622 replies to this topic

[wjfox]

Greenwald: "The most revealing fact of the Obama presidency is the lack of a single prosecution of Wall Street execs for the massive fraud that caused the 2008 crisis. As long as we maintain impunity, no rational person should expect anything other than pervasive elite corruption and lawbreaking."

http://www.salon.com..._justice/?miaou

[wjfox]

US debt visualised in $100 bills

http://demonocracy.i...bt/us_debt.html

[wjfox]

Expert Explains In Horrifying Detail How The Next Shock Will Shatter The Global Economy

David Korowicz, a physicist and human-systems ecologist, recently authored a lengthy 78-page white paper titled: "Trade-Off: Financial System Supply-Chain Cross-Contagion: a study in global systemic collapse."

We read the paper and boiled it down to its key points.

Read more: http://www.businessi...1#ixzz22t0H24wv

[mic of orion]

[mic of orion]

Financial crisis: 25 people at the heart of the meltdown – where are they now?


In 2009 the Guardian identified 25 people – bankers, economists, central bankers and politicians – whose actions had led the world into the worst economic turmoil since the Great Depression. On the fifth anniversary of the credit crunch, what are they doing?



Alan Greenspan, chairman US Federal Reserve 1987-2006
A disciple of libertarian icon Ayn Rand, Greenspan became chairman of the Fed just in time to save the global economy from the 1987 stock market crash from becoming a full-blown disaster. He went on preside over the boom years of the 90s and lead the US economy through the aftermath of the September 11 attacks and was widely referred to as an "oracle" and "the maestro".

But Greenspan's super-low interest rates and consistent opposition to regulation of the multitrillion-dollar derivatives market are now widely blamed for causing the credit crisis. Under Greenspan's tenure the derivatives market went from barely registering to a $500 trillion industry, despite billionaire investor Warren Buffett warning that they were "financial weapons of mass destruction".

His rock-bottom rates encouraged Americans to load up on debt to buy homes, even when they had no savings, no income and no job prospects.

These so-called sub-prime borrowers were the cannon fodder for the biggest boom-bust in US history. The housing collapse brought the global economy to its knees.

He was given an honorary knighthood in 2002 for his "contribution to global economic stability", but in 2008, at a Congressional hearing investigating the causes of the financial crisis, Greenspan finally admitted he "made a mistake in presuming" that financial firms could regulate themselves.

"You found that your view of the world, your ideology was not right, it was not working?" Henry Waxman, the committee chairman, said.

"Absolutely, precisely," Greenspan replied. "You know, that's precisely the reason I was shocked, because I have been going for 40 years or more with very considerable evidence that it was working exceptionally well."

After he quit the Fed, in 2006, Greenspan joined Pimco, the world's largest bond investor, as a special consultant. Pimco's co-founder Bill Gross said Greenspan had helped make the firm "billions of dollars'' in his role as a consultant.

Gross said Greenspan's "brilliance" was a "big money saver for us''. "He's made and saved billions of dollars for Pimco already,'' Gross said in 2008.He has also advised Deutsche Bank and hedge fund billionaire John Paulson.

Greenspan has also found time to criticise current Fed chairman Ben Bernanke's programme of quantitative easing. "I've stayed away from commenting on Fed policy," he said on US TV earlier this month. "I will say this, however, that the data do show that the expansion of assets has had very little impact on the economy, for an important reason, that we've created a major increase in the asset side of the Fed balance sheet and a very large trillion and a half increase in excess reserves." ------- http://www.guardian....own?INTCMP=SRCH

[mic of orion]

[wjfox]

Shhhh…It’s Even Worse Than The Great Depression

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 08/20/2012 16:46

Velocity of money is the frequency with which a unit of money is spent on new goods and services. It is a far better indicator of economic activity than GDP, consumer prices, the stock market, or sales of men’s underwear (which Greenspan was fond of ogling). In a healthy economy, the same dollar is collected as payment and subsequently spent many times over. In a depression, the velocity of money goes catatonic. Velocity of money is calculated by simply dividing GDP by a given money supply. This VoM chart using monetary base should end any discussion of what ”this” is and whether or not anybody should be using the word “recovery” with a straight face:





In just four short years, our “enlightened” policy-makers have slowed money velocity to depths never seen in the Great Depression.

Read more: http://www.zerohedge...reat-depression

[Logically Irrational]

^^ Not really sure what's more disturbing about those kinds of articles. The economics or the fact that the comments almost always devolve into "let's start shooting people."

[kjaggard]

the price of bullets will skyrocket, shooting becomes economically not feasible.

[Logically Irrational]

IMF Says Bailouts Iceland-Style Hold Lessons in Crisis Times

http://www.businessw...-crisis-nations

Iceland holds some key lessons for nations trying to survive bailouts after the island’s approach to its rescue led to a “surprisingly” strong recovery, the International Monetary Fund’s mission chief to the country said.

Iceland’s commitment to its program, a decision to push losses on to bondholders instead of taxpayers and the safeguarding of a welfare system that shielded the unemployed from penury helped propel the nation from collapse toward recovery, according to the Washington-based fund.

