Even though the U.S. financial system nearly experienced a total meltdown in late 2008, the truth is that most Americans simply have no idea what is happening to the U.S. economy. Most people seem to think that the nasty little recession that we have just been through is almost over and that we will be experiencing another time of economic growth and prosperity very shortly. But this time around that is not the case. The reality is that we are being sucked into an economic black hole from which the U.S. economy will never fully recover.
The problem is debt. Collectively, the U.S. government, the state governments, corporate America and American consumers have accumulated the biggest mountain of debt in the history of the world. Our massive debt binge has financed our tremendous growth and prosperity over the last couple of decades, but now the day of reckoning is here.
And it is going to be painful.
The following are 20 reasons why the U.S. economy is dying and is simply not going to recover....
#1) Do you remember that massive wave of subprime mortgages that defaulted in 2007 and 2008 and caused the biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression? Well, the "second wave" of mortgage defaults in on the way and there is simply no way that we are going to be able to avoid it. A huge mountain of mortgages is going to reset starting in 2010, and once those mortgage payments go up there are once again going to be millons of people who simply cannot pay their mortgages. The chart below reveals just how bad the second wave of adjustable rate mortgages is likely to be over the next several years....
#2) The Federal Housing Administration has announced plans to increase the amount of up-front cash paid by new borrowers and to require higher down payments from those with the poorest credit. The Federal Housing Administration currently backs about 30 percent of all new home loans and about 20 percent of all new home refinancing loans. Tighter standards are going to mean that less people will qualify for loans. Less qualifiers means that there will be less buyers for homes. Less buyers means that home prices are going to drop even more.
#3) It is getting really hard to find a job in the United States. A total of 6,130,000 U.S. workers had been unemployed for 27 weeks or more in December 2009. That was the most ever since the U.S. government started keeping track of this statistic in 1948. In fact, it is more than double the 2,612,000 U.S. workers who were unemployed for a similar length of time in December 2008. The reality is that once Americans lose their jobs they are increasingly finding it difficult to find new ones. Just check out the chart below....
#4) In December, there were also 929,000 "discouraged" workers who are not counted as part of the labor force because they have "given up" looking for work. That is the most since the U.S. government first started keeping track of discouraged workers in 1949. Many Americans have simply given up and are now chronically unemployed.
#5) Some areas of the U.S. are already virtually in a state of depression. The mayor of Detroit estimates that the real unemployment rate in his city is now somewhere around 50 percent.
#6) For decades, our leaders in Washington pushed us towards "a global economy" and told us it would be so good for us. But there is a flip side. Now workers in the U.S. must compete with workers all over the world, and our greedy corporations are free to pursue the cheapest labor available anywhere on the globe. Millions of jobs have already been shipped out of the United States, and Princeton University economist Alan S. Blinder estimates that 22% to 29% of all current U.S. jobs will be offshorable within two decades. The days when blue collar workers could live the American Dream are gone and they are not going to come back.
#7) During the 2001 recession, the U.S. economy lost 2% of its jobs and it took four years to get them back. This time around the U.S. economy has lost more than 5% of its jobs and there is no sign that the bleeding of jobs is going to stop any time soon.
#8) All of this unemployment is putting severe stress on state unemployment funds. At this point, 25 state unemployment insurance funds have gone broke and the Department of Labor estimates that 15 more state unemployment funds will likely go broke within two years and will need massive loans from the federal government just to keep going.
#9) 37 million Americans now receive food stamps, and the program is expanding at a pace of about 20,000 people a day. The United States of America is very quickly becoming a socialist welfare state.
#10) The number of Americans who are going broke is staggering. 1.41 million Americans filed for personal bankruptcy in 2009 - a 32 percent increase over 2008.
#11) For decades, the fact that the U.S. dollar was the reserve currency of the world gave the U.S. financial system an unusual degree of stability. But all of that is changing. Foreign countries are increasingly turning away from the dollar to other currencies. For example, Russia’s central bank announced on Wednesday that it had started buying Canadian dollars in a bid to diversify its foreign exchange reserves.
