LITMIR.BIZ

Скачать книгу

the country’s greatest architects and designers. He is considered to be among the most accomplished Americans in history, having a substantial number of patents to his name. He was a respected futurist and inspiration for John Denver’s lyrics about “grandfather of the future” in his song “What One Man Can Do.” Fuller was an environmentalist before most people knew what the word meant. But most of all, he is respected because he used his genius to work for a world that benefited everyone… not just himself or the rich and powerful.

      I read a number of Dr. Fuller’s books before reading Grunch of Giants. The problem for me was that most of his earlier books were on math and science. Those books went right over my head. But Grunch of Giants I understood.

      Reading Grunch of Giants confirmed many of my unspoken suspicions regarding the way the world worked. I began to understand why we do not teach kids about money in school. I also knew why I was sent to Vietnam to fight a war we should never have fought. Simply put, war is profitable. War is often about greed, not patriotism. After nine years in the military, four attending a federal military academy, and five as a Marine Corps pilot who served in Vietnam twice, I could only agree with Dr. Fuller. I understood from firsthand experience why he refers to the CIA as Capitalism’s Invisible Army.

      The best thing about Grunch of Giants was that it awakened the student in me. For the first time in my life, I wanted to study a subject, the subject of how the rich and powerful exploit the rest of us—legally. Since 1983, I have studied and read over 50 books on this subject. In each book, I found one or two pieces of the puzzle. The book you are reading now will put those many puzzle pieces together.

       Is There a Conspiracy?

      Conspiracy theories are a dime a dozen. We have all heard them. There are conspiracy theories about who killed Presidents Lincoln and Kennedy, and about who killed Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. There are also conspiracy theories about September 11, 2001. Those theories will never die. Theories are theories. They are based on suspicions and unanswered questions.

      I am not writing this book to sell you another conspiracy theory. My research has convinced me that there have been many conspiracies of the rich, both in the past and the present, and there will be more conspiracies in the future. When money and power are at stake, there will always be conspiracies. Money and power will always cause people to commit corrupt acts. In 2008, for instance, Bernard Madoff was accused of running a $50 billion Ponzi scheme to defraud not only wealthy clients, but also schools, charities, and pension funds. He once held the highly respected position of head of NASDAQ; he did not need more money, yet he allegedly stole it for years from very smart people and worthy organizations dependent upon his competence in financial markets.

      Another example of the corruption of money and power is spending over half a billion dollars to be elected the president of the United States, a job that pays only $400,000. Spending money like that on an election is not healthy for our country.

      So has there been a conspiracy? I believe so, in a way. But the question is, So what? What are you and I going to do about it? Most of the people who caused this latest financial crisis are dead, yet their work lives on. Arguing with dead people would be rather futile.

      Regardless of whether there is a conspiracy, there are certain circumstances and events that impact your life in profound and unseen ways. Let’s look at financial education, for instance. I’ve often marveled at the lack of financial education in our modern school system. At best, our children are taught how to balance a checkbook, speculate in the stock market, save money in banks, and invest in a retirement plan for the long term. In other words, they are taught to turn their money over to the rich, who supposedly have their best interest at heart.

      Every time an educator brings a banker or a financial planner into their classroom, supposedly in the name of financial education, they are actually allowing the fox to enter the henhouse. I am not saying bankers and financial planners are bad people. All I am saying is that they are agents of the rich and powerful. Their job is not to educate but to recruit future customers. That is why they preach the doctrine of saving your money and investing in mutual funds. It helps the bank, not you. Again, I reiterate this is not bad. It’s good business for the bank. It is no different than Army and Marine recruiters coming on campus when I was in high school and selling students on the glory of serving our country.

      One of the causes of this financial crisis is that most people do not know good financial advice from bad financial advice. Most people cannot tell a good financial advisor from a con man. Most people cannot tell a good investment from a bad one. Most people go to school so they can get a good job, work hard, pay taxes, buy a house, save money, and turn over any extra money to a financial planner—or an expert like Bernie Madoff.

      Most people leave school not knowing even the basic differences between a stock and a bond, between debt and equity. Few know why preferred stocks are labeled preferred and why mutual funds are mutual, or the difference between a mutual fund, hedge fund, exchange-traded fund, and a fund of funds. Many people think debt is bad, yet debt can make you rich. Debt can increase your return on investment, but only if you know what you are doing. Only a few know the difference between capital gains and cash flow and which is less risky. Most people blindly accept the idea of going to school to get a good job and never know why employees pay higher tax rates than the entrepreneur who owns the business. Many people are in trouble today because they believed their home was an asset, when it was really a liability. These are basic and simple financial concepts. Yet for some reason, our schools conveniently omit a subject required for a successful life—the subject of money.

      In 1903, John D. Rockefeller created the General Education Board. It seems this was done to ensure a steady supply of employees who were always financially in need of money, a job, and job security. There is evidence that Rockefeller was influenced by the Prussian system of education, a system designed to produce good employees and good soldiers, people who dutifully follow orders, such as “Do this or be fired,” or “Turn your money over to me for safe keeping, and I’ll invest it for you.” Regardless of whether this was Rockefeller’s intent in creating the General Education Board, the result today is that even those with a good education and a secure job are feeling financially insecure.

      Without a basic financial education, long-term financial security is almost impossible. In 2008, millions of American baby boomers began retiring at a rate of 10,000 a day, expecting the government to take care of them financially and medically. Today, many people are finally learning that job security does not ensure long-term financial security.

      In 1913, the Federal Reserve was created, even though the Founding Fathers, creators of the U.S. Constitution, were very much against a national bank that controlled the money supply. Without proper financial education, few people know that the Federal Reserve is not federal, it has no reserves, and it is not a bank. Once the Fed was in place, there were two sets of rules when it came to money: One set of rules for people who work for money, and another set of rules for the rich who print money.

      In 1971, when President Nixon took the United States off the gold standard, the conspiracy of the rich was complete. In 1974, the U.S. Congress passed the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA), which led to retirement vehicles like the 401(k). This act effectively forced millions of workers who enjoyed employer-provided defined benefit (DB) pension plans to instead rely on defined contribution (DC) pension plans and put all their retirement money in the stock market and mutual funds. Wall Street now had control of the U.S. citizens’ retirement money. The rules of money were completely changed and heavily tilted in favor of the rich and powerful. The biggest financial boom in the history of the world began, and today, in 2009, that boom has busted.

       Reader Comment

       I remember when they stopped backing our money with gold. Inflation went crazy. I was only a teenager and had gotten my first job. Things I needed back then I had to buy myself—prices of goods went up, but not my parents’ paychecks.

       The discussions of the adults revolved around how this could have happened. They felt that this could be the downfall of our whole economic

Скачать книгу