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When people are dependent on the government they are much easier to control. We are often told that we are not “compassionate” when we object to the endless expansion of government social programs, but that is not how the debate should be framed. In America today, well over 100 million people receive money from the federal government each month, and the number of Americans that are truly financially independent is continually shrinking. In fact, only 25 percent of all Americans have more than $10,000 in savings right now according to one survey. If we eventually get to the point where virtually all of us are dependent on the government for our continued existence, that would give the globalists a very powerful tool of control. In the end, they want as many of us dependent on the government as possible, because those that are dependent on the government are a lot less likely to fight against their agenda.

Back in 1992, the bottom 90 percent of American income earners brought in more than 60 percent of the country’s income. But last year that figure slipped to just 49.7 percent. The wealth of our society is increasingly being concentrated at the very top, and the middle class is steadily being eroded. Surveys have found that somewhere around two-thirds of the country is living paycheck to paycheck at least part of the time, and so living on the edge has become a way of life for most Americans.

Earlier today, I came across a Business Insider article that was bemoaning the fact that the U.S. economy seems to be rather directionless at this point…

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Debt Nightmare: Does Anyone Actually Care That Our Exploding National Debt Is Destroying Our Future?

September 12, 2017

Debt Nightmare: Does Anyone Actually Care That Our Exploding National Debt Is Destroying Our Future?

When will America finally wake up? The borrower is the servant of the lender, and we now have a colossal 20 trillion dollar chain around our collective ankles. We have willingly enslaved ourselves, our children and our grandchildren, and yet our addiction is so insatiable that we continue to add more than 100 million dollars to our debt load every single hour of every single day. The national debt is sitting at a grand total of $20,162,176,797,904.13 at this moment, but now that the debt ceiling has been lifted that number is expected to shoot up very rapidly toward 21 trillion dollars by the end of the year. The national debt had been held down by accounting tricks to keep it under the debt limit for many months, but every time this has happened before we have seen the national debt absolutely explode back to projected levels once the debt ceiling was raised.

But very few of our “leaders” in Washington seem to care that we are in the process of committing national suicide. There is no possible way that we will be able to continue to be the most powerful economy on the planet if we continue down this road. During Obama’s eight years in the White House, we added more than 9 trillion dollars to the national debt. That certainly improved things in the short-term, because if we could go back and take 9 trillion dollars out of the economy over the past 8 years we would be in an absolutely nightmarish economic depression right now.

But even with all of this borrowing and spending, our economy has still only grown at an average rate of just 1.33 percent a year over the last 10 years.

And by going into so much debt, we are literally destroying the future for our children and our grandchildren.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

How to Make the Financial System Radically Safer

September 3, 2017

How to Make the Financial System Radically Safer

Preventing the Last Crisis

Clear thinking and discerning rigor when it comes to the twisted state of present economic policy matters brings with it many physical ailments. A permanent state of disbelief, for instance, manifests in dry eyes and droopy shoulders. So, too, a curious skepticism produces etched forehead lines and nighttime bruxism.

The terrible scourge of bruxism and its potentially terrifying consequences. Curious skepticism can lead to the darnedest things, which is why Big Brother strongly recommends that citizens remain in a medication and cable TV-induced apathetic stupor. To make this happy outcome easier to achieve, stagnation in real wages was successfully introduced a number of moons ago; forced to work to exhaustion just to keep their heads above water, citizens tend to be more docile in their shrinking free time. [PT]

Nonetheless, these are small prices to pay for the simple delight that comes when a central planner opens their mouth and inserts their foot. Last Friday, for example, Fed Chair Janet Yellen gave a speech to her friends and cohorts at the annual central banker’s powwow in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. There she patted herself and the financial regulatory community on the back for what she believes has been a successful execution of financial regulations:

“The events of the [2008] crisis demanded action, needed reforms were implemented, and these reforms have made the system safer.”

How Yellen knows the reforms have made the system safer is unclear. Like France’s impenetrable Maginot Line, the regulations Yellen lauds are backward looking. They are suited to preventing the last crisis while ignoring new and greater threats amassing just beyond the horizon.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Is This The Generation That Is Going To Financially Destroy America?

July 13, 2017

Is This The Generation That Is Going To Financially Destroy America?

