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Financialization - the step before collapse

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Financialization

In his 2006 book, American Theocracy: The Peril and Politics of Radical Religion, Oil, and Borrowed Money in the 21st Century, American writer and commentator Kevin Phillips presented financialization as “a process whereby financial services, broadly construed, take over the dominant economic, cultural, and political role in a national economy.” (page 268). Philips considers that the financialization of the U.S. economy follows the same pattern that marked the beginning of the decline of Habsburg Spain in the 16th century, the Dutch trading empire in the 18th century, and the British Empire in the 19th century: (It is also worth pointing out that the true final step in each of these historical economies is; collapse)

". . . the leading economic powers have followed an evolutionary progression: first, agriculture, fishing, and the like, next commerce and industry, and finally finance. Several historians have elaborated this point. Brooks Adams contended that “as societies consolidate, they pass through a profound intellectual change. Energy ceases to vent through the imagination and takes the form of capital.”

Brooks Adams, The Law of Civilization and Decay, 1896
http://www.archive.org/details/lawcivilization00adamgoog

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Wikipedia / amazon - The law of civilization and decay - why is there this progression? human nature / evolution.

The reproductive imperative - mate acquisition and retention aka offspring acquisition and "disposal" - and by "disposal" I mean getting them out of the house / married / setup on their own.

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