Economics from a Dummy

**DISCLAIMER: If any of the following appears strange or offensive in any way, please assume that it is intended as exaggeration or hyperbole.**

Although I know almost nothing about economics, I shall present my economic theory here. Thusly, it shall, quite literally, be an idiot’s guide to economics, in that I am the idiot.

My Lack of Credentials

I was forced to take an economics course in high school – a whole semester of a course! I was told at some point in my life that I should love economics, for it is a social science infused with math, and these are two things I have been known to enjoy, excluding of course, my K-12 (minus 8th and 11th grades) difficulties with actual social studies courses. However, not only do I not love economics, I rather detest it. I find it painfully boring, and I find myself unable to grasp most economic concepts. It’s very possible that the former is causing the latter; in fact, I would argue that it most certainly is, as evidenced by my love of hardcore neuroscience and hardcore physics despite my inability to grasp things in those fields of knowledge. This is evidence because my lack of understanding with interest feels entirely different from my lack of understanding without interest. Furthermore, even when I do understand something in economics, I am still intensely bored by it, and I think it might be impossible for me to have any real interest in it.

Anyway, the point is, I don’t understand much of anything that involves economics, and I think I got a B or less in that economics class I was forced to take. Thus, I am by no means, an expert or qualified in any way to postulate any kind of economic theory or even thought.

My Theory (or Quasi-Theory, or really Non-Theory)

My Non-Theory has three nearly unrelated parts.

Part One: It’s All a Gamble

Something suddenly occurred to me today that I am quite sure no other human on Earth has ever realized before. In fact, I am so sure of this, that I am not even going to Google to confirm my statement.

It occurred to me that the whole stock market is nothing but institutionalized, society-encouraged, legal gambling. One is expected to invest money in something with the hope that that money will grow, but it’s very possible that the money will shrink significantly. One is expected to continue gambling that money, and decide at what point the stock should be sold, which is also a gamble. One is then expected to continue this never-ending loop of buying and selling stocks, and thus, the gambling never ends.

One of the few things I remember from that economics course that was forced upon me in high school was the claims of the importance of investing, particularly in the stock market. I believe it was a guest speaker that explained that it is best to start early, and that our parents would likely help us. Clearly, these stock-pushers wanted to get the kids started young on their new legal gambling addictions, and clearly they wanted to get as many of us involved in it as possible, while we were young and impressionable, by having an authority figure that we were to inherently trust to tell us of all the wonderful things that might happen if we invest early. This very clearly indicates the degree to which our society encourages stock market gambling.

Since I couldn’t help myself, I did Google, but I will just pretend that this wasn’t the first Google result of many that indicates that the stock market being a form of gambling is a commonly held belief.

Part Two: Commodity Stocks will be our Downfall

Some time ago (I don’t know how long ago, hence the use of  “some time ago”), I saw a video on the interwebs that explained commodity stock trading. I don’t know what that video was, and I am far too lazy to find it for you. As you should expect if you read the beginning of this blog posting, I failed to understand the bulk of what the video explained. However, I did understand one thing (that might or might not have been explicated in the video): The commodity stock trade will be our downfall.

The man in the video and people that I have seen on the TV after I saw the video explained that commodities are things like oil, sugar, coffee, and most importantly, cocoa. From what I gather, it seems that Wall Street people make presumably psychic speculations about the future of these commodities and then pretend to trade them via the stock market. Their pretend trading causes real things to happen to the prices of these commodities in our real economy, and I am therefore quite sure, will inevitably cause real problems and our real downfall as a society that once had a real economy.

The gambling of the commodity portion of the stock market is far worse than the normal stock market gambling. It’s a game involving imaginary trades that result in real changes that affect real people and real chocolate. I therefore suggest, with my complete and utter lack of credentials and nearly complete lack of economic understanding, that we abolish the commodity stock trade, and that alone will fix our economy. I’m sure of it – as sure as I am of the originality and pure novelty of Part One of my Fabulous Non-Theory of Economics.

Ultimately, I felt bad that I didn’t look for the video that first taught me about commodities, so I tried to find it, but I could not. While unsuccessfully searching for it, I saw several snippets that seem to agree with me in that commodity speculation is damaging, and I won't pretend those don't exist. Here are some French people talking about the need for regulation of it. This suggests that I might have understood this better than I thought I did. I go girl!

Part Three: Simple Taxes for Simple and Also Not Simple Folk

A few months or a few years ago, I had a brilliant thought. Instead of arguing about different groups of people being taxed different amounts, and instead of having horribly confusing tax laws and forms, why not have a simplified theory on taxation. Since I’m playing fast and loose with my misuse of the word “theory,” I figured I should continue with that trend. Anyway, my simplified taxation non-theory is as follows:

Pick a percentage, and require all the people to pay that particular percentage of their net (or would it be gross? I'm not entirely sure what these things mean) income to the government as their sole taxes. That way, the wealthier people will end up paying higher taxes, the poorer people will pay lower taxes, and no one will complain because it will be 100% fair. Perhaps a few tweaks here and there would be necessary, but I think this could work really well.

For someone who knows nearly nothing about economics, I sure am smart, with my brilliant ideas! But I won’t run for president, and you can’t make me.