Posts with the tag inflation
About the Author
One of our Party Builders, Robert Brooks, has written an excellent article on his blog at http://thewildernessvoice.blogspot.com/
I am not duplicating his excellent article, but making a major correction. As shocking as his article is, and with great respect to Mr. Brooks, he understates the problem.
He uses the example of the year 1967 for his computations that the dollar has lost 80 percent of its value in forty years, compared, among other things to the price of gold.
I beg to argue that the two most relevant benchmarks are the price of oil, and the median homeprice, since those two items determine the price of almost everything else we spend our money on.
In 1967 a barrel of oil was $2.90 a barrel. Today, Sept. 2, 2008 oil closed at a five year low of $105, which indicates a loss of 97 percent in the value of a dollar.
National figures on median home prices are subject to manipulation, so I will use my home.
My home was built in 1967, coincidentally the same base year used as a base by Mr. Brooks.
The current market value of my home indicates a 92 percent loss in the value of the dollar. People are mistaken when they think they have made money when a homeprice goes up. What you are really seeing is inflation: it takes more dollars to buy the same thing.
In the 39 or 40 years since 1967, Republicans have controlled the White House most of the time, but there is plenty of blame to go around for both parties.
What this really means is that our government has stolen 92 to 97 percent of the life savings that people had in 1967.
And every year they are stealing more of our life savings. Greenspan is a traitor who belongs in jail, because the statutory job of the Federal Reserve is to preserve a sound dollar.
Greenspan only missed the mark by 95 percent.
We need CHANGE
In case I did not state it clearly, WE NEED CHANGE
I am not duplicating his excellent article, but making a major correction. As shocking as his article is, and with great respect to Mr. Brooks, he understates the problem.
He uses the example of the year 1967 for his computations that the dollar has lost 80 percent of its value in forty years, compared, among other things to the price of gold.
I beg to argue that the two most relevant benchmarks are the price of oil, and the median homeprice, since those two items determine the price of almost everything else we spend our money on.
In 1967 a barrel of oil was $2.90 a barrel. Today, Sept. 2, 2008 oil closed at a five year low of $105, which indicates a loss of 97 percent in the value of a dollar.
National figures on median home prices are subject to manipulation, so I will use my home.
My home was built in 1967, coincidentally the same base year used as a base by Mr. Brooks.
The current market value of my home indicates a 92 percent loss in the value of the dollar. People are mistaken when they think they have made money when a homeprice goes up. What you are really seeing is inflation: it takes more dollars to buy the same thing.
In the 39 or 40 years since 1967, Republicans have controlled the White House most of the time, but there is plenty of blame to go around for both parties.
What this really means is that our government has stolen 92 to 97 percent of the life savings that people had in 1967.
And every year they are stealing more of our life savings. Greenspan is a traitor who belongs in jail, because the statutory job of the Federal Reserve is to preserve a sound dollar.
Greenspan only missed the mark by 95 percent.
We need CHANGE
In case I did not state it clearly, WE NEED CHANGE
Basically, the U.S. Dollar is worth whatever a dollar is worth because the U.S. government has promised to keep taxing its citizens - a situation that basically only benefits the banking industry. The following info is from Wikipedia:
"The terms fiat currency and fiat money relate to types of currency or money whose usefulness results, not from any intrinsic value or guarantee that it can be converted into gold or another currency, but only from a government's order (fiat) that it must be accepted as a means of payment....."
"Historically, societies have relied on monetary systems where currency used in trade was either composed of a physical commodity (such as gold coin-- see commodity money) or else if not directly composed of the commodity, was exchangeable for a predetermined amount of a physical commodity. This could be a precious metal such as gold, silver, or copper, although some systems had money that was redeemable for other commodity items such as crops, beasts of burden, or food."
Fiat money is a subset of general credit money, but a special one in which a government, often through a central bank or reserve bank, has taken the responsibility (monetary authority) of being the major creditor backing the currency.... An economy may function on credit money which is not fiat money, such as United States paper currency during periods when the U.S. did not have a central bank...."
"Usually, a fiat-money currency loses value once the government which acts as the creditor refuses to further guarantee its value through taxation...."
