It has been said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. Unfortunately, millions of Americans find themselves slowly going insane as they apply for hundreds upon hundreds of jobs and yet never get hired. It is incredibly difficult to get a good job in most areas of the United States today. So if you are unemployed, and there are no jobs in your area, should you move somewhere else in an attempt to find work? That is a very hard question. Of course if what you are currently doing right now is not working it is only natural to want to change course, but sadly unemployment is absolutely rampant all over the United States. Today, the “official” unemployment rate is hovering around 9 percent, but the true employment picture is much bleaker than that. There are millions and millions of unemployed Americans that are so discouraged and have given up looking for a job for so long that the U.S. government does not even consider them “part of the labor force” any longer. If they were included in the “official” figure, the true unemployment rate would be well into double figures. In addition, there are millions upon millions of Americans that are working part-time jobs or very low paying jobs because that is all they can get. Those millions of “underemployed” Americans would jump at the chance to get a “good job” if that opportunity was available. Low income jobs now make up 41% of all the jobs in the United States. So there are a lot of people that have a job that really wish that they were making a lot more money. Because of the lack of good jobs, millions of American families have been pushed to the edge of economic desperation and millions of American families are drowning in debt. So what do you do if there are no good jobs in your area? Do you sit tight or do move to a new location hoping for something better?
On the negative side, it can be extremely expensive to move. Not only will you have moving expenses, but you will also have to find a new place to live, set up new utilities, change your insurance policies, register your vehicles in a new area, etc. etc.
Moving somewhere new almost always costs more money than you think that it will.
Then, once you get to a new location, often you don’t have the same “connections” that you did in the place where you used to live.
And in today’s economy, having “connections” is one of the only ways that you can get a good job.
On the flip side, there are actually a few areas of the United States where the unemployment rate is low right now and where there do seem to be some good jobs available.
When people ask me where to look for a job, I tell them to check out North and South Dakota. It is cold as the dickens up there, but if you can handle the cold you just might be able to find work.
However, it is extremely risky to move somewhere new without having a job first. Most people that have been through that “adventure” know what I am talking about.
But sometimes in life you have to take a risk. Today there are over 47 million Americans that are living in poverty, and that number is increasing every single month. Sitting on your couch and doing nothing is not going to get you where you need to be.
Rather than just sit there and sink even deeper into desperation, an increasing number of Americans are deciding to make a move. There are some areas of the United States that have become absolute hellholes. After years of experiencing intense economic frustration in those hellholes, many Americans are picking up stakes and are heading for greener pastures.
For example, the following video report from RT describes how large numbers of people are now abandoning Riverside, California….
Sadly, very few jobs are truly safe anymore.
Years ago, I would tell people to look into government jobs because they were relatively more secure. Unfortunately, that is no longer the case.
Today, state and local government debt has reached at an all-time high of 22 percent of U.S. GDP. State and local governments from coast to coast are implementing austerity programs and are laying off employees at a staggering pace.
The following is a chart from the Federal Reserve of local government hiring over the past five years. Obviously, the trend is not heading in a positive direction….
Most Americans don’t realize just how nightmarish the financial problems of many of our state and local governments are right now.
For example, the state of California is basically a financial basket case at this point. In a recent article I discussed the cold, hard reality that California is broke and I explained some of the reasons why millions of people have already left the state….
Back in the 1960s and 1970s, there was a seemingly endless parade of pop songs about how great life was in California, and millions of young Americans dreamed of moving to the land of sandy beaches and golden sunshine. But now all of that has changed. Today, millions of Californians are dreaming about leaving the state for good. The truth is that California is broke. The economy of the state is in shambles. The official unemployment rate has been sitting above 12 percent for an extended period of time, and poverty is everywhere. For many Californians today, there are very few reasons to stay in the state but a whole lot of reasons to leave: falling housing prices, rising crime, budget cuts, rampant illegal immigration, horrific traffic, some of the most brutal tax rates in the nation, increasing gang violence and the ever present threat of wildfires, mudslides and natural disasters. The truth is that it is easy to understand why there are now more Americans moving out of California each year than there are Americans moving into the state. California has become a complete and total disaster zone in more ways than one, and an increasing number of Californians are deciding that enough is enough and they are getting out for good.
On the “Survive And Thrive TV” channel on YouTube, one Californian that was in the process of moving to a different state was recently interviewed as he was preparing to leave. The following interview shows the mindset of many that are leaving California. It also contains just a bit of strong language, so if you are sensitive to that you may want to not watch this video….
Other desperate Americans are taking a different approach. Instead of moving to a new area, these Americans are coming up with “creative” ways of raising cash.
For example, a criminal gang of white middle-aged women in Detroit nicknamed the “Mad Hatters” has become so successful that they have made international news. It is alleged that they have pulled off a stunning series of robberies.
According to the Telegraph, the “Mad Hatters” have stolen somewhere in the neighborhood of half a million dollars so far….
The total value of merchandise and cash stolen could be as high as $500,000, police said. The women stole almost $200,000 from one bank.
In a previous article I detailed many of the ways that Americans have “gone wild” lately, but it was even shocking to me to hear of a gang of middle-aged women terrorizing the city of Detroit.
Is the Greek debt crisis about to explode out of control? According to Der Spiegel, the government of Greece is considering leaving the Euro and reestablishing its own currency. If that happened, it would throw global financial markets into chaos and it might mean the end of the euro as a pan-European currency. But the Greek government has to do something about all of these debts. At this point Greece is literally drowning in debt. The yield on 10-year Greek bonds has now reached an astounding 15.51%. There is no way that is sustainable even for the short-term. Greece is rapidly going bankrupt. Even with absolutely brutal austerity measures in place, the debt just continues to explode. There are protests against the government almost daily and Greece is in a state of chaos. Unfortunately, because Greece is part of the euro they can’t just start printing lots of money as a way to get out of this crisis. Now there are persistent rumors that Greece really is thinking about leaving the euro, and that could potentially mean big trouble for the world financial system.
It was a new article in Der Spiegel that brought these rumors to the forefront again. Der Spiegel says that it possesses secret Greek government documents that discuss plans to leave the euro. Der Spiegel also claims that a secret crisis meeting was held in Luxembourg on Friday night to discuss this crisis.
The following is a brief excerpt from the Der Spiegel article that caused the financial community in Europe to be in such an uproar today….
“The debt crisis in Greece has taken on a dramatic new twist. Sources with information about the government’s actions have informed SPIEGEL ONLINE that Athens is considering withdrawing from the euro zone. The common currency area’s finance ministers and representatives of the European Commission are holding a secret crisis meeting in Luxembourg on Friday night.”
So was there such a meeting in Luxembourg on Friday night?
Well, it turns out that there was a meeting of a small group of European finance ministers. But according to German government spokesman Steffen Seibert, this meeting was planned well in advance and had nothing to do with Greece leaving the euro….
“There is a meeting of some finance ministers that has long been planned. Greece exiting the Eurozone is not on the agenda of that meeting, and it has never been.”
So is Greece actually thinking about leaving the euro? All over Europe this notion is being denied.
“The report on an imminent Greek exit from the eurozone, as well as being untrue, has been written with incomprehensible levity despite the fact that this has been repeatedly denied by the Greek government, and the governments of other EU member states.”
What was probably being discussed at this meeting of European finance ministers is a restructuring of Greek debt. This is something that Germany has apparently wanted for quite some time according to a recent article posted on Business Insider….
