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Just In Time For The Holidays, The Biggest Mandate Of All Is About To Go Into Effect…

November 1, 2021November 1, 2021 by Michael

What a joyful time of the year this is going to be for the countless families that are about to experience a job loss. You would think that Joe Biden’s rapidly plunging poll numbers would cause him to rethink his absurd mandates, but that hasn’t happened. Instead, he is has chosen to stubbornly move forward, and the consequences are going to be absolutely disastrous. Earlier today, I watched a heartbreaking video of a pandemic hero being marched out of a hospital in California because her religious exemption was denied. She admits that she could soon lose her house as a result, but freedom is more important to her. Sadly, similar scenes are about to be repeated over and over again all across the country, because the biggest mandate of them all is about to be implemented. According to the senior White House correspondent for CBS News, it appears that the OSHA mandate will go into effect in just a few days…

OSHA has finished developing a rule that compels companies with 100+ employees to require vaccines or regular testing. It also requires employers to provide paid time to workers to get vaccinated and to recover from any side effects. The rule will go into effect in days.

It has been estimated that the OSHA mandate will cover somewhere around 80 million American workers.

As the new regulations start to be enforced, countless Americans will choose to willingly leave their jobs, and countless others will be ruthlessly terminated for not complying. Needless to say, this is going to cause enormous nightmares in industry after industry.

For example, we are already in the midst of the worst supply chain crisis in U.S. history, and logistics companies are warning that the OSHA mandate will make things much, much worse…

Logistics companies in industries ranging from trucking to warehouses are warning that President Joe Biden’s vaccine mandate will cause further supply chain backlogs.

Groups representing them say substantial numbers of their employees are unvaccinated, and may quit or be let go at the height of the holiday season.

Even if he purposely wanted to be this evil, why in the world would Biden want to make our supply chain headaches far more painful right as we are entering the busiest time of the year?

It doesn’t make any sense.

Because of the epic worker shortage that we are currently experiencing, replacing employees that are lost is going to be exceedingly difficult.

We are already dealing with a shortage of approximately 80,000 truckers, and the ATA is openly warning that the OSHA mandate “will create a workforce crisis for our industry”…

American Trucking Associations has sent a letter to the Biden administration expressing “grave concern” over the potential damage that the president’s plans for a COVID-19 vaccine mandate for many businesses — including trucking companies — could cause for the country.

“While much of the country was sequestered in their homes, the trucking industry served its essential function and did so successfully with safety standards developed by public health experts,” said the Oct. 21 letter, signed by ATA President Chris Spear. “Now placing vaccination mandates on employers, which in turn force employees to be vaccinated, will create a workforce crisis for our industry and the communities, families and businesses we serve.”

We aren’t just talking about the loss of a few thousand truck drivers.

According to the ATA, we could potentially be facing the loss of 37 percent of all truck drivers in the entire nation…

The federation warns that motor carriers it represents – who it said supply 80% of the country and move 70% of all freight tonnage — could lose up to 37% of their drivers.

37 percent!

If you think that store shelves are empty now, just wait until that happens.

The retail industry is also in a state of panic because of the upcoming mandate…

Besides trucking, retailers are also concerned the mandate could trigger resignations in an industry also short on workers, according to a lobbyist at the Retail Industry Leaders Association, Evan Armstrong.

‘It has been a hectic holiday season already, as you know, with supply chain struggles,’ Armstrong told CNBC after a meeting with White House officials last Monday.

‘This is a difficult policy to implement. It would be even more difficult during the holiday season.’

Retailers are already really struggling to staff their stores in many areas of the country.

This new mandate certainly will not help matters.

The U.S. military has their own mandates that are in the process of being implemented, and this week we learned that large numbers of Marines could be on the verge of being kicked out of the military…

The Corps will kick out every Marine who refuses the COVID-19 vaccine and fails to receive an approved exemption by the Nov. 28 deadline, a new administrative message said.

Barring an approved administrative, medical or religious accommodation, or a pending appeal, Marines who fail to meet the deadline will be processed for administrative separation, the MARADMIN said. General court-martial convening authorities will “retain authority to take any additional adverse administrative or disciplinary action” deemed appropriate.

Frankly, this makes me sick.

We are really going to do this right around Thanksgiving?

How heartless are these people?

After our military has been gutted, I hope that no major conflict suddenly erupts, because our ability to go to war will be greatly diminished.

In so many ways, this moment represents a fundamental turning point for the United States, and nothing will ever be the same after this.

Personally, I have never been more disgusted with the Democratic Party than I am right now, and countless others feel the same way. If you doubt this, just check out these poll results…

Independents believe that the Democratic Party more than the Republican Party is “the bigger threat” to American democracy, according to an NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll released on Monday.

In response to the question, “In general, which party do you think is the bigger threat to democracy in the United States,” 41 percent of Independents said the Democratic Party, while 37 percent said the Republican Party.

The sort of mandates that are now being pushed on all of us have absolutely no place in a civilized society.

If you have lost a job or are about to lose a job, I want you to know that you are not alone.

There are millions upon millions of other Americans that still believe in freedom, and we shall not bow our knees before these tyrants.