"After World War II, the Bretton Woods system was set up, which pegged the value of the United States dollar to 1/35th of a troy ounce (888.671 milligrams) of gold (the “gold standard”) and other currencies to the U.S. dollar. The U.S. promised to redeem dollars in gold to other central banks. Trade imbalances were corrected by gold reserve exchanges or by loans from the International Monetary Fund. This system collapsed when the United States government ended the convertibility of the US dollar for gold in 1971...."
"Global capitalism, wherein a currency is widely traded as a commodity in itself, is more likely to rely on credit money which can reflect both (commodity) supplies and protections of supplies (by states’ military fiats). It is not held stable by any one state but rather by tension between states, as investment migrates from currency to currency in an open “money market....”
"The regime of asset-based money, or credit-based money — in which banks create currency as intermediaries and governments, in turn, back the banking system — produces a different series of problems. In no small part because it is not immediately easy to differentiate sound currencies from unsound ones, and it is possible to convert credit-based money into fiat money by a legal act or regulation. The question of confidence dominates credit-based money,..."
Blind Acceptance of Unjust Economic Society
http://structuraleconissues.blogspot.com/2008/07/blind-acceptance-of-unjust-economic.html
We've all been blessed with the ability to rationally discern reality from illusion propped up by an aesthetic orthodoxy of economic fundamentalism. What do we realize when we arrive at a gas station to fill our car up with gas, visit the grocery, receive a bill from a hospital that shows a $200,000 balance that our insurance didn't pay, open the mailbox and find a foreclosure notice on our home, get the news that our office or factory is closing and moving overseas, or we find ourselves unable to send our child to a university because the cost is now beyond our comprehension? Are we then struck with a profound belief that the 'free market' coupled with 'globalization' will continue to provide us with economic security or does reality grasp us by the neck demanding our recognition.
We all know far to well what is transpiring globally - a select group of oligarchs (the business elite) that comprise less than 5% of the population have setup a system (totalitarian economic society) that ensures them ultimate power over the 95% of us that fall under their crushing 'boot'. Within their society we're continually bombarded by the frantic ranting of fanatic experts espousing the omnipotence and infallibility of the 'free market economy'. They've even instructed the most intellectually pliable among us in the fine art of simultaneously reconciling a multitude of contradictions into unquestioned compliance and acceptance of their orthodoxy. Essentially, all it requires is a citizenry that is indoctrinated into thinking in terms of proffered processes and dissuaded from deep thought.
When you can rob someone of all pretenses of personal power over their lives and instill in them a sense of hopelessness in the face of forces seemingly beyond their control you've essentially anesthetized them from taking meaningful actions at understanding the reality of their situation much less directly acting to change their condition. Feelings of "that's just the way it is", "we've done it to ourselves", "there's nothing we can do about it", and "we'll just have to adjust", begin to permeate the collective consciousness.
...
The 'Free Market' Guise Is "Big Brother"
http://structuraleconissues.blogspot.com/2008/07/free-market-guise-is-big-brother.html
Funnel everything back onto the adaptive, receptive masses of the global citizenry instilling in them a feeling of inferiority whereby all their actions have and will be perceived to result in a continuing deterioration of their economic situation. It is a perversion of thought pandered through the totalitarian economic society that every injustice or inequality committed by the business elite is ultimately our fault due to our inherent inferiority. We are to blame for not adequately educating ourselves, for over spending, and generally not adjusting to the new world economic order.
In order to effectively perpetuate this ball-faced lie the media is used by the business elite to manipulate not just public opinion but thought itself. There now exists correct and incorrect thought and incorrect thought is portrayed as deviant thought to be identified and ultimately vanquished within our current authoritarian society. Thought is always constrained to only those ideas and concepts acceptable to those who wield power within a strictly regimented hierarchical society. Therefore within the totalitarian economic society complete uniformity of opinions throughout the entire global citizenry is a goal strived for constantly by the elite.
