Most Popular
1. It’s a New Macro, the Gold Market Knows It, But Dead Men Walking Do Not (yet)- Gary_Tanashian
2.Stock Market Presidential Election Cycle Seasonal Trend Analysis - Nadeem_Walayat
3. Bitcoin S&P Pattern - Nadeem_Walayat
4.Nvidia Blow Off Top - Flying High like the Phoenix too Close to the Sun - Nadeem_Walayat
4.U.S. financial market’s “Weimar phase” impact to your fiat and digital assets - Raymond_Matison
5. How to Profit from the Global Warming ClImate Change Mega Death Trend - Part1 - Nadeem_Walayat
7.Bitcoin Gravy Train Trend Forecast 2024 - - Nadeem_Walayat
8.The Bond Trade and Interest Rates - Nadeem_Walayat
9.It’s Easy to Scream Stocks Bubble! - Stephen_McBride
10.Fed’s Next Intertest Rate Move might not align with popular consensus - Richard_Mills
Last 7 days
Nvidia Numero Uno in Count Down to President Donald Pump Election Victory - 5th Nov 24
Trump or Harris - Who Wins US Presidential Election 2024 Forecast Prediction - 5th Nov 24
Stock Market Brief in Count Down to US Election Result 2024 - 3rd Nov 24
Gold Stocks’ Winter Rally 2024 - 3rd Nov 24
Why Countdown to U.S. Recession is Underway - 3rd Nov 24
Stock Market Trend Forecast to Jan 2025 - 2nd Nov 24
President Donald PUMP Forecast to Win US Presidential Election 2024 - 1st Nov 24
At These Levels, Buying Silver Is Like Getting It At $5 In 2003 - 28th Oct 24
Nvidia Numero Uno Selling Shovels in the AI Gold Rush - 28th Oct 24
The Future of Online Casinos - 28th Oct 24
Panic in the Air As Stock Market Correction Delivers Deep Opps in AI Tech Stocks - 27th Oct 24
Stocks, Bitcoin, Crypto's Counting Down to President Donald Pump! - 27th Oct 24
UK Budget 2024 - What to do Before 30th Oct - Pensions and ISA's - 27th Oct 24
7 Days of Crypto Opportunities Starts NOW - 27th Oct 24
The Power Law in Venture Capital: How Visionary Investors Like Yuri Milner Have Shaped the Future - 27th Oct 24
This Points To Significantly Higher Silver Prices - 27th Oct 24
US House Prices Trend Forecast 2024 to 2026 - 11th Oct 24
US Housing Market Analysis - Immigration Drives House Prices Higher - 30th Sep 24
Stock Market October Correction - 30th Sep 24
The Folly of Tariffs and Trade Wars - 30th Sep 24
Gold: 5 principles to help you stay ahead of price turns - 30th Sep 24
The Everything Rally will Spark multi year Bull Market - 30th Sep 24
US FIXED MORTGAGES LIMITING SUPPLY - 23rd Sep 24
US Housing Market Free Equity - 23rd Sep 24
US Rate Cut FOMO In Stock Market Correction Window - 22nd Sep 24
US State Demographics - 22nd Sep 24
Gold and Silver Shine as the Fed Cuts Rates: What’s Next? - 22nd Sep 24
Stock Market Sentiment Speaks:Nothing Can Topple This Market - 22nd Sep 24
US Population Growth Rate - 17th Sep 24
Are Stocks Overheating? - 17th Sep 24
Sentiment Speaks: Silver Is At A Major Turning Point - 17th Sep 24
If The Stock Market Turn Quickly, How Bad Can Things Get? - 17th Sep 24
IMMIGRATION DRIVES HOUSE PRICES HIGHER - 12th Sep 24
Global Debt Bubble - 12th Sep 24
Gold’s Outlook CPI Data - 12th Sep 24

Market Oracle FREE Newsletter

How to Protect your Wealth by Investing in AI Tech Stocks

America in Dire of a Mental Paradigm Shift Towards a Simpler Life - “A New Mission”

Politics / US Politics Jun 10, 2011 - 08:54 AM GMT

By: Andy_Sutton

Politics

Best Financial Markets Analysis ArticleA sabbatical is usually a good thing as it gives a nice opportunity to take a step back, assess, reassess, and potentially relax. I’ve enjoyed the past few months away as I took time to do the above and also to try to impart a little common sense and perhaps some wisdom on the up and coming generation regarding economics, the study thereof, and more importantly, the dire consequences of failing to recognize and follow basic economic laws. 


So I return, and in many ways, things are not much different than when I took leave back in February. There have been some recurring themes, and in a sad way, it is nice to have been right about so many things, particularly the fraudulent nature of the recovery that was pronounced by the govermedia back in early 2009. Believe me though, for all the people who have had their jobs outsourced, offshored, or eliminated, I’d have much rather been wrong. The same goes for those who are now struggling to support families on a fraction of their prior earnings. I would much rather have had to slink away in disgrace because of a voracious (and healthy) economic recovery than see the suffering endured by so many.