For weeks, German officials have been hinting that they want a Greek restructuring to happen. German economic advisor Lars Feld recently said that the restructuring should happen “sooner than later.” He’s previously also said “restructuring is the only road to take.”
So what would a restructuring of this debt look like? A recent article on CNBC gives us some clues….
More importantly, tonight’s finance ministers meeting might lay the groundwork for “extending the maturities” on those loans — giving Athens a little more oxygen until it probably ends up restructuring its $470 billion existing debt by either extending maturities or exchanging Greek bonds, at a discount, for EU-guaranteed bonds, Brady Bond-style from the 1980s.
What Germany does not want is for Greece to even think about leaving the euro. According to the article on Der Spiegel, German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble is ready to play hardball with the Greeks. Der Spiegel says that a report has been prepared that would lay out for the Greeks the severe consequences of leaving the euro….
“It would lead to a considerable devaluation of the new (Greek) domestic currency against the euro,” the paper states. According to German Finance Ministry estimates, the currency could lose as much as 50 percent of its value, leading to a drastic increase in Greek national debt. Schäuble’s staff have calculated that Greece’s national deficit would rise to 200 percent of gross domestic product after such a devaluation. “A debt restructuring would be inevitable,” his experts warn in the paper. In other words: Greece would go bankrupt.
Greece is really in a tough position. They are going to go bankrupt if they stay with the euro and they are going to go bankrupt if they leave the euro.
Meanwhile, the anti-government protests continue. The Greek people are not happy. The Greek economy is coming apart like a 20 dollar suit. Greece could end up being the spark that sets off a massive financial panic in Europe.
As I have written about previously, the European debt crisis is on the verge of spinning wildly out of control. It is not just Greece that is facing a horrific debt crisis. The financial problems in Europe literally span the entire continent.
A lot of Americans are obsessed with the death of the U.S. dollar, but the truth is that there is a strong possibility that the euro could end up collapsing before the dollar does.
Keep an eye on Europe. The European debt crisis could plunge the entire global financial system into chaos at any time. Things are not nearly as stable as they seem.
The United States is in the middle of a devastating long-term economic decline and it is getting really hard to deny it. Over the past year I have included literally thousands of depressing statistics in my articles about the U.S. economy. I have done this in order to make an overwhelming case that the U.S. economy is in deep decline and is dying a little bit more every single day. Until we understand exactly how bad our problems are we will never be willing to accept the solutions. The truth is that our leaders have absolutely wrecked the greatest economic machine that the world has ever seen. Most Americans just assume that we will always experience overwhelming prosperity, but that is not anywhere close to the truth. We are not guaranteed anything. Our manufacturing base has been gutted, the number of jobs is declining, more Americans are dependent on government handouts than ever before, our dollar is dying and as a nation we are absolutely drowning in debt. The economists that are trumpeting an “economic recovery” and that are declaring that the U.S. economy will soon be “better than ever” are delusional. We really are steamrolling toward a complete and total economic collapse and our leaders are doing nothing to stop it.
The following are 24 more signs of economic decline in America. Hopefully you will not get too depressed as you read them….
#1 On Monday, Standard & Poor’s altered its outlook on U.S. government debt from “stable” to “negative” and warned the U.S. that it could soon lose its AAA rating. This is yet another sign that the rest of the world is losing faith in the U.S. dollar and in U.S. Treasuries.
#2 China has announced that they are going to be reducing their holdings of U.S. dollars. In fact, there are persistent rumors that this has already been happening.
#3 Hedge fund manager Dennis Gartman says that “panic dollar selling is setting in” and that the U.S. dollar could be in for a huge decline.
#5 This cruel economy is causing “ghost towns” to appear all across the United States. There are quite a few counties across the nation that now have home vacancy rates of over 50%.
#6 There are now about 7.25 million less jobs in America than when the recession began back in 2007.
#7 The average American family is having a really tough time right now. Only 45.4% of Americans had a job during 2010. The last time the employment level was that low was back in 1983.
#8 Only 66.8% of American men had a job last year. That was the lowest level that has ever been recorded in all of U.S. history.
#9 According to a new report from the AFL-CIO, the average CEO made 343 times more money than the average American did last year.
#10 Gas prices reached five dollars per gallon at a gas station in Washington, DC on April 19th, 2011. Could we see $6 gas soon?
#11 Over the past 12 months the average price of gasoline in the United States has gone up by about 30%.
#15 Total home mortgage debt in the United States is now about 5 times larger than it was just 20 years ago.
#16 Total credit card debt in the United States is now more than 8 times larger than it was just 30 years ago.
#17 Average household debt in the United States has now reached a level of 136% of average household income. In China, average household debt is only 17% of average household income.
#18 The average American now spends approximately 23 percent of his or her income on food and gas.
#19 In a recent survey conducted by Deloitte Consulting, 74 percent of Americans said that they planned to slow down their spending in coming months due to rising prices.
#2059 percent of all Americans now receive money from the federal government in one form or another.
#21 According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average length of unemployment in the U.S. is now an all-time record 39 weeks.
#22 As the economy continues to collapse, frustration among young people will continue to grow and we will see more seemingly “random acts of violence”. One shocking example of this happened in the Atlanta area recently. The following is how a local Atlanta newspaper described the attack….
Roughly two dozen teens, chanting the name of a well-known Atlanta gang, brought mob rule to MARTA early Sunday morning, overwhelming nervous passengers and assaulting two Delta flight attendants.
#24 As the economy has declined, the American people have been gobbling up larger and larger amounts of antidepressants and other prescription drugs. In fact, the American people spent 60 billion dollars more on prescription drugs in 2010 than they did in 2005.
Guess what? The Democrats and the Republicans are both lying to us again. So what else is new? The truth is that the great “budget crisis” which supposedly took us to the verge of a government shutdown was just a whole bunch of political theater. Even the Associated Press is declaring that our politicians used “accounting sleight of hand” to reach the $38.5 billion budget cut figure. Not that $38.5 billion was an impressive number to begin with. $38.5 billion would just be one percent of the federal budget. But once you strip away the accounting charades, the real budget cut number is somewhere around 14 billion dollars. It turns out that the “budget cuts” include money left unspent from previous years, earmarks that were going nowhere, unused census money and programs that Obama was already planning to cut. The more you examine the “budget deal”, the more it becomes obvious that the Republicans and the Democrats had no intention of doing anything serious about our debt problems. The U.S. government is still going to run a record-setting budget deficit in 2011 and both the Democrats and the Republicans are to blame.
So should we be surprised that our politicians have been lying to us again?
Of course not.
But if something is not done about our soaring debt it is absolutely going to crash our financial system.
According to the IMF, the U.S. government will have to borrow an amount of money equivalent to 29 percent of GDP this year alone in order to finance its budget deficit and its maturing debt.
That is what you call a crisis.
But neither political party seems the least bit serious about the national debt.
The Republicans are proposing even more tax cuts without saying how they are going to pay for them, and they even tucked an increase in military spending into the “budget cut” deal.
The Democrats don’t seem to want to cut much of anything. In fact, most Democrats seem to believe that government debt is not much of a crisis at all.
Our politicians love to talk about “cutting the budget”, but nothing ever gets done. Both parties have been promising us “fiscal responsibility” for decades but both parties have never delivered.
Sadly, the American people have not held our politicians responsible for this.
This latest episode just reveals how much of a joke Washington D.C. has become. In the 8 days leading up to the “historic” $38.5 billion budget deal, the U.S. national debt increased by $54.1 billion dollars.