The totalitarian economic society can only effectively extend it tentacles of corruption, subversion, hate, and inequality into every crevice of existing equality through their complete obliteration of the self. Individuality is the enemy of the oppressor for it represents individual thought that disrupts the currents of illusion perpetuated by effective societal propaganda. In fact, the two primary aims of the totalitarian economic society is the complete subjugation of all global citizens under the 'heal' of the business elite and the maintenance of a perpetual vigilance targeted at rooting out and extinguishing all independent thought from whatever level of society it originates.
...
Not Inflation but Monopolistic Pricing
http://structuraleconissues.blogspot.com/2008/07/not-inflation-but-monopolistic-pricing.html
Inflation is an increase in prices that is triggered primarily from rising wages among the general population which in turn results in a significant consumption 'pop'. With more and more money flowing into the economic system from the acceleration in consumption spending by a citizenry flush with wealth - prices will trend higher. Companies realize that there are far more consumers that are willing to spend money on their products than products available to purchase - they therefore ramp up production to meet the demand. In the process, these companies will increase their prices for their products realizing full well that consumers that may never have purchased their products before may now want them given their new found wealth.
Prior to reaching an inflationary period the Federal Reserve will analyze trends in inflation indicators such as the M1 money supply and wage levels relative to worker productivity. If the money supply and wages start rising within an economy that has experienced negligible productivity increases this (along with other economic markers) typically indicates that an economy is moving towards an inflationary period. Wage increases within an economy that has experienced negligible productivity gains is indicative of a tight labor market and/or a well organized labor market that is in a position of strength relative to (capital) corporations. In the 1960's & 70's when the United States was at its economic nadir and labor unions represented a larger percentage of workers there were periods of inflation and one brief instance of stagflation.
...
Wake up America - The Financial Pillage Continues
http://structuraleconissues.blogspot.com/2008/06/wake-up-america-financial-pillage.html
The U.S. dollar's fall against most of the major currencies is the result of a lack of confidence by speculators and governments in the future viability of our economy. We are a nation of debtors that produce very little of anything - not even our past ingenuity and technological base remains for it was erased by greed induced multinational companies scouring the planet in search of cheap labor. Why would anyone want to possess even one dollar bill since it represents a government in name only, a government that is completely beholden to special interest business elites that only use its shell to do their exclusive bidding. Therefore it is only logical that these same evil cloaked speculators realize that the United States is on the verge of a final pillaged by their fellow wicked business elite rulers. Why possess the paper money of a shell of a nation whose poor citizens are bleeding profusely on the pavement (from globalization) unable to muster any meaningful spending power without acquiring debt that they can no longer find or afford.
Only the special interests of a few well heeled business elites matter to our governmental representatives - you're of no concern to them, just a mere citizen. National interests are no longer relevant because nations are fast becoming just fascades that are used by the business elite to exact their complete control over every aspect of our lives - our wallets will be completely drained into the bottomless cauldrons of a seething greed that covers the entire financial landscape of this corrupt totalitarian economic society.
...
The Human Toll of Our Economic Death
http://structuraleconissues.blogspot.com/2008/06/human-toll-of-our-economic-death.html
Sitting out in the car last fall waiting for Diana to step out of the last remaining department store in a dilapidated mall that had been dying slowly for a few short years, it occurred to me that the moment represented the collapse of our nation. This store was closing its doors forever, when the setting sun caressed it in shadows - there would be no returning. Looking over the quiet, dark, and desolate concrete that the encased towering glass opening one couldn't help but wonder what went wrong, for when it happened we were all in the midst of flying head first towards the payment with hair streaming back - there was no halting the terrible fall.
This had mall been just a reflection of the general capital destruction (both material and human) that had been occurring even prior to the 'Great Fall' which happened in just a few sharply defined months. Through a combination of factors both inherent to the distorted economic society and symptomatic of the resulting consumption crisis that grew unabated as real wages steadily dropped lights everywhere started their crescendo of darkening.
...
Consumption Crisis Resulting From Distorted Economy
http://structuraleconissues.blogspot.com/2008/06/consumption-crisis-resulting-from.html
Everything that transpires on our planet cycles within one of many natural loops given that the entire biosphere is our self contained spaceship hurtling us on its elliptical track around the Sun. Space engulfs this living organically lush planet reaching around it with a cold vacuum of nothing other than plasma energies that race across the poles ebbing from our pulsing star. All the various natural systems stabilize across a range of dynamic spectrums merging, mingling, and converging across boundaries that are in a constant state of flux. Nothing is at any instant in a state of equilibrium but only continually approaching a natural steady state. The key word is approaching, since the planetary events are like a boiling pot of water vigorously active but never so stimulated to exceed the natural limits placed upon their expanding volume of molecular excitement.