#12) The recent economic downturn has left some localities totally bankrupt. For instance, Jefferson County, Alabama is on the brink of what would be the largest government bankruptcy in the history of the United States - surpassing the 1994 filing by Southern California's Orange County.
#13) The U.S. is facing a pension crisis of unprecedented magnitude. Virtually all pension funds in the United States, both private and public, are massively underfunded. With millions of Baby Boomers getting ready to retire, there is simply no way on earth that all of these obligations can be met. Robert Novy-Marx of the University of Chicago and Joshua D. Rauh of Northwestern's Kellogg School of Management recently calculated the collective unfunded pension liability for all 50 U.S. states for Forbes magazine. So what was the total? 3.2 trillion dollars.
#14) Social Security and Medicare expenses are wildly out of control. Once again, with millions of Baby Boomers now at retirement age there is simply going to be no way to pay all of these retirees what they are owed.
#15) So will the U.S. government come to the rescue? The U.S. has allowed the total federal debt to balloon by 50% since 2006 to $12.3 trillion. The chart below is a bit outdated, but it does show the reckless expansion of U.S. government debt over the past several decades. To get an idea of where we are now, just add at least 3 trillion dollars on to the top of the chart....
#16) So has the U.S. government learned anything from these mistakes? No. In fact, Senate Democrats on Wednesday proposed allowing the federal government to borrow an additional $2 trillion to pay its bills, a record increase that would allow the U.S. national debt to reach approximately $14.3 trillion.
#17) It is going to become even harder for the U.S. government to pay the bills now that tax receipts are falling through the floor. U.S. corporate income tax receipts were down 55% in the year that ended on September 30th, 2009.
#18) So where will the U.S. government get the money? From the Federal Reserve of course. The Federal Reserve bought approximately 80 percent of all U.S. Treasury securities issued in 2009. In other words, the U.S. government is now being financed by a massive Ponzi scheme.
#19) The reckless expansion of the money supply by the U.S. government and the Federal Reserve is going to end up destroying the U.S. dollar and the value of the remaining collective net worth of all Americans. The more dollars there are, the less each individual dollar is worth. In essence, inflation is like a hidden tax on each dollar that you own. When they flood the economy with money, the value of the money you have in your bank accounts goes down. The chart below shows the growth of the U.S. money supply. Pay particular attention to the very end of the chart which shows what has been happening lately. What do you think this is going to do to the value of the U.S. dollar?....
#20) When a nation practices evil, there is no way that it is going to be blessed in the long run. The truth is that we have become a nation that is dripping with corruption and wickedness from the top to the bottom. Unless this fundamentally changes, not even the most perfect economic policies in the world are going to do us any good. In the end, you always reap what you sow. The day of reckoning for the U.S. economy is here and it is not going to be pleasant.
Want to save America …. use less government. That equates to lower taxes and a better economy. That’s how we got prosperous. Now we have social security, medicare, drug prescriptions, outrageous public pensions, huge public employee unions, corrupt politicians, waste, waste and more waste. For a few bribes and stipends anyone can pull the BIG Government levers to stack the deck in their favor (IE Wall Street). China is a more FREE Market than America… that’s why it is growing.
You want all this government then accept the doom. You are the problem that caused it.
And yes….. people can use much less government. Strengthen your family, be more rugged, responsible and independent. Step up and do it yourself. Simply put … be better than that.
Rant over…. (save your stupid comments …I won’t read them)
Ban1944,
The devaluation of the dollar is a huge tax on already angry people. The first revolution was fought over taxes and so will this one (moron).
Hey, how’s it going eh!
I’m a Canadian long haul truck driver that regularly crosses the border (what a pain)to bring various commodities (mostly fuels and foods)into the USA. Sometimes I run short of US currency on my trips, it happens. One time, I pulled into a “dunking” coffee shop and tried to buy a coffee with my Canadian dollars; I couldn’t. I was told that my money was no good!
Hey friends, what are you going to buy from the world when the world says to you “YOUR MONEY IS NO GOOD”?