Our politicians are standing by and doing nothing while the financial future of this nation is being destroyed right in front of our eyes. It is now being projected that by the year 2021, interest payments on the national debt will amount to $1.1 trillion dollars a year.
Fortunately, some bloggers out there are starting to wake up to just how pathetic this latest “budget deal” really was.
For instance, Tim Fernholz of the National Journal recently posted the following….
For example, the final cuts in the deal are advertised as $38.5 billion less than was appropriated in 2010, but after removing rescissions, cuts to reserve funds, and reductions in mandatory spending programs, discretionary spending will be reduced only by $14.7 billion.
In fact, some conservative bloggers are becoming absolutely furious with the duplicity of the Republican party. In a recent article on Business Insider, John Ellis really let John Boehner have it….
It turns out that the budget agreement that all parties were hailing this past weekend as a “great achievement” is in fact a joke. Any Republican who was elected with even a sliver of Tea Party support is now duty-bound to vote against it on Friday. Every 2012 Republican presidential hopeful is now duty-bound to demand that it be voted down.
But Boehner is already saying that it is time to “move on” and that he is really going to “get tough” during the next battle. Boehner is claiming that the “war” over the debt ceiling is going to be about “trillions” instead of “billions”.
The American people are certainly in the mood for something to be done about our debt crisis. According to a new NBC/WSJ poll, the vast majority of Republicans and the vast majority of independents do not want the debt ceiling raised. Even Democrats are roughly split on the issue.
So what pathetically low number will cause John Boehner to cave in this time?
Obama is already taking a strong stand on the debt ceiling. He is demanding that the Republicans send him a “clean bill” and is warning that they must not “play politics” with U.S. government finances.
On Monday, White House press secretary Jay Carney stated that “the consequences of not raising the debt ceiling would be Armageddon-like in terms of the economy.”
You know what? To a certain degree Carney is right. If the U.S. government hits the debt ceiling the financial markets will likely go haywire. That would cause the big boys up on Wall Street to start putting tremendous pressure on Boehner. There is no way that Boehner would watch chaos unfold on Wall Street and not end up flinching.
Not that Boehner was ever serious about cutting the federal deficit. He was not serious about it during the Bush years and he is not serious about it now.
This is all just a whole lot of political theater.
Meanwhile, most Americans are not even paying attention to all of the financial fraud being committed by the “fourth branch of government”.
Of course the Federal Reserve is not actually part of the federal government at all. But they do get to spend trillions and lend trillions without ever having to get the approval of Congress, the president or the American people.
For example, most Americans don’t realize this, but the Federal Reserve has been handing out hundreds of millions of dollars in nearly risk-free loans to their friends and even to the wives of their friends.
Unfortunately, the Federal Reserve is above the law and is not accountable to anyone. In fact, we can’t even get our politicians to authorize a comprehensive audit of their books.
The truth is that our system is soaked in so much fraud that there is no way that it will ever recover.
We have turned our backs on the principles of our founding fathers and so now we pay the price.
The U.S. national debt is now over 14 times larger than it was 30 years ago and it is currently rising by well over 4 billion dollars every single day. This debt will destroy our financial system. We are stealing the future from our children and our grandchildren.
It is so sad to see what is happening to America.
So what do all of you think about what is going on in Washington D.C.? Feel free to leave a comment with your opinion below….
Everything that you own is slowly being taken away from you. It is being done purposely and it is being done by design. Many Americans like to think of themselves as “well off”, but as will be demonstrated below, we don’t “own” nearly as much as we think that we do. The truth is that most of us have to frantically run around accumulating wealth as rapidly as we can so that we can somehow stay ahead of the rate that wealth is being taken away from us. The entire system is designed to take what you have away from you. There are many ways that this is accomplished – taxation, inflation, debt, interest, fines, fees, tickets, government seizures and good old-fashioned corporate greed. If you tried to just sit back and do nothing but hold on to the wealth that you already have you would find out that it would disappear rather quickly. When you take the time to really analyze our system the conclusion is undeniable – everything that you think that you own is being systematically taken away from you.
There is a reason why the wealthiest one percent of all Americans control 40 percent of all the wealth in the United States. The system is designed to funnel all of the wealth to them and to the government. Average Americans are experiencing a declining standard of living and it is not by accident.
Just check out some of the ways that our wealth is being taken from us….
#1 Do you think that you own your house? You might want to think again. Most Americans that “own a home” are paying a mortgage. If you stop paying that mortgage you will lose that home. Over a million American families were kicked out of their homes last year. This year a million more American families will get the boot.
But when those families get booted out onto the street they don’t get their down payments back. They don’t get all the mortgage payments that they have made back. The banks get to keep all of the money and all of the houses.
Perhaps you don’t have a mortgage. Does that mean that you “own your home”?
No, not really. Just refuse to pay your property taxes and watch what happens. At best you can say that you have the right to rent your home from the government.
In any event, the reality is that the banks now own more of “our homes” than we do. During the most recent recession, the total amount of U.S. home equity owned by the banks surpassed the total amount of U.S. home equity owned by the rest of us for the first time ever.
Things used to be far different in this country. Once upon a time American families owned most of the houses and most of the land in this nation.
But now the banks own most of it. Sadly, most American families that believe that they “own homes” are actually enslaved to 20 or 30 year debt contracts.
#2 Do you think that you own your car? You don’t own it if you are still making payments on it. If you stop making payments you will rapidly lose that car.
But even if your car is paid off, you can only operate that car if you do the following….
*You must pay the license fee
*You must pay the car registration fee
*You must pay the emissions inspection fee
*You must pay the property taxes on that car (if that applies in your area)
*You must pay the tire taxes
*You must pay the gas taxes
If you have paid all of those taxes, then you are permitted to drive only where the government allows you to drive and only under the rules that the government sets for you.
But at least you “own” your car, right?
#3 What about your possessions? Do you own them?
Well, yes, you probably own some possessions.
But that doesn’t mean that they are not enslaving you.
After all, did you use a credit card to pay for any of them?
If so, you could end up paying much more for your possessions than you originally thought that they cost.
For example, if you only make the minimum payment on your credit card each month, a $6,000 credit card bill could end up costing you over $30,000 (depending on the interest rate).
#4 Do you own your education? Well, it is undeniable that nobody can ever take it away from you. But if you took out student loans that debt may end up enslaving you for decades.
The borrower is the servant of the lender and student loan debt is more of a financial drain on Americans than ever before. Americans now owe more on student loans than they do on credit cards. As hard as that is to believe, that is actually true. Americans now owe more than $903 billion on student loans, which is a new all-time record.
#5 Will you protect your wealth if you put your money in the bank?
No, in fact your wealth will be systematically destroyed in the bank.
Inflation is a hidden tax on every single dollar that you own. It destroys the value of all dollars in existence. There are some Americans that have been saving money for decades, but those savings are being taxed into oblivion by inflation. Many experts are now projecting that the average price of a gallon of gasoline will hit $5 by the end of the year. So the next time you go to the gas pump just take a moment to think about how your wealth is being drained away by inflation.
#6 Insurance costs continue to soar. After insuring everything in our lives many of us barely have any money left over to actually live our lives with. In particular, health insurance premiums have become completely and totally ridiculous. According to the Los Angeles Times, Blue Shield of California plans to raise rates an average of 30% to 35%, and some individual policy holders could see their health insurance premiums rise by a whopping 59 percent this year alone. So how are American families supposed to survive if they keep on handing over bigger and bigger chunks of their income to the health care industry?