***It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.***

About the Author: My name is Michael Snyder and my brand new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available on Amazon.com. In addition to my new book I have written five other books that are available on Amazon.com including “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, “Get Prepared Now”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”. (#CommissionsEarned) By purchasing the books you help to support the work that my wife and I are doing, and by giving it to others you help to multiply the impact that we are having on people all over the globe. I have published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe. I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but I also ask that they include this “About the Author” section with each article. The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions. I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help. During these very challenging times, people will need hope more than ever before, and it is our goal to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with as many people as we possibly can.

In 2022, “Things Aren’t Gonna Get Done” On An Absolutely Massive Scale

October 31, 2021October 31, 2021 by Michael

Are we about to witness one of the greatest self-inflicted economic wounds in history? Vaccine mandate deadlines are starting to arrive, and large numbers of very qualified people are losing their jobs as a result. Of course this comes at a very bad time, because we are already in the midst of the most epic worker shortage in U.S. history. Despite the biggest hiring push that I have ever seen in my entire lifetime, businesses all over America are still desperate for workers. The funny thing is that lots of available workers should theoretically be out there somewhere. The number of Americans that are currently working is still about five million less than the peak that was hit just before the pandemic arrived. So where did all of those missing workers go? That is a question that we desperately need an answer for, because millions of workers seem to have evaporated from the system. Now the vaccine mandates are going to make things far worse, because millions of Americans that are actually good at their jobs are going to be ruthlessly terminated, and finding replacements for them is going to be exceedingly difficult.

For instance, you can’t just pull guys off the street and have them fly planes. Very soon, large numbers of pilots will be sent packing on a permanent basis, and pilots for American Airlines gave us a taste of what is coming by engaging in a “sick out” over the weekend…

American Airlines canceled another 634 flights on Sunday, more than 12% of its total operations for the day, the company said Sunday.

The airline has now canceled more than 1,500 flights since Friday, as it deals with weather issues and staffing shortages that started last week.

Of course American Airlines is trying to blame “the weather” for these canceled flights, but everyone knows what is really going on.

And I greatly applaud the pilots for taking a stand.

If these airlines don’t reverse their mandates, pretty soon we will have widespread air travel headaches on a permanent basis in this nation.

In New York City, Friday was the deadline for municipal workers to get vaccinated, and more than 26,000 of them have refused to comply…

Twenty-six percent of municipal employees in New York City were still unvaccinated following a Friday deadline that mandated workers get the COVID-19 vaccine.

A significant jump in vaccinations occurred among city employees due to the deadline, the city said, according to The Associated Press, but more than 26,000 workers have not uploaded proof of their vaccination status and face unpaid leave as a result.

Moving forward, all of the work that those 26,000 workers used to do simply will not get done.

Already, a total of 26 fire companies have had to be completely shut down…

The FDNY shuttered 26 fire companies citywide on Saturday due to staff shortages caused by the COVID-19 vaccination mandate, according to furious elected officials, who ripped the move as “unconscionable” — and warned it could have catastrophic consequences.

So will this cost lives?

Of course it will.

In fact, a seven-year-old boy just died in an apartment fire…

A seven-year-old boy died and his grandmother was seriously injured in an apartment fire in New York City as the FDNY deals with staff shortages in response to a vaccine mandate.

Firefighters responded to a 1:30 a.m. call Saturday at a building in Washington Heights, where fire broke out in the building superintendent’s basement apartment. First responders quickly contained and extinguished the fire.

Meanwhile, trash is starting to pile up around the city at a very alarming rate…

Trash bags can be spotted all over the Midwood neighborhood of Brooklyn, where some residents said that it has been days since their trash was last picked up. A few said they realized something was off earlier in the week, as one missed pickup happens, but they started to think there was a problem after the second missed time.

On both residential streets and commercial areas, the trash bags on the sidewalk are piled several feet high in some instances. One resident who has lived in the area for about 40 years said she has never seen the area as dirty as has been the past few days.

So what is the city going to look and smell like in a few months once we get into the early portion of 2022?

The sad thing is that none of this had to happen.

The vaccine mandates are absurd, and they are going to cause enormous problems all over the country.

Countless supply chain workers are going to be pulled out of our supply chains in the coming months, and we are already facing painful shortages from coast to coast…

Supermarket chains are revamping their operations to navigate persistent product shortages, expanding storage space and curbing discounts to make sure they don’t run out.

Companies are planning for shortages of popular brands of food and staples to continue for months and managers are trying to keep up as different products run short from week to week, industry executives said.

A lot of Americans are still expecting these shortages to go away eventually, but Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg is now admitting that there will be supply chain problems “as long as the pandemic continues”…

Transport Secretary Pete Buttigieg says the supply chain crisis will continue at least until the COVID-19 pandemic ends amid fears of shortages ahead of the winter holidays.

‘There are definitely going to continue to be issues, especially as long as the pandemic continues,’ Buttigieg told Fox News Sunday. ‘If you have, for example, the third-largest container port in the world in China shutting down because of a COVID outbreak in late summer you’ll feel that in the fall here on the West coast.’

Of course there is no end in sight for the pandemic. The virus is constantly mutating, and any immunity to it is very temporary.

So just like the common cold and the flu, COVID will be with us indefinitely.

If Biden administration officials want to reverse recent polling trends, they better find a way to address our supply chain issues, because right now their numbers are really dismal. Here is just one example…

“Americans have lost their confidence in President Joe Biden and their optimism for the country.”

That, according to Chuck Todd, is the top takeaway from a just-released NBC News poll out Sunday. Breaking down the numbers on Meet the Press, Todd pointed to data from the survey that he deemed “shocking.”

