The post-Covid world that will arrive… one day

Summary:

1 - Human beings, instruments of capital

2- The infinite accumulation of capital
3 - Surplus of people

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1 - Human beings, instruments of capital

Among the multiple effects of the pandemic, some - non-sanitary ones - can be
highlighted, such as greater difficulty in utilization, by the large emporiums, regarding
the scrutiny, classification, manipulation of personal data, for purposes of their
segmentation or homogenization, with the norms to be followed and the
accompanying surveillance, diluting individual capacities in an alienating and useless
work, articulated with a leisure time filled with mind-boggling activities.

These useless activities serve only to convince its practitioner to remain integrated at
the circus of capital, however useless their "work" could be from an economic, social or,
cultural enrichment point of view. Work, being an effort, only fits if it produces
something socially necessary or useful; however, in many cases, the performer's entire
life is crossed without him ever realizing the uselessness or damage that resulted from
the application of his time and his physical and soul capacities. This distortion in the
lives of human beings has become typical of capitalism and, due to its dimension, leads
to damages of an animistic, environmental and sanitary nature that affect large human
groups or even humanity; as is the case with military cannon.

In the past, in the dominant classes, especially in the nobility, their main activities were
leisure and war, with the delivery of heritage management, the collection of taxes and
tributes, to someone qualified for the purpose - an ecclesiastical or a commoner. In the
other population strata, in the countryside or the embryonic cities, there was no place
for useless tasks, seen as work; everyone knew the purpose and real usefulness of their
work effort, even if it was leisure or the satisfaction of a gentleman's whim. It was a

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question of guaranteeing subsistence and measuring labor effort according to the
needs of the family group and the payment of the tribute to the local master - in kind,
young people for war or domestic service in the castle or palace.

In times of epidemic, bad harvests or, devastation by the war - there is no ...
unemployment benefits or tasks defined by the public authorities to make up for the
lack of income, as in the New Deal, the only emigration remained, or the search for
occupation in the cities, where productive activity was much more diverse than in the
countryside.

Mobility after the European expansion of the sixteenth century was extended to the
global space, greed, spirit of adventure, war or through the trade of spices, slaves,
weapons .. . This mobility involved areas where complex and even more advanced
societies lived than European ones, but which gave in to European colonization. Where
this did not happen, as in North America and the Caribbean, the rule was the
extermination of its inhabitants and the massive recourse to slavery ... covered by the
divine figures of the Christian pantheon and its priests.

Capitalism, generating the incessant demand for capital accumulation and benefiting
from technologies that generate high productivity gains, could reduce the time
dedicated to working, freeing Humanity from labor effort and giving it free time for its
use in the delight of culture, sport, sociability ...

But it did not and will continue not to. It benefits from the essentials of productivity
gains, builds huge bureaucracies and instruments for the control of labor and its
workers so that the labor force remains pacified and captured by the logic of
capitalism, accepting its subordination to the stars as written in the stars. capitalists.

An entire ideology based on the segmentation of labor income between workers and
employers is developed; and these, even though they are very minority, benefit from
the majority of gains. Capital leaders say that it is essential to have capitalists because
they are the ones who create jobs, pay wages ... thus showing the secondary character,
the accessory of workers. In the capitalists' bible, God created the capitalist and, as a
result, created the wage earner to ensure the welfare and entertainment of the former.

2- The infinite accumulation of capital

Capitalism conceives no limits for accumulation and invents ways to increase it to

infinity, to consolidate its perpetuity and perpetuate its power over the population and
the resources of the planet. On the one hand, in terms of the production of goods and
services, it seeks to maximize its supply to increase profits; and, on the other hand, in
total contradiction, it seeks to maintain restraint in income from work knowing that
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restricted purchasing power means less consumption, less spending. And, that is why
people point to the unreasonable recourse to debt to feed consumerism in all social
strata, after the capacity to use labor income has dried up. How do you get out of this?

Of course, this is not enough. This results in dementia inherent in the financial system,
which, as a central element in the multiplication of capital, is always overcome by a
drive, gluttony that is never satisfied, with the increase and appreciation of the
securities it issues; nor with the profit margins it obtains from the transactions it carries
out, at all times. Hence the financial crises, the military conflicts and the "investment" in
armaments, with the leadership of the managers of the big central banks, of global
institutions such as the IMF or the BIS - Bank of International Settlements, which follows
the situation of the global financial system; as well as national and political classes that
are responsible for managing the impacts of financial folly governments, and turn them
in social and economic crisis, with increasing sharpness and increasingly frequent, as
can be seen by comparing the Wall crisis Street in 2008 with the one that develops in
the coronavirus ride.

Financialization, with the creation of money exponentially, in a virtual way, inserted in

networks of data circulation, generated in instantaneously way and linked together, is,
at all times, speculative business networks. The material basis of the economy, based on
the production of goods and services or domestic self-production and self-
consumption, has lost relevance and has become an appendix, a by-product of the
market, duly supervised by the state apparatus.