Cash, gas or ass; nobody rides for free!
While most of the 20 reasons are very valid in detail, I’ll go ahead and deliver these additional views.
We have 3 major broken syatems in this country that have been and will continue to hamper any and every effort to address these hardships:
- Political system – the filibuster has been co-opted by the political parties to install filter politics in every major initiative in the USA. There is no civility in the Senate now, the Senate has become the critical path to anything getting through Congress. The filibuster was not written into the Constitution, nor should it have been. This was a late 18th century chamber rule that morphed into the biggest obstruction in more effective political leadership in the nation today. This minority empowering tool is sure to contimue to tamp down any kind of effective throughput from the Senate, and without the Senate nothing gets through Congress.
Along these lines, the basic lack of common civility and respect among Americans is appalling in the general sense. All needs to do is look at any media or internet blogs to reveal anger at unhealthy levels. How this chnages or reverses I don’t know, but that is up to every American to decide whether the United States continues to live up to its name. We have not been united in the real sense since the fall of the Soviet Union in my opinion, save for the brief time after 09/11.
Both the Democrats and Republicans have faults too numerous to detail, Americans continuing to fight and advocate for self-righteousness for one of the political parties against the other only extends the problems. The founding fathers knew the potential problems with political parties (why there is no reference to political parties in the Constitution), I am always amazed at the wisdom of this group of men going on 250 years ago.
- Information system – I don’t know about all of you, but I have learned that media outlets can no longer be trusted, perhaps they never should have been. Related to the hard partisan issues, major inroads of ideology into typical daily reporting has provided two alternate realities among Americans, one liberal and one conservative. No one talks to each other on political issues any more, they talk at and past each other. Institutions like Walter Cronkite, Huntley and Brinkley and others are gone forever in the era of tabloid reporting and instant gratification and titillation on new stories (e.g. any celebrities you can name including Tiger Woods, Charlie Sheen etc that fall into hard times captivate many Americans). Supposedly, the media keeps feeding what they believe will sell their product or service, many times they seem to judge correctly as to the shallow nature on how Americans view and react to news stories.
We have many experts that know how to corrupt and use the broken information system to serve their ends, to frame an agenda driven perception among Americans that many times works. Freedom of the press is fine in principle, but we have not really had a free press in the classical sense in a very long time.
- Financial systems – I could write a book on this and only repeat what many of us already know. Americans are not used to having to sacrifice for things in many cases, and there are a lot more bad people in the country that attempt to defraud others than I wish were there.
All the same, I am amazed we have not seen political violence yet on any major scale, but if the slide to economic depression continues and the top 1% of the rich continue to take resources from every one else, things will need to change I’m afraid. Much of what I wrote requires introspection from many people, I doubt anything will change truly until it is too late and violence and financial hardship escalate.
#1 on the list is…Americans are in the poorest health of any population in the developed world. We are a fat, lazy, obsese nation, getting older and less healthy every year. When the flabby Baby Boomers all start needing kidneys, metal knees, insulin, and nursing homes by the score, AND expecting their kids to pay for it and their Social Security to boot, the costs will be bigger than any war our nation has fought.
I wonder if most of you know that the economy of Heaven trumps that of earth? On earth, it’s about buying and selling, hence the mark. In the Kingdom, it’s about giving and receiving; about storing treasures in Heaven that we can call upon in great abundance in times of great need. God doesn’t run out of provision, though the earth certainly will.
So, what about it? Where’s your head at? Are you looking out only for yourself, buying and selling, or are you preparing for yourself and others? If you’re concern is more for others, then God will look after you and who better to have your back.
This is not the time to be tight-fisted but generous. Have faith (trust and confidence) in God. He is not a liar. He has NOT fallen off the throne in Heaven. He is our salvation, our deliverance, our protection and provision.
Jesus wondered if when He returned if He would find faith in the world.
I wonder too.
Man, this was the best article I’ve read in a long time. I agreed with about 98% of it. The only thing he left out was how the Fed “injected” $1 Billion into the housing market about a year ago….