#7 State and local governments all over the nation have turned to ticket writing as a primary revenue source. In fact, in some areas of the country traffic citations are soaring at a crazy rate. For example, 110,000 more traffic citations were written in Los Angeles County last fiscal year than were written in the fiscal year immediately prior to the last recession.
The truth is that the police even realize what is going on. Just consider the following quote from from Police Chief Michael Reaves of Utica, Michigan….
“When I first started in this job 30 years ago, police work was never about revenue enhancement, but if you’re a chief now, you have to look at whether your department produces revenues.”
#8 Some states have decided to simply confiscate wealth even if nothing has been done wrong. For example, the state of California is aggressively seizing “unclaimed” safe deposit boxes. If you have a safe deposit box that you have not checked on in a while you might want to make sure that it is still there.
#9 You might end up losing your valuables when you cross the border. It is being reported that U.S. border agents are now regularly seizing laptops and other electronic devices as people cross the border. In many cases those items are never returned.
#10 If you don’t pay your property taxes, you will lose your house and it will likely be a big Wall Street bank that will be taking it from you. As I have written about previously, the big Wall Street banks are buying up thousands upon thousands of tax liens and are making a killing by socking distressed homeowners with predatory interest, outrageous penalties and almost unbelievable legal fees.
#11 Of course the biggest way that our wealth is being drained is through federal income taxes. The reason that the Federal Reserve and the IRS were established back in 1913 was to redistribute wealth. Wealth is transferred from the American people to the U.S. government and then ultimately to the elite and to the causes that the elite favor.
But federal taxes are only one of the taxes that we pay. The truth is that the average American pays dozens of different taxes each year. Just check out a few examples of the different taxes that drain our wealth….
#12 Accounts Receivable Taxes
#13 Building Permit Taxes
#14 Capital Gains Taxes
#15 CDL License Taxes
#16 Cigarette Taxes
#17 Corporate Income Taxes
#18 Court Fines (indirect taxes)
#19 Dog License Taxes
#20 Federal Unemployment Taxes (FUTA)
#21 Fishing License Taxes
#22 Food License Taxes
#23 Gasoline Taxes
#24 Gift Taxes
#25 Hunting License Taxes
#26 Inheritance Taxes
#27 Inventory Taxes
#28 IRS Interest Charges (tax on top of tax)
#29 IRS Penalties (tax on top of tax)
#30 Liquor Taxes
#31 Local Income Taxes
#32 Luxury Taxes
#33 Marriage License Taxes
#34 Medicare Taxes
#35 Payroll Taxes
#36 Property Taxes
#37 Real Estate Taxes
#38 Recreational Vehicle Taxes
#39 Road Toll Booth Taxes
#40 Road Usage Taxes (Truckers)
#41 Sales Taxes
#42 Self-Employment Taxes
#43 School Taxes
#44 Septic Permit Taxes
#45 Service Charge Taxes
#46 Social Security Taxes
#47 State Income Taxes
#48 State Unemployment Taxes (SUTA)
#49 Telephone federal excise taxes
#50 Telephone federal universal service fee taxes
#51 Telephone federal, state and local surcharge taxes
#52 Telephone minimum usage surcharge taxes
#53 Telephone recurring and non-recurring taxes
#54 Telephone state and local taxes
#55 Telephone usage charge taxes
#56 Toll Bridge Taxes
#57 Toll Tunnel Taxes
#58 Traffic Fines (indirect taxation)
#59 Trailer Registration Taxes
#60 Utility Taxes
#61 Vehicle License Registration Taxes
#62 Vehicle Sales Taxes
#63 Watercraft Registration Taxes
#64 Well Permit Taxes
#65 Workers Compensation Taxes
Even the future is being taken away from us. The future is literally being stolen from our children and our grandchildren. They will be inheriting the 14 trillion dollar (and still rising) national debt that we have accumulated. What we have done to future generations is unthinkable, and yet we continue to endlessly borrow more money. The Congressional Research Service estimates that the U.S. government will need to borrow $738 billion between April 1st and September 30th. Faith in U.S. Treasuries is falling so rapidly that now the biggest bond fund in the world, PIMCO, is actually shorting U.S. Treasuries.
When you base an entire economy on debt, eventually you end up with money problems that never seem to end. As a nation we are now enslaved to a vicious spiral of debt that is going to destroy everything that our forefathers worked so hard to build.
As the debt loads of our federal, state and local governments become even more burdensome, they are going to want even more money from us. For decades we gave in to new tax after new tax thinking that it would finally satisfy them. But it never seems to be enough. They always want more.
It is the same thing with the banksters. They are never satisfied either. They always want more assets and they always want more Americans to be enslaved to debt.
Unfortunately, most Americans are so caught up in the “rat race” that they never take much time to think about who designed the race or why they are running it.
Hopefully more Americans will wake up and will realize that our entire economy and our entire financial system need to be reformed. Our current system is inherently flawed and it will eventually impoverish the vast majority of us if we allow it to.
If the U.S. government were to shut down for a while, would that really be such a bad thing? Right now everyone in the mainstream media is freaking out as if the world is going to end, but the truth is that there have been government shutdowns before. The apocalypse is not going to happen if there is another shutdown. If Congress could find a way to get our troops and our border patrol agents paid, then what would be so bad about the government taking a “vacation” for a while? After all, when was the last time that either the Republicans or the Democrats did anything that was actually good for America? It has not mattered which political party has been in power – over the past couple of decades our “representatives” in Washington D.C. have passed an endless parade of bad laws and have gotten us into the biggest mountain of debt in the history of the world. They literally seem unable to do anything right. So would it really be so bad if a government shutdown slows them down for a while? If our politicians are going to act like a bunch of idiots, why not let them shut it down?
Think of it this way – if you could eliminate all of the laws passed under George W. Bush and Barack Obama would you do it?
I think that most Americans would.
Almost every single law that has been passed over the past couple of decades has been bad for America.
But many Americans seem to be going into a panic at the thought that the “almighty government” might not be operating for a few days.
Many Americans seem to have bought into the lie that the federal government is the most important institution in our country.
But this is never what our founding fathers intended. Our founding fathers intended for the federal government to be very limited. Unfortunately, we have turned our backs on the principles of our founding fathers.
So exactly what is this fight between the Republicans and the Democrats all about? Why have we been brought to the brink of a government shutdown?
We keep hearing that it is all about cutting the budget. In fact, House Speaker John Boehner says that his party is “damn serious about it”.
But that is a joke. The federal budget deficit for this year is going to be approximately $1.6 trillion dollars. The Republicans were asking for just $61 billion in budget cuts (3.8% of the budget deficit) and there are rumors that Republican and Democratic negotiators have agreed to a figure of $38 billion in budget cuts.
$38 billion?
Is this why the Tea Party was sent to Washington?
$38 billion would just be 2.4 percent of the $1.6 trillion dollar deficit.
Wow, that is really wielding the budget cutting axe!
Look, the U.S. government cannot spend a single penny from now on without Republicans going along with it.
The Republicans control the House of Representatives. Barack Obama and the Senate will not have a single dime to spend unless they can get the House to go along with it.
If the Democrats want money to implement Obamacare then they have to get the Republicans to go along with it.
If the Democrats want to give money to the EPA to implement Obama’s “green agenda” then they have to get the Republicans to go along with it.
In fact, pretty much whatever the Democrats want to do, they have to get the Republicans to agree to fund it.
So if you don’t like what Obama and the Democrats are doing, don’t just blame them.
Blame the Republicans as well.