Did you know that the federal government is going to spend more than 4 trillion dollars this year? To put that into perspective, U.S. GDP for the entire year of 2017 is going to be somewhere between 18 and 19 trillion dollars. So when you are talking about 4 trillion dollars you are talking about a huge chunk of our economy. But of course the federal government doesn’t bring in 4 trillion dollars a year. At the beginning of Barack Obama’s first term, we were 10.6 trillion dollars in debt, and now we are nearly 20 trillion dollars in debt. That means that we have been adding more than a trillion dollars a year to the national debt. When you break that down, that means that we have essentially been stealing more than a hundred million dollars from future generations of Americans every single hour of every single day to pay for our debt-fueled lifestyle. Even Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen is warning that this is not sustainable, and yet we just keep on doing it.

Nobody can pretend that what we have today is the kind of limited federal government that our founders intended. When federal spending accounts for more than 20 percent of GDP, it is hard to argue that we haven’t moved very far down the road toward socialism. As I mentioned above, total federal spending will surpass 4 trillion dollars for the first time ever in 2017…

Both the Congressional Budget Office and the White House Office of Management and Budget project that federal spending will top $4 trillion for the first time in fiscal 2017, which began on Oct. 1, 2016 and will end on Sept. 30.

In its “Update to the Budget and Economic Outlook: 2017 to 2027” published last week, CBO projected that total federal spending in fiscal 2017 will hit $4,008,000,000,000.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Federal Reserve Must Go

May 16, 2017

The Federal Reserve Must Go

If you want to permanently fix America’s economy, there really is no other choice. Even before Ron Paul’s rallying cry of “End The Fed” shook America during the peak of the Tea Party movement, I was a huge advocate of shutting down the Federal Reserve. Because no matter how hard we try to patch it up otherwise, the truth is that our debt-based financial system has been fundamentally flawed from the very beginning, and the Federal Reserve is the very heart of that system. The following is a free preview of an upcoming book that I am working on about how to turn this country is a more positive direction…

*****

As the publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog, there have been times when I have been criticized for focusing too much on our economic problems and not enough on the solutions. But I believe that in order to be willing to accept the solutions that are necessary, people need to have a full understanding of the true severity of our problems. It isn’t by accident that we ended up 20 trillion dollars in debt. In 1913, a bill was rushed through Congress right before Christmas that was based on a plan that had been secretly developed by very powerful Wall Street bankers. G. Edward Griffin did an amazing job of documenting the development of this plan in his groundbreaking book “The Creature from Jekyll Island: A Second Look at the Federal Reserve”. At that time, most Americans had no idea what a central bank does or what one would mean for the U.S. economy. Sadly, even though more than a century has passed since that time, most Americans still do not understand the Federal Reserve.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Multiple Bubbles Are Going to Bring America to Its Knees: “The Warning Signs Are There”

April 1, 2017

Multiple Bubbles Are Going to Bring America to Its Knees: “The Warning Signs Are There”

If you’ve been paying attention to the ongoing degradation of the American economy since the last financial crisis, you’re probably flabbergasted by the fact that our economy has managed to make it this far without imploding. I know I am. I find myself shocked with every year that passes without incident.

The warning signs are there for anyone willing to see, and they are flashing red. Even cursory research into the numbers underlying our system will tell you that we’re on an unsustainable financial path. It’s simple math. And yet the system has proven far more durable than most people thought.

The only reasonable explanation I can think of, is that the system is being held up by wishful thinking and willful ignorance. If every single person knew how unsustainable our economy is, it would self-destruct within hours. People would pull their money out of the banks, the bonds, and the stock market, and buy whatever real assets they could while their money is still worth something. It would be the first of many dominoes to fall before the entire financial system collapses.

But most people don’t want to think about that possibility. They want the relative peace and prosperity of the current system to continue, so they ignore the facts or try to avoid them as much as possible. They keep their money right where it is and cross their fingers instead. In other words, the only thing propping up the system is undeserved confidence.

Unfortunately, confidence can’t keep an unsustainable system running forever. Nothing can. And our particular system is brimming with economic bubbles that aren’t going to stay inflated for much longer.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Hell To Pay

September 24, 2016

SkillUp/Shutterstock

Hell To Pay

The final condition for a market crash is falling into place

Sometimes I wonder if I’m ever going to run out of new things to say about the economy. Nothing interesting has happened in a long time.

Our liquidity-drunk “markets” remain over-priced due to the chronic intervention of the global central banking cartel, which has demonstrated over and over again that it won’t tolerate even the slightest drop in asset prices.