@Mike
Another thing about BILL CLINTON, as you put it. Look at the debt chart. See that part where it starts to curve and go flat, then shoot back up again? That period was Bill’s time in office – where we started cutting back our national debt and had a balanced budget. See where shoots back up again after 2000?
Funny that.
We cannot blame any president for this – not even George W. with his insane spending. No, this falls far more on the shoulders of Congress and the American people themselves.
Rotten scum? Government checks? Are you KIDDING me? Please take your racist, bigoted bull somewhere else, LATaxSlave. I would not be as woried about grandma on Social Security as I would be about the working folks who are going to, for the first time, understand that the “system” is not designed to meet their needs at all, but rather to exploit them and steal their money at every turn in order to give it to the Fat Cats on Wall Street. Them’s gonna be some pissed off mothers.
to those who think I who own a wheat field, or a can of food would even consider trading for a pot of gold is ignorant and not in touch with how bad it could get. you will not be able to buy from grocers and stores they will not have any products to buy.
to those who think economy is fixable, the powers that be will not allow it, to make a one world government you must get rid of capitalism. and then bring in socialism. Gold can be confiscated, as was done by Roosevelt, it can be outlawed as history has proven.
This country has tried for many many decades to bring the standard of living of other countries up to the level enjoyed by Americans, it has proven impossible due to gangs, dictatorships, and greed in those countries, so the only alternative is to bring ours down to their level. There is no other way for socialism and the New world order. So unless you are willing to phyically stop them with revolution,and go back to isolationism, I suggest you
prepare for a long long hold out.
20 problems is only about 3 problem.
Debt, Job, and Home Market.
Here’s how you solve our problem. Take my message to our incompetent political leaders.
1. Look at our government budget. Cut defense and social welfare spending. Use it to pay off the debt and create job.
2. All the lazy American needs to get their butt go to college or do something to retrain themselves to match the current demand.
3. The big bank will need to re-adjust the all the mortgage contract to where American can pay. They have to do it or fall along side all Americans.
4. The most important of all… For all the stupid American to stop buying everything they want, and only buy what they really need. Those American who can do this will not suffer as much as those who can’t.
Wow your recommendation are a little contradictory.
1 Stop social programs? how? Stop affording the military? when we are at our weakest, is suicide. disbanding soldiers?
Seems to me that soldiers on the social programs line will defeat your purpose of less social programs, and also all the people going back to school? who will feed them other then social programs to go to school, for 4 years or more?
or do you plan to make education free,
as to the mortgage companies why would they readjust when then can have your property if you don’t pay. and still get the money from bailouts? then tear down your homes and sell them to big farm corp. you expect them to not make money why be in business then? and as to the people buying what they need and not what they want, hmmm how is that gonna creat jobs?
as I said a little condradictory to say the least a little more thought into the problems is required.
to those who are in the midst of the blame game! kinda reminds me of children, we the people need to take the responsibility.you know like grown ups.
even worse,
So true, how do you explain the richest, with all the medical, vaccines, foods, etc. have the worst health?
could it be the richest lifestyles that cause it? Just as it causes lazy, depressed, cows waiting for slavery. funny perhaps man was not made to live in such conditions and the future fall will increase the health of America,
I have to tell you. I love all your comments. You are all very much awake. this is why I have been buying silver over the past 2 years and have a decent size food storage in my house.
2012 is coming or perhaps is already here.
What does it mean?
Many speculate the possibilities that are coming which is normal.
One thing for sure is that the people are going to suffer for a time and then those control freaks that run wall street, the biggest casino around, will find them selves out to lunch as good sense and harmony return and people stop worshiping the material things and begin to discover again the spiritual meaning on life.
Modern Religion has little to do with the spiritual.
Modern religion is the cause of a great deal of the insanity that prevails today on the planet.
Perhaps most beliefs that are rooted in religion are to blame to some extent.
A few thoughts from out there to ponder.
The first and number 1 reason the economy is going down a black hole probably not be what you expect. When loans start adjusting , right now, because rates are so low they may actually adjust down like mine did. I had a 3 year fixed rate. I got the original loan in 2004. The loan was not subprime it was through Wells Fargo.
