The Coming Depression

Economic Collapse a Mathematical Certainty - Top 5 Places Where Not To Be

2012-02-01T00:28:00.002-05:00

While the dollar is still functional, Donate $15 or More at my blog above and as a thank you , I will send a free CD packed with 160 Survival books to build your library to help you get the knowledge you will need to get through the great reset coming.

The dollar collapse will be the single largest event in human history. This will be the first event that will touch every single living person in the world. All human activity is controlled by money. Our wealth,our work,our food,our government,even our relationships are affected by money.

No money in human history has had as much reach in both breadth and depth as the dollar. It is the de facto world currency. All other currency collapses will pale in comparison to this big one. All other currency crises have been regional and there were other currencies for people to grasp on to. Read more....

US employment rise fails to benefit blacks

2012-02-01T00:17:00.000-05:00

Unemployment in the US has dropped to its lowest rate since February 2009, according to recent data.

However, joblessness among African Americans is continuing to increase and is now put at 15.8 per cent.

The prospects for finding work are even more bleak for black teenagers.

Al Jazeera's Cath Turner has been following Kelvin Diggs, 15, around Boston as he tries to find work to keep his family's household afloat. Read more.....

Unemployment and Jordan's youth

2012-02-01T00:10:00.000-05:00

29-year-old Alaa graduated from university six years ago, with a bachelor's degree in English, and he's still jobless.

He is originally from the northern city of Irbid, where jobs are scarce, so he has been applying for positions at hundreds of companies in Amman. He was interviewed, but never hired. Read more....

Economic 'recovery' leaves jobs behind

2012-01-31T23:58:00.002-05:00

Reporting from Washington — Still limping two years after officially emerging from the recession and buffeted by a new wave of bad news, the U.S. economy is struggling with problems that run far deeper than higher oil prices, the European debt crisis or auto industry slowdown stemming from the Japanese earthquake and tsunami.

Serious as those problems are, what's crippling the job market and chilling recovery on almost every front is a confluence of factors that economists and business leaders say are fundamentally reshaping the economic landscape in which Americans live and work.

Taken together, these factors have created a vicious circle: Incomes of average families are barely growing, even as many struggle with heavy debts left over from the boom times. That in turn has curbed consumer spending power. And businesses, seeing little chance for a surge in sales, have had little reason to expand — neither hiring more workers nor paying their existing workers more. Read more.......

Faces of Change: Lilly Ledbetter's Equal Pay Story

2012-01-31T00:34:00.000-05:00

President Obama knows that when women do better, America does better. That's why he kept his promise to fight for equal pay for an equal work and affordable health care—and won.

No one knows that better than Lilly Ledbetter.

Lilly stood up for equal pay for equal work and she stands by President Obama as he continues the fight for fair pay for all workers. Read more...

Business in America, Glass half empty

2012-01-31T00:20:00.000-05:00

PROFITS may be at a record high, but American businessfolk are feeling glum. Some moan that their pipeline-postponing president, Barack Obama, doesn’t understand how business works. Others fret that America itself is becoming dysfunctional. Much of this pessimism is uncalled for, but it matters nonetheless.

A survey published on January 18th offers unsettling detail. Fully 71% of the businesspeople polled expected America’s competitiveness to decline over the next three years. (National competitiveness is a slippery concept: countries do not compete in the same way that firms do. But the businessfolk in question answered some clearer questions, too.) Some 45% said that American firms will find it harder to compete in the global economy. A startling 64% said that American firms will find it harder to pay high wages and benefits. Read more....

Can you hear me now?

2012-01-30T23:12:00.003-05:00

The Fed makes its views loud and clear
JAPAN holds the modern record for years spent with interest rates at zero; they were on the floor from 2001 to 2006. America is on track to break that record. Having cut its short-term rate to near zero in late 2008, the Federal Reserve said on January 25th it will probably stay there “at least through late 2014”, more than a year longer than its previous guidance.

On the same day the Fed for the first time published projections of the year individual members of the Federal Open Market Committee, its main policymaking body, expect the federal-funds rate to start rising and the path it would follow over the next three years. The median forecast for a rise in interest rates is 2014 (see chart) but the accompanying statement implies it will probably be later. Read more....