“Just 22 percent of adults say [the U.S. is] headed in the right direction,” Todd reported. “A shocking 71 percent say we’re on the wrong track.”

The only surprise from that survey is that there are 22 percent of Americans that are still gullible enough to have a positive outlook.

The Democrats have cooked up a recipe for national suicide, and they are setting the stage for so many of the things that I warned about in my latest book.

If Joe Biden had any sense, he would rescind all nationwide vaccine mandates immediately.

But he isn’t going to do that.

And major cities like New York and Los Angeles are not going to rescind their mandates either.

So “things are not gonna get done” on an absolutely massive scale in 2022, and we will all suffer deeply as a result.

***It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.***

You Better Wake Up, Because The Shortages Are Getting A Lot Worse

October 28, 2021October 28, 2021 by Michael

A lot of people aren’t going to want to hear this. There are a lot of people out there that just want to hear that the future is going to be filled with rainbows, lollipops and unicorns, but that isn’t the truth. Months ago, I warned my readers that the global chip shortage wasn’t going to end any time soon and that it would deeply affect thousands of other industries, and that is precisely what is happening right now. Industry after industry is deeply hurting, and a lot of executives are really starting to freak out. Earlier this year, many among the blind optimists assured us that the chip shortage would be resolved by the end of 2021, but obviously that has not happened. In fact, the corporate media is now telling us that it is getting even worse. For example, the following comes from a Wall Street Journal article entitled “Global Chip Shortage ‘Is Far From Over’ as Wait Times Get Longer”…

Wait times for chip deliveries have continued to climb above a healthy threshold of 9-12 weeks. Over the summer, the wait stretched to 19 weeks on average, according to Susquehanna Financial Group. But as of October, it has ballooned to 22 weeks. It is longer for the scarcest parts: 25 weeks for power-management components and 38 weeks for the microcontrollers that the auto industry needs, the firm said.

Those numbers are unlike anything that we have ever seen before.

And we are rapidly getting to a point where some wait times will start to be measured in years. Manuel Schoenfeld placed an order for transmission chips in May 2021, and he is now being told that they will probably be delivered in May 2022…

Manuel Schoenfeld placed an order in May for transmission chips for the utility-monitoring devices made by his New York-based firm PowerX. He was told the chips would arrive by summer, then fall, then winter and now doesn’t expect to get them until May 2022.

“This is far from over,” Mr. Schoenfeld said.

How bad does it have to get before people start waking up?

The entire global economic system is experiencing stunning breakdowns on a widespread basis, and yet a lot of people still assume that everything is going to work out just fine somehow.

Due to a lack of chips, new vehicle production has dropped precipitously and dealers around the nation have seen their inventories drop to alarmingly low levels. As a result, demand for used vehicles has skyrocketed, and this has pushed used car prices to absolutely insane heights…

The 2019 Honda Civic that kicked off a used-car auction earlier this month would have been nothing special before the pandemic. But as automotive dealer Brad Wimmer watched, the online bidding quickly became, to quote him, “bananas.”

As a new car, the Civic would have had a sticker price of around $21,000. But within seconds at the wholesale auction, the two-year-old model, with 4,000 miles, sold for $27,200.

If you have an old clunker that you don’t need anymore just sitting around, you may want to check what it is worth now.

We are witnessing a similar phenomenon with farm equipment. A lack of chips has suppressed production, and used equipment is now in very high demand.

So just like we are seeing with used cars, many pieces of used farm equipment are now selling for much more than when they were brand new…

Joel Everett said he was astounded when a lightly used 2009 John Deere tractor sold at his last auction in Strawberry Point, Iowa, for tens of thousands of dollars more than it had cost fresh off the production line more than a decade ago.

Bought new for $109,000, the tractor sold for $143,000 at auction, he said. It’s not an isolated incident, said Everett, who has run Joel’s Tractor and Auction since 1992. A lot of farm equipment, particularly used tractors, is selling for 30 percent to 50 percent more than it was two years ago at his auction house.

Food prices are shooting up at a very brisk pace as well.

According to Bloomberg, global food costs have jumped “by a third” over the past year…

The jump in global food prices to a decade high risks leading to even more expensive grocery bills, and the energy crisis is threatening to make things even worse.

Harvest setbacks, strong demand and supply chain disruptions have sent a United Nations index of food costs up by a third over the past year. The latest leg up last month came as prices for almost all types of foodstuffs gained, adding to inflationary headaches for consumers and central banks.

In my latest book, I have an entire chapter entitled “Hyperinflation and Shortages”, and in that chapter I specifically warned that this would happen.

In fact, in that chapter I specifically warned about the impact that the chip shortage would have on global food prices.

We knew in advance that this was coming, and now it is here.

As global food supplies get tighter and tighter, shortages are going to become more intense and prices are going to become increasingly painful.

Even now, we are being told that this will be the most expensive Thanksgiving ever, and stores shelves just seem to keep getting emptier and emptier.

Earlier today, I posted footage that one man took in an alarmingly empty Walmart in Connecticut. We are seeing similar things happen all over the nation, but authorities continue to insist that everything is just fine.

In fact, the USDA is specifically telling us that there are “no nationwide shortages of food”…

There are currently no nationwide shortages of food, although in some cases the inventory of certain foods at your grocery store might be temporarily low before stores can restock. Food production and manufacturing are widely dispersed throughout the U.S. and there are currently no wide-spread disruptions reported in the supply chain.