Chaotic systems both natural and artificially induced (like our contorted, manipulated economic society) always involve the excitement of a multitude of variables that operate within a unique closed system. It is still a system even though most of the variables have been distorted in order to bring short-term gain to a few at the expense of those many who continually grope for income with outstretched hands. Any one of the perturbed variables may tilt the entire system towards temporary instability. Granted a multiplicative effect of income generation is possible by generously infusing the system with income but only through meaningful production either creative or actual transformation of material into useable capital is unperturbed economic steady state migration possible.
...
Caress Us with Lies from a Corrupt System
http://structuraleconissues.blogspot.com/2008/06/caress-us-with-lies-from-corrupt-system.html
The cackles can be heard coming from behind every wall of this 'windowless dirty room' that where trapped within - with little or no hope of escape. Don't worry every now and then they'll throw us a dark moldy piece of stale bread from that opening in the wall to our far right. Word is that those on the other side who call themselves 'controllers' have nightly banquets within crystal palaces. The controllers belong to a select group of privileged citizens who are the lobbyists, business elite, corrupt elements of the intelligentsia, and least we forget the governmental representatives that have been 'body snatched' by the business elite through their lobbyists.
We've been dropped here because when we were working outside within their society we had the indiscretion to engage in wasteful spending. Not just your average supplementing of our paltry subsistence wages through excessive borrowing (credit card, and 2nd mortgage debt) at their financial 'company stores' but the heinous act of causing a correction within their economic society. We neglected to cut back our daily meals from 3 to 1 in order to save some of our meager income at their banks.
...
Oil Block Induced Profit Inflation - Crumbling Economy
http://structuraleconissues.blogspot.com/2008/06/oil-block-induced-profit-inflation.html
Immediately nationalize all the oil companies whose corporate offices reside within the borders of the United States. Seize all assets belonging to the oil companies and their associated oil block (OPEC, oil speculators, and oil companies) thieves' intent upon exacting a short term extraction of available income from every sector of our dying economy. The consuming nation-states should use any and all means at their disposal to ensure that an adequate oil supply is maintained. We cannot afford to idly watch while the entire contrived totalitarian economic society swirls into an income drain gasping with flailing arms for consumption that is mostly chocked off through artificially imposed oil company profit inflation, and speculator income extraction enhanced through OPEC production limits.
Stop the profit inflation spurred on by the oil 'block' intent upon financially razing each and every global citizen leaving behind a barren economic landscape incapable of sustaining consumption spending. With the consumption 'machine' already sputtering from lack of any real wage growth among the working class (even during a period of unprecedented productivity gains) the assault by the oil 'block' on the wallets of this most important group of citizens further erodes their already strained ability to spend. With each and every day the erosion of potential spending from this majority of the citizenry is spilling every additional dollar of potential spending into an encroaching sea of oil profits.
...
Many more articles that break through the wall of illusion...
http://structuraleconissues.blogspot.com/
http://structuraleconissues.blogspot.com/2008/07/blind-acceptance-of-unjust-economic.html
We've all been blessed with the ability to rationally discern reality from illusion propped up by an aesthetic orthodoxy of economic fundamentalism. What do we realize when we arrive at a gas station to fill our car up with gas, visit the grocery, receive a bill from a hospital that shows a $200,000 balance that our insurance didn't pay, open the mailbox and find a foreclosure notice on our home, get the news that our office or factory is closing and moving overseas, or we find ourselves unable to send our child to a university because the cost is now beyond our comprehension? Are we then struck with a profound belief that the 'free market' coupled with 'globalization' will continue to provide us with economic security or does reality grasp us by the neck demanding our recognition.
