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The Fed has tripled the money supply and reduced interest rates to zero.
Hey Zer0... Drill baby drill! AND, stop printing money and start paying off the debt.
Posted on 04/26/2011 7:31:29 PM PDT by sickoflibs
Let's go back to the beginning of the current economic crisis — yes, it is still a crisis for many millions of Americans who lost their jobs, ruined their credit, filed for bankruptcy, lost their homes, and lost their lifestyle. Shanty towns have popped up all over America, though rarely gaining media exposure.
Tens of millions have been ripped from the middle class back down into the poverty from whence their parents or grandparents had climbed.
Make no mistake: it is not capitalism that got us here; it is government interventionism and central banking — the Federal Reserve.
The first two charts we're looking at are the S&P 500 Index (top) and the Effective Federal Funds Rate (bottom). Our current economic state of affairs began with the Internet bubble (the red arrow on the first chart), which itself was exasperated by an earlier easing of the federal-funds rate (the green arrow on the second chart).
After the bubble burst in 2000, Alan Greenspan sought to prop up the "irrational exuberance" against which he himself had cautioned, by dropping interest rates — artificially, of course — from 6.5 percent down to barely 1 percent in 2002 (the orange arrow on the second chart).
The whole idea here was to encourage corporate (and private) spending by lowering the cost of borrowing money. This "cost" was thus much lower than it otherwise would have been in a truly free market, where interest rates are set by the supply and demand of money. Today, a free-market interest-rate environment is simply a dream — it's illusory; it doesn't exist. The Fed, rather, simply creates as much supply as it wants, and then hopes foolish risk takers will take the bait. Indeed, millions did.
Enter the housing boom. Maybe you remember the 1 percent LIBOR interest-only adjustable loans? How completely, unrealistically optimistic (or gullible) did you have to be in order to buy into an adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) when interest rates were at an all-time low?
In any event, the loose-money policy and low interest rates drove the real-estate market to new, all-time highs, with record low unemployment and a false feeling of risk-free risk taking.
Sure enough, inflation hit, the Fed raised rates, those ARMs adjusted upward, people couldn't sell their house for what they owed, and then record foreclosures ensued. All the while, the banks responsible for the bad loans got bailed out by the taxpayer, and the bank executives got to keep their multimillion-dollar bonuses. Hooray.
But that's not the end of it. Once the housing bubble burst, our masters at the Fed (primarily Comrade Bernanke) decided to drop rates to zero and to inflate the money supply beyond all recognition.
The next chart is the Fed's monetary base. Note the vertical movement during and after the Depression of 2008: an increase from around $800 billion to just over $2.4 trillion.
This is the most worrisome chart I have ever seen. By comparison to what Bernanke has done, take a look at the blip (circled in red) that Greenspan caused just after the dot-com bust in early 2000. This is not the kind of comparison that makes it to CNBC or the front page of the Wall Street Journal.
If 1 percent interest rates and that small Greenspan monetary increase back in 2000 caused the boom and ultimate crash of 2008, then what will be the ultimate result of our current extended course of 0 percent interest rates and a 300 percent increase in the monetary base?
There is an answer, but it's not good. To quote Human Action, by Professor Mises, the economist who actually predicted our current plight over 60 years ago,
There is no means of avoiding the final collapse of a boom brought about by credit [or monetary] expansion. The alternative is only whether the crisis should come sooner as the result of voluntary abandonment of the further credit expansion, or later as a final and total catastrophe of the currency system involved.
The end result seems fixed; the only question that remains is what happens between now and then.
Even though the federal-funds rate has been at zero, and even though the Fed has created enormous amounts of fiat money, most of that money remains at the banks. Take a look at the chart below.
This chart represents the amount of money our nation's banks keep on deposit with the Federal Reserve. So you see, the newly created money is being held by the banks, who instead of loaning it out to folks who would like to refinance their houses and businesses that might expand and hire (which is what the Fed intended), they (the banks) just redeposit the free money back with the Fed and earn massive amounts of interest.
What? Are you kidding me? The banks got bailed out from billions of dollars in bad loans that they issued, then they got literally $1.2 trillion (as you can see from the chart above) of free money that they then turned around and invested in Treasuries, the interest on which is one of Obama's biggest line-item budget expenses. Are we living in an Ayn Rand novel? How would you like to get free money to invest, the interest on which is guaranteed by the government's taxation authority (and guns)?
And speaking of the budget, the next chart is the second scariest I've ever seen. It shows the federal deficit, which now surpasses $1.4 trillion annually! Note that the chart is denominated in millions.
