Communitarian Themes in the 'Hunger Games' (Spoilers)

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Sunday April 01, 2012 · 6:58 PM PDT

2012/04/01 · 18:58

"A toast to my big brother George: The richest man in town." So ends It's a Wonderful Life, probably the most well-known film with a communitarian climax, where the lead character George, both finds meaning for himself through his sacrifices to others, and sees it come back to him as family, friends and respect in the community bring him real wealth, literal and figurative.

Katniss Everdeen is no solitary heroine. The theme that through mutual help and cooperation with others, we can achieve more than we could on our own also pervades the popular book and film series the Hunger Games. We see this through the decision of Gale and Katniss not to run away from the District in the beginning, Katniss volunteering to take the place of her sister Prim as a tribute, the critical help given to Peeta and Katniss by Haymitch their mentor, Cinna the stylist, the help Peeta and Katniss give to each other, the strategy of forming teams within the game including between Katniss and Rue, and through the gifts, which depend on the ability of the tributes to win sponsors. Finally we see it in the finale, where the power of selflessness allows Katniss and Peeta to break the rules and escape the games.

randomfacts

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Saturday March 17, 2012 · 10:05 AM PDT

2012/03/17 · 10:05

One of the big Republican talking points in this election will be "debts exploding under Obama". This is grossly misleading. Never mind that Obama inherited a $1.4 trillion deficit from Bush, who put together the fiscal year 2009 budget, and deficits have gone down since then.

In fact, total debt owed by Americans has not increased significantly under Obama at all. It has increased far less than under the Bush and Clinton administrations.

randomfacts

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Tuesday January 10, 2012 · 6:01 PM PST

2012/01/10 · 18:01

randomfacts

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Sunday December 11, 2011 · 7:40 AM PST

2011/12/11 · 07:40

I've been pretty depressed by world trends over the past year.

First you have the revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt which originally were supposed to be about freedom but now seem to be getting taken over by Islamists. In the hometown of the fruit seller who burned himself a year ago in Tunisia to set off the revolution, a landslide was won by a populist hard-right charlatan living in Europe. Then you had the TV executive whose house was set on fire for broadcasting a documentary that showed an image of Mohammed, despite it being an award-winning Iranian movie (Persepolis) from another Muslim country. Instead of the arsons being brought to justice, the TV executive was the one brought to trial. Meanwhile in Egypt, the Salafists, who are against democracy have won anywhere from 21 to 30 percent of the vote in the first round, which supposedly included all of the most liberal and secular parts of Egypt. Even worse, the secular Egyptian Bloc refuses to represent the interests of the average impoverished Egyptian, leaving that task up to the Salafists. The Egyptian Bloc appears to be a hodgepodge of losers from the former regime, and middle class (read: rich), out of touch neo-liberals. Basically, there is no leftist party in Egypt of any significance whatsoever.

randomfacts

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Wednesday November 16, 2011 · 5:10 PM PST

2011/11/16 · 17:10

The banking system is not the enemy.

Banks play a critical role in our society. Whether big or small, they essentially do the same thing-- financial inter-mediation. That is, they bring together those people who have savings with those people who can put those savings to use doing some activity.

Almost every company that employs any person in the private sector today gets funding from a bank and has from their inception. Too many people talk too flippantly about "bringing down the international financial system". The consequences of this would be very bad. And it would not be the 1% who are hurt the most by this. It would be the 99%. Because the 99% are the most vulnerable to any downturn in the economy.

randomfacts

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Thursday November 10, 2011 · 4:40 PM PST

2011/11/10 · 16:40

To the left is a chart of the difference between interest rates charged Germany and France since late 2006. The higher the difference, the more worried investors are France will default, hence they will charge France a higher interest rate to borrow. To the right is a chart of Credit Default Swap (CDS) contract prices on major US commercial banks leading up to the 2008 financial crisis. The higher the price, the more worried investors were of US commercial bank default, hence the more willing they were to pay for CDS insurance contracts.