3 - Surplus of people[1]

There is a time of great uncertainty in the face of the virus and fear in the face of the
assault on the income of the popular classes. Among the effects of the pandemic, some
can be highlighted, such as greater difficulty in using, by the large emporiums, the
scrutiny, the framing, the manipulation of personal data, for their segmentation or
homogenization; also, with the establishment of standards to be complied with and
adequate surveillance, diluting individual capacities in an alienating and useless work;
or, with leisure time filled with mind-boggling activities. With these useless activities -
not felt as such by the worker - it is intended to give him a false idea about the
importance of his work. It is an alienating and pacifying practice - typical of capitalism.

In the pre-capitalist modes of production, labor functions could be painful, but their
purposes were known; no one performed functions without knowing the objective,
even if it was the satisfaction of a whim from his master. In capitalism, technologies
would allow sharp reductions in working time, without loss of income, if all the
functions to be performed were recognized as socially useful. This would mean

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increased leisure time, for study, culture or sport and this would result in the great
political question - if the means allow the production of all goods and services useful to
Humanity, it is necessary to abolish those who condemn the crowd to journeys of long,
painful and low-income jobs. As well as all socially useless or harmful activities.

For the way the crowd - in times of covid-19 - allows for massive unemployment, the
layoff, the extended resource to charity, the limitations in the circulation in the physical
space, the loss of hours of life with the eyes glazed on the new screen, a very nebulous
and not very promising future, it appears that the articulation between the capitalists
and the political classes dominates the situation.

In Portugal, what followed the financial debacle caused by the PS-PSD party-state,
before and during the troika's intervention (2011-2015); and, the pacification by the
"left" of the sparse contestation then took place, still shows its effects. The Portuguese
political class, as in other countries, did not solve any problems of those existing at that
time and added the effects attributed to the covid-19.

The occupation of the State by political parties that place all the responsibilities for the
economic and social management of society on their members and are attached, remits
the population to the situation of meek and soft objects, of subordinates subordinated
to the interests of the political class. The virus crisis, which has a duration far beyond
what was initially foreseen, reveals, in a first instance, the immense inability of
management by the political classes - with emphasis on Western Europe, USA and,
Brazil - contrasting with the coldness and capacity observed in several East Asian
countries. In all cases, however, there is a constant - the absence of popular initiatives
capable of organizing themselves in a network, moving away from the pyramidal logic
and the monstrous bureaucracy that characterizes state apparatus; the people stick to
the TV and watch, passive, the repetitive spectacle starring hordes of mandarins and
writers; and, being stupid, they will be ready to sleep with a mask or bathe in tar if
determined by a prime minister.

If humanity cannot, due to physical or institutional limitations, produce the income

necessary to accompany the speculative financial drift, it must resort to devices to
increase the capital involved in the economic circuit; and in the process, the globalized
financial system and the governments that serve it disrupt societies, spread suffering,
artificialize economies, offend the planet.

In Portugal, this summer, the savings rate exceeded 10%, which is close to zero (when
not negative) values in recent years; and this is related to major drops in consumption
and disposable income. The people have the good sense to take precautions for worse
days, however, the banking system and governments do not know what may arise; for

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example, they can penalize accounts with a balance above a certain amount to
encourage consumption or, increase the tax burden to reduce the public deficit. The
power wants to return to the zero savings rate so that the money can be captured by
the financial carousel; its business is to generate debt, not savings. And in 2023, it is
expected that in Europe in the euro, there will be no money on paper or metal;
everything will be recorded, not on the stars but the servers of the globalized financial
system[2], a much higher degree of control over the lives of populations.

Today, the so desired economic growth, that of the nebulous GDP, has as its central
and most usual feature, the recourse to debts contracted by families, companies and,
States. The financial carousel runs on another stage.

 As a rule, families are indebted to banks, namely to support homeownership

and means of transport, essential needs neglected by States; these, avid tax
collectors, gave their satisfaction to the sacred "private initiative"[3]. The debt gear,
originating in families, has the following framework:

 Families are indebted for decades, taking advantage of the low-interest rates
granted by banks; and the States show their parasitism by collecting taxes - IMT, Selo
and later, IMI, ad secula seculorum.

 The risk for banks is low because the property is subject to mortgage and surety
bonds; the risk is entire of the families, in cases of unemployment or marital
separation, for example;

 Low-interest rates are in line with wages, also with weak developments. And the
former do not particularly concern banks, as will be seen below;

 The creditor banks are not waiting for decades to pass to recover the borrowed
capital and interest. They add up a large number of credits, share their value in
securities they place on the financial market, recovering the equivalent of a large part
of the credit granted to debtor families. This operation is called securitization and
corresponds to the constitution of a cascade of successive operations, with the
inclusion of new credits, involving successive groups of long-term home buyers or
others;

 Briefly, there is a family debt built up for several decades and a bank granting
the loan. This bank will collect several loans of this type (and others) and issue bonds
that will be purchased by other institutions, thus recovering a value that includes the
value of the totality of these various loans granted. However, he did not cease to be
a creditor of that family and others; only an expedient used to anticipate the return
of the value of loan.
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The transaction put into circulation a value that is the mirror of the housing loans
included therein; and, this can be multiplied n times, as many as the securitizations
made involving the debts, being able to be associated with a set of mirrors or the
constitution of the pyramids of Ponzi, whose maximum value is, theoretically, the
infinite. Putting all those debts together, the same bank becomes the debtor of those
who purchased the bonds issued but collected money for new investments.

