problems, but it leads to serious institutional overstaffing. It reduces the competitiveness of enterprises. Young people worry that they will be laid off and they will lose their competitiveness in employment. Long-term unemployment will cause employers to be very picky about such people and become social aliens. The French regard the social model of Britain and the United States as Anglo The Saxon model, it would be political suicide, they wouldn't risk rebuilding the national economic system to switch to the Anglo-Saxon model, pushing the unemployed into the fire pit, but not weeding out the ones who would bloat the organization , unable to deal with the elite beachhead troops of Britain and the United States, this gap will only be eliminated when one of the parties changes its policy, otherwise the gap between Western Europe and Britain and the United States will always exist.

Which mode do you think is better?

Yamazaki-san said, I read a book written by a Frenchman, and I think he said something very well.

What did he say?

Yamazaki-san said that the people do not desire freedom, they just dislike their king, when all of us are enslaved we are all equal, but freedom creates inequality. The passion for equality can arouse the desire of the weak to join the strong, and it can also make the weak attack the strong and reduce the strong to their own level. If I am not the one who is pushed into the fire pit, I will think that the Anglo-Saxon model is good.

Just because of your situation, you changed your perspective?

Yamazaki-san said, if I was young, I would long for the equality of opportunity that Americans want. Now that I am old, what I want is equality of results. It is a pity that houses are not milk. There will be so many empty houses, tempting me to go in and live in them.