There is Hope for Education in America! Andrew Campanella Tells Us Why

2012-01-29T23:43:00.001-05:00

"We can't do this to kids. We are paying far too much money for a public education system that isn't working," says Vice President of National School Choice Week Andrew Campanella.

Everyone knows that the U.S. education system is in trouble. Campanella offers a few words on how school choice week can help with promoting "access to better options and empowering parents and kids."

According to Campanella, the U.S. ranks 35th in the world in math and literacy.
"Other countries are not just nipping at our heels educationally, they've lapped us," Campanella says. Read more....

Health Costs, Regardless of Your Politics

2012-01-29T23:34:00.001-05:00

Dr. Emanuel is correct that no Americans, including liberals, can ignore escalating health care costs. Unfortunately, this is exactly what he and the rest of the Obama administration did in passing the Affordable Care Act.

To obtain the cooperation of important stakeholders — the American Medical Association, the American Hospital Association and major pharmaceutical companies — in achieving the laudable goal of expanding coverage, our dysfunctional, inefficient and exceedingly expensive system was left intact. Read more....

10 income-paying stocks that beat the crowd

2012-01-29T23:28:00.001-05:00

These high-quality names slip under yield-hunters’ radar

Stock investors no longer have doubts about dividends, and that’s reason for some doubt.

Shares of high-quality, cash-rich, large-cap companies that yield more than the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index SPX -0.16% are the new favorites in many portfolios. But many of these success stories have been discovered, boosting share prices and trimming yields.

At this point, investors might do better scouring the S&P 500 for companies that wouldn’t show up on a screen for above-average yielders, but which still enjoy dominant, “wide moat” positions in their business.

“It’s kind of a crowded trade,” said Paul Nolte, managing director at investment firm Dearborn Partners, about the popularity of the high-quality dividend strategy. “Valuations on high-dividend payers are at the upper-end of their historical ranges.” Read more.....

US ECONOMIC COLLAPSE AND SCARY ECONOMIC NUMBERS ! RON PAUL ! OBAMA'S ECONOMIC

2012-01-29T02:16:00.000-05:00

U.S. employment growth accelerated last month and the jobless rate dropped to a near three-year low of 8.5 percent, the strongest evidence yet the economic recovery is gaining steam.

Nonfarm payrolls increased 200,000 in December, the Labor Department said on Friday. It was the biggest rise in three months and beat economists' expectations for a 150,000 gain. Read more.....

Rise in number of Americans seeking unemployment benefits

2012-01-29T02:06:00.000-05:00

The number of people seeking unemployment benefits rose last week to a seasonally adjusted 377,000, after a nearly four-year low the previous week.

The Labor Department said Thursday that weekly applications increased 21,000. Applications had plummeted two weeks ago to their lowest level since April 2008. The four week average, a less volatile measure, is down to 377,500.

Applications have trended downward over the past few months. The average has fallen about 9% since Oct. 1. Read more....

Monetary policy,Full speed ahead

2012-01-29T01:56:00.002-05:00

THE ocean liner Queen Elizabeth 2 was launched in 1967 to throngs of excited spectators. Expectations are considerably lower for the Federal Reserve’s launch of monetary QE2: a second round of quantitative easing, the purchase of bonds with newly printed money. Critics have already predicted it will be either ineffectual or dangerous.

Undeterred, the Fed has moved ahead:

To promote a stronger pace of economic recovery and to help ensure that inflation, over time, is at levels consistent with its mandate, the Committee decided today to expand its holdings of securities. The Committee will maintain its existing policy of reinvesting principal payments from its securities holdings. In addition, the Committee intends to purchase a further $600 billion of longer-term Treasury securities by the end of the second quarter of 2011, a pace of about $75 billion per month. Read more....