Original rate- 3.875 % (Fixed for 3 years 3/2004 to 2/2008)
First adjustment – 5.875% 3/2008(The Feds had just raised rates the first adustment cap was a max of 2% more then my original rate)
2nd Adjustment – 3.875% 3/2009(went back down as the Feds slashed rates because of our recession)
This march will be the 3rd and final adjustment should take the rate down to 2% fixed for the life of the loan. WOWWWWW!!!!! 2% fixed interest rate when I had an adjustable rate mortgage! YEAHHHHH
When the loans start adjusting, depending on the index, they actually may have a lower interest rate on thier loan like I did. This wave of rate adjustment may be a good thing for the people, like it was for me. These loans that are coming due are 5 and 7 year fixed. They are good loans. They are likely to have rate decreases not increases in our current enviroment.
Let’s celebrate the only silver lining I see on a very big black cloud.
I think our economy is getting worse and jobs are being lost. Until this problam gets better I am scared regardless of the interest rate on my mortgage. Taxes are going to go up because of our deficit spending. Eventually we’ll have inflation. The middle east is going to stop trading their oil is US Dollars as soon as we leave them unoccupied. I pray for our country, there are so many issues….
I like some of the ideas relating to how we can take back our financial freedom and get this country back on track. The problem is that we never got rid of the monarchy, they just rule from the shadows. Self-interest is not limited to the masses, the leaders have it too, and they can do something about it. What they have done is created so many laws that should we try to change anything, we will run into one or another law that will keep us from being successful. Tariffs are supposed to pay for governement, not income taxes. NAFTA says that if the country does something to impede a corporations right to make the most money it can make, the company can sue for damages. We are screwed, blued, and chewed. It is what they want it to be and by the time any change comes it will have to be drastic (ie. god, aliens, violence, anarchy) Not a fun buncha choices for the majority.
You are forgetting commercial real estate resetting
We need term limits for everyone in Washington. The same old farts have bilked us for years and years to their/coprorate advantages. 2-terms and your out of Washington!
It’s obvious that we are now a Banana Republic, with the super-rich owning and controlling everything, while the peasants toil like hamsters in a wheel. I disagree about the struggle–it is absolutely between the rich and the poor.
The middle class is disappearing because we’ve been squeezed for the last 30 years by policies and laws that take our money while sending our jobs overseas. These outsourced jobs are not likely to return. There will be no recovery for Main Street.
And for all the dissing you give socialism, when things fall apart, it may be the only way we collectively can survive. Saying that Obama and Congress are “socialists” is just more Republican name-calling. It’s yet another way to divide us and distract us from what is really happening–and that is corporate fascism.
Exactly why I paid off all creditors, bought gold, food, and guns so I could hang onto the first two. If you are doing anything else than this then you are a fool.
As far as I can see, this may be our only hope:
http://www.fairtax.org/
It isn’t only the middle class being hit, just FYI. We had become very successful, due to hard work, just as many of our friends had. Guess what is happening to us? Well…we develop and hold real estate. The banks have now gotten new appraisals on our properties and are calling the loans due, stating that the values have dropped. In the bank’s eyes, this means we have defaulted on the agreements. They know we can’t get a new loan to pay them, and even though we were paying our loans on time, they are still coming after us. Someone knocked on our door tonight delivering lawsuit paperwork. Because of this, they will cause MANY of us to go bankrupt. We have employed 100’s of people over the years, as have our friends. If the commercial side of real estate falls apart, then my friends, we are in REAL serious trouble. You ALL have to remember that people who make money, hire people to help them run their businesses as they grow. Stop beating up on capitalism, because it is NOT the problem. The problem is the GOVERNMENT!!!!!!!!!!!
One more point I would like to make, that is important.
When someone has a private sector job, they are paying taxes into OUR tax/bank account.
When the govt hires someone to work in the public sector, then we pay that person out of our tax/bank account.
Let’s assume that both the private and the public employee makes $50,000/year.
