A $1.9 trillion stimulus package was recently signed into law in the United States. Can such a stimulus bill, plus packages passed in other countries, really pull the world economy out of the downturn it has been in since 2020? I don’t think so.
The economy runs on energy, far more than it operates on growing debt. Our energy problems don’t appear to be fixable in the near term, such as six months or a year. Instead, the economy seems to be headed for a collapse of its debt bubble. Eventually, we may see a reset of the world financial system leading to fewer interchangeable currencies, far less international trade and falling production of goods and services. Some governments may collapse.
[1] What Is Debt?
I understand debt to be an indirect promise for future goods and services. These future goods and services can only be created if there are adequate supplies of the right kinds of energy and other materials, in the right places, to make these future goods and services.
I think of debt as being a time-shifting device. Indirectly, it is a promise that the economy will be able to provide as many, or more, goods and services in the future compared to what it does at the time the loan is taken out.
Common sense suggests that it is much easier to repay debt with interest in a growing economy than in a shrinking economy. Carmen Reinhart and Ken Rogoff unexpectedly ran across this phenomenon in their 2008 working paper, This Time Is Different: A Panoramic View of Eight Centuries of Financial Crises. They reported (p. 15), “It is notable that the non-defaulters, by and large, are all hugely successful growth stories.” In other words, their analysis of 800 years of governmental debt showed that default was almost inevitable if a country stopped growing or started shrinking.
The IMF estimates that the world economy shrank by 3.5% in 2020. There are many areas with even worse indications: Euro Area, -7.2%; United Kingdom, -10.0%; India, -8.0%; Mexico, -8.5%; and South Africa, -7.5%. If these situations cannot be turned around quickly, we should expect to see collapsing debt bubbles. Even the US, which shrank by 3.4%, needs a rapid return to growth if it is to keep its debt bubble inflated.
[2] The Inter-Relationship Among (a) Growing Debt, (b) Growing Energy Consumption and a (c) Growing Economy
When we are far from energy limits, growing debt seems to pull the economy along. This is a graphic I put together in 2018, explaining the situation. A small amount of debt is helpful to the system. But, if there gets to be too much debt, both oil prices and interest rates rise, bringing the braking system into action. The bicycle/economy rapidly slows.
Just as a two-wheeled bicycle needs to be going fast enough to stay upright, the economy needs to be growing rapidly enough for debt to do what it is intended to do. It takes energy supply to create the goods and services that the economy depends on.
If oil and other energy products are cheap to produce, their benefit will be widely available. Employers will be able to add more efficient machines, such as bigger tractors. These more efficient machines will act to leverage the human labor of the workers. The economy can grow rapidly, without the use of much debt. Figure 2 shows that the world oil price was $20 per barrel in 2020$, or even less, prior to 1974.
Figure 3 below shows the historical relationship between the growth in US energy consumption (red line) and the dollar increase in US debt growth required to add a dollar increase in GDP (blue line). This chart calculates ratios for five-year periods because ratios for individual years are unstable.
Based on Figure 3, the US average annual growth in energy consumption (red line) generally fell between 1951 and 2020. The quantity of debt that needed to be added to create an additional $1 dollar of GDP (blue line) has generally been rising.
According to Investopedia, Gross domestic product (GDP) is the total monetary or market value of all the finished goods and services produced within a country’s borders in a specific time period. Notice that there is no mention of debt in this definition. If businesses or governments can find a way to make large amounts of credit available to borrowers who are not very credit worthy, it becomes easy to sell cars, motorcycles or homes to buyers who may never repay that debt. If the economy hits turbulence, these marginal buyers are likely to default, causing a collapse in a debt bubble.
[3] Analyzing Energy Consumption Growth, Debt Growth and Economic Growth for Broader Groupings of Years
To get a better idea what is happening with respect to energy growth, debt growth, and GDP growth, I created some broader groupings of years, based primarily on patterns in Figure 2, showing inflation-adjusted oil prices. The following groupings of years were chosen:
- 1950-1973
- 1974-1980
- 1981-2000
- 2001-2014
- 2015-2020
Using these groupings of years, I put together charts in which it is easier to see trends.
Figure 4 shows that for the US, there has been a general downward trend in the annual growth of energy consumption. At same time, real (that is, inflation-adjusted) GDP has been trending downward, but not quite as quickly.
We would expect that lower energy consumption would lead to lower growth in real GDP because it takes energy of the appropriate kinds to make goods and services. For example, it takes oil to ship most goods. It takes electricity to operate computers and keep the lights on. According to the World Coal Association, large quantities of coal are used in producing cement and steel. These are important for construction, such as is planned in stimulus projects around the world.
Also, on