Both parties are deeply corrupt and both parties have gotten us to the point we are at.
Sadly, it looks like any deal that the Republicans and the Democrats are going to agree to is going to include virtually everything that the Democrats want.
It is going to include full funding for Obamacare.
It is going to include full funding for Planned Parenthood.
It is going to include full funding for NPR.
It is going to include full funding for the EPA.
So what are the Republicans going to get?
$38 billion in spending cuts?
Is that supposed to be a “deal”?
The truth is that Boehner is a joke and he is not serious about cutting the federal budget.
But if we don’t start seriously cutting the federal budget we are heading for complete and total disaster.
David Stockman, who served as budget director under Ronald Reagan, says that if Congress is not serious about getting our financial house in order that a government shutdown could be precisely the kind of wake up call that we need….
If the Smithsonian, the Parks Service and the Cherry Blossom Festival get delayed or canceled, it’s the wakeup call that we really needed. The fools inside the Beltway are borrowing $100 billion month in and month out, and there’s nobody left in the world buying except the central banks—the Fed and the people’s printing press of China. There’s no way that’s sustainable or viable. It’s simply building up pressure in the monetary system that’s going to blow sky-high.
Look, the United States is heading straight for financial armageddon. This is a crisis of historic proportions. In a previous article on U.S. government finances, I detailed some absolutely horrifying statistics about the debt crisis that the U.S. government is facing….
*If you divide the national debt up equally among all U.S. households, each one owes a staggering $125,475.18.
*The federal government has borrowed 29,660 more dollars per household since Barack Obama signed the economic stimulus law two years ago.
*In the new budget that the Obama administration has proposed, the U.S. government would spend 3.7 trillion dollars in 2012 and by 2021 the U.S. government would be spending a whopping 5.6 trillion dollars per year.
*The U.S. government currently has to borrow approximately 41 cents of every single dollar that it spends.
*The total compensation that the federal government workforce earned last year came to a grand total of approximately 447 billion dollars.
*The U.S. national debt is currently rising by well over 4 billion dollars every single day.
*The U.S. government is borrowing over 2 million more dollars every single minute.
*Unfunded liabilities for entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicare are estimated to be well over $100 trillion, and nobody in the U.S. government seems to have any idea how we are actually even going to come close to meeting all of those obligations.
*If you were alive when Jesus was born and you spent one million dollars every single day since that point, you still would not have spent one trillion dollars by now. But this year alone the U.S. government is going to go about 1.6 trillion dollars more into debt.
*If the federal government began right at this moment to repay the U.S. national debt at a rate of one dollar per second, it would take over 440,000 years to pay off the national debt.
But even if the Republicans got every single thing that they have been demanding it would make essentially no difference as far as our national debt crisis is concerned. It would basically be like spitting into Niagara Falls.
So which political party has the correct position in this battle?
Neither of them. In fact, both political parties are a joke. They are both acting like a bunch of idiots just like they have been for decades.
So let them shut it down. The truth is that the number one threat to our liberties and freedoms right now is our own federal government.
In a recent article, J.B. Williams talked about why he thinks that it would be a really good idea to shut the government down….
I say, shut it down! The federal government has done as much to harm the union of states as it has ever done to improve freedom and liberty in America. We will be better off without a federal government, with each state able to fund and govern itself better than the Fed ever could.
Extreme threats demand extreme measures, and nothing threatens the future freedom and prosperity of the United States more than our own federal government. Enemies beyond, we can deal with. It’s the enemy within which threatens us most today. It’s time to shut it down and reset.
Just think about a few of the ways that our own federal government violates our liberties and freedoms every single day….
*If you want to get on an airplane in America today, you must either go through one of the incredibly intrusive full body scanners that are going into all U.S. airports and let airport security goons gawk at your exposed body, or you must allow airport security goons to feel you up using the new “enhanced pat down” techniques they are being instructed to employ.
*Thanks to the Patriot Act, if you are identified as a “terrorist”, you suddenly lose all of your constitutional rights. We are told that detaining American citizens indefinitely and subjecting them to “enhanced interrogation” techniques will keep us all safer.
*The federal government controls our lives so tightly that now they even tell us what kinds of light bulbs we are allowed to buy.
*Barack Obama has been pushing a plan that would create a national database that will store the DNA of all individuals who have been arrested, even if they end up not being convicted of a crime.
*Just about anything can be used against you in court these days. In one of the very first military commissions held under the Obama administration, a U.S. military judge ruled that confessions obtained by threatening the subject with rape are admissible in court.
*The federal government listens to our cell phones whenever they want and they require that all cell phone companies must be able to pinpoint the locations of all of their customers to within 100 meters.
*According to FBI Director Robert Mueller, “homegrown terrorists” represent just as much of a threat to American national security as al-Qaeda does.
*In Washington D.C., if you do not submit to “random bag checks” while riding the Metro there is a good chance that you could receive a follow-up visit by the FBI or by the Department of Homeland Security.
*If you make food “incorrectly” there is a good chance that you will get raided by the federal government. In fact, the feds raided an Amish farmer at 5 AM in the morning because they claimed that he was was engaged in the interstate sale of raw milk in violation of federal law.
So in light of how extreme our federal government has become, is there anyone out there that still thinks it would be a “crisis” if the government was to shut down for a while?
If our government is going to take away our liberties and freedoms instead of protecting them, then why would it be a bad thing if it shut down for a short time?
It might just get some of the control freaks off our backs for a while.
Yes, we do need to make sure our military men and women are paid. We also need to make sure that our border patrol agents are paid. But if Congress could actually get that accomplished it wouldn’t be too bad at all if the government were to shut down for an extended period of time.
So what do all the rest of you think? Feel free to leave a comment with your opinion about the possibility of a government shutdown below….
Do you need a good job? If so, there are millions of other Americans that are just like you. Unfortunately, most of the jobs that are available in America today are either part-time jobs, temp jobs or are “independent contractor” jobs. The “full-time job with benefits” is a dying breed. There are so many desperate unemployed workers in America today that companies don’t have to roll out the red carpet anymore. Instead, they can just hire a horde of inexpensive part-timers and temps that they don’t have to give any benefits to. But isn’t the employment situation supposed to be getting better? No, it really is not. Yes, the U.S. economy added 216,000 jobs in March. However, the truth is that approximately 290,000 part-time jobs were created and about 80,000 full-time jobs were actually lost. This is all part of a long-term trend in America. Good jobs are rapidly disappearing and they are being replaced by low paying service jobs that do not pay a living wage. In many American households today, both parents have multiple jobs. Yet a large percentage of those same households can’t even pay the mortgage and are drowning in debt.
Whenever a new government jobs report comes out from now on, try to find out how many of the jobs that were created were actually part-time jobs. Most Americans that only have part-time jobs are living around or below the poverty line. The truth is that it is really hard to get by if you are only making a couple hundred bucks a week.
As mentioned above, the U.S. economy added 216,000 jobs last month. The Obama administration and the mainstream media heralded that figure as evidence that the U.S. economy is recovering nicely.
But is that really accurate?
Rebel Cole, a professor at DePaul University’s Kellstadt Graduate School of Business, says that when you take the time to do a closer examination of the employment numbers they don’t look so good….
“If you look deeper in the report, there were 290,000 new part-time workers, which means that there were 80,000 fewer full-time workers, that’s not a good sign. Things are getting worse, not getting better.”
Unless you are a teen or a college student or a retired person, most likely you would prefer to be working a full-time job. Most people do not actually have the goal of working part-time. Most part-time jobs pay very poorly and offer very few benefits.