Those familiar with my writing know I put the word “markets” in quotes because we no longer have a financial system where legitimate price discovery is a regular — or even recognizable — feature.

It’s destined to fail. What more can be said about such a flawed system?

Well, a lot as it turns out.

And failure to pay attention at this stage of economic and ecological history will prove to be exceptionally painful.

The Beginning of the End

It’s been a long 7 years for those of us who believe fundamentals matter. For quite some time they have not.

So we reality-based fundamentalists have largely been reduced to pointing at the parade of policy failures and ham-fisted market manipulations and saying, essentially, That’s just dumb.

But ‘dumb’ mistakes have become ‘stupid’, and ‘stupid’ became ‘idiotic’, and now ‘idiotic’ mistakes are piling up, accumulating into a mountain of stored potential energy that will someday topple destructively across the global markets. We’ve all known, deep down, that money printing is not the same as capital formation, and that prosperity never truly results from redistributing wealth from one group to another. And yet, far too many have been willing to play along and place their trust in the central banks.

Well, we’ve finally reached the beginning of the end.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Former Treasury Secretary says banks may be riskier now than in the 2008 crisis

September 17, 2016

Former Treasury Secretary says banks may be riskier now than in the 2008 crisis

“Sir. SIR! This your bag,” the TSA agent barked at me last week, more as a statement than a question.

“It is.”

“Are you carrying any liquids?”

I knew immediately; I had forgotten about the bottle of water that I had shoved in my briefcase before checking out of my hotel.

They opened my bag and confiscated the water bottle immediately with an extra harrumph to make sure I knew that I had wasted their time.

Yeah, I get it. I broke the rule. But it’s such a ridiculous rule to begin with.

Are we really supposed to pretend that Miami International Airport is any safer because there’s a brand new, unopened Dasani bottle in the TSA wastebin?

You may recall how Istanbul’s Ataturk Airport was attacked on June 28th by men armed with automatic weapons and explosives.

Ataturk was already one of the most security-conscious airports in the world– you actually have to go through a security checkpoint just to enter the building, followed by a second security checkpoint on your way to the gate.

And yet, despite all of this extra security, 41 people were killed and hundreds more wounded in an attack that shows just how ineffective airport security really is.

Airport security isn’t real security. It’s merely the illusion of security– a bunch of busybodies in uniforms enforcing pointless rules to make people believe that they’re safer.

Candidly, our financial system has borrowed the same principle. There’s no real safety in our financial system– merely the illusion of safety.

Leading up to the 2008 financial crisis, most people thought the banks were safe.

After all, we’ve been told our entire lives that the banks are rock solid. What could go wrong?

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Sometimes You Just Have to Go With the Flow When Nothing Flows

June 18, 2016

Sometimes You Just Have to Go With the Flow When Nothing Flows

The central banks are clueless and have no control over the economy. This whole thing reminds me of Australia. I loved going into the Outback, driving through rivers, and seeing ant hills that were taller than the Jeep. I was invited to go to the Todd River Regatta in the middle of the desert. I thought it was a joke. They said, “No mate! Come on!”

Armstrong Palm Valley Australia

I was perplexed at first. How can you have a regatta in the middle of a desert? Well, only Australia could figure that one out. They raced in pretend boats down an ancient river bed where no white man has ever seen water flow. They held the pretend boats up around their waist and raced down the riverbed. It was good fun. I actually joined in on the camel races.

We have the same thing going on now in politics and finance — just living the dream. Negative interest rates punish savers, and bankrupt pensions are creating a collapse in socialism that threatens civil unrest on a grand scale beginning next year (2017). Then we have politicians raising taxes and creating mountains of regulations that nobody can figure out without a lawyer and an accountant preventing small businesses from forming. Those who want to always rule the world are brain-dead and it is impossible for them to figure out why small businesses are not expanding to create jobs. Duh! They craft pretend theories and run down dried-up riverbeds where there is no water and proclaim to the world they are “stimulating” the economy when they encourage bankers not to lend paying them for excess reserves and then raise taxes because they want to be “fiscally responsible” to the bond holders. You really cannot reconcile these actions and theories. It is just the Todd River Regatta on a grand scale.