The private person pays you and me about 30% or $15,000 into our tax/bank account.
The public person making $50,000/yr gives us back 30% in taxes, which is the same $15,000, BUT that means that we are still paying out $35,000 from our tax/bank account.
So, not only are we losing the $35,000 but we are also losing the $15,000 we would have gained from the private person that is now doing a govt job. Do the math. Big govt costs us all dearly!!!
Socialism is the problem that got us into this mess. Our government should be small and limited. We should have a very modest tax rate primarily to fund the military. Welfare programs should be done at the state level if they choose to do them.
Nevertheless, I know capitalism will be blamed for the collapse even though we haven’t been capitalist since before the creation of the Federal Reserve. We all just need to come to the reality that we will be a poorer country. People will blame the rich even though it’s not the rich people’s fault. I want to position myself in a place where I can bless and help others when things get bad. We all should be doing the same. We will be able to re-build, but the attitude of socialism that got us into this mess must first be dealt with.
Printed out this article for my customers to read as we go over how both of us are going to pay our bills. Small business is getting crushed, especially in Florida. Sir/Madam, if I may please have permission to post this article on a blog site at Tallahassee.com, the only local newspaper in the capital city of Florida. Between the federal/state/local governments, 64% of the workforce is government employed, with business paying all the local property taxes. (FL passed double homestead exemption w/Gov. Crist) Your brilliantly simple article needs to be seen in our town, to provide encouragement, yes, to hang on. If we know the truth, we know how to fight against being crushed. Thank you!!
Blue collar jobs have been shifting to low-cost countries for decades, & are continuing to do so. More recently it is also white-collar higher paying jobs which are shifting to low-cost countries. There are millions of IT, accounting, legal & other similar jobs affected. So, what’s left ? Do we all become scientists, millionaire business owners, CEOs ? Hey, don’t bet that these jobs can’t go overseas as well. What’s left ? Who’s left to pay the taxes ? Globalisation is a massive con-job.
Yes, please feel free to post this article on that blog. Just please include a direct link back to the original article – that is all we ask.
Thanks for checking out our site and we hope that you will come back again often.
Michael
What many of us fail to understand is that the economic failure of the US is planned. Our leaders are controlled by a demonic presence. They are puppets. They are deliberately trying to cause a world wide depression and it’s going to happen.
For some time now, in all facets of the economy, every adjustment has been to drive the US deeper into debt.
Our economy is now propped up and ready for a catastrophic event to cause it to fall like a rock. This horrific event is planned by the people that control both sides of the fence.
The overall goal of a world wide depression is many fold.
First: starvation, pestilence and war will quickly reduce the population to a more manageable level. This will be a horrific time and we are on the very eve of this event.
Secondly: A one world monetary system will then be introduced, where there is no money to change hands and your every purchase can be tracked. A microchip will be embedded into each and every person on the globe if they want to be able to buy and sell. Some call this the mark of the beast.
This is all in biblical prophecy and we are in the end times. Very shortly now we will begin tribulation.
So no amount of adjustment to the present economy can deter the terrible times that are near.
I am not here to preach to or convert anyone, but it is a simple fact that one’s best defense to the coming hard times is a solid spritual relationship with God.
Merlin, you said, “Exactly why I paid off all creditors, bought gold, food, and guns so I could hang onto the first two. If you are doing anything else than this then you are a fool.”
No, the moron and very evil one is you as your name shows. Hanging on Christ, the perfect man, and God, is what must be done to be saved from Hell which you are headed for because of your disobeying God. Guns, murder, will not save you from Hell, or God.
Thank you very much for the permission to reprint, Michael!!! I just posted your brilliant piece to: http://www.tallahassee.com/apps/pbcs.dll/section?category=PluckPersona&U=fedad0c71164438e812e68a3a718acdc&plckPersonaPage=BlogViewPost&plckUserId=fedad0c71164438e812e68a3a718acdc&plckPostId=Blog%3afedad0c71164438e812e68a3a718acdcPost%3a8a553982-3779-434e-9b7e-afeb084ac246&plckController=PersonaBlog&plckScript=personaScript&plckElementId=personaDest
(I don’t know how to tinyurl this address) The link to this site is at the top, and the readers have access to more of the best economic reporting I’ve ever read. Thank you!!