I remember vividly a conversation I had with author Jim Kunstler a few years ago about these matters and we hammered on the need for people to scale down. Sure, we were having that conversation through the lens of the reality of peak oil, but it really applied in the financial sense as well. Perhaps the reality that has struck me the most over the past few weeks is the impact that McDonalds is able to have on the labor market. Who would have ever thought that a fast-food joint would be responsible for half the jobs created in a single month? And that is if you have any reason at all to believe the BLS jobs numbers. I don’t. But that is another story that has been told many times before and we’ll not do it again.

Getting back to my conversation with Kunstler, we talked about the mental paradigm shift necessary to deal with peak oil. The days of the hour-long commute are limited. Driving more than 100 miles a day is going to be a thing of the past soon. Many are now telecommuting a couple of days a week in jobs where that is suitable and that helps. Gas prices were much lower when Jim and I talked than they are now, that is for sure. For the guy who drives 100 miles each day to work, his commuting bill has gone up dramatically while his wages have stagnated. He is pummeled again at the grocery store with increasing prices for quality and quantity of foods that are continuously decreasing. The media and government are doing Joe America a huge disservice by making it sound like these situations are transient in nature, rather than here for the long term. Again, the point of this commentary is not to flesh out the reasons behind what is going on; that’s already been done. The point is that people need to adjust and most simply won’t. It isn’t that they can’t; they just refuse.

Our entitlement society is heading for a brick wall. The major underpinnings of our gimme society are insolvent. Our debt is skyrocketing. Our bonds are junk. Our currency is a joke. Our ‘free’ press is in the pockets of the same people who have brought all of this economic despair to Main Street. Joe America nearly shut down this corrupt system in 2008-09 simply by curtailing his expansion of borrowing. Nobody wants to talk about that. The proof is irrefutable and the connections are clear. America stops borrowing and the fiat system is dead on arrival at the Fed’s triage center: the FOMC. We hear dire warnings about the government’s debt and the statutory debt limit. Threats are made, promises of doomsday echo from the same ratings agencies who saw fit to apply AAA ratings to junk mortgage bonds and will mercilessly downgrade the PIIGS for problems that are several orders of magnitude less than what we face.

Joe America is largely unfazed, however. Sure, there are pockets of hurt, and there are many, many people who have re-evaluated their personal situations and have embraced individual austerity. Yet in the aggregate, we’re back on the credit card. It is hard to discern at this point whether the uptick in borrowing is for essentials or discretionary goods. Based on the anecdotal evidence, it is likely both. People have been trained to borrow, make minimum payments, and to live as a servant to the creditor. When you think about it, the ‘money’ that has been used to create this servitude has been created from nothing, yet must be repaid with something very real – the sweat of one’s brow. Hardly seems like a fair deal to me, yet we not only accept it, we demand it. Have we really spent any time thinking about these matters? It is almost funny when I look at the latest opinion polls regarding the national debt. The vast majority of Americans think that Congress needs to put the country’s fiscal house in order, yet most of those same people refuse to do it in their own backyard.

Yes, America is in dire need of a mental paradigm shift towards a simpler life, with less emphasis on accumulation of toys and materialism and more of an emphasis on stewardship and restoring the economic environment that allowed this country to become what it was. That should be our mandate. However, I am a realist and I know deep down that most will not heed this or any other call for a change of thinking. Unfortunately, history is firmly on the side of this pessimistic disposition. I have decided in my time off to focus at the micro level instead of the macro level. My days of open letters to Congress and calls to economic action are over. My days of open letters to individuals have begun. These commentaries and my firm’s newsletter will be geared more towards helping individuals who recognize our changing world to adjust, cope, and prepare for what is inevitable rather than attempting to convince those who will continue to deny the obvious until the time for meaningful action has long passed.

These words are not meant to be harsh, but have come over months of reflection as I’ve had some time to ruminate over the human condition and its predilection to lemming-like behavior. The one silver lining in all this is that if people live more responsibly and in a simpler manner from a financial perspective, they will be taking many of the steps that will be necessary for the preparation of the effects of peak oil. Yes, peak oil is real. Even the big banks are now talking about ‘resource constraints’ in the energy space and figuring it into their forecasts. Oil companies are hammering like crazy in the Marcellus shales to bring natural gas to market that hasn’t sold for over $5.50 a thousand in what seems to be a dog’s life.

If you are one of those people who understand these matters, then this column and anything else I can do to help are here for you to utilize. From here forward this work will be dedicated to the awakened rather than to the process of awakening. If you’re not there yet, there are plenty of mainstream media outlets that will gladly satiate your desire for information.

This month’s Centsible Investor Keynote will focus on the debt ceiling, government debt in general, and most importantly, some steps you can take on an individual basis to assist you in mitigating the effects of continued runaway borrowing. In addition, we’ll provide our traditional analysis of energy, precious metals, and the major financial markets. For more information, click here.

By Andy Sutton

http://www.my2centsonline.com

Andy Sutton holds a MBA with Honors in Economics from Moravian College and is a member of Omicron Delta Epsilon International Honor Society in Economics. His firm, Sutton & Associates, LLC currently provides financial planning services to a growing book of clients using a conservative approach aimed at accumulating high quality, income producing assets while providing protection against a falling dollar. For more information visit www.suttonfinance.net

Andy Sutton Archive

© 2005-2022 http://www.MarketOracle.co.uk - The Market Oracle is a FREE Daily Financial Markets Analysis & Forecasting online publication.


Post Comment

Only logged in users are allowed to post comments. Register/ Log in