Walking Dead Mercantilism

Zombie politics leads to a walking dead economy.

Envy is a powerful force.

   "Whoever has the most gold at the end, wins," summarizes mercantile economics, popular in the 18th Century but still followed today by those who adhere to free-market economics unfettered by any government regulation, notwithstanding the reality that markets cannot exist without some form of regulation.
   But the problem with mercantile thinking is this: If the winner has all the money, the loser has none and therefore cannot buy anything from the winner. Thus, there is no market at all.
   And so goes the cycle, until one nation dominates the world, since it has all the money. It produces nothing and it makes nothing, but it has won and that's all that matters.
   Inevitably, however, the losers soon become resentful, hungry and poor. Envy is a powerful economic force, just as hunger and poverty are powerful political forces.
   Soon enough, then, the losers get desperate and a leader arises, encouraging people to organize and fight for what they need to survive.
   Sound familiar?
   It happened to the Roman Empire two thousand years ago, it happened to Spain in the 18th Century, and it happened to the British Empire soon after.
   On a different level, it happened in America in the 19th and 20th Centuries as workers formed unions to push for fair treatment by industrial tyrants.  And unless attitudes change as some U.S. political leaders and candidates call for dominance over American trading partners, the result will be an attempt to form an economic empire that will eventually collapse behind its own walls.
   
   Walls do not make for good trading partners, whether those barriers be physical blockades or high import tariffs. Eventually, the wall and its sponsoring government both collapse.
   Over time, the Great Wall of China failed., the Roman walls in Britain failed, the Berlin Wall failed, the Iron Curtain failed, and the proposed Mexican wall will fail.
   
   Some call these variations on mercantilism supply-side economics. "If you make it, they will buy," is the article of faith guiding the cause.
   But the question soon becomes, "With what? The people have no money."
   Some call it Voodoo Economics, the idea that if you cut taxes at the top, in the long run the benefits will trickle down and energize everyone.
   However, as economist John Maynard Keynes pointed out, "In the long run we are all dead."
   But mercantilistic supply siders don't care about the long run. They want all the money now, so they and they alone can eat drink and be merry, with no cares for those not part of their own self-perceived elite.