You are welcome Leslie!
Feel free to use more of our articles the same way in the future. The key is to get this information out there so that more Americans will wake up.
Amen to syevesmitty79 ’s comment on the 26th. Well said…well said
The BEST way to save America, is: Stop offending God! God LOVES to reward those who Love Him, Honor Him, Worship Him, Respect Him, Adore Him! God gave humanity Laws and Rules of Conduct to Bless humanity! It is sooo simple! DO IT TODAY! Start now! As long as you’re breathing, on this side of the dirt, it’s not too late!
You want to improve the economy. BUY AMERICAN STUPID!! Don’t support big box businesstha no no longer even attempts to buy American. The actually tell their vendors to send jobs overseas.
Wake up people too much talk and not enough action. People need to look seriously at what is going on in America and the rest of the world. Countries that are manufacturing stuff for Countries like America, Canada, Europe & ECT. do not make enough to buy the products they make. Soon the Countries America, Canada, Europe will not be able to buy either. Governments like in America are the problem, the greed and control is their goal. The only way to right this is 1) remove the elected who have been their way to long and those who call them selfs Progressive liberals on both sides of the isles of Government. 2) While working toward this goal, those who have said to get in food storage, gold & Silver & guns and ammo to help people and good families is the only way to weather perfect storm and here is hoping it dose not last too long if it can not be turned around.
We need to clean up congress. What if we required all congress people and presidential offices to have degrees in science, arts, history and math?? How about some smart people at the helm? Maybe we should re think how we structure our political offices, pay these people bank for having a higher education and mandate that they have no financial ties to corporations during or after office. What pay scale do we pay them to keep them happy and doing good jobs? Big corporations through our politicians are marching us back into slavery. Write your reps and congress and give em a piece of your mind.
rfs
Illuminating. Now it starts to make sense how Sun Life never took a bailout.
Have you seen their recent commercials? They’re great.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYWGEbIhSMg
11 Big suprises for the next decade:
The United States Remains World’s Strongest Economy-
In the second decade of the 21st century the United States was suffering. The economy was stagnating and was bouncing in and out from recessions and depressions. The military was involved in countless wars, and the personal and economic cost became unbearable. Beside that, the country suffered from record high crime rates, social unrest and political turmoil. But, the rest of the world was far worst. Europe has disintegrated, China has collapse, Russia remained a corrupt and failed state and India remained a poor and corrupt country fighting terrorist group. The world discovered that without the U.S locomotive the world economy couldn’t grow.
http://israelfinancialexpert.blogspot.com/search/label/predictions%202010
Where does the 80% number come from? The article said that the Fed bought 80% of the Treasuries last year. Can anyone send a link to the information where that came from?
blah blah blah!!! go jump off a freaking bridge if your life is so miserable!!
hey dude the real world isnt on graph paper…as long as the sun rises and the world turns, people will get up every morning and look for something to eat. last time i checked the united states produces a massive food surplus year after year. also, thanks to the housing boom in the last decade we have plenty of stable buildings in this great land of our, we also have youtube. so by my recollection we’ve got everything we need to wait out a long and boring recession, depression or whatever else you want to call it.
until the sky actually start falling or the rain really stops falling on the midwestern plains … i think we’ll be ok
PEOPLE make the world go round NOT graph and certainly (despite what you may have been told) NOT economists (thank god!)
The same sort of thing took place in 1933 – when FDR signed Executive Order 6102. The government essentially seized privately held gold. The 1934 Gold Reserve Act followed.
(see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_6102 and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_Reserve_Act)
[...] This post was Twitted by Lady_Liberty [...]
This literally scares the **** out of me. Before I stumbled upon this blog I had been thinking that we were kidding ourselves if we thought the economy would be ANYTHING like it was just a couple of years ago.