We all know far to well what is transpiring globally - a select group of oligarchs (the business elite) that comprise less than 5% of the population have setup a system (totalitarian economic society) that ensures them ultimate power over the 95% of us that fall under their crushing 'boot'. Within their society we're continually bombarded by the frantic ranting of fanatic experts espousing the omnipotence and infallibility of the 'free market economy'. They've even instructed the most intellectually pliable among us in the fine art of simultaneously reconciling a multitude of contradictions into unquestioned compliance and acceptance of their orthodoxy. Essentially, all it requires is a citizenry that is indoctrinated into thinking in terms of proffered processes and dissuaded from deep thought.
When you can rob someone of all pretenses of personal power over their lives and instill in them a sense of hopelessness in the face of forces seemingly beyond their control you've essentially anesthetized them from taking meaningful actions at understanding the reality of their situation much less directly acting to change their condition. Feelings of "that's just the way it is", "we've done it to ourselves", "there's nothing we can do about it", and "we'll just have to adjust", begin to permeate the collective consciousness.
...
The 'Free Market' Guise Is "Big Brother"
http://structuraleconissues.blogspot.com/2008/07/free-market-guise-is-big-brother.html
Funnel everything back onto the adaptive, receptive masses of the global citizenry instilling in them a feeling of inferiority whereby all their actions have and will be perceived to result in a continuing deterioration of their economic situation. It is a perversion of thought pandered through the totalitarian economic society that every injustice or inequality committed by the business elite is ultimately our fault due to our inherent inferiority. We are to blame for not adequately educating ourselves, for over spending, and generally not adjusting to the new world economic order.
In order to effectively perpetuate this ball-faced lie the media is used by the business elite to manipulate not just public opinion but thought itself. There now exists correct and incorrect thought and incorrect thought is portrayed as deviant thought to be identified and ultimately vanquished within our current authoritarian society. Thought is always constrained to only those ideas and concepts acceptable to those who wield power within a strictly regimented hierarchical society. Therefore within the totalitarian economic society complete uniformity of opinions throughout the entire global citizenry is a goal strived for constantly by the elite.
The totalitarian economic society can only effectively extend it tentacles of corruption, subversion, hate, and inequality into every crevice of existing equality through their complete obliteration of the self. Individuality is the enemy of the oppressor for it represents individual thought that disrupts the currents of illusion perpetuated by effective societal propaganda. In fact, the two primary aims of the totalitarian economic society is the complete subjugation of all global citizens under the 'heal' of the business elite and the maintenance of a perpetual vigilance targeted at rooting out and extinguishing all independent thought from whatever level of society it originates.
...
Not Inflation but Monopolistic Pricing
http://structuraleconissues.blogspot.com/2008/07/not-inflation-but-monopolistic-pricing.html
Inflation is an increase in prices that is triggered primarily from rising wages among the general population which in turn results in a significant consumption 'pop'. With more and more money flowing into the economic system from the acceleration in consumption spending by a citizenry flush with wealth - prices will trend higher. Companies realize that there are far more consumers that are willing to spend money on their products than products available to purchase - they therefore ramp up production to meet the demand. In the process, these companies will increase their prices for their products realizing full well that consumers that may never have purchased their products before may now want them given their new found wealth.
Prior to reaching an inflationary period the Federal Reserve will analyze trends in inflation indicators such as the M1 money supply and wage levels relative to worker productivity. If the money supply and wages start rising within an economy that has experienced negligible productivity increases this (along with other economic markers) typically indicates that an economy is moving towards an inflationary period. Wage increases within an economy that has experienced negligible productivity gains is indicative of a tight labor market and/or a well organized labor market that is in a position of strength relative to (capital) corporations. In the 1960's & 70's when the United States was at its economic nadir and labor unions represented a larger percentage of workers there were periods of inflation and one brief instance of stagflation.
...