USDA and the Food and Drug Administration are closely monitoring the food supply chain for any shortages in collaboration with industry and our federal and state partners. We are in regular contact with food manufacturers and grocery stores.

Well, the USDA has spoken, and so I guess that settles it.

I am sorry for alarming all of you with the facts that I presented earlier in this article.

The USDA says that there are no “wide-spread disruptions reported in the supply chain”, and the federal government always tells us the truth.

So that means that everything is going to be okay, and you can go back to sleep now.

***It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.***

What Will It Mean For The Global Economy When The Price Of Oil Soars To $200 Per Barrel?

October 27, 2021 by Michael

If you haven’t been paying attention, you will want to start watching the price of oil again. Just before the financial crisis of 2008, the price of oil briefly shot up to 140 dollars a barrel, and experts agree that a very high price for oil would definitely unsettle financial markets now. Unfortunately, it appears to be inevitable that the price of oil will go much higher. Large financial institutions have become extremely hesitant to fund any projects that would “pollute the environment”, and governments around the world have made it extremely difficult for those that produce traditional forms of energy to expand operations. Globally, there is a major push to bring in “the new green economy”, but “the new green economy” cannot provide the energy that we need. Meanwhile, the demand for energy continues to grow all over the globe on a daily basis. What this means is that all forms of traditional energy are going to become a lot more expensive.

At this moment, the price of oil is over 80 dollars per barrel, and many are anticipating that it will soon hit 100 dollars per barrel.

When Russian President Vladimir Putin was recently asked about the price of oil, this is how he responded…

After the price of West Texas Intermediate (WTI) recently crossed $80 per barrel, Russian President Vladimir Putin was asked whether it could reach $100. He replied “That is quite possible.” Given Russia’s dependence on revenue from its oil exports, he was probably smiling when he said it.

100 dollar oil wouldn’t be much of a shock, but what about 20o dollar oil?

Not too long ago, a team of JPMorgan analysts suggested that we could actually see it happen…

“We believe the evolution of coal prices might reflect supply, demand, cost of capital and energy transitioning issues for all fossil fuels, and it would certainly be possible that oil prices will follow the same pattern (inflation adjusted for oil, that would be in a $150-200/bbl range),” wrote a team of JPMorgan Chase & Co. strategists led by Marko Kolanovic.

Virtually all forms of economic activity require power, and so if the price of oil doubles or triples from current levels that is going to push all prices much higher than they are now.

Some have suggested that we could increasingly switch to other forms of traditional energy if the price of oil becomes too oppressive, but that is not likely to happen due to the widespread shortages that we are witnessing.

For example, supplies of natural gas have never been tighter than they are at this moment. In South Dakota, residents are being warned that their natural gas bills could potentially double this winter…

“The natural gas industry is experiencing shortages in supply while also seeing an increase in overall natural gas demand. As a result, homeowners should expect to see higher natural gas bills this winter,” said PUC Chairman Chris Nelson. “South Dakota’s regulated natural gas utilities, including MidAmerican Energy Co., Montana-Dakota Utilities Co., and NorthWestern Energy, are currently projecting bill increases for residential customers of at least 50% to 100% compared to the bills seen between November and February of the 2020-2021 heating season,” he explained.

The current natural gas shortage is the result of a number of factors. High demand due to increased exports of liquefied natural gas and increased natural gas usage for electric generation along with low production due to hurricanes have led to low storage inventories heading into the peak heating season.

We don’t have enough propane either.

In fact, we are being openly warned of a major “inventory shortage” in the months ahead…

Total US propane stocks concluded the annual summer build season well below the previous five-year average, fueling longstanding concerns among market participants of an inventory shortage coinciding with colder temperatures ushering in the annual increase in winter demand.

In the old days, we could always count on there being plenty of coal, but now that has changed too.

At this point, we are being told that the amount of coal our power plants have on hand is the lowest ever measured “in records going back to 1997”…

Coal stockpiles at U.S. power plants plunged to the lowest in at least 24 years as electricity generators burn the fuel faster than miners can dig it out of the ground.

Inventories fell to 84.3 million tons in August, according to government data released Tuesday. That’s the lowest in records going back to 1997, when Bill Clinton was beginning his second term as U.S. president.

Many Americans don’t realize that coal is still extremely important to our economy.

According to an article posted on Zero Hedge, coal still accounts for about one-fourth of all U.S. power generation…

As of August, about a quarter of all US power generation was derived from coal. As winter approaches, coal-fired power plants will become a more significant percentage of all U.S. power generation.

Power plants are expected to burn 19% more coal this year because soaring natural gas prices have made it uneconomical to produce power. In return, this is forcing generators to burn through coal reserves much quicker and has caught coal producers off guard who cannot bring new coal to the market.

In all my years, I have never seen a time when supplies of oil, natural gas, propane and coal all became extremely tight simultaneously.

If we get to a point where there are severe energy shortages for an extended period of time, that is going to be absolutely disastrous for our economic system.

And of course things are already not going very well for the U.S. economy. In fact, Gallup just found that 68 percent of all Americans believe that the economy is “getting worse”…

The share of Americans saying the economy is getting worse climbed from 63 percent in September to 68 percent in October, Gallup reported Wednesday.