Unless Congress cuts spending dramatically (which I doubt will happen), the Fed will continue to buy Treasuries to fund our deficit with money that is created out of nothing, just like the Weimar Republic did after World War I. The end result must be a collapse.
Not to throw more fear on the fire, but recently the "Godfather of Bonds," Bill Gross, who manages over $1 trillion, sold every single Treasury his firm owned because, according to a shareholder letter he recently published,
Unless entitlements are substantially reformed, I am confident that this country will default on its debt; not in conventional ways, but by picking the pocket of savers via a combination of less observable, yet historically verifiable policies — inflation, currency devaluation and low to negative real interest rates.
I would venture to say it has already begun.
"So what can we do about it? And how does this affect me and my money?" Did I just hear you ask that? Well, good question. Because I don't have the space or the time to go into detail here, suffice it to say that booms and busts are easy to understand and predict if you reject the currently prevalent Keynesian School of economics and look to the Austrian School.
Most people have heard of the "wheelbarrow inflation" of the Weimar Republic in Germany. History has been down this very same road many, many times, and the result is always the same.
Thus, we can learn from the Austrian economists' reasoning — which reflects realism and historical facts, and not flights of academic fancy. Though I run the risk of dramatically oversimplifying the investment method, essentially you want to be more aggressive in a monetary expansion phase and more conservative in a monetary contraction phase. It sounds easy, huh? In reality, it is impossible to time the market to the day or even the month, but our experience in 2000 and 2008 has shown that it is possible to be correct to within a 12- to 18-month period. The key is knowing what signs inevitably show themselves — and taking heed.
As a prime example, one of the chief indicators we monitor in addition to those above is the velocity of money. This can vaguely be analogized to how quickly a dollar moves from one hand to another, but it is much more than that.
Every time you deposit a dollar into your checking or savings account, your bank can then lend that dollar out to ten other people, essentially creating ten more dollars out of your one dollar deposit. This is called the Mandrake mechanism, and it is part of the problem of expanding credit, because your dollar is leveraged ten to one. This exponential expansion of money in the banking system creates vast profits for the banks, but also vast losses when a run ensues. (The true reason the Federal Reserve System was created was to bail out the banks.)
So here's a recap:
1.The Fed has tripled the money supply and reduced interest rates to zero.
2.A stronger economy is trying to get off the ground but can't because all the newly created money is being retained by the banks in reserve.
3.Eventually the banks will start lending again, and the velocity of money will increase.
4.When that occurs, inflation will begin to show signs that even Bernanke can't ignore, and he will respond by raising rates.
5.Eventually, increased velocity, inflation, high oil prices, and interest rates will conspire to crash the market again. And we start the whole thing over again — if we can.
With the tripling of the money supply, cold mathematics would imply that eventually prices will likewise triple — once the new money has made it out into the economy. Thus, $3.50 gas becomes $10.50 gas. Clearly the math is not as easy as that, because really no one (especially Bernanke) can predict what will happen; but if history is any guide, then all of a sudden, $7 gas seems like a deal.
If you realize both parties in Washington think that our money is theirs and you trust them to do the wrong thing, this list is for you.
If you think there is a Santa Claus that has some magic easy cure for the economy; someone who is going to get elected in Washington and fix everything just by cutting your taxes, investing (more government spending) a few trillion more we don't have and will never have, and who will just command some countries to lower their prices and others to raise their prices all to suit your best interests, then this list is not for you.
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The Austrian Economics School’s Commandments plus :From : link
1) You cannot spend your way out of a recession
2) You cannot regulate the economy into oblivion and expect it to function
3) You cannot tax people and businesses to the point of near slavery and expect them to keep producing
4) You cannot create an abundance of money out of thin air without making all that paper worthless
5) The government cannot make up for rising unemployment by just hiring all the out of work people to be bureaucrats or send them unemployment checks forever
6) You cannot live beyond your means indefinitely
7) The economy must actually produce something others are willing to buy
8) Every government bureaucrat should keep the following motto in mind when attempting to influence the economy: “First, do no harm!”
9) Central bank-supported fractional reserve banking is an economically distorting, ethically questionable activity. In particular, no government should ever do anything to save any bank from the full consequences of a bank run, no matter what the short-term consequences.
10) Gold is God’s money.
Add mine:
1) Businesses don't hire workers just because of demand for products or services, they hire because it makes them money. Sorry to have to state the obvious.
2) Government spending without taxing is still redistribution
3) Taking one man's money and giving it to another is not a job.
4) Paul Krugman and Bernake have been wrong about everything, as well as the other best and brightest Keynesian's who have been fixing our economy for over a decade.