It Takes a Village to Maintain a Dangerous Financial System

June 6, 2016

It Takes a Village to Maintain a Dangerous Financial System

Abstract: I discuss the motivations and actions (or inaction) of individuals in the financial system, governments, central banks, academia and the media that collectively contribute to the persistence of a dangerous and distorted financial system and inadequate, poorly designed regulations. Reassurances that regulators are doing their best to protect the public are false. The underlying problem is a powerful mix of distorted incentives, ignorance, confusion, and lack of accountability. Willful blindness seems to play a role in flawed claims by the system’s enablers that obscure reality and muddle the policy debate.

1. Introduction

“If it takes a village to raise a child, it takes a village to abuse a child.”1

The financial system is meant to facilitate efficient allocation of resources and help people and businesses fund, invest, save and mange risks. This system is rife with conflicts of interests. Reckless practices, if uncontrolled by market forces and effective rules, can cause great harm. Most of the time, however, the harm from excessive risk in banking is invisible and the culprits remain unaccountable. They rarely violate the law.

In this chapter I focus on the excessive use of debt in banking that creates unnecessary fragility and distortions. The Great Financial Crisis of 2007-2009 exposed the ineffectiveness of the relevant regulations in place at the time. Yet even now and despite the crisis, the rules remain inadequate and flawed. Policymakers who repeatedly fail to protect the public are not accountable partly because false claims obscure reality, create confusion and muddle the debate.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Where Will You Be When the End Game Begins?

June 4, 2016

WHERE WILL YOU BE WHEN THE END GAME BEGINS?

Sometime after oh dark thirty it will begin, the previously cocked trigger suddenly released to wreck havoc throughout the world’s financial system. Like an intricate and interwoven design made entirely of standing dominoes, all it takes is a slight disturbance to knock one off its base and start the cascade of toppled consequences running down the line.

With the benefit of hindsight it will be seen that the trigger itself was not the killer. Instead, sometime later, a specific projectile will be (most likely falsely) identified as the blunt instrument which tore economic flesh asunder and quickly bled the system of ‘liquidity’ faster than a slash to the femoral artery. Too late to make a difference, tourniquets will be applied to stem the red tide. Sadly, all it will accomplish is to extend economic life long enough to enable a final frenzy of looting before the bloody end.

And the totalitarian end game will have only just begun.

A socioeconomic system, if healthy and vibrant, can usually withstand extremely rough handling and even intentionally directed assault. A severed lifeline, while certainly a devastating shock to the organism, can and will be survived simply because adequate resources and flexibility remain within the structure which can be quickly marshaled while emergency repairs are made.

But a compromised entity already deathly ill, continuously pumped with toxic drugs and stimulants, stressed beyond compare by various Rube Goldberg financial devices, constantly monitored and regulated to assure compliance to artificial standards no natural system would ever adhere to, is always one disturbance away from disaster.

Thus the stage is set for the dark thirty triggering event.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Financial Analyst Warns: “What We’re Looking At Is An Event You’re Not Going To Be Able To Recover From”

May 8, 2016

Financial Analyst Warns: “What We’re Looking At Is An Event You’re Not Going To Be Able To Recover From”

“Things are breaking down, something big is happening,” according to leading alternative news web site SGT Report.

Citing the recent emergency meeting between the Federal Reserve and President Obama, America’s explicit warning to other countries not to devalue their currencies against the dollar, and scores of other global indicators, SGT Report’s latest interview with Bill Holter may be your last chance to get ready for the next wave.

What we’re looking at is an event that you’re not going to be able to recover from… If this market snaps and the markets close and you’re not in position, you’re out for the rest of your life.

(Watch At Youtube)

That an economic catastrophe is imminent should be at the very forefront of mainstream news. But instead of heeding the warnings, the propaganda has gone so deep that even President Obama says that those who say there is something wrong are peddling fiction.

But the reality is that even they know what’s coming.

The following exchange between SGT and guest Bill Holter is all you really need to know:

SGT Report: This is a big one. This is General Mark Milley. He’s the U.S. Army Chief of Staff and he was giving the keynote address to the ROTC Centennial Symposium on April 22nd, 2016.

[plays clip]

“You’re going to be leading the soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines in that world. You’ll be dealing with terrorists, you’ll be dealing with hybrid armies, you’ll be dealing with little green men, you’ll be dealing with tribes, you’ll be dealing with national leaders and local leaders.”

I want your impression of what he just said… This is General Mark Milley, the U.S. Army Chief of Staff!