This was not a case of partisan politics. Democrats and Republican views of the economy were essentially unchanged in October, according to Gallup. What happened was the percentage of independents who say economic conditions are getting worse soared nine points from 63 percent to 72 percent.

Needless to say, all of this is perfectly setting the stage for the sort of epic economic meltdown that I have been warning about.

The price of oil will soon hit 100 dollars a barrel, but that won’t be the end of the world.

But when it hits 150 dollars a barrel, Wall Street and the mainstream media will definitely be freaking out.

And when it hits 200 dollars a barrel, it will officially be time to panic about the economy.

The world must have energy to function, and supplies of energy are going to get tighter and tighter in the months ahead.

We have been warned that this energy crunch was coming for decades, and now it is here.

I hope that you are prepared for what is going to happen next, because it isn’t going to be pretty.

***It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.***

The CEO Of Blackstone Is Warning That “A Real Shortage Of Energy” Will Cause Social Unrest All Over The Planet

October 26, 2021October 26, 2021 by Michael

We are facing an unprecedented global energy crunch. Demand for energy is continually rising, and the production of energy is not keeping pace. One of the biggest reasons for this is that large financial institutions have become extremely hesitant to fund any new energy projects that will add more carbon emissions to the environment. Instead, they want to fund projects that will help us transition to the new “green economy”, but meanwhile we are getting to a point where we will soon see widespread shortages of traditional forms of energy. So now we all get to suffer. A lack of oil is pushing the price of gasoline to alarming heights, shortages of natural gas are already causing tremendous disruptions in Asia and Europe, we are being told that we are facing a propane “armageddon” this winter, and supplies of coal have dropped to dangerously low levels around the world.

In other words, we are potentially heading into the most painful global energy crisis in modern history.

When CNN asked Blackstone CEO Stephen Schwarzman about this, he openly admitted that we are “going to end up with a real shortage of energy”…

Blackstone CEO Stephen Schwarzman warned Tuesday that high energy prices will likely set off social unrest around the world.

“We’re going to end up with a real shortage of energy. And when you have a shortage, it’s going to cost more. And it’s probably going to cost a lot more,” the private-equity billionaire told CNN International’s Richard Quest at a conference in Saudi Arabia.

When the power goes out, people are not going to be happy.

And people are really not going to be happy if it goes out for an extended period of time.

According to Schwarzman, we will soon see “very unhappy people” all over the globe…

“You’re going to get very unhappy people around the world in the emerging markets in particular but in the developed world,” Schwarzman said at the Future Investment Initiative. “What happens then, Richard, is you’ve got real unrest. This challenges the political system and it’s all utterly unnecessary.”

Sadly, he is right that this global energy crisis did not have to happen.

If the global elite had continued to fund traditional energy projects at the pace that was needed, we could have avoided this nightmare to a very large degree.

But traditional forms of energy are now being shunned, and billions of people will suffer as a result.

Meanwhile, prices throughout our economic system continue to rise at a very alarming pace. Just check out what has been happening to the price of turkey…

The U.S. Department of Agriculture, for example, released data recently showing the average wholesale price of Grade A frozen 8- to 16-pound turkey has spiked by 21.91% since last year. That means what cost $1.15 per pound a year ago will now ring at at $1.41. And just for context, the same would have cost 96 cents in 2019 and 84 cents in 2018.

If math isn’t your thing, that’s a 68% wholesale price increase in just two years.

Overall, we are being told that this upcoming Thanksgiving will be the most expensive Thanksgiving that any of us have ever experienced…

Matthew McClure paid 20% more this month than he did last year for the 25 pasture-raised turkeys he plans to roast at the Hive, the Bentonville, Arkansas, restaurant where he is the executive chef. And Norman Brown, director of sweet-potato sales for Wada Farms in Raleigh, North Carolina, is paying truckers nearly twice as much as usual to haul the crop to other parts of the country.

“I never seen anything like it, and I’ve been running sweet potatoes for 38 or 39 years,” Brown said. “I don’t know what the answer is, but in the end it’s all going to get passed on to the consumer.”

Unfortunately, more price hikes are on the horizon.

In fact, Kimberly-Clark is opening warning that they are going to be boosting prices even higher…

Prices of toilet paper, diapers, facial tissues and paper towels will likely rise in coming weeks as Irving-based consumer giant Kimberly-Clark warned Monday that inflation and supply chain concerns aren’t “likely to be resolved quickly.”

So I would stock up on paper products while you still can.

In case you haven’t figured it out yet, inflation is eventually going to get far worse than what we witnessed during the 1970s.

At this point, even many top Democrats are warning that high inflation is with us to stay. Here is one recent example…

Former President Barack Obama’s chief of global development on Tuesday predicted inflation was here to stay, despite the Biden administration’s protestations to the contrary.

Prices “will go higher, and the Fed has misread the inflation dynamics in a big way,” former Global Development Council Chairman Mohamed El Erian said in an afternoon interview with Fox News’ Sandra Smith, adding that the Federal Reserve was “still hostage to this notion that it’s transitory.”

And the shortages that we are currently experiencing are ultimately going to get worse too.

Right now, we are already facing the worst shortage of alcoholic beverages since the 1930s. When asked about his empty shelves by a reporter, one gas station owner said that he has “never seen anything like this”…

Supply chain issues are impacting the alcohol supply in the U.S., and it’s making alcohol more expensive and difficult for bars and liquor stores to get.