The transaction put into circulation a value that is the mirror of the housing loans
included therein; and, this can be multiplied n times, as many as the securitizations
made involving the debts, being able to be associated with a set of mirrors or the
constitution of the pyramids of Ponzi, whose maximum value is, theoretically, the
infinite. Putting all those debts together, the same bank becomes the debtor of those
who purchased the bonds issued but collected money for new investments. The
financial balance does not change; what is added is the present and future fiscal
puncture to pay the public debt and private indebtedness, resulting from the
abandonment by the states of housing and public transport policies in favor of the
much sung private initiative.

Companies also resort to debt. Low-interest rates are rooted in central bank policy in
the same direction, with due repercussions on commercial banking, which in turn
develops securitization actions to free up capital for new loans.

Cheap credit - and the almost zero rates of return on deposits - work together to
encourage consumption and, at the same time, discourage savings; hence, an almost
obligation is formed in the sense of indebtedness… as it is in the interest of the
financial system and the political classes that, in the sequence, take possession of the
future of people and companies, captured by the obligations in the financial system.
The credit training is born, not savings but in the Ponzi pyramid in which it appears the
practice of securitization.

These pyramids are also magnified by the constant entry into the "legal" circuits of
money from various types of traffic (drugs, weapons, human beings…), corruption, etc.
to the joy of the financial system and the distracted eye of the supervision of central
banks and other pompous regulators; as a rule, governments are more cautious about
fiscal leakage from small businesses and very little about tax evasion from the wealthy
[4]. These regulators and national governments have traditionally been distracted by
the money that circulates between the visible financial system and the dozens of
offshore registries around the world, especially on remote islands.

By maximizing the availability of cheap credit, companies reduce the use of equity; and,
in the Portuguese case, it has also become trivialized - and for many years now - the

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use, by companies, of contributions, due and unpaid, to the sleepy Portuguese Social
Security , parasitized by all governments ... without any protest from the union world or
the parties opposition sayings. The decapitalization of Social Security is a recurring
practice that is part of a tacit agreement within the political class.

The competitiveness of companies will thus arise from low wage levels of workers -
atomized and disorganized - in working hours unpaid in precarious work, dismissal or,
even facilitated, by layoffs facilitated by the government in covid-19 times.

This whole system based on credit cascades is extremely vulnerable even if anchored at
very low- interest rates, to avoid difficulties for companies and, linked to equally low
inflation rates; thus, it fosters a high consumer propensity for the population, which,
with stagnant wages, embarks on recourse to credit, facilitated by banking.

 This model of integration of entities - companies, especially the smallest ones,

the States and the banking sector - depends essentially on the central bank, which
can hardly cancel it:

 The supply of the financial system cannot be stopped because bank credit
would be much more expensive and difficult to obtain without firm guarantees,
which many companies could not offer;

 Its cessation would lead to a huge global crisis, it would be the collapse of a
house of cards, with the bankruptcy of countless companies, indebted and with an
accumulation of bad loans in the banks. The activation of mortgages would lead to
the accumulation of real estate without buyers and, therefore, devalued, with
upstream impacts, on construction, which incorporates elements from many
industries, services and work;

 The dismissals of workers and the mobilization of replacement income, coming

from the state level, not prevent m difficulties in paying the installments of loans for
housing;

The subsequent effects on public accounts (deficits) would affect the usual use of
public debt "auctions", certainly with much higher interest rates than today.

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[1] According to the Portuguese Minister of Labor, 42000 companies resorted to the simplified layoff (two
minimum wages) and other measures that involved 380000 workers
[2] The disappearance of physical money in Europe from the euro - today, a value of $ 14.5 ^ 11 - which will
incorporate the availability of the financial system for speculation to which must be added the costs of supplying
populations with notes and coins, leaving populations without any instruments of exchange other than a direct
exchange of potatoes for onions, for example. If you think that the fortune of the five richest people on the planet -
Bezos, Gates, Arnaud, Zuckerberg and, Ellison - is $ 414 ^ 9 … it might not be much…
[3] http://grazia-tanta.blogspot.pt/2012/12/a-nao-politica-de-habitacao-eo-imi-1.html
http://grazia-tanta.blogspot.pt/2013/01/a-nao-politica-de-habitacao-eo-imi.html
[4] In Portugal, the BES case is a good example of the interweaving of circuits and the parsimony of how
governments view the issue, incorporating into their rosters people who are very well connected with
the financial crime or senior law firms. No ruler wants to (or can) show himself as a Robin of the Woods,
although the staff of the… sheriffs of Nottingham abound within him.

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