Wake up America - The Financial Pillage Continues
http://structuraleconissues.blogspot.com/2008/06/wake-up-america-financial-pillage.html
The U.S. dollar's fall against most of the major currencies is the result of a lack of confidence by speculators and governments in the future viability of our economy. We are a nation of debtors that produce very little of anything - not even our past ingenuity and technological base remains for it was erased by greed induced multinational companies scouring the planet in search of cheap labor. Why would anyone want to possess even one dollar bill since it represents a government in name only, a government that is completely beholden to special interest business elites that only use its shell to do their exclusive bidding. Therefore it is only logical that these same evil cloaked speculators realize that the United States is on the verge of a final pillaged by their fellow wicked business elite rulers. Why possess the paper money of a shell of a nation whose poor citizens are bleeding profusely on the pavement (from globalization) unable to muster any meaningful spending power without acquiring debt that they can no longer find or afford.
Only the special interests of a few well heeled business elites matter to our governmental representatives - you're of no concern to them, just a mere citizen. National interests are no longer relevant because nations are fast becoming just fascades that are used by the business elite to exact their complete control over every aspect of our lives - our wallets will be completely drained into the bottomless cauldrons of a seething greed that covers the entire financial landscape of this corrupt totalitarian economic society.
...
The Human Toll of Our Economic Death
http://structuraleconissues.blogspot.com/2008/06/human-toll-of-our-economic-death.html
Sitting out in the car last fall waiting for Diana to step out of the last remaining department store in a dilapidated mall that had been dying slowly for a few short years, it occurred to me that the moment represented the collapse of our nation. This store was closing its doors forever, when the setting sun caressed it in shadows - there would be no returning. Looking over the quiet, dark, and desolate concrete that the encased towering glass opening one couldn't help but wonder what went wrong, for when it happened we were all in the midst of flying head first towards the payment with hair streaming back - there was no halting the terrible fall.
This had mall been just a reflection of the general capital destruction (both material and human) that had been occurring even prior to the 'Great Fall' which happened in just a few sharply defined months. Through a combination of factors both inherent to the distorted economic society and symptomatic of the resulting consumption crisis that grew unabated as real wages steadily dropped lights everywhere started their crescendo of darkening.
...
Consumption Crisis Resulting From Distorted Economy
http://structuraleconissues.blogspot.com/2008/06/consumption-crisis-resulting-from.html
Everything that transpires on our planet cycles within one of many natural loops given that the entire biosphere is our self contained spaceship hurtling us on its elliptical track around the Sun. Space engulfs this living organically lush planet reaching around it with a cold vacuum of nothing other than plasma energies that race across the poles ebbing from our pulsing star. All the various natural systems stabilize across a range of dynamic spectrums merging, mingling, and converging across boundaries that are in a constant state of flux. Nothing is at any instant in a state of equilibrium but only continually approaching a natural steady state. The key word is approaching, since the planetary events are like a boiling pot of water vigorously active but never so stimulated to exceed the natural limits placed upon their expanding volume of molecular excitement.
Chaotic systems both natural and artificially induced (like our contorted, manipulated economic society) always involve the excitement of a multitude of variables that operate within a unique closed system. It is still a system even though most of the variables have been distorted in order to bring short-term gain to a few at the expense of those many who continually grope for income with outstretched hands. Any one of the perturbed variables may tilt the entire system towards temporary instability. Granted a multiplicative effect of income generation is possible by generously infusing the system with income but only through meaningful production either creative or actual transformation of material into useable capital is unperturbed economic steady state migration possible.
...
Caress Us with Lies from a Corrupt System
http://structuraleconissues.blogspot.com/2008/06/caress-us-with-lies-from-corrupt-system.html
The cackles can be heard coming from behind every wall of this 'windowless dirty room' that where trapped within - with little or no hope of escape. Don't worry every now and then they'll throw us a dark moldy piece of stale bread from that opening in the wall to our far right. Word is that those on the other side who call themselves 'controllers' have nightly banquets within crystal palaces. The controllers belong to a select group of privileged citizens who are the lobbyists, business elite, corrupt elements of the intelligentsia, and least we forget the governmental representatives that have been 'body snatched' by the business elite through their lobbyists.
We've been dropped here because when we were working outside within their society we had the indiscretion to engage in wasteful spending. Not just your average supplementing of our paltry subsistence wages through excessive borrowing (credit card, and 2nd mortgage debt) at their financial 'company stores' but the heinous act of causing a correction within their economic society. We neglected to cut back our daily meals from 3 to 1 in order to save some of our meager income at their banks.
