We have begun a long and perilous journey toward currency failures, insolvency, higher consumer prices, stagflation, and eventual loss of dollar reserve currency status. Read:
A Long and Perilous Journey
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A Brief Review:
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Central banks created, via computer entries, well over $20 trillion in new currency units. This should encourage us to question the value of those newly created currency units. Call them fake money.
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The U.S. government spends more than its revenues every year and borrows the shortfall. Official national debt on January 1, 2009 was $11.1 trillion. On January 1, 2017 it stood at $19.8 trillion. As of mid-July 2020, debt has “blown out” to $26.5 trillion, up $4.5 trillion in the last 12 months.
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Interest rates have fallen to multi-decade lows because the Fed buys bonds and supports the bond markets. Without Fed support, interest rates would be higher, and the government would be less able to deficit spend in the $ trillions.
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The Fed is monetizing U.S. government debt, a risky practice. The government deems it necessary to spend, given the COVID-19 shutdown, huge unemployment, many insolvent corporations, skyrocketing bankruptcies, election year politics, current recession/depression, and the need to buy votes.
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Necessary or not, excessive spending has consequences. The U.S. has entered the era of MMT—Modern Monetary Theory or Magic Money Tree economics, in which debt hardly matters. Call it QE4ever or “Inflate or Die” currency creation. Call it insanity or nonsense.
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The Fed has forced everyone to drink their Kool-Aid. This “QE4ever Kool-Aid” is poisonous to the lower 90% of Americans. The wealth of the top 1% has jumped because of the lockdown and QE4ever, but the financial security of the lower 90% is down hard.
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The quantity and quality of coming fiscal and monetary nonsense should worry every thinking individual who wishes to protect his savings, purchasing power, and retirement funds. (Do you own enough gold?)
The Fed is monetizing government debt, a sign of trouble to come. What other programs could government and the Fed initiate that accelerate the journey to national insolvency?
a)
MMT creation - $ trillions more debt each year.
b)
Universal Basic Income—income for all, work not required.
c)
Reparations to your favorite groups. Where will it end?
d)
Stimulus programs, boondoggles, and payoffs.
e)
Expanded Medicare, Medicaid, Student loan forgiveness.
f)
Enlarged wars. A new war.
g)
Pension plan bailouts for cities and states.
h)
Bailouts for politically connected corporations, cities, and states.
i)
When will it end?
Riding the Fantasy Express Train toward Insolvency and Dollar Collapse
Speculating on fiscal and monetary nonsense during the next two years…
a)
The U.S. has 40+ million newly unemployed workers. They need currency units to pay for rent, mortgages, credit card bills, student loans, and… food. Assume they need $25,000 in government handouts during the next year.
That is $1 trillion.
b)
Student Loans: Assume $500 billion in defaults, less than one-third of outstanding loans. If former students aren’t working, they won’t be repaying loans.
Add half a $ trillion.
c)
Bailouts for city and state pension plans. New York, Chicago, New Jersey, Illinois, and California come to mind.
Assume $3 trillion of fake money will be needed.
d)
Bailout Wall Street. Estimate
another $3 trillion to keep the upper 1% happy.
e)
Bailout large corporations, even though they bought back over $4 trillion in stock in the past decade. Assume they
need $3 trillion. The currency units are free, so add more as needed.
f)
Well over 100,000 businesses have (or will be) closed forever. That means more unemployment, lost sales taxes, and other revenue shortfalls. Estimate
another $ trillion or so to bailout politically connected businesses.
g)
Free checks to citizens, illegal aliens, dead people, and others. Government has spent $2 or $3 trillion. Assume they will distribute
another $3 trillion to individuals. It might discourage rioting.
h)
Toss in
another $2 trillion for miscellaneous. The Fed is “printing” so why not?
Total of the above is $16.5 trillion. It’s free, so round up to $17 trillion in excess spending and new debt during the next twenty-four months. The era of fiscal and monetary nonsense proceeds.
Total official national debt is $26.5 trillion. Add another $17 trillion of fantasy bailouts and the debt exceeds $43 trillion by the end of 2022.
Assume $3 to $4 trillion in added debt for 2023—2024 and the official debt has jumped to $50 trillion in Fantasyland
. Those new fake dollars will devalue existing dollars. Maybe it will take a few extra years to arrive at $50 trillion in national debt. With MMT it doesn’t matter… or does it?
Official U.S. government gold reserves (Remember - Fantasyland) are 260 million ounces. If (supposed) U.S. gold bullion backed the national debt, the price of gold in Fantasyland in 2024 could be $200,000 per ounce.
Gold at $2,000 looks tiny compared to $200,000 per ounce, or $26.5 trillion in current debt, or $50 trillion in future debt.
Back to the world of The Fed, deficit spending, and politics:
Second Order Consequences:
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Debt increases, currency in circulation rises, dollars devalue in purchasing power and assets rise in price. Example: the NASDAQ hit a new-all time high this week. The S&P 500 Index, Apple stock (market cap = $1.6 trillion), Tesla stock, gold, and silver will rise (erratically) as the era of fiscal and monetary nonsense unfolds.
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Apple stock sold for $11 in 2009, and closed at $383 on July 10, up 34 times.
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The S&P 500 Index was 667 in March 2009 and closed at 3,185 on July 10, up 4.8 times.
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COMEX silver sold for $9 in October 2008, and for $19.08 on July 10, up 2.1 times. Apple stock, boosted by QE, was a better investment… so far.
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COMEX gold sold for $700 in October 2008 and for $1,801 on July 10, up 2.6 times.
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Those extra dollars created by the Fed and other central banks have boosted the price of tech stocks more than prices for gold and silver.
Expect gold and silver to rally more than tech stocks during this era of fiscal and monetary nonsense.
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Consider the ratio of ten times gold to the DOW Index. Gold is inexpensive compared to the inflated price for the DOW stocks.
