Despite what Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke says, rampant inflation is officially here. The federal government is constantly monkeying with the numbers to keep the “official” rate of inflation below 2 percent, but it is becoming very difficult to deny that the cost of almost everything is really going up these days. The American people are not stupid. They notice the difference when they go to the grocery store or stop at the gas station. The dollar is losing value rapidly now. The price of gold set another new all-time record today and is currently hovering just above $1430 an ounce. The price of West Texas crude has moved above 100 dollars several times recently and the price of Brent crude is currently above 116 dollars. These higher oil prices are really starting to be felt in the United States. The average price for a gallon of gasoline in the United States has now reached $3.38. There are some gas stations in the U.S. where the price of a gallon of gas is already over 4 dollars. But it is not just the American people that are feeling the pain. The global price of food recently hit a new record high and almost every major agricultural commodity has absolutely skyrocketed in price over the past 12 months. Meanwhile, Ben Bernanke just told the Senate Banking Committee that he really isn’t concerned about inflation at all. (Read More...)
QE3? Several Top Federal Reserve Officials Seem To Think That More Quantitative Easing Is Necessary
The end of QE2 is still several months away and yet quite a few top Federal Reserve officials are already hinting that more quantitative easing may be necessary. Apparently the U.S. economy is not moving forward as rapidly as they would like. So it looks like “QE3” could be on the way. But did anyone out there actually believe that quantitative easing would come to a complete stop in June? Whether they call it “QE3” or something else entirely, the reality of the matter is that we have now come to a time when the Federal Reserve is going to be continually purchasing a significant percentage of all new U.S. government debt. This is essentially a gigantic Ponzi scheme, but sadly there is just not enough money in the rest of the world to be able to continue to feed the U.S. government’s voracious appetite for debt. Right now Ben Bernanke and his cohorts are trying to break the news to us gently, but anyone with half a brain can see what is happening. The only way for the game to keep going is for the Federal Reserve to print lots more money, and that is going to be incredibly bad for the U.S. economy in the long run. (Read More...)
Global Economy? 23 Facts Which Prove That Globalism Is Pushing The Standard Of Living Of The Middle Class Down To Third World Levels
From now on, whenever you hear the term “the global economy” you should immediately equate it with the destruction of the U.S. middle class. Over the past several decades, the American economy has been slowly but surely merged into the emerging one world economic system. Unfortunately for the middle class, much of the rest of the world does not have the same minimum wage laws and worker protections that we do. Therefore, the massive global corporations that now dominate our economy are able to pay workers in other countries slave labor wages and import the products that they make into the United States to compete with products made by “expensive” American workers. This has resulted in a mass exodus of manufacturing facilities and jobs from the United States. (Read More...)
Mob Robbers And Rampant Looting: Is This The Future Of America?
Have you ever heard of mob robberies? What happens is that dozens of young people storm a store at the same time, take whatever they want, and then storm out as powerless store clerks watch helplessly. Most of the time these “mob robbers” end up getting caught, but unfortunately “group crime” is a trend that is rising. Is it a sign of the times that large groups of people are starting to recklessly invade retail establishments? Is this the future of America? As I have written about so frequently, the U.S. middle class is being destroyed by this economy and large numbers of our young people are losing hope. Frustration and anger are rising from coast to coast and millions of Americans are losing faith in the system. The thin veneer of civilization which we all take for granted is already starting to disappear. So what is going to happen when the economy collapses? As our economic system fails, mob robberies and rampant looting are only going to become more common. Let us hope that the economy can hold together for at least a couple more years, because once society falls apart things are going to get really, really ugly in our major cities. (Read More...)
Become A Teacher? 10 Examples That Show Why Becoming A Teacher Is A Dead End In This Economy
Today budget cutters are on the rampage from coast to coast and often one of their first targets is public school teachers. What we have witnessed recently in Wisconsin is just one example of this. The truth is that you do not want to become a teacher if you want to have financial security in America today. Teacher salaries are being slashed from sea to shining sea. But to a certain extent the teachers that are having their wages cut are the fortunate ones. There are thousands upon thousands of teachers that have already been laid off, and there are tens of thousands more that are about to be laid off. It is absolutely brutal out there right now. So if you are thinking about becoming a teacher you might want to think twice. Not that there are a whole lot of other jobs that are more secure right now. The truth is that there is no such thing as a “safe job” in America today. (Read More...)
Stagflation 2011: Why It Is Here And Why It Is Going To Be Very Painful
Are you ready for an economy that has high inflation and high unemployment at the same time? Well, welcome to “Stagflation 2011”. Stagflation exists when inflation and unemployment are both at high levels at the same time. Of course we all know about the high unemployment situation already. Gallup’s daily tracking poll says that the U.S. unemployment rate has been hovering around 10 percent all year so far. But now thanks to rapidly rising food prices and the exploding price of oil, rampant inflation is being added to the equation. Normally inflation is a sign of increased economic activity, but when the basic commodities that we depend on to run our economy (such as oil) go up in price it actually causes a slowdown in economy activity. When the price of oil goes up high enough, it fundamentally changes the behavior of individuals and businesses. Suddenly certain types of economic activities that were feasible when oil was very cheap are not profitable any longer. When the price of oil rises to a new level and it stays there, essentially what is happening is that more “blood” is being drained out of our economy. Our economy will continue to function when there are higher oil prices, it will just be a lot more sluggish. (Read More...)
5 Dollar Gas? Get Ready To Pay An Arm And A Leg For Gasoline
One of the quickest ways to bring down the U.S. economy would be to dramatically increase the price of oil. Oil is the lifeblood of our economic system. Without it, our entire economy would come to a grinding halt. Almost every type of economic activity in this country depends on oil, and even a small rise in the price of oil can have a dramatic impact on economic growth. That is why so many economists are incredibly alarmed about what is happening in the Middle East right now. The revolution in Libya caused the price of WTI crude to soar more than 7 dollars on Tuesday alone. It closed at $93.57 on Tuesday and Brent crude actually hit $108.57 a barrel before settling back to $105.78 at the end of the day. Some analysts are warning that we could even see 5 dollar gas in the United States by the end of the year if rioting spreads to other oil producing nations such as Saudi Arabia. With the Middle East in such a state of chaos right now it is hard to know exactly what is going to happen, but almost everyone agrees that if oil prices continue to rise at a rapid pace over the next several months it is going to have a devastating impact on economic growth all over the globe. (Read More...)
As The Obamas And The Ultra-Wealthy Live The High Life Most Americans Are Going Through Economic Hell
Barack Obama recently made the following statement to American families that are struggling to survive in this economy: “If you’re a family trying to cut back, you might skip going out to dinner, or you might put off a vacation.” A few days after making that statement Obama sent his wife and children off on yet another vacation, this time to a luxury ski hotel in Vail, Colorado. But the Obamas are not the only ones enjoying the high life. Wealthy corporate executives and greedy Wall Street fatcats insist that profit margins are too tight to hire more American workers, and yet sales of luxury cars, private jets and vacation homes are soaring. Meanwhile, most American families are going through economic hell right now. In 2010, more Americans than ever before were living below the poverty line. Over 4 million Americans have been unemployed for more than a year, and over 5 million Americans are at least two months behind on their mortgage payments. As the Obamas and wealthy corporate executives jet off to fancy ski resorts, half of all American workers are earning $505 or less per week and 55 percent of American families are living paycheck to paycheck. Something is very wrong with this picture. (Read More...)