Off The Books
Has anyone else noticed the proliferation of "tip jars" in strange places? I'm now seeing them at fast-food joints, movie theater refreshment counters, the corner grocery store, and even car rental desks. My dry cleaner has one.
Several factors are behind this. But essentially it's a response to a stagflationary environment in which wages aren't keeping pace with the cost of living. Of course it contributes to a vicious circle, because when income that would have been taxed stays off the books, generally the government either raises taxes or prints more money (the latter is presently the case) which in turn increases the cost of living. Incidentally, keeping income on the books and thus in the system is one benefit of raising the minimum wage.
When you start seeing tip jars next to the cockpit when leaving an airplane, you'll know we've reached some sort of breaking point.
posted by The Cunning Realist at Monday, April 09, 2007
8 Comments:
i also see Tip Jars on various blogs.
Kudos for not asking...YET. I know stagflation can be a burden :)
Has anyone besides me found that the labor statistics are pure fantasy?
Corporations are laying off thousands while eligible workers are graduating from high schools, colleges and graduate schools and our monthly job creation, thanks to massive gov't hiring, has still been abysmal for well over a year, maybe 2.
Now, just who puts out these statistics? Huh?
http://www.economist.com/displayStory.cfm?story_id=8984177&fsrc=RSS
http://www.stockhouse.ca/shfn/article.asp?edtID=19504
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601012&refer=commodities&sid=a6_GQirc88VI
It's gotten bad with the tip jars. If you go to a night club, the person taking your money, has a tip jar (Yes, I've seen them at those "night clubs", but i'm talking about normal night clubs). So I'm supposed to tip this person, because they took my admission to the club? It makes me uncomfortable with these tip jars showing up everywhere. People need to stop filling these tip jars, so that the real problems can come to light.
Obviously I am a big fan of gold. The economist link was rather funny. He posts the chart of gold Vs the Dow. Correctly pointing out that the only relative comparison is after 1972 when gold and the USD became unlinked...but fails to make the connection that between 1972 and 1982...gold beats dow...1982 to 2000 dow beats gold...2000 to present gold beats dow. Hedge my butt...it has been a solid investment...if you were smart enough to jump into stocks early 80s and smart enough to buy gold after dropping into the 200s...wow what a killing you would have made. Combine that with lack of federal oversight in gold sales (not that I am advocating tax avoidance) and it is a no brainer. If the mass public starts buying and selling gold the days of lax oversight will be over. Big gains to be made staying ahead of the herd. If the mainstream public continues to get hammered by the run away printing press gold may see a huge boom. I've noticed NPR's market watch started giving the gold price every episode. Of course if the dow collapsed and everybody starts buying gold...that is about the time to start investing in stocks again. Love Doug Casey by the way. I got in late on the Uranium boom but I have still made a bunch of money from his advice on Canadian jr. mining companies...as far as the public goes I couldn't care less about their troubles. They deserve everything they get for being dumb enough to support the US federal goverment. I show my lack of faith and support by betting against the US dollar. I will continue to do this until this sham of an economy has a major correction. The majority of the US population will not see the error of their ways until that happens.
Little doubt, the chap is certainly right.
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