My wife and I pay our bills on time and never spend erroneously, yet we’ve had our credit limits slashed (no more unlimited Am Ex) and are finding it harder and harder to make ends meet month to month as companies get more creative with fees and surcharges.
Now I’m convinced we’re screwed.
Too Bad…AMERICANS ARE SO STUPID FOR NOT LEARNING ANYTHING FROM THEIR OWN PAST PROBLEMS….AFTER 2008-2009 WALL STREET BS…I NEVER SAW ONE RIOT ON THE STREET …EVERYONE FELT SO GOOD THAT THERE STOCKS WENT FROM $1 TO $5 THEY ALL FORGOT THAT THE SAME STOCK WAS $50-$70 TWO YEAR BEFORE…DUMB AMERICANS
Thanx a lot for this great article. Since the same phenomenon is happening in Europe, I have done a french translation of your text.
Keep writing !
What needs to be done is everyone needs to stop paying on their credit cards…thats right, default. collapse the entire credit card industry completely. You won’t be getting any more credit after you pay them off anyway and if you do, your credit line will be decreased substantially. Stop the insanity (30% interest)..you keep making corporate america richer. Then, hard as this may seem…default on your car loans; thus collapsing the banks further. (Buy a cheap car, learn to pay cash for everything). Once the fat cats cant feed off the poor, let’s see them fail as well. The whole system needs to collapse before anyone in power will take notice. Wall street needs to collapse as well.. cash in your stocks and refuse to be owned by speculators. Let’s see the bastards start jumping off buildings like in the 1st Great Depression (we are now in the 2nd Great Depression…with NO HOPE of coming out). Do not do what you have been conditioned to do for years, stop following their rules, and stop listening to the government controlled media who wants you to be afraid of your neighbor and certain groups…you need to fear your government, and take steps now to do something about it.Chaos is coming soon, be prepared for it.
In the “Great Depression” of the 30’s, nobody expected a handout from the government, but now when the government runs out of money, those who receive welfare and food-stamps will be rioting, robbing, and raping!
Better learn how to love your neighbor, people-we’ll have to stick together when the bottom falls out, and it will fall out! How do I know? Read your Bible! Ya do have one don’tcha? It’s all in there people! Come on-here we are , and it won’t get any better. And there ain’t no use in waitin’ for hell to freeze over-the fires are bein’ stoked as I type this!
Its exasperating to know that we have to accept it as is! Life is getting tougher but I know there is still something we can do out of this heck.
Yes, we are going to pay dearly for our sins. The worst one of which is that we killed (or stood by while others killed) our “golden goose”… our economy. It died a death by 1,000 cuts… and we will mourn our loss for generations to come.
It is being repeated everywhere that “capitalism failed”. That could not be farther from the truth.
The free market (Laissez-faire Capitalism) did not cause this crisis, the government (CRONY Capitalism/Socialism/Communism) did.
The free market did not create Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Ginnie Mae and Sallie Mae, the government did.
The free market did not pass laws that force banks to lend to those who do not qualify for a loan, the government did.
The free market did not take us off the gold standard, the government did.
The free market did not dump trillions of dollars of cheap money into the system causing the largest asset bubble in history, the government did.
The free market did not create multiple multi-trillion-dollar unfunded entitlement programs, the government did.
The free market did not write a 60,000+ page tax code that punishes work, rewards sloth and buys the votes of special interest groups, the government did.
The free market did not destroy our public school system and graduate (or fail to graduate) generations of civically and financially illiterate citizens, the government did.
The free market did not drive our jobs overseas and kill our entrepreneurial spirit with over-taxation, over-regulation and frivolous lawsuits, the government did.
The free market did not ban drilling for oil, vilify coal and block the building of nuclear power plants in the United States, thereby transferring hundred of billions of dollars of American wealth and many thousands of energy-industry jobs to foreign countries, the government did.
This crisis is the result of a giant social engineering experiment and vote-buying scheme gone tragically wrong.
The free market does not try to engineer society or buy votes, the government does.
The government caused this crisis, the free market did not.
If there is any way to fix this crisis, the government cannot do it, only the free market can.