Unfortunately, that is why so many big companies like part-time workers and temp workers. There are so many more rules, regulations and laws that pertain to full-time workers.
Hiring a bunch of part-time workers is so much easier and so much cheaper. Without a doubt it is definitely more profitable in most situations.
Today, there are millions of Americans that have part-time jobs that would love to have full-time jobs. In fact, the government says that there are about 8 million Americans that are currently working part-time jobs for “economic reasons”.
If only I could make HALF that much! The dirty secret is McDonalds needs to add 50,000 workers to increase the headcount in every store. The goal is to have no full-time employees who qualify for health benefits. So these 50,000 jobs will pay $174 a week BEFORE taxes, and have no benefits, no vacation days, no holidays off, call in sick and get fired, but they will have 52 mandatory weekends each year.
And how do I know this? I work for a national restaurant chain that already has gone to a part-time only policy. I am scheduled for 23 hours next week. The threshold for benefits is 26 hrs.
Of course I would assume that there are perhaps a couple of full-time workers at the restaurant that John works at (such as the manager). But the reality is that we are seeing this kind of thing more and more around the nation. Companies are being careful to keep hours low enough so that the majority of their employees do not qualify for expensive “full-time benefits”.
Another commenter on that same article said that it is possible to get by on a low wage but that doesn’t mean that it is easy….
I make about $400 a week; my wife nothing. Rent is $500 a month. Credit card bills (run up back when I made about $1200/week) run about $200 a month. Other expenses run us another few hundred dollars. We quit tv. We’re a litte cold. We eat ok. Try to fill the gas tank just once a month. We’re getting by, but able to save nothing, nor do we go out and have fun. Well, fun has become walks on Saturday morning. Those are free. And, as we’ve learned, rather nice.
$10 an hour stinks, but it is livable if you don’t mind admitting that you are poor. I know I’m poor now. It’s just the way it is. If I tried to keep living as i did when I was a middle class manager, I’d be extremely unhappy. I cant say I’m happy about being poor, but my wife and i are finding that happiness isn’t about having “stuff.”
This is the new “American Dream” for millions of American families. They are learning to scratch and claw to get by on what they have.
As I have written about previously, the standard of living of the middle class is being pushed down to third world levels. We have been merged into a “global labor pool”, and what that means is that the standard of living of all workers all over the world is going to be slowly equalized over time.
Translation: your standard of living and the standard of living of virtually everyone that you know is slated to go way down.
Right now America is rapidly losing high paying jobs and they are being replaced by low paying jobs. According to a recent report from the National Employment Law Project, higher wage industries accounted for 40 percent of the job losses over the past 12 months but only 14 percent of the job growth. Lower wage industries accounted for just 23 percent of the job losses over the past 12 months and a whopping 49 percent of the job growth.
So yes, jobs are being created, but most of them are jobs that none of us would really want under normal circumstances.
Unfortunately, times are not normal and millions of desperate people are having to take whatever they can get.
What makes things even worse is that really bad inflation is coming. There are less good jobs for American families and at the same time the cost of basic necessities is going up.
Have you been to the gas pump lately?
As I wrote about yesterday, the average price of a gallon of gasoline in the United States is now $3.70.
A year ago it was just $2.83.
For average American families on a tight budget that is a huge difference.
Food inflation is already here as well.
During the month of February, the price of food in the U.S. increased at the fastest rate in 36 years.
Are you starting to understand why so many American families are feeling squeezed right now?
Times are tough and they are going to get tougher. If you still have a good full-time job you should be very thankful, because there are millions and millions of people that would love to trade places with you.
So do the rest of you believe that America is turning into “the land of the part-time job”? Please feel free to leave a comment with your opinion below….
Now that nearly a month has gone by since the horrific tsunami in Japan on March 11th, it is starting to become clear just how much economic damage has been done. The truth is that the Japanese economy is in much bigger trouble than most people think. This is almost certainly going to be the most expensive disaster in Japanese history. The tsunami that struck Japan on March 11th swept up to 6 miles inland, destroying virtually everything in the way. Thousands upon thousands of Japanese were killed and entire cities were wiped off the map. Yes, Japan is a resilient nation, but exactly how does a nation that is already drowning in debt replace dozens of cities and towns that are suddenly gone? The truth is that thousands of square miles have been more completely destroyed than if they had been bombed by a foreign military force. The loss of homes, cars, businesses and personal wealth is almost unimaginable. It is going to take many years to rebuild the roads, bridges, rail systems, ports, power lines and water systems that were lost. Nobody is quite sure when the rolling blackouts are going to end, and nobody is quite sure when all of the damaged manufacturing facilities are going to be fully brought back online.
On top of everything else, the nuclear crisis at Fukushima never seems to end. In fact, it seems to get worse with each passing day.
According to the Los Angeles Times, it has now been announced that seawater off the coast of Japan near the Fukushima facility was recently found to contain 7.5 million times the legal limit of radioactive iodine….
The operator of Japan’s stricken Fukushima nuclear plant said Tuesday that it had found radioactive iodine at 7.5 million times the legal limit in a seawater sample taken near the facility, and government officials imposed a new health limit for radioactivity in fish.
Do you think anyone is going to want any Japanese seafood after this?
In fact, at this point one must really question the long-term prospects for the seafood industry in that entire region of Asia. There are going to be tens of millions of people (myself included) that will no longer want anything to do with any seafood that comes from that part of the world.
Sadly, some nuclear experts now claim that it could take years to bring the reactors at Fukushima fully back under control.
At the end of this crisis, how large of an area around Fukushima will be uninhabitable?
A 20 km radius?
A 30 km radius?
A 40 km radius?
More?
Japan is the third largest economy in the world, but it never was a large nation to begin with. Now that the tsunami and the nuclear crisis at Fukushima have made the amount of usable land significantly smaller, what is that going to mean for the future of the Japanese economy?
That is a very good question.
The truth is that there are already signs that the Japanese economy is regressing into another recession.
According to The Telegraph, one major manufacturing index in Japan has already shown a very serious decline….
The purchasing mangers’ index (PMI) gave an early indication of the extent of the damage wreaked on the economy as it dropped 6.5 points to a reading of 46.4, the largest slide since the survey began in late-2001.
In particular, the auto industry is really being affected by this crisis. Vehicle supply chains all over the globe are now in a state of chaos.
Approximately 3,000 individual parts go into every single new vehicle. If even one of those parts is missing, a new car or truck cannot be built.
So just how big of a problem are we looking at?
Well, it was originally projected that 72 million vehicles would be built around the globe in 2011.
In fact, Goldman Sachs is projecting that this crisis is currently costing automakers in Japan $200 million every single day.
Ouch!
A recent article on CNBC detailed some of the problems that Japanese automakers are facing right now….
In the weeks ahead, car buyers will have difficulty finding the model they want in certain colors, thousands of auto plant workers will likely be told to stay home, and companies such as Toyota, Honda and others will lose billions of dollars in revenue. More than two weeks since the natural disaster, inventories of crucial car supplies — from computer chips to paint pigments — are dwindling fast as Japanese factories that make them struggle to restart.
Unfortunately, the worst for the auto industry is yet to come. AutoNation is warning that “production disruptions will significantly impact product availability from Japanese auto manufacturers in the second and third quarters of 2011.”
Because of supply chain disruptions, a number of North American manufacturing facilities look like they will be shutting down at least for a while.
For example, Toyota has announced that it will be shutting down all of its North American factories for a certain period of time because of shortages of parts from Japan.