“I have so many empty shelves. In the two years of doing this, I’ve never seen anything like this,” gas station chain owner Ali Ali said.

As I discussed yesterday, now Biden wants to take countless more truck drivers off the road, and that will make our supply chain headaches a whole lot worse.

And as energy prices escalate, that will push all prices throughout our economic system higher and higher and higher.

Yes, all of this is really happening.

This is not a drill.

We are in the early chapters of a full-blown economic meltdown of epic proportions, and nothing will ever be the same after this.

If you want to keep waiting for conditions to “return to normal”, you are going to be waiting for a really, really long time.

We have entered a truly horrible nightmare, and there will be no waking up from this.

***It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.***

Business Leaders Are Begging Biden Not To Crash The Economy

October 25, 2021 by Michael

Is Joe Biden about to apply the finishing blow to the U.S. economy? If you don’t understand what I am talking about, just keep reading. Somehow it seems appropriate that “the Grim Creeper” is in charge during the dying days of the U.S. economic system. The U.S. dollar is being systematically destroyed, there are significant shortages all over the nation, a horrifying global energy crisis has suddenly erupted, and we are facing the most epic shortage of workers in our entire history. As a result of the worker shortage, thousands upon thousands of very basic tasks that need to get done in order for our economy to run smoothly simply aren’t getting done. This is one of the reasons why we are now facing the worst supply chain headaches that any of us have ever seen, and it is in this environment that Biden has chosen to deliver the coup de grâce.

As I have discussed previously, Biden’s absurd mandates will force millions upon millions of highly skilled Americans out of their jobs at a time when big companies all over the U.S. are already extremely desperate for workers. Over the past few weeks, scores of business leaders have been traveling to Washington to beg Biden to at least delay his mandates until after the holiday season…

Worried that President Joe Biden’s Covid vaccine mandate for private companies could cause a mass exodus of employees, business groups are pleading with the White House to delay the rule until after the holiday season.

White House officials at the Office of Management and Budget held dozens of meetings with labor unions, industry lobbyists and private individuals last week as the administration conducts its final review of the mandate, which will require businesses with 100 or more employees to ensure they are vaccinated against Covid or tested weekly for the virus. It is estimated to cover roughly two-thirds of the private sector workforce.

But so far the White House has been unmoved.

It is almost as if Biden can’t wait to drop the hammer on the economy.

Needless to say, these mandates will make the unprecedented supply chain crisis that we are currently dealing with far, far worse. If you doubt this, just consider what the trucking industry is potentially facing…

The American Trucking Associations, which will meet with the OMB on Tuesday, warned the administration last week that many drivers will likely quit rather than get vaccinated, further disrupting the national supply chain at time when the industry is already short 80,000 drivers.

The trucking association estimates companies covered by the mandate could lose 37% of drivers through retirements, resignations and workers switching to smaller companies not covered by the requirements.

Okay, so let me get this straight.

We need 80,000 more truck drivers right now, and Biden wants to fire 37 percent of those that we currently have on the roads?

In the past I have written articles about what would happen if America’s trucks stopped running, and we might be on the verge of actually seeing about a third of them suddenly shut down.

If you think that our store shelves are empty now, just wait until that happens.

And the trucking industry is just a small part of the overall picture. Just imagine what our country would look like if millions upon millions of important workers suddenly vanished from the system.

When I said that Biden was about to deliver a “finishing blow”, I was not kidding.

Over in Europe, they are facing a problem of a different nature. A severe shortage of magnesium threatens to reach a major crisis point next month, and that could result in millions of jobs being lost…

Europe purchases 95% of its magnesium from China, will run out of the industrial metal used to strengthen aluminum by the end of November that could threaten millions of jobs in sectors from automobiles to aerospace to defense and much more, according to Bloomberg.

Three trade groups, including European Aluminium, Eurometaux, and industriAll, warn shipments from China are dwindling quick due to power cuts to energy-intensive magnesium smelters. They said if reserves of the industrial metal aren’t increased in the near term, it may result in trade production shortages, factory closures, and job losses.

Over the years, how many times did I warn that it was foolish to become so dependent on China?

Now Europe is about to learn this lesson the hard way.

So much of the pain that the western world is experiencing now could have been avoided if we would have made different policy decisions when we had the chance.

To a very large degree, our wounds are self-inflicted, and now Biden is going in for the kill.

Once his mandates go into effect, millions of hard working Americans will be ruthlessly fired and suddenly won’t have any paychecks coming in.

Meanwhile, inflation is starting to get out of control and the cost of living is absolutely soaring. Earlier today, I was horrified to learn that propane prices have skyrocketed to utterly insane levels…

Propane prices haven’t been so high heading into winter in a decade, which is bad news for the millions of rural Americans who rely on the fuel to stay warm.

At $1.41 a gallon at the Mont Belvieu trading hub in Texas, on-the-spot prices are about triple those of the past two Octobers. Of the two main U.S. propane futures contracts, one hit a high earlier this month and the other doesn’t have far to climb to eclipse the record it set during the blizzard of 2014. The average residential price tracked by the U.S. Energy Information Administration has jumped by 50% from a year ago, to $2.69 a gallon.

Unfortunately, propane supplies are supposed to become even tighter in the months ahead.

They keep telling us that this is going to be a “dark winter”, but for many Americans it will be a very cold winter too.

