Jump to content
Chapala.com Webboard

The Truth About Safety in Mexico


livinglovingmexico

Recommended Posts

Very well put Guss. My problem is that even as I approach 70, I have a far too good memory. For example, when I was a young man just beginning life, well over half the U.S. population weren't using or had used drugs. Druggies were ostracized, not tolerated. The divorce rate wasn't north of 50 percent and the majority of children weren't living in one parent families. We didn't have all the stuff that even those on welfare NOB have now but we did live in neighborhoods that were so safe no one locked their doors and everyone watched out for everyone's kids. We didn't go to schools where the kids dressed like bums and studied like them too.

We didn't watch much TV and when we did, we weren't treated to non-stop sex and violence and moral decadence. Ditto for the movies. Half of the major cities weren't drug and gang banger infested hell holes. Yes there was poverty, there's even more of it now after 3 trillion spent on government programs that seem to have mainly disintegrated the families of the poor and created those hell holes. Most poor people were moral people and there was upward mobility. We didn't have generation after generation living in squalor on the dole. Sorry, but I don't see that as an improvement.

Is the U.S. some sort of safe first world country? I don't think so. More like an emerging police state IMO. Is Mexico a place of everyday crime and danger everywhere? I don't think so. In both places, I think you have to create your own safety as much as possible and that will usually, but not always, work for you. Overall, it is inescapable that the social fabric is fraying and declining all over the developed world and in much of the developing world. You can run but you can't hide from that reality and politics, when it isn't adding to the problem, have basically nothing to offer that could turn things around.

That would require billions to re-embrace values and life styles that have proven by actual experience to create strong and cohesive societies. Those times are past in this cycle of history IMO.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

You might want to read up on what happened here in Mexico when some politicians spent money they didn't have and ended up having to grossly devaluate their currency and wipe out the savings of a lot of folks at the time. To their credit, Mexico seems to have learned the lesson from this

The Canadians seemed to have learned a similar lesson some time ago and stopped spending money they don't have and started paying their debts, without going over the cliff like Mexico did

I presume you were not in Mexico during the first years of the 80s when Mexico nationalized the banks here and had runaway inflation like I was. Nobody in Mexico put their extra money into banks or stuffed matresses with cash, most still don´t today. They invest their extra money in real things and collect rent or especially at that time in expanding their business, as there were many oportunities available for any amount of money and less competition then. Consumerism was growing fast. The fast rate of inflation didn´t hurt too many people for very long. Banks here gave you the option of depositing money in US dollars etc.The gov´t. got hurt because of their $9 billion US World Bank loan to expand oil production etc. Stores simply charged more as they paid more. People refused to work for less so they got more pay. The only place it was very noticable was when foriegners brought their currency here to spend .

It was fun to buy pesos after a devaluation with US dollars and then invest them before another devaluation. Some people made good profits then, I did it on a new 2 bedroom house in 1982 and again a few years later after when the banks were nationalized on a larger house which I still have. I made 400% on selling the 2 bedroom and rented it for 20 years [$1,200 US per year]. Property taxes were $35.00 US per year in the end.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Very well put Guss. My problem is that even as I approach 70, I have a far too good memory. For example, when I was a young man just beginning life, well over half the U.S. population weren't using or had used drugs. Druggies were ostracized, not tolerated. The divorce rate wasn't north of 50 percent and the majority of children weren't living in one parent families. We didn't have all the stuff that even those on welfare NOB have now but we did live in neighborhoods that were so safe no one locked their doors and everyone watched out for everyone's kids. We didn't go to schools where the kids dressed like bums and studied like them too.

We didn't watch much TV and when we did, we weren't treated to non-stop sex and violence and moral decadence. Ditto for the movies. Half of the major cities weren't drug and gang banger infested hell holes. Yes there was poverty, there's even more of it now after 3 trillion spent on government programs that seem to have mainly disintegrated the families of the poor and created those hell holes. Most poor people were moral people and there times are past in this cycle of history IMO.was upward mobility. We didn't have generation after generation living in squalor on the dole. Sorry, but I don't see that as an improvement.

Is the U.S. some sort of safe first world country? I don't think so. More like an emerging police state IMO. Is Mexico a place of everyday crime and danger everywhere? I don't think so. In both places, I think you have to create your own safety as much as possible and that will usually, but not always, work for you. Overall, it is inescapable that the social fabric is fraying and declining all over the developed world and in much of the developing world. You can run but you can't hide from that reality and politics, when it isn't adding to the problem, have basically nothing to offer that could turn things around.