Dreams Fading In America And Europe

2012-01-27T23:25:00.003-05:00

We announced our belief a few weeks ago that the Fed loan to the ECB could with fractional banking be $10 trillion. This past week we found that Credit Suisse shares our ideas as well. We believe that what this move by the Fed and the ECB is telling us that this is probably it. We also ask again how can the banks in the LTRP repay the funds in a timely manner? No plan has been presented before or since, there is no plan. Again, just throw money at the problem. The only player really capable of saving Europe is Germany and they would destroy themselves in the process. Everyone should have seen this coming but no one did except a handful of insiders. The resultant use of funds since the ECB distribution is hardly even mentioned in the media. It is a big dark secret. Read more.....

Martin Luther King Jr's universal message

2012-01-27T23:20:00.002-05:00

Much has transpired in America these past few weeks leading to this annual recognition of Martin Luther King Jr's life. I've cringed as I've listened to one Republican presidential candidate after another diss those struggling financially by saying there is "class envy", that the wealthy are who they are simply because they've worked harder. I had flashbacks to Ronald Reagan and George W Bush when some of these current Republican standard-bearers used thinly veiled racist and classist sentiments to blame, conveniently, blacks and cash-strapped Americans for our nation's deep-rooted social ills.

Since the earliest days of the republic, clergymen have played major roles in American politics. In the years prior to the Civil War, preachers fanned the flames of the abolitionist movement. They were hair shirts. Martin Luther King Jr. was in that tradition. In King's case, it was notable that a minister of the Gospel played such a pre-eminent role in a decade that was as secular, albeit idealistic, as the 1960s. Read more....

how rich is romney

2012-01-27T23:12:00.000-05:00

Exactly how much is Mitt Romney worth? Hard to say.

The estimates, even from the candidate and his own campaign, are all over the map. Asked point blank on Wednesday during an interview with Univision, Romney described his net worth in very general terms.

It’s hard for most of us to imagine being worth a few million dollars. That’s serious greenbacks, putting us beyond worry and squarely in the land of comfort. But if we were Mitt Romney, who is worth a quarter-BILLION dollars, that would be chump change.

The answer is that Romney's earning was taxed at a corporate level and then again as it was distributed to him as a capital gains tax. Correspondent John Berman spun the Republican candidate as out of touch: "Mitt Romney earned more than $42 million over the last two years. Earning in a day, roughly, what the median American makes in a year." Read more....

Eurocrisis is a Global Crisis

2012-01-26T23:06:00.000-05:00

Leo Panitch: People need to build their own political organizations that push for public banking and serious capital controls.

Only problem is that we don't truly value freedom and education in this country. People don't care about learning and actually knowing things. They just want to get rich quick, stay safe in their cushy $9.00/hr jobs, and/or focus on frivolous things like Jersey Shore or Keeping Up with the Kardashians. We have to find a way to motivate them. Read more...

The Fed's big announcement, Down the slipway

2012-01-26T22:58:00.000-05:00

“Quantitative easing” is unloved and unappreciated—but it is working

EVEN before the Federal Reserve unveiled its second round of quantitative easing (QE) on November 3rd, critics had already denounced it as ineffectual or an invitation to inflation. It cannot be both and it may not be either.

The announcement of “QE2” was hardly breathtaking. The Fed said it will buy $600 billion of Treasuries between now and next June, at about $75 billion a month, although it also said it could adjust the amount and timing if need be. That was about what markets expected but far less than the $1.75 trillion of debt it bought between early 2009 and early 2010 in its first round of QE. Yet QE2 seems already to have exceeded the low expectations it has aroused. Since Ben Bernanke, chairman of the Fed, hinted at it at Jackson Hole on August 27th, markets have all done exactly what they should (see chart). Read more....

Average Is Over

2012-01-26T22:49:00.000-05:00

In an essay, entitled “Making It in America,” in the latest issue of The Atlantic, the author Adam Davidson relates a joke from cotton country about just how much a modern textile mill has been automated: The average mill has only two employees today, “a man and a dog. The man is there to feed the dog, and the dog is there to keep the man away from the machines.”

Davidson’s article is one of a number of pieces that have recently appeared making the point that the reason we have such stubbornly high unemployment and sagging middle-class incomes today is largely because of the big drop in demand because of the Great Recession, but it is also because of the quantum advances in both globalization and the information technology revolution, which are more rapidly than ever replacing labor with machines or foreign workers. Read more....