I am doing my best to sound the alarm, and so many of the things that I have warned about are now happening right in front of our eyes.

But most of the population still doesn’t want to believe that things are really this bad.

Most of them are still convinced that better days are just around the corner, and it would be wonderful if they were actually correct.

***It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.***

Is It Time To Start Talking About Hyperinflation?

October 24, 2021October 24, 2021 by Michael

Our leaders have been creating, borrowing and spending dollars at a pace that is far beyond anything that we have ever seen before in U.S. history, and yet they would have us believe that the terrible inflation that they have created is just “temporary”. They must think that we are really stupid or really gullible (or both), because anyone with even a shred of common sense can see that this is going to end badly. I have been warning about this for years, and many others have also been sounding the alarm for a very long time. But at this point, you don’t have to be any sort of an “expert” to see what is happening. In fact, Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey just posted a tweet on his official account warning that “hyperinflation” is coming…

Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey weighed in on escalating inflation in the U.S., saying things are going to get considerably worse.

“Hyperinflation is going to change everything,” Dorsey tweeted Friday night. “It’s happening.”

Hyperinflation is going to change everything. It’s happening.

— jack⚡️ (@jack) October 23, 2021

I didn’t think that I would ever utter these words, but Jack Dorsey is right.

Our leaders are systematically destroying the reserve currency of the planet, and nothing will ever be the same again after this.

Needless to say, Dorsey’s tweet caused quite an uproar, and he later clarified what he meant by stating that “it will happen in the US soon”…

Responding to user comments, Dorsey added Friday that he sees the inflation problem escalating around the globe. “It will happen in the US soon, and so the world,” he tweeted.

What would cause Dorsey to make statements like these?

Some apologists for the establishment are suggesting that Dorsey has gone off the deep end, but the truth is that the cold, hard numbers do not lie.

For example, the following chart comes straight from the Federal Reserve, and it shows that M2 has been rising at an exponential rate…

The people that are criticizing this recklessness are not the ones that are crazy.

The ones that are crazy are those that are doing this to the rest of us.

Increasing the money supply at an exponential rate was inevitably going to cause very painful inflation, and that is precisely what we are witnessing all across the country right now…

You’ve already noticed prices going up at the supermarket and the drugstore. Unfortunately, more sticker shock could be around the corner.

What’s happening: Companies that make consumer goods are announcing price increases left and right. Faced with persistent higher costs, they don’t expect the situation to moderate any time soon.

But those in charge continue to insist that everything is going to be just fine.

In fact, even though Janet Yellen admits that inflation “will remain high into next year”, she fully expects things to return to normal eventually…

“I don’t think we’re about to lose control of inflation,” Yellen said.

“On a 12-month basis, the inflation rate will remain high into next year because of what’s already happened. But I expect improvement by the middle to end of next year… second half of next year,” she added.

Do you believe her?

I don’t.

Our leaders continue to flood the system with more new money, and that is going to continue to create more inflation.

We have way too many dollars chasing way too few goods and services, and that is creating shortages and forcing prices to absurd heights. During a recent interview with Fox Business, billionaire supermarket owner John Catsimatidis made this stunning prediction about food prices…

“I see over 10% [price increase] in the next 60 days,” he said.

10 percent in 60 days?

I think that would qualify as “hyperinflation”, don’t you?

Over on CNBC, billionaire Paul Tudor Jones boldly declared that inflation is now “the single biggest threat” to our society…

Billionaire hedge fund manager Paul Tudor Jones believes inflation is here to stay, posing a major threat to the U.S. markets and economy.

“I think to me the No. 1 issue facing Main Street investors is inflation, and it’s pretty clear to me that inflation is not transitory,” Jones said Wednesday on CNBC’s “Squawk Box.” “It’s probably the single biggest threat to certainly financial markets and I think to society just in general.”

These are not just random people from off the street we are talking about.

These are billionaires that have a very deep understanding of our financial system.

When CNBC’s Jim Cramer was asked about inflation, he referenced what Paul Tudor Jones had said, and he also admitted that it is “much worse than we thought”…

“Yeah. I mean, look, I think Paul Tudor Jones, as always, is right about inflation. It’s much worse than we thought,” he said. “I keep hoping that the capacity will come on and make it so that it’s not as bad, but it just can’t seem to come on as fast enough.”

All of these “experts” are starting to sound just like The Economic Collapse Blog.

Needless to say, that is a sign that we are very late in the game.

If our leaders wanted to get inflation under control, they would stop flooding the system with enormous mountains of new money.

But as Egon von Greyerz has pointed out, they can’t do that because it would crash the economy…

The central bankers can either squash the chronic inflation by tapering and at the same time create a liquidity squeeze that will totally kill an economy in constant need of stimulus. Or they can continue to print unlimited amounts of worthless fiat money whether it is paper or digital dollars.

If central banks starve the economy of liquidity or flood it, the result will be disastrous. Whether the financial system dies from an implosion or an explosion is really irrelevant. Both will lead to total misery.

Without a doubt, “total misery” is definitely coming.

Eventually, prices will be so high that the big corporations will start putting armed guards on food trucks.

Throughout human history, every time a nation has started to create money at an exponential rate it has always ended in tragedy.

Now it is our turn, and a day of reckoning is fast approaching.