That would require billions to re-embrace values and life styles that have proven by actual experience to create strong and cohesive societies. Those

I don´t get this. Moderator-2 edits a thread for partisan political statements and then we find MC´s thread which is, in fact, a political screed seemingly intact. I don´t begrudge MC his written opinions but just a comment here. I am not simply approaching 70, I am there having been born in February, 1942. Don´t be telling me that the U.S. or Mexico or, for that matter, most of the world were better places back then. I have a great deal to say on this subject but, as the moderator has threatened to lock the thread if more political positions are taken I´ll respectfully refrain from responding in a civil manner. It seems to me to me that to be fair, MC´s highly charged political statement and. perhaps, this rejoinder should both be deleted or I should be allowed to publish a contrary opinion. I request the opportunity to dispute MC´s commentary point by point or to request omission of all of this political chatter.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I don´t get this. Moderator-2 edits a thread for partisan political statements and then we find MC´s thread which is, in fact, a political screed seemingly intact. I don´t begrudge MC his written opinions but just a comment here. I am not simply approaching 70, I am there having been born in February, 1942. Don´t be telling me that the U.S. or Mexico or, for that matter, most of the world were better places back then. I have a great deal to say on this subject but, as the moderator has threatened to lock the thread if more political positions are taken I´ll respectfully refrain from responding in a civil manner. It seems to me to me that to be fair, MC´s highly charged political statement and. perhaps, this rejoinder should both be deleted or I should be allowed to publish a contrary opinion. I request the opportunity to dispute MC´s commentary point by point or to request omission of all of this political chatter.

I am also old enough to remember a time when phrases like "school shooting" and "home invasions" didn't exist in the collective vocabulary of Americans. A time before local radio stations issued "Amber alerts" or schools having procedures in place resembling that of jails referred to as "being on lock down." Were things perfect in the past? Of course not, but things have gone far amiss in our modern society. And the trend continues.

Back to Alan's idea of needing lots of money to fix our social ills; No amount of money can accomplish this.

Standard of living is relatively easy to quantify, quality of life is a little trickier. Quality of life is the stuff that life is truly made of and the Mexicans have it in spades. Meanwhile, too many Americans do whatever is right in their own eyes, making society a very unpredictable place. Like news of yet another school shooting plot (in Oklahoma) that was thwarted by police.

Rubbing where there is already a rash; Dec 21st is right around the corner and I would not be surprised to hear of another loon committing more violence.

G

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Very well put Guss. My problem is that even as I approach 70, I have a far too good memory. For example, when I was a young man just beginning life, well over half the U.S. population weren't using or had used drugs. Druggies were ostracized, not tolerated. The divorce rate wasn't north of 50 percent and the majority of children weren't living in one parent families. We didn't have all the stuff that even those on welfare NOB have now but we did live in neighborhoods that were so safe no one locked their doors and everyone watched out for everyone's kids. We didn't go to schools where the kids dressed like bums and studied like them too.

We didn't watch much TV and when we did, we weren't treated to non-stop sex and violence and moral decadence. Ditto for the movies. Half of the major cities weren't drug and gang banger infested hell holes. Yes there was poverty, there's even more of it now after 3 trillion spent on government programs that seem to have mainly disintegrated the families of the poor and created those hell holes. Most poor people were moral people and there was upward mobility. We didn't have generation after generation living in squalor on the dole. Sorry, but I don't see that as an improvement.

Is the U.S. some sort of safe first world country? I don't think so. More like an emerging police state IMO. Is Mexico a place of everyday crime and danger everywhere? I don't think so. In both places, I think you have to create your own safety as much as possible and that will usually, but not always, work for you. Overall, it is inescapable that the social fabric is fraying and declining all over the developed world and in much of the developing world. You can run but you can't hide from that reality and politics, when it isn't adding to the problem, have basically nothing to offer that could turn things around.

That would require billions to re-embrace values and life styles that have proven by actual experience to create strong and cohesive societies. Those times are past in this cycle of history IMO.

Agreed. You can't teach what you don't know. Once the traditions and values of the past are completely lost it will very hard to rediscover them.

G

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I very well remember the values of the past Guss. I don´t have time to go into this in great detail but let´s look back at the 1940s when I was born and the decades thereafter. Some 50,000,000 people slaughtered or starved in the prelude to or during WW 11. Racial segregation and lynchings against African Americans in the U.S. Colonial empires exploiting millions kept in subjugation for the benefit of exploitative colonial masters stealing the birthright of third world countries all over the globe. Japanese fanaticism resulting in the rape of Nanking among countless attrocities in the Far East. Burning alive countless Japanese civilians with atomic weapons by the United States, the Bataan death march, apartheid in South Africa, the entirely immoral humiliation and exploitation of African Americans in my native Alabama, the treating of brown skinned people all over the world as incompetents to be detested and exploited, the western alliance with the fiend Joseph Stalin to defeat the Axis powers and the subsequent enslavement of all of Eastern Europe with western acquiesence and approval while he exploited and murdered millions and the west looked the other way.

Terrible times of gross injustice. Your not having to lock your door back then, if that is the case, is only demonstrative of the fact that the misery was happening in someone else´s backyard..

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I would say you are making my point, Alan. The Mexican government printed money wholesale, runaway inflation resulted, a fiscal collapse that required replacement of the currency occurred. Government irresponsibility created the problem.

Mexico was lucky. When you%

Slightly, even greatly simplified argument for what appears to be a complex turn of events in 1980 to 1982 Mexico and beyond and the recession during those times in the US also. Mexico printing money wholesale was not the cause! You could try to get more involved in this as you seem interested in it.

http://lnweb90.worldbank.org/oed/oeddoclib.nsf/DocUNIDViewForJavaSearch/56A4FD9C05E7BAEB852567F5005D87A0

"

1980s oil glut
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
250px-Nominalrealoilprices1968-2006.png
magnify-clip.png

The Real and Nominal price of oil from 1968 to 2006.

