Summary of "More Factor"

The More Factor describes past accounts in the 1880s in which land in Texas would be developed into towns with all the amenities. After t he labor was finished, the people would then move on an continue the cycle continuously. Sometimes some would be paid to appear as residents for a census worker to count and even their houses would be setup to be transportable. This sounds like a convoluted way to draw up political boundaries as well as to divide up extra funding from government for a non existent population. Back then, the rail road tycoons seemed to be pulling the strings behind the scenes. Most likely they were funding the bribes for a populace to stay. This echos what has been happening today with the value of stocks and homes falling. The common elements are that some person figured out a profitable venture and continued to produce more until it became unprofitable due to a variety reasons. These towns in the 1880s may have been built in very bad locations such as to far away from any real natural resource such as water or trees. Without some kind of mechanical pump for water or a trucking infrastructure, no one would want to live in the middle of nowhere without resources. In the past few years, some would buy a house to fix up and sell for profit which combined with easy money and credit caused a huge inflation in price that eventually burst when the housing market became over saturated. In the past, it was suggested that one could not be wiped out by such losses because there would be another venture to capitalize on.
There had always been some new place to colonize which in turn has been called the final frontier or the land of opportunity. From Europeans traveling to the new world to Americans moving west in search of gold. What I believe Laurence Shames is trying to convey is that there is a limit to how far and how much we can expand. He also suggests that we as Americans are not realizing that there is more than infinite expansion and consumption. His idea seems to be to change the system from invest wildly and hope profit is to be made to consider the ramifications first before rash actions. I personally doubt this would happen anytime soon because many people seem to be concerned with the bottom line without little regard to the consequences, unless it doesn't benefit them.