Notice a similarity?

randomfacts

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Monday October 31, 2011 · 4:42 PM PDT

2011/10/31 · 16:42

I'll be honest. I never read Naomi Klein's 'Shock Doctrine', and I have been pretty skeptical about her actual sophistication when it comes to the ability to debate economics. I only heard of the 'Shock Doctrine' as a way of using a crisis to force through drastic pro-market, neo-liberal reforms that would never be approved democratically.

But that's the perfect analogy for what's happening right now in Europe. Germany is using the crisis to force other countries to bust their unions, destroy labor protections, crush pensions and social security, slash wages, and bring up unemployment rates. Because German is in a currency union with the rest of Europe, it has, by necessity, a shared monetary policy. But Germany refuses to allow that monetary policy to work for Greece, Italy, Spain, and other countries. It prefers to force these countries into adjustments of the above described nature.

The problem is that the countries cannot adjust fast enough because they are under speculative attack by the markets, and face a liquidity crunch. Besides that, forcing these countries into adjustment is undemocratic. The correct solution is to break up the euro area.

randomfacts

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Saturday October 22, 2011 · 4:04 PM PDT

2011/10/22 · 16:04

The sickness that pervades the global economy in the West is contraction-ism--- the moralistic doctrine of take your medicine, pay for your mistakes, suffering is noble. First there is a great agony about economic pain. Then the cure for the agony is prescribed-- more agony. It comes not only from elites such as those in Europe which are leading the world towards disaster, but also from popular blogs and online commentary and in news articles of the day. The voice is nearly unanimous: contraction!

Alongside the doctrine of contraction-ism is the voice of pessimism. All good news must be dismissed at once-- it cannot be real. Only suffering is real. There is a downside to everything, for if it is day in America, it is night in China, and if it is night in China, it is day in America. The glass half full, is half-empty. You see? There is no corner into which the ideology of relentless defeatism cannot possibly thrust and triumph.

randomfacts

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Sunday September 25, 2011 · 10:25 PM PDT

2011/09/25 · 22:25

Should We Just F@#k Everything?

randomfacts

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Saturday August 27, 2011 · 8:25 PM PDT

2011/08/27 · 20:25

Thinking about the various problems with the economy, and looking at the various ideas that people have, it appears to me that overall, what people want most is the liquidation of the financial system and elimination of debts by one way or another, so that we can start clean again.

Up until now, I have been pretty skeptical of this idea, because I've always it would be too painful, and it'll bring a lot of hardship on people. But the more I read, the more that it's clear that this is the overwhelming consensus of most people.

If there's one thing that trumps economics, it's politics. That is true in the modern world because our societies are basically abundant. We have the capacity to be quite prosperous. The key question is how we choose to act politically. And as democracies, it's the will of the majority of people that matters. If the majority of people want to liquidate the present financial system, regardless of the cost to pain, then ultimately this outcome must prevail.

randomfacts

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Friday August 19, 2011 · 12:37 AM PDT

2011/08/19 · 00:37

My economic plan is simple: have the government print $10 trillion. Then give $10,000 to every household in America.

I am quite serious.

Yes there will be some inflation as a one-time effect, but the effect will be more than cancelled out by the $10,000 check.

Yes the dollar will depreciate compared to other currencies. This will act as a 'tariff' to incentivize people to spend their money on American-made things.

randomfacts

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Wednesday August 10, 2011 · 9:17 AM PDT

2011/08/10 · 09:17

Above is a chart of the "yield" on German and French government debt. Much like US Treasury "bonds", "bills", and "notes", the European debt also have specific names. The German bond is called the "bund", while the French bond is called the "BTAN".

The "yield" charted above refers to the interest rate charged by the market on this debt. Usually, when the economy is doing well, investors charge a higher interest rates for governments to borrow, because the private sector sees lots of other good opportunities to put its money. When the economy isn't doing well (like now), investors charge the government just a little to borrow, because they don't see anywhere else to put their money (If you read Krugman, you get this).

But notice something about this chart.

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Communitarian Themes in the 'Hunger Games' (Spoilers)

Obama's Deficits

LOL Redstate

Depressed.

The Banking System is not the Enemy

Is France about to default?

Shock Doctrine is Destroying Europe

Contractionism Rules the Day

X

Should We Just F@#k Everything?

My Economic Plan

The Scariest Chart You've Seen Yet