It is ironic that a country that was built on a system of checks and balances now has a monetary system that is accountable to no one... the way our monetary system is structured, the government can literally print money and spend it on anything, no matter how foolish ... it has no checks and balances. And so according to many estimates the unfunded liabilities run $75 to $100 trillion... these can never be paid off. It has grown to this level because there are no real operating principles other than buying the votes needed to get re-elected and to stay in office for as long as they can. If you would have asked anybody on this planet five, six years ago, if the US government could run a … [Read more...]
Money Essentials for These ChaoticTimes
Trying times are upon us. There are a few essentials you absolutely must understand if you are going to thrive or at least survive financially over the next few years. If you want serious money, you have to get serious about money. You need to understand these fundamentals and never forget them. Here are the fundamentals: Liquidate, Consolidate, Create and Speculate. The key to becoming wealthy is simple to state but totally incomprehensible to modern society. Simply produce more than you consume and save the difference. But we are taught that consumption is the goal. He who dies with the most toys wins... Consumption is the good that will save our country. But is it true or is … [Read more...]
Has the Fed Started QE3?
By Bud Conrad, Casey Research The Fed surprised the market by extending its policy of 0 to 0.25% Fed funds rate to mid-2013. The way the Fed manages to drive rates lower is to buy Treasuries with newly created money – driving the price up and the rates down. The big question is whether the policy will have a sizeable effect on markets. The chart below shows the historical jump in the Fed’s combined policy tools that were used to lower rates and bail out financial institutions through a variety of programs. These include the big purchase of mortgage-backed securities (MBS) called QE1 and the large purchase of Treasuries called QE2. The point of the extrapolation in the chart is just to … [Read more...]
Can You Really Get a Free Credit Report?
Anyone who has surfed the web long enough has probably seen offers for "Free Credit Reports" but when you go there you usually find that it is just a scam that requires you to register or buy something first. Well, I recently found the one true source of free credit reports and actually was able to verify it with the Federal Trade Commission! I strongly recommend that before you sign up for any free credit report that you check it with the FTC. (See the end of this article for a link to the FTC). -- editorIn the United States, there are three main credit reporting companies they are Equifax, Experian, and Trans Union. They are strictly monitored by the Federal Government and are required … [Read more...]
Bud Conrad: Volatile Markets Show Original Credit Crisis Is Still With Us
Bud Conrad, Chief Economist Bud Conrad, the chief economist for Casey Research, sat down with Jim Puplava on the Financial Sense Newshour to discuss the ongoing debt crisis, the fate of the Euro, Fed policy, and other key issues. "The situation is that the world's economy is not well balanced. We in the US have taken over the bank debt by bailing out banks and taking over Fannie and Freddie, but we haven't handled the government debt and deficits in a way that we can get through this storm." Click play below to listen to his interview in its entirety. http://www.netcastdaily.com/broadcast/fsn2011-0816-1.mp3 Our country’s debt crisis will devastate you if you don’t adjust your … [Read more...]
Recession Watch- Where are We Now?
Recessions are generally caused by a shrinking money supply and/or an increase in demand for cash. In the last two years the M1 money supply has grown by 40% and still the economy is weak, the unemployment rate is high... basically no recovery. Why? In this article Terry Coxon discusses the slow recovery and how it compares to previous recessions. ~Tim McMahon, editor Economically Sleepwalking Terry Coxon, Senior Economist Until the Great Depression of the 1930s, the average length of a recession was 21 months. The misery that began in October 1929 lasted five times that long – 105 months.... the government pursued an array of policies to prevent prices from falling, which had the … [Read more...]
The Real Basket of Goods
I recently received the following from Ed Devol, "When I try to educate people about the impact of inflation, I find putting it in terms of time worked for something is a good way of explaining inflation". Thanks, Ed. I agree, when I am deciding whether to purchase something, I like to think of it in terms of how many hours I have to work to buy it. (It helps keep it "real"). In addition economists often link how many hours the average person has to work to eat. A poor country might require eight hours of work a day just to eat. While a rich country might require only 1 hour a day. So you might like the following article by Lynn Carpenter as she tracks prices and earnings over the last 60 … [Read more...]
Five Things You Need to Know About the Economy
By David Galland, Managing Director, Casey Research At any point during the recent negotiations in Washington over the debt, did you seriously think for even a second that the U.S. was about to default? Of course, in time the U.S. government (along with many others) will default. However, they are highly unlikely to do so by decree or even through the sort of legislative inaction recently on display. Rather, it will come about through the time-honored tradition of screwing debtors via the slow-roasting method of monetary inflation. Yet most people still bought into the latest drama put on by the Congressional Players – a troupe of actors whose skills at pretense and artifice might … [Read more...]
The Buzz Around Gold Is Growing Louder
By Jeff Clark, Casey Research BIG GOLD I outlined last week the increasingly bullish consensus among analysts about gold stocks. The same pattern exists with gold itself; growing numbers of analysts have either joined the movement or have upped their bullish outlook. The following comments and developments have all been reported just this month. It presents quite a convincing case when one strings them together like this. Keep in mind that this is what these analysts and managers are telling their clients. … [Read more...]
A Thousand Pictures Is Worth One Word
By Jeff Clark, BIG GOLD In spite of constant headlines about debts and deficits, most Americans don’t really believe the U.S. dollar will collapse. From knowledgeable investors who study the markets to those seemingly too busy to worry about such things, most dismiss the idea of the dollar actually going to zero. History has a message for us: No fiat currency has lasted forever. Eventually, they all fail. BMG BullionBars recently published a poster featuring pictures of numerous currencies that have gone bust. Some got there quickly, while others took a century or more. Regardless of how long it took, though, the seductive temptations allowed under a fiat monetary system eventually … [Read more...]