E S S A Y I N T R O D U C T I O N
The essay below deals with important topics:
- The New Zealand state is installing networked computer systems to instantly freeze bank savings if any bank gets into trouble. The systems will be up and running by the end of 2012.
- There is a rising risk of problems with New Zealand banks. Their main asset base consists of household mortgages, and many highly indebted homeowners could be tipped into default by even a moderate economic downturn.
- China is suddenly experiencing a plunge in the housing and financial sectors, which is certain to hurt Australia. Since these two countries are key trading partners of New Zealand, this country’s economy will get a double hit.
- The world economy has been totally colonised by Big Money. Global financial activities last year were 22 times greater in dollar value than world GDP, a measure of the “real” economy. In effect, the planet’s 99% are being held hostage to a global Ponzi bubble, which will burst unless the people accept increased austerity.
- The inevitability of a bursting of the global Ponzi bubble intersects with world capitalism's four other existential crises: ecology, resources, imperial leadership and legitimacy. Together, these crises are shoving world capitalism towards collapse.
- It’s essential for leftists of all shades to come together and forewarn the people about capitalism’s slide towards collapse. A people forewarned is a people prepared and mobilised to overcome the disasters that a collapsing system will bring.
- To this end, a proposal is being made to establish an inclusive membership organisation of collapse educators. Its working title is Forum on Capitalist Collapse, although that name may change as other leftists express their opinions. All leftists in New Zealand, and globally, are invited to respond and participate.
Grant Morgan
Auckland, New Zealand
grantmorgan@paradise.net.nz
Will your savings be frozen?
by Grant Morgan
18 January 2012
If you have a bank account in New Zealand, watch out! Your savings will soon be at risk of expropriation by the capitalist state in the shape of the Minister of Finance and the Reserve Bank.
Any time your bank gets into financial strife, a state-actioned computer keystroke will soon be able to freeze a portion of your savings, perhaps forever. How big a portion? That depends entirely on the size of your bank’s loss. Theoretically, close to 100 percent of your savings could be swallowed up, although the Reserve Bank likes to pluck a much lower example out of thin air. And how many “mum and dad” depositors know about this risk? Probably close to zero percent.
Since March 2011, with backing from National’s finance minister Bill English, the Reserve Bank has been working quietly with banks in New Zealand to “pre-position” retail accounts (overwhelmingly opened by grassroots depositors) so part of their funds can be frozen in a second to offset bank losses.
To make out that nothing really new is happening, English says the “option” of freezing bank deposits has been “available to the Reserve Bank for a number of years”. But this “truth” hides a bigger lie. Up till now, the Reserve Bank has lacked the technical means to put this option into operation.
That technical blockage is, however, being rapidly overcome by the installation of networked computer systems. “By the end of 2012”, predicts the Reserve Bank, the “systems” will be in place for “full implementation” of the deposit freeze plan. From that point onwards, the Reserve Bank will be able to “recommend” to the Minister of Finance that any troubled bank(s) be put under state control and a portion of deposits frozen. Only a brave minister would refuse such a “recommendation” from New Zealand’s banking gurus to authorise Open Bank Resolution.
Open Bank Resolution? Yes, that’s the friendly-sounding name the state mandarins have coined for the legal looting of our savings.....
CONTINUE READING HERE
9 comments:
This business about capitalism's collapse reminds me of the 1938 Trotsky's Transitional Program and later Cliff's "reformism without reforms" mantra in the 90s.
That said, I think the crisis is a good opportunity to pull the left together and it seems like this is what this initiative is all about. You folks are ahead of the socialist left in the U.S. on that.
The question I have after reading this is: what's the plan of action?
Is it possible to organize a national day where a lot of people (and unions and other left institutions, NGOs, etc.) withdraw their money and put it into community banks/credit unions? This may not sound terribly radical but it can be. See:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWGEQ5QTYhk
http://www.observer.com/2011/10/occupy-wall-street-run-on-citibank-ends-in-arrests/
An organized bank run might scare the government into backing down. At the very least it might protect people's savings from the government.
This bank scare thing has got to be one of the silliest bloody things I have ever read.
When I stop to think, it actually pisses me off.
Because it makes the left look nutty.
A contribution which describes the argument of an article as "silly" and "nutty" without giving any reasons why is simply not worth engaging with. It suggests that the author is coming from a position of sheer prejudice that these things CAN'T HAPPEN, a position not amenable to argument.
Not that I am 100% convinced by the article but it certainly deserves debate, rather than being blindly championed on one side and simply ignored by the other.
Here's a comment from a different anonymous poster than the one above...
When I saw the title of this article, "Will your savings be frozen?", my immediate response was, "who cares?".
In this debt-driven economy, who the hell has savings anyway?
Judging by the title, this article seems to be targeted at the concerns of a few elderly white people.
Does this reflect some new theory about the agent of revolutionary change, or just the demographics of UNITYblog contributors?
Anon 1: check the link I posted. It's not "nutty" to collectively remove money from a bank that could be put under state control with no ability to withdraw your funds into a community bank. It's common sense.
Anon 2: Almost all workers have some money in a bank account, usually checking accounts. The article here isn't referring exclusively to savings accounts or the elderly's nesteggs.
A huge proportion of workers, very likely the majority, actually live from payday to payday. They may get a direct credit paycheck into an account; that goes straight to power, gas and rent/mortgage. Whenever there's a strike of any length, crunch day is after the first week. Most workers are then strapped for cash.
As far as the main article goes - if society gets to the state where petty check accounts are frozen by the state , Socialist Worker will not be required to provide collapse education. The streets will be turbulent with enraged citizens, passing and enacting their own open bank resolution.
the New Zealand state is preparing to freeze our bank deposits - are you guys for real?
I spose you think the twin towers was an inside job too
Its working title is Forum on Capitalist Collapse, although that name may change as other leftists express their opinions.
What about
"Forum Undermining Capitalist Kingdoms Engendering Dictatorship"
Grant writes: "English says the “option” of freezing bank deposits has been “available to the Reserve Bank for a number of years”. But this “truth” hides a bigger lie. Up till now, the Reserve Bank has lacked the technical means to put this option into operation.
That technical blockage is, however, being rapidly overcome by the installation of networked computer systems."
Since when did a very minor technological advance ever precipitate a sudden total anarchic upheaval of society as we know it?
The poster posting before was right. Nutty my friends,nutty, nutty nutty.
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