5) Republicans in the minority (esp out of the White House) act like Republicans, in the majority they act like Democrats .
Equity bubble rules:
1)If something goes up too fast, it is going down faster,
2) By the time it looks like everybody is getting rich, it’s too late, stay out!
3) To get rich you have to get in early start of recovery and get out at the first really 'bad' news, and ignore the experts that claim that they will stop the next crash(our buddy Bernake.).
4) Don't invest money you will probably need, or worse money you don't really have.
Obama is going down. They can not keep the truth about him covered up for another 18 months. I hope the Republicans who are backing him go down with him. They all know and are giving him cover except Trump. I really think Trump is doing Gods Will. I remember when he was in a big battle with the Libs in Palm Beach about his giant American Flag.
The country will long since have been in the throws of mass civil unrest or worse before we reach this point.
Were all just one missed welfare check away from all out anarchy in this country, or once the same crowds can no longer afford to even eat at McDonalds it’ll be game on at that point.
I see Obama is reading directly from the liberal playbook on this that says: It's not the prices you have to pay that matter it is only the 'profits'(bad) and 'taxes'(good) that matter because the government can use that money to make life fairer..
Besides from the drilling issue which it looks like Obama decided to neutralize by going along with, we got Obama destroying the dollar and destabilizing the middle East driving oil prices up. And dont get me started with ethanol. The Obama 'gas price gouging commission' wont find any of those causes.
On a similar note, check out these vids and email to friends
Obama and High gas prices: a classic set of past videos for reference
” Were all just one missed welfare check away from all out anarchy in this country, “
Don’t kid yourself that it’s just the ‘welfare crowd’ that’ll be in the streets —
High unemployment/underemployment means that there’s no pressure for wages to even attempt to keep pace with the price inflation (even - especially - if it’s pretty much limited to ‘necessities of life’) that’s happening... How many Working Stiffs will tolerate working 60-80 hour weeks to NOT make ends meet??
obama,as a senator wanted the same thing to fund his programs, none of this is random, we have been manipulated and now we have to fight back.
It looks like poor Peggy the Moocher actually believed that Obama would lower her gas prices
Peggy the moocher at Obama rally:”Obama Is Going To Pay For My Gas And Mortgage!!!”(Oct 31, 2008 )
Ever wonder where Peggy the moocher is now after thinking Obama was going to fill her tank for free ??? With gas prices skyrocketing he tells poor Peggy to sell her SUV and buy a hybrid. How the hell is Peggy going to fit her 12 children in a hybrid ( question to Obama)? Heck, she even lost her part-time job under his new economy and has no money for a bus trip let alone a hybrid.
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The Fed has tripled the money supply and reduced interest rates to zero.
Hey Zer0... Drill baby drill! AND, stop printing money and start paying off the debt.
I think he wants further control over the people by making it too expensive to drive. This will certainly afffect the restaurant, seaside resorts, and all vacation plans this summer. not to mention the inflationary prices in food and goods! He’s already caused the cost of electricity to go up, just as he said he would. The value of our dollar is sliding each day! Our quality of life is definitely jeapardized with this type of “leadership!.
It's comments like yours that make me think that Obama will be re-elected. WTF are you talking about?
Trump is a liberal corporatist. If he had a chance of being elected I would be terrified. He is the ultimate snake oil salesman trolling for suckers, which is his life's story.
Are you just pulling my leg?
Where’s the outrage at obama at gas prices?
Seems to me that when Bush was in office that when gas made a little blip up, the MSM was screaming bloody murder.
Gas is now higher than ever and still going up and what do we hear?
crickets........
I thought it said Kenyan/Obama economics, instead of Keynesian for a minute.
'They all know and are giving him cover except Trump. I really think Trump is doing Gods Will.'
at : #2
Not Keynsianeconomics, but Keynsian economics..
I brake for $7.00/gal gasoline and I stay broke as a result!
ping please
“It looks like poor Peggy the Moocher actually believed that Obama would lower her gas prices”
But if you don’t have to pay for it, you don’t really care what it costs, right?
Seriously, there’s no comparison between Europeans driving 75 miles a week in small, efficient, no-weird-gas blend, high-compression friendly vehicles and Americans driving 300 miles a week. If gas goes to even five in “flyover country”, there will be some serious hardship. As it is, I’d like to know how younger/lower-level workers are making it, spending about 1.5 hours of after-tax wages every day just going to work. Car pooling and buses are simply not going to work in much of America, and there doesn’t seem to be any way to explain this to people who have probably never been outside of the exurbs except at several thousand feet overhead in an airplane.
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