But Toyota is far from alone as a recent report in The Globe and Mail made quite clear….
Honda Motor Co. Ltd. has already slashed output by half at its North American plants, while Nissan Motor Co. Ltd. will shut all its U.S. and Mexican plants for at least one week in April. Ford Motor Co., too, has halted production at a truck plant in Kentucky this week.
So why don’t North American facilities just switch to other suppliers?
Japanese companies also specialized in making the array of highly specialized computer chips that control everything from the engine to the brakes in modern cars. Computer chip production is a complex process that can take weeks and involves hundreds of individual steps, Morgan Stanley analyst Noriaki Hirakata said.
Not only that, but if an automaker is forced to find a new source for an electronic chip, the process of “certifying” a new computer chip supplier — that is, determining that a new company can meet all the requirements for cost, quality and quantity — can take as long as a year, Hirakata said.
The truth is that this is a complete and total economic disaster.
The Japanese economy is not going to be the same for many years to come. In fact, many are now warning that this could be one of the triggers that could lead to another major global financial crisis.
One of the big fears is that Japan will need to sell off a large amount of U.S. Treasuries to fund the rebuilding of that nation.
If that were to happen, it could result in a “liquidity crisis” similar to what we saw in 2008. Already the rest of the world is really starting to lose confidence in the U.S. dollar and in U.S. Treasuries, and if Japan starts massively dumping U.S. government debt things could get out of control fairly quickly.
In any event, it is undeniable that the Japanese economy has been absolutely devastated by this crisis. In fact, when you combine the tsunami and the nuclear crisis, this could be the biggest economic disaster that any major industrial power has faced since World War 2.
So will the crisis in Japan push the rest of the globe into another major recession?
If you know someone that believes that the U.S. economy is in great shape, just show that person the following statistics. But please don’t show these statistics to anyone that is feeling depressed or that has just lost a job – it might push such a person over the edge. The sad truth is that the U.S. economy is in the midst of a long-term decline and it is coming apart at the seams. Right now the Obama administration and the Federal Reserve are attempting to “paper over” our economic problems with massive amounts of government debt and paper currency, but in the end it is not going to work. When you analyze the numbers objectively, it leads to the inescapable conclusion that we are headed for another Great Depression. That is a very depressing thought, but there is no denying that decades of debt and incredibly bad decisions are starting to catch up with us. The economic pain that is coming is going to be absolutely mind blowing.
It would be nice if our politicians and our business leaders suddenly started making incredibly wise decisions so that we could bring the U.S. economy in for a “soft landing”, but the chance of that happening is so small that it is not even worth mentioning.
It is time for all of us to face up to the truth. In this day and age it is really easy to get caught up in the trap of feeling depressed, but once we understand exactly how bad our problems are it can be empowering because then we can start focusing on solutions.
The following are 27 depressing statistics about the U.S. economy that are almost too crazy to believe….
#1 The Obama administration projects that the federal budget deficit will be approximately $1,600,000,000,000 this year. Right now the Republicans and the Democrats are fighting tooth and nail over budget cuts. The Republicans are proposing to cut the budget deficit by 3.8%. The Democrats only want to cut it by 2.1%.
#2 The U.S. economy actually grew more between 1930 and 1940 than it did during the decade that recently ended.
#3 Over the last decade, the number of Americans without health insurance has risen from about 38 million to about 52 million.
#4 Agricultural commodities are absolutely soaring. The price of corn has more than doubled over the last 12 months. Considering the fact that corn is in literally thousands of our food products, that is a very frightening statistic.
#5 Between 1999 and 2009, real median household income in the United States declined by 5.0%.
#6 It is being estimated that total U.S. government debt will grow by 42 percent by the year 2015.
#7 According to the Pentagon, the cost of the first week of attacks on Libya was 600 million dollars.
#8 The average American now spends approximately 23 percent of his or her income on food and gas.
#9 According to the U.S. Energy Department, the average U.S. household will spend approximately $700 more on gasoline in 2011 than it did during 2010.
#10 It is being projected that for the first time ever, the OPEC nations are going to bring in over a trillion dollars from exporting oil this year. Their biggest customer is the United States.
#11 According to the Economic Policy Institute, almost 25 percent of U.S. households now have zero net worth or negative net worth. Back in 2007, that number was just 18.6 percent.
#12 China produced 19.8 percent of all the goods consumed in the world last year. The United States only produced 19.4 percent.
#13 The United States has lost an average of 50,000 manufacturing jobsper month since China joined the World Trade Organization in 2001.
#14 The U.S. trade deficit with China in 2010 was 27 times larger than it was back in 1990.
#19 Now home sales in the United States are now down 80% from the peak in July 2005.
#20 The financial condition of American families continues to deteriorate rapidly. In 2010, one out of every eight American families had at least one family member that was unemployed. That number was the highest it has been since the U.S. Labor Department began keeping track of that statistic back in 1994.
#25 According to the Federal Reserve, between 2007 and 2009 median household net worth in the United States fell by 23 percent.
#26 The Federal Reserve also says that median household debt in the United States has risen to $75,600.
#27 According to a recent article posted on the website of the American Institute of Economic Research, the purchasing power of a U.S. dollar declined from $1.00 in 1913 to 4.6 cents in 2009. Sadly, the Federal Reserve is working very hard to get rid of the little bit of purchasing power that the U.S. dollar has left.
It has been said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. Unfortunately, millions of Americans find themselves slowly going insane as they apply for hundreds upon hundreds of jobs and yet never get hired. It is incredibly difficult to get a good job in most areas of the United States today. So if you are unemployed, and there are no jobs in your area, should you move somewhere else in an attempt to find work? That is a very hard question. Of course if what you are currently doing right now is not working it is only natural to want to change course, but sadly unemployment is absolutely rampant all over the United States. Today, the “official” unemployment rate is hovering around 9 percent, but the true employment picture is much bleaker than that. There are millions and millions of unemployed Americans that are so discouraged and have given up looking for a job for so long that the U.S. government does not even consider them “part of the labor force” any longer. If they were included in the “official” figure, the true unemployment rate would be well into double figures. In addition, there are millions upon millions of Americans that are working part-time jobs or very low paying jobs because that is all they can get. Those millions of “underemployed” Americans would jump at the chance to get a “good job” if that opportunity was available. Low income jobs now make up 41% of all the jobs in the United States. So there are a lot of people that have a job that really wish that they were making a lot more money. Because of the lack of good jobs, millions of American families have been pushed to the edge of economic desperation and millions of American families are drowning in debt. So what do you do if there are no good jobs in your area? Do you sit tight or do move to a new location hoping for something better?
65 Ways That Everything That You Think That You Own Is Being Systematically Taken Away From You
There is a reason why the wealthiest one percent of all Americans control 40 percent of all the wealth in the United States. The system is designed to funnel all of the wealth to them and to the government. Average Americans are experiencing a declining standard of living and it is not by accident.
Just check out some of the ways that our wealth is being taken from us….
#1 Do you think that you own your house? You might want to think again. Most Americans that “own a home” are paying a mortgage. If you stop paying that mortgage you will lose that home. Over a million American families were kicked out of their homes last year. This year a million more American families will get the boot.
But when those families get booted out onto the street they don’t get their down payments back. They don’t get all the mortgage payments that they have made back. The banks get to keep all of the money and all of the houses.
Perhaps you don’t have a mortgage. Does that mean that you “own your home”?
No, not really. Just refuse to pay your property taxes and watch what happens. At best you can say that you have the right to rent your home from the government.