The 1980s oil glut was a serious surplus of crude oil caused by falling demand following the 1970s Energy Crisis. The world price of oil, which had peaked in 1980 at over US$35 per barrel ($99 per barrel today), fell in 1986 from $27 to below $10 ($57 to $21 today).[2][3] The glut began in the early 1980s as a result of slowed economic activity in industrial countries (due to the crises of the 1970s, especially in 1973 and 1979) and the energy conservation spurred by high fuel prices.[4] The inflation adjusted real 2004 dollar value of oil fell from an average of $78.2 in 1981 to an average of $26.8 per barrel in 1986."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I very well remember the values of the past Guss. I don´t have time to go into this in great detail but let´s look back at the 1940s when I was born and the decades thereafter. Some 50,000,000 people slaughtered or starved in the prelude to or during WW 11. Racial segregation and lynchings against African Americans in the U.S. Colonial empires exploiting millions kept in subjugation for the benefit of exploitative colonial masters stealing the birthright of third world countries all over the globe. Japanese fanaticism resulting in the rape of Nanking among countless attrocities in the Far East. Burning alive countless Japanese civilians with atomic weapons by the United States, the Bataan death march, apartheid in South Africa, the entirely immoral humiliation and exploitation of African Americans in my native Alabama, the treating of brown skinned people all over the world as incompetents to be detested and exploited, the western alliance with the fiend Joseph Stalin to defeat the Axis powers and the subsequent enslavement of all of Eastern Europe with western acquiesence and approval while he exploited and murdered millions and the west looked the other way.

Terrible times of gross injustice. Your not having to lock your door back then, if that is the case, is only demonstrative of the fact that the misery was happening in someone else´s backyard..

Commenting on today's obvious breakdown of society does not equate to condoning past injustices of an earlier era. This kind of argument reminds me of a bumper sticker I read once that said something like "if one person is oppressed, all are oppressed"; while true in one sense, it ignores the fact that we are all divided into microcosms of existense, parallel universes if you will, and in my small universe I was able to leave the door unlocked (among other things). Unlocked doors are a much bigger metaphor for past freedoms now relinquished to rising insecurities thanks to increased lawlessness and random acts of terror. Grandparents in Connecticut attending their grandchildren's funerals would agree.

BTW, you overlooked the point I already made when I said: Were things in the past perfect? To which I answered: Of course not...... It's unfortunate when people suggest that only two extreme views of an issue exist.

Ultimately, we're having the wrong conversation. The original article asks us to seriously reconsider what many think about the Mexican experience before feebly succumbing to all the negative hype. The author invites us to consider a reality where Mexico is not maligned as a dangerous failed state but, rather depicted as the dynamic and complex place it truly is. I, for one, accepted the invitation.

G

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Alan, the Mexican government didn't adjust expenditure for falling income or come up with other ways to cover decreased PEMEX revenues.

No matter how you slice it, government is going to be the primary element in determining if currency retains value and inflation is avoided.

And policies of massive deficit financing if not voluntarily stopped at some point before collapse, always lead to collapse. That is the lesson of history, repeated over and over again.

Saw an interesting figure that global GDP is around 62 trillion and global debt is now at 200 trillion. And I'll wager that figure doesn't include the something like 80 trillion of unfunded social security and medicare liability in the U.S. alone.

Something has to give and something will give IMO. It makes me extremely nervous when I realize that the country north of us is armed to the teeth and has this huge military that is always looking for a war to get into.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Alan, the Mexican government didn't adjust expenditure for falling income or come up with other ways to cover decreased PEMEX revenues.

No matter how you slice it, government is going to be the primary element in determining if currency retains value and inflation is avoided.

And policies of massive deficit financing if not voluntarily stopped at some point before collapse, always lead to collapse. That is the lesson of history, repeated over and over again.

Saw an interesting figure that global GDP is around 62 trillion and global debt is now at 200 trillion. And I'll wager that figure doesn't include the something like 80 trillion of unfunded social security and medicare liability in the U.S. alone.

Something has to give and something will give IMO. It makes me extremely nervous when I realize that the country north of us is armed to the teeth and has this huge military that is always looking for a war to get into.

You leave out the inflation rate, already double digit from having a long time sytem of "protectivism" tariff policies for imports had the effect of other countries importing into Mexico doing in kind to Mexico and levy tarrifs on Mexican imports, and already high inflation existed before they defaulted on World Bank loans and changed the system from this to liberal tariffs, international loosening of tight regulations on international banking, companies wanting to come into Mexico etc. in 1982 on. I can guarantee their devaluation was from many other things than simply not readjusting the deficit when they were up to their neck in foriegn aid debt and had spent the money on infrastucture to industrialize and modernize to fast hoping they could pay it back with petroleum exports and then having the bottom fall out pricewise. Plus skimming of and other considerations with this foriegn aid and Pemex revenues they were recieving.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...