Get to Know Newt Gingrich

2012-01-24T03:30:00.001-05:00

Tenured CFR Member Newt Gingrich has a record that speaks for itself. Are you listening? Remember the lesser of two evils, is still evil.

The Ron Party is a place for people who believe Ron Paul is the best chance we have to restore constitutionality in America to rally around him under one name that cannot be confused or condemned for being anything other than what it states. The Ron Party is intended to create separation from the Neocon Republican Party and Infiltrated "Tee" Party. We intend to help others see the clear choice to save the Republic by exposing the Establishment and it's tactical control of both political parties. In a sense our mission is to create real choice by driving home the differences between Ron Paul and the Establishment Left Right. Read more....

The Point of No Return

2012-01-24T03:24:00.001-05:00

Mr. Paine argues that November 6, 2012 will determine America's future or lack of one.
The point of no return has passed. The electronic voting machine tabulations company was sold to a foreign private company in Spain.

That company SCYTL is the only middleman access point for over 525 jurisdictions in AL, AZ, CA, CO, DC, FL, KY, MI, KS, IL, IN, NC, NM, MN, NY, SC, TX, UT, WA. And growing.

With SCYTL, there is no physical evidence, no chain of custody. No way for the public to authenticate who actually cast the votes or the count. Our elections were sold to the highest bidder. Read more....

Is Our Economy Healing?

2012-01-23T23:22:00.000-05:00

How goes the state of the union? Well, the state of the economy remains terrible. Three years after President Obama’s inauguration and two and a half years since the official end of the recession, unemployment remains painfully high.

But there are reasons to think that we’re finally on the (slow) road to better times. And we wouldn’t be on that road if Mr. Obama had given in to Republican demands that he slash spending, or the Federal Reserve had given in to Republican demands that it tighten money.

Why am I letting a bit of optimism break through the clouds? Recent economic data have been a bit better, but we’ve already had several false dawns on that front. More important, there’s evidence that the two great problems at the root of our slump — the housing bust and excessive private debt — are finally easing. Read more.....

Why GDP report won’t be sign of what’s in store

2012-01-23T23:07:00.002-05:00

Faster fourth-quarter growth unlikely to be matched in first quarter

The economy probably grew at its fastest pace in a year and a half during the fourth quarter, a key U.S. report is expected to show, but the first three months of 2012 probably won’t be as strong.

Gross domestic product for the fourth quarter — the statistics that shows how fast the economy expanded — is the biggest report of the week. Other notable data include consumer confidence, new home sales and orders for durable goods.

The current MarketWatch forecast of economists predicts 3.0% growth in the fourth quarter, well above the third-quarter level of 1.8%. That would be the fastest pace of growth in a year and a half.

A higher fourth-quarter GDP, however, doesn’t mean the economy is ready to soar after several years of mediocre growth. Indeed, the MarketWatch forecast calls for growth to slow to 1.9% in the 2012 first quarter. Read more.....

How the U.S. Economy, Americans Fared in 2011

2012-01-22T23:30:00.003-05:00

From the jobless rate to a discouraging housing market and an aggravated lot of indebted college graduates, the year's defining economic stories kept a downbeat theme. Ray Suarez discusses 2011's economic impact with The Atlantic's Don Peck, the University of Pennsylvania's Annette Lareau and The Chicago Sun-Times' Terry Savage. Read more.....

Anger Over Debt And Poor Governance

2012-01-22T23:22:00.003-05:00

European politicians, bureaucrats, bankers and assorted other lose more and more credibility each day as we are inundated each day with more lies and deliberate misdirection regarding the course of financial events within the European Union.

The key to solving the debt crisis is Germany. The Greek debt crisis is worse today than it was two years ago. 65% of Germans want out of the euro zone and the euro and want to return to the Deutschemark, but for more than two years their political representatives have denied them that. Finally breaks in the political armor are beginning to appear. All efforts to fix the Greek problem have been futile. If the Federal Reserve hadn't stepped into the breach a couple of weeks ago who could guess where things would be now. Read more.....