In any event, the reality is that the banks now own more of “our homes” than we do. During the most recent recession, the total amount of U.S. home equity owned by the banks surpassed the total amount of U.S. home equity owned by the rest of us for the first time ever.
Things used to be far different in this country. Once upon a time American families owned most of the houses and most of the land in this nation.
But now the banks own most of it. Sadly, most American families that believe that they “own homes” are actually enslaved to 20 or 30 year debt contracts.
#2 Do you think that you own your car? You don’t own it if you are still making payments on it. If you stop making payments you will rapidly lose that car.
But even if your car is paid off, you can only operate that car if you do the following….
*You must pay the license fee
*You must pay the car registration fee
*You must pay the emissions inspection fee
*You must pay the property taxes on that car (if that applies in your area)
*You must pay the tire taxes
*You must pay the gas taxes
If you have paid all of those taxes, then you are permitted to drive only where the government allows you to drive and only under the rules that the government sets for you.
But at least you “own” your car, right?
#3 What about your possessions? Do you own them?
Well, yes, you probably own some possessions.
But that doesn’t mean that they are not enslaving you.
After all, did you use a credit card to pay for any of them?
If so, you could end up paying much more for your possessions than you originally thought that they cost.
For example, if you only make the minimum payment on your credit card each month, a $6,000 credit card bill could end up costing you over $30,000 (depending on the interest rate).
#4 Do you own your education? Well, it is undeniable that nobody can ever take it away from you. But if you took out student loans that debt may end up enslaving you for decades.
The borrower is the servant of the lender and student loan debt is more of a financial drain on Americans than ever before. Americans now owe more on student loans than they do on credit cards. As hard as that is to believe, that is actually true. Americans now owe more than $903 billion on student loans, which is a new all-time record.
#5 Will you protect your wealth if you put your money in the bank?
No, in fact your wealth will be systematically destroyed in the bank.
Inflation is a hidden tax on every single dollar that you own. It destroys the value of all dollars in existence. There are some Americans that have been saving money for decades, but those savings are being taxed into oblivion by inflation. Many experts are now projecting that the average price of a gallon of gasoline will hit $5 by the end of the year. So the next time you go to the gas pump just take a moment to think about how your wealth is being drained away by inflation.
#6 Insurance costs continue to soar. After insuring everything in our lives many of us barely have any money left over to actually live our lives with. In particular, health insurance premiums have become completely and totally ridiculous. According to the Los Angeles Times, Blue Shield of California plans to raise rates an average of 30% to 35%, and some individual policy holders could see their health insurance premiums rise by a whopping 59 percent this year alone. So how are American families supposed to survive if they keep on handing over bigger and bigger chunks of their income to the health care industry?
#7 State and local governments all over the nation have turned to ticket writing as a primary revenue source. In fact, in some areas of the country traffic citations are soaring at a crazy rate. For example, 110,000 more traffic citations were written in Los Angeles County last fiscal year than were written in the fiscal year immediately prior to the last recession.
The truth is that the police even realize what is going on. Just consider the following quote from from Police Chief Michael Reaves of Utica, Michigan….
#8 Some states have decided to simply confiscate wealth even if nothing has been done wrong. For example, the state of California is aggressively seizing “unclaimed” safe deposit boxes. If you have a safe deposit box that you have not checked on in a while you might want to make sure that it is still there.
#9 You might end up losing your valuables when you cross the border. It is being reported that U.S. border agents are now regularly seizing laptops and other electronic devices as people cross the border. In many cases those items are never returned.
#10 If you don’t pay your property taxes, you will lose your house and it will likely be a big Wall Street bank that will be taking it from you. As I have written about previously, the big Wall Street banks are buying up thousands upon thousands of tax liens and are making a killing by socking distressed homeowners with predatory interest, outrageous penalties and almost unbelievable legal fees.
#11 Of course the biggest way that our wealth is being drained is through federal income taxes. The reason that the Federal Reserve and the IRS were established back in 1913 was to redistribute wealth. Wealth is transferred from the American people to the U.S. government and then ultimately to the elite and to the causes that the elite favor.
But federal taxes are only one of the taxes that we pay. The truth is that the average American pays dozens of different taxes each year. Just check out a few examples of the different taxes that drain our wealth….
#12 Accounts Receivable Taxes
#13 Building Permit Taxes
#14 Capital Gains Taxes
#15 CDL License Taxes
#16 Cigarette Taxes
#17 Corporate Income Taxes
#18 Court Fines (indirect taxes)
#19 Dog License Taxes
#20 Federal Unemployment Taxes (FUTA)
#21 Fishing License Taxes
#22 Food License Taxes
#23 Gasoline Taxes
#24 Gift Taxes
#25 Hunting License Taxes
#26 Inheritance Taxes
#27 Inventory Taxes
#28 IRS Interest Charges (tax on top of tax)
#29 IRS Penalties (tax on top of tax)
#30 Liquor Taxes
#31 Local Income Taxes
#32 Luxury Taxes
#33 Marriage License Taxes
#34 Medicare Taxes
#35 Payroll Taxes
#36 Property Taxes
#37 Real Estate Taxes
#38 Recreational Vehicle Taxes
#39 Road Toll Booth Taxes
#40 Road Usage Taxes (Truckers)
#41 Sales Taxes
#42 Self-Employment Taxes
#43 School Taxes
#44 Septic Permit Taxes
#45 Service Charge Taxes
#46 Social Security Taxes
#47 State Income Taxes
#48 State Unemployment Taxes (SUTA)
#49 Telephone federal excise taxes
#50 Telephone federal universal service fee taxes
#51 Telephone federal, state and local surcharge taxes
#52 Telephone minimum usage surcharge taxes
#53 Telephone recurring and non-recurring taxes
#54 Telephone state and local taxes
#55 Telephone usage charge taxes
#56 Toll Bridge Taxes
#57 Toll Tunnel Taxes
#58 Traffic Fines (indirect taxation)
#59 Trailer Registration Taxes
#60 Utility Taxes
#61 Vehicle License Registration Taxes
#62 Vehicle Sales Taxes
#63 Watercraft Registration Taxes
#64 Well Permit Taxes
#65 Workers Compensation Taxes
Even the future is being taken away from us. The future is literally being stolen from our children and our grandchildren. They will be inheriting the 14 trillion dollar (and still rising) national debt that we have accumulated. What we have done to future generations is unthinkable, and yet we continue to endlessly borrow more money. The Congressional Research Service estimates that the U.S. government will need to borrow $738 billion between April 1st and September 30th. Faith in U.S. Treasuries is falling so rapidly that now the biggest bond fund in the world, PIMCO, is actually shorting U.S. Treasuries.
When you base an entire economy on debt, eventually you end up with money problems that never seem to end. As a nation we are now enslaved to a vicious spiral of debt that is going to destroy everything that our forefathers worked so hard to build.
As the debt loads of our federal, state and local governments become even more burdensome, they are going to want even more money from us. For decades we gave in to new tax after new tax thinking that it would finally satisfy them. But it never seems to be enough. They always want more.
It is the same thing with the banksters. They are never satisfied either. They always want more assets and they always want more Americans to be enslaved to debt.
Unfortunately, most Americans are so caught up in the “rat race” that they never take much time to think about who designed the race or why they are running it.
Hopefully more Americans will wake up and will realize that our entire economy and our entire financial system need to be reformed. Our current system is inherently flawed and it will eventually impoverish the vast majority of us if we allow it to.