You get the feeling, when will they pull the rug out from under us again. They being the manipulators and power brokers of the world economic system.
Yep. At some point, someone pulls the wrong block out of the Jenga tower of shell games and ponzi scams and all bets are off. The financial caste system goes into full survival mode and millions of lives and livelihoods are thrown under the bus. Not sure I want to be around for that one.
Not trying to be a doomsayer, just don’t have any confidence in the glorious successes of Wall Street no matter how ugly it is in the real world. Something ain’t right. It just smells funny. All the time.
I think the big difference between now and 1929 is the federal government was not using the Federal Reserve as a printing press (quantitative easing). For sure, the government WAS spending money it didn’t have - roads, bridges, public works - tangible infrastructure and jobs ala the likes of CCC and WPA. Just not injecting it into the banks and brokers’ pockets like QE.
To me, there is a big disconnect between jobs, production, prices, nearly every indicator that affects me personally (not the government’s concoction of what prices are doing). Anything bad happens, the market may hiccup for a minute or two, or just keep humming - odd, really.
The stock market seems oblivious to nearly any commonly felt indicator. They have seemed perfectly happy to have that 6 years of nearly $1trillion/year QE for mortgage backed securities and the Fed’s purchase of T-Bills (which ‘legitimizes’ the increasing debt it is incurring for us.)
I think the whole thing stinks myself. And, I don’t think it will come crashing down until the QE is stopped (for one reason or another). At that point, all the worthless debt that’s been shuffled off to bad deals, derivatives, payments for debt will come home to roost.
Many Americans are still on their asses from the last time it was pulled (2007-08); they’ve never gotten back up.
We are very much in the 1930s in terms of wealth distribution; the lower class has been stirred into a frenzy against the upper class, and the middle class is stuck between them. Racial politics are just thrown in the mix to keep the conflicct boiling.
This is 1935 Europe.