***It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.***

This Winter, We Could Potentially Be Facing Simultaneous Shortages Of Oil, Natural Gas, Propane And Coal

October 21, 2021October 21, 2021 by Michael

I realize that the headline that I have chosen for this article may sound a bit wild to many of you, but keep reading because what we are potentially facing is extremely serious. Right now, we are already in the midst of an epic global energy crisis. There have already been significant power outages all over the planet, and prices are spiking at a pace that is absolutely breathtaking. With each passing day, it seems like supplies of oil, natural gas, propane and coal just keep getting tighter, and what is really odd is that it is happening so early in the year. Summer just ended a few weeks ago, and the heart of winter in the northern hemisphere is still several months away. So if things are this bad already, what are things going to look like when we get into January and February?

This morning, I was stunned when I pulled up the Drudge Report and saw that one gas station in California was now selling gasoline for $7.59 a gallon…

Gas keeps getting more and more expensive, especially in California. But perhaps nowhere is it pricier than the remote central coast community of Gorda.

The town’s only gas station is offering regular unleaded for $7.59. Premium is nearly $8.50.

The good news is that a gallon of gasoline is not nearly that high in most of the rest of the nation.

But the bad news is that prices are rising aggressively from coast to coast. As of yesterday, Fox News was reporting that the price of gasoline had risen “for 22 straight days”.

The main reason why prices are skyrocketing is because supplies are starting to get really tight. In fact, it is being reported that the crude oil hub in Cushing, Oklahoma could be “effectively out of crude” in just a few weeks…

In a note predicting the near-term dynamics of the oil market, JPMorgan’s commodity Natasha Kaneva writes that in a world of pervasive nat gas and coal shortages which are forcing the power sector to increasingly turn to oil (boosting demand by 750bkd during winter and drawing inventory by 2.1mmb/d in Nov and Dec), Cushing oil storage – which just dropped to 31.2mm barrels, the lowest since 2018…

… may be just weeks from being “effectively out of crude.” The bank’s conclusion: “if nothing were to change in the Cushing balance over the next two months, we might expect front WTI spreads to spike to record highs—a “super backwardation” scenario.”

Needless to say, we have never seen anything like this happen before.

In such a scenario, how high could the price of oil potentially go?

And if oil price records are being shattered in the months ahead, what will ordinary Americans have to pay when they go to fill up their vehicles?

I have a feeling that we are about to enter uncharted territory.

Meanwhile, one expert recently told Bloomberg that we could soon be facing “propane-market armageddon”…

In the report by Bloomberg, Ang says prices for the first quarter of 2022 are already far above later supplies, saying, “it may indicate players are preparing for propane-market armageddon.” He added that some areas could see outright shortages before winter ends.

To add to the stress, Poynter says some weather forecasts are already calling for a colder than normal winter, thanks to the La Nina effect. Experts call for an 87% chance of the system bringing an early and harsh winter season.

The use of the term “outright shortages” definitely alarms me, because there are millions of Americans that use propane to heat their homes.

If the propane runs out in the middle of the winter, what are those people supposed to do?

On the other side of the globe, a tightening of natural gas supplies has become an enormous problem. According to Global News, natural gas prices in Europe and Asia “have more than tripled” in 2021…

Regional natural gas markets in the United States are seeing prices for this winter surge along with global record highs — suggesting that the energy bills causing headaches in Europe and Asia will hit the world’s top gas producer before long.

Gas prices in Europe and Asia have more than tripled this year, causing manufacturers to curtail activity from Spain to Britain and sparking power crises in China.

In addition to a lack of natural gas, a severe coal shortage has also contributed to the economic chaos that we are witnessing in China at the moment.

Just recently, CNN reported that energy shortages had already spread to 20 different provinces…

Power shortages have spread to 20 provinces in recent weeks, forcing the government to ration electricity during peak hours and some factories to suspend production. These disruptions resulted in a sharp drop in industrial output last month and weighed on the outlook for China’s economy.

India is being hit really hard by the global coal shortage as well.

In fact, we are being told that most of India’s coal plants “have critically low levels of coal inventory”…

Most of India’s coal-fired power plants have critically low levels of coal inventory at a time when the economy is picking up and fueling electricity demand.

Coal accounts for around 70% of India’s electricity generation.

So the truth is that my headline for this article is not over the top at all.

The shortages aren’t something that we have to wait for. They are already here, and they are going to get a lot worse.

Of course this new energy crisis is going to make our global supply chain headaches even more frustrating.

In our economic system, it takes energy to literally do just about anything, and as energy becomes more expensive virtually every form of economic activity will also become more expensive.

That means that all of the stuff that is made for us in Asia and shipped halfway around the planet is going to start costing a lot more.

As toy shortages intensify heading into the holiday season, we are already seeing some resellers pricing toys at nearly 400 percent of their normal levels…

American Girl’s sold-out blonde winter princess doll, which retailed for $250, is now going for up to $999 on platforms such as Mercari and eBay.

The cat-themed Gabby’s Dollhouse, which is all the rage for this year’s preschoolers, has nearly quadrupled on some sites from its original $55 price tag.

This is the “new normal”, and so you might as well get used to it.

I am shocked that things have deteriorated so rapidly, and this new global energy crisis is definitely setting the stage for so many things that I have been warning about.

As global energy supplies get tighter and tighter, all of us will feel the pain.

And the experts are telling us that things are not going to turn around any time soon.

So I hope you have a plan for this winter and beyond, because things are really starting to get crazy out there.

***It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.***

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