“Iceland has made significant achievements since the crisis,” Daria V. Zakharova, IMF mission chief to the island, said in an interview. “We have a very positive outlook on growth, especially for this year and next year because it appears to us that the growth is broad based.”

Iceland refused to protect creditors in its banks, which failed in 2008 after their debts bloated to 10 times the size of the economy. The island’s subsequent decision to shield itself from a capital outflow by restricting currency movements allowed the government to ward off a speculative attack, cauterizing the economy’s hemorrhaging. That helped the authorities focus on supporting households and businesses.

“The fact that Iceland managed to preserve the social welfare system in the face of a very sizeable fiscal consolidation is one of the major achievements under the program and of the Icelandic government,” Zakharova said. The program benefited from “strong implementation, reflecting ownership on the part of the authorities,” she said.

[Cody930]

The US national debt has topped the $16 trillion mark. Not very good timing for the democrats.

http://www.usdebtclock.org/

[Raklian]

The US national debt has topped the $16 trillion mark. Not very good timing for the democrats.

http://www.usdebtclock.org/

But notice that the US Federal Budget deficit is slowly going down, instead of going up, same with the Federal spending.

[Cody930]

The US national debt has topped the $16 trillion mark. Not very good timing for the democrats.

http://www.usdebtclock.org/

But notice that the US Federal Budget deficit is slowly going down, instead of going up, same with the Federal spending.

Indeed. Which in turn the national debt growth rate itself has fallen as well since President Obama has been in office.

[wjfox]

[Roh234]

Reinstating an Old Rule Is Not a Cure for Crisis



http://dealbook.nyti...s/?ref=business

Looks like the Glass-Steagall fails.

[kjaggard]

video

A man in the biz of selling precious metals says that the leading currency of world economics is going to collapse and the only haven is precious metals? Oh, well then it must be true. Why would he say it otherwise?

Reinstating an Old Rule Is Not a Cure for Crisis



http://dealbook.nyti...s/?ref=business

Looks like the Glass-Steagall fails.

The problem I have with this article is it compartmentalizes the aspects as if they don't effect each other and the choices made elsewhere and the growth and size of banks becoming too big to fail.

Let me give you another example. Go down to the governmental benefits offices and watch for the people coming in for benefits. I've had to claim before, and I'm not saying even the majority are like this but I can pretty much tell you that while you wait you will see somebody come in wearing $120 track suits and $100 shoes with hundreds of dollars worth of tatoos and wearing gold jewelry talking on their smart phone with data plans, ring tones, games and movies. There here because they can't afford to eat, and they need the government to take care of them. They head out to their cherry red suped up car with ground effects and gold rims and the stereo system that rattles window when they drive by at night. And they are never underfed, and you can tell the have other less than legal and expensive habits by some of there markings on self clothing jewelry ect.

So what's my point. in a situation where the government benefits didn't exist anymore and they needed to survive do you really imagine they couldn't pull the funds away from the body mods and data plans to get by. And if their government housing disappeared that they couldn't find a way to trade the car and all it things for so run down shelter in a city where they can bus or walk to get the money to support their habits.

It's not that that they are part of some government drug and tatoo funding program, it's that they can spend what they do have on drugs and tatoos because they can use the government money to artificially inflate their lifestyle. And that what banks did with public funds.

They couldn't generate enough funds doing public banking but the gambling thing seemed like a good use of resources, so they got in to the offices and made it inappropriate to restrict banks freedoms. Then when the gates were open the banks bloated on their gambling with borrowed money from public, and when they lost they cried and said that all the cost would devestate the public unless the banks could be bailed out with a loan to cover the losses.

They got their loan and then used it to secure their personal costs and left the rest of the country to hang. The funny (not really funny) thing is, banks gambled the public into debt, asked for a loan from the government who can only generate the loan by taking from the people of the country, and never will repay which the government must minimize the losses of by asking a bank to print more money to spread the loss through inflation, which devalues every dollar out there by a few percent so that everyperson essentially loses more money without any disappearing via disappearing purchasing power. Which is only made worse by the lack of increase in a pay rate and loss of jobs shorting the circulation of money.

All thanks to G-S making it possible to gamble money they couldn't gamble before and trade off the losses to the people.

Edited by kjaggard, 09 September 2012 - 08:58 PM.

[Roh234]

Leslie T. Chang: The voices of China's workers - YouTube

[Italian Ufo]

http://www.examiner....-oil-using-yuan

Dollar no longer primary oil currency

Edited by Italian Ufo, 19 September 2012 - 11:07 AM.

[Time_Traveller]

JJB Sports shares suspended as administration looms

Trading of shares in JJB Sports has been suspended as the struggling sports clothes and equipment retailer prepares to call in the administrators.

From http://www.bbc.co.uk...siness-19697949

[Roh234]

North Korea 'to allow farmers to keep half their produce'

http://www.telegraph...ir-produce.html

Its about time.