Hybrid armies? And tribes? And terrorism?

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

150 Strong: A Pathway to a Different Future – Serialisation Part 2

April 12, 2016

150 Strong: A Pathway to a Different Future – Serialisation Part 2

When we find ourselves in need of a miracle there is a simple formula that can be applied: “Don’t panic, take stock, and do the next logical thing.” If we apply this formula, hold our course and maintain a positive outlook, the white knight of providence may intercede on our behalf.

That is not to say that the relationship between action and consequence can be avoided. There is no magic wand for the absolution of a life of feckless excess. In the case of our collective consumption binge, we have brought about the sixth mass-extinction event (to add to the previous ones, which are evident in the Earth’s geologic record), we have created a shambolic financial system of gross imbalance, and we have allowed our culture to degrade so far that a figure as flawed as that of Donald Trump has been allowed to become a credible candidate for the position of the world’s supposedly most powerful person. It would be a long way back to some semblance of a reasonable equilibrium.

But we should not give up hope. If we work through our collective karma, we might find that there is the potential for regeneration.

As far as stoic perseverance in the face of testing circumstances is concerned, we are doing this part quite well. Panic levels are low. We have taken on board recent information about the extraordinary warming of our planet, the impending financial collapse and the degeneration of our systems of government into a total farce, and have just kept going. An eerie feeling of normalcy is being maintained without much effort.

However, we seem to be falling short in “taking stock.”
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Helicopter Money: Global Central Banks Consider Distributing Money Directly To The People

March 23, 2016

Helicopter Money: Global Central Banks Consider Distributing Money Directly To The People

Should central banks create money out of thin air and give it directly to governments and average citizens? If you can believe it, this is now under serious consideration. Since 2008, global central banks have cut interest rates 637 times, they have injected 12.3 trillion dollars into the global financial system through various quantitative easing programs, and we have seen an explosion of government debt unlike anything we have ever witnessed before. But despite these unprecedented measures, the global economy is still deeply struggling. This is particularly true in Japan, in South America, and in Europe. In fact, there are 16 countries in Europe that are experiencing deflation right now. In a desperate attempt to spur economic activity, central banks in Europe and in Japan are playing around with negative interest rates, and so far they seem to only have had a limited effect.

So as they rapidly run out of ammunition, global central bankers are now openly discussing something that might sound kind of crazy. According to the Telegraph, central banks are becoming increasingly open to employing a tactic known as “helicopter money”…

Faced with political intransigence, central bankers are openly talking about the previously unthinkable: “helicopter money”.

A catch-all term, helicopter drops describe the process by which central banks can create money to transfer to the public or private sector to stimulate economic activity and spending.

Long considered one of the last policymaking taboos, debate around the merits of helicopter money has gained traction in recent weeks.

Do you understand what is being said there?

The idea is basically this – central banks would create money out of thin air and would just give it to national governments or ordinary citizens.

So who would decide who gets the money?

Well, they would.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Why Our Financial System Is Like the Titanic

March 15, 2016

Why Our Financial System Is Like the Titanic

The “unsinkable” global financial system is rushing headlong toward its encounter with the iceberg.

Why did the Titanic sink, despite being considered unsinkable? The conventional answer is the design of its watertight compartments was flawed: the watertight bulkheads were limited in height to a few feet above the waterline.

The ship was designed such that if the first few compartments were flooded, the flooding would be contained by the watertight bulkheads.

But the iceberg ripped open a gash almost a third the ship’s length, flooding the first six compartments. As the ship’s bow sank, water poured over the bulkhead into the seventh compartment, and so on, until the ship’s bow sank deep enough to bring the ship almost vertical, at which point the hull broke roughly in half–hence the two hull sections discovered on the bottom of the Atlantic in 1985.

But further analysis has revealed this isn’t the only reason Titanic sank. It turned out the ship’s hull plates were brittle due to high sulfur content in the steel, especially at cold temperatures (the water was near freezing at the time of the wreck).

Causes and Effects of the Rapid Sinking of the Titanic

Rather than deform as the iceberg scraped against the hull, the plates and rivets fractured, opening the gash that sank the ship.

The technologies of the early 1900s enabled shipbuilders to construct enormous ships almost 900 feet in length capable of steaming at 24 knots, transporting passengers across the Atlantic in comfort, but the technologies that made such ships and transits low risk were not yet developed.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

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