...
Oil Block Induced Profit Inflation - Crumbling Economy
http://structuraleconissues.blogspot.com/2008/06/oil-block-induced-profit-inflation.html
Immediately nationalize all the oil companies whose corporate offices reside within the borders of the United States. Seize all assets belonging to the oil companies and their associated oil block (OPEC, oil speculators, and oil companies) thieves' intent upon exacting a short term extraction of available income from every sector of our dying economy. The consuming nation-states should use any and all means at their disposal to ensure that an adequate oil supply is maintained. We cannot afford to idly watch while the entire contrived totalitarian economic society swirls into an income drain gasping with flailing arms for consumption that is mostly chocked off through artificially imposed oil company profit inflation, and speculator income extraction enhanced through OPEC production limits.
Stop the profit inflation spurred on by the oil 'block' intent upon financially razing each and every global citizen leaving behind a barren economic landscape incapable of sustaining consumption spending. With the consumption 'machine' already sputtering from lack of any real wage growth among the working class (even during a period of unprecedented productivity gains) the assault by the oil 'block' on the wallets of this most important group of citizens further erodes their already strained ability to spend. With each and every day the erosion of potential spending from this majority of the citizenry is spilling every additional dollar of potential spending into an encroaching sea of oil profits.
...
Many more articles that break through the wall of illusion...
http://structuraleconissues.blogspot.com/
yup.....effective 5-12. then it will cost even more to pay the bills you cannot afford to pay. grrrrrr......
Just look back over the last twenty years there has never been a single month with deflation, and millions of Americans do not make a penny more in wages really.
The US macroeconomic numbers look way better than they should for a country that has been at war for four years, which leads me to conclude that the numbers are about to change -- drastically for the worse. Read More »
Zimbabwe, an African nation located northeast of South Africa and once known as Rhodesia, is experiencing as severe drought and may be experiencing hyperinflation and shortages, while its leader Robert Mugabe proposes nationalization of foreign firms.
Voice of America (VOA) reported July 20, 2007 that "Zimbabwe is facing serious food shortages: more than a third of its population faces hunger between now and the next harvest beginning in March 2008." Both US and Canada have pledged food relief.
Link
A new report on VOA describes the drought:
"U.N. relief coordinator John Holmes ... says Zimbabwe's cereal harvest is expected to be 44 percent less this year than in 2006 because of the drought."
"'The anticipation is that some 4 million people, which is around a third of the population, will be in need of some kind of food assistance by the first quarter of 2008,' he explained."
"Holmes says the drought is having an impact on Zimbabwe's already turbulent economy by driving food prices up in the markets. He also says the drought will undermine efforts to provide proper nutrition for the nation's large HIV/AIDS-infected population. Holmes estimates that population at 12 percent, but other experts place it even higher. "
Link Read More »
Voice of America (VOA) reported July 20, 2007 that "Zimbabwe is facing serious food shortages: more than a third of its population faces hunger between now and the next harvest beginning in March 2008." Both US and Canada have pledged food relief.
Link
A new report on VOA describes the drought:
"U.N. relief coordinator John Holmes ... says Zimbabwe's cereal harvest is expected to be 44 percent less this year than in 2006 because of the drought."
"'The anticipation is that some 4 million people, which is around a third of the population, will be in need of some kind of food assistance by the first quarter of 2008,' he explained."
"Holmes says the drought is having an impact on Zimbabwe's already turbulent economy by driving food prices up in the markets. He also says the drought will undermine efforts to provide proper nutrition for the nation's large HIV/AIDS-infected population. Holmes estimates that population at 12 percent, but other experts place it even higher. "
Link Read More »
The economic indicators have come out. Fox News and the White House have been using the following if you take out food and energy inflation is knell as their talking point.
Well I just thought that is the funniest thing I have heard in a long time.
So let me try to rap my hands around that for a sec.......Nope can not do it.
So if I do not drive or eat there is no inflation I have to worry about. :-)
Well I just thought that is the funniest thing I have heard in a long time.
So let me try to rap my hands around that for a sec.......Nope can not do it.
So if I do not drive or eat there is no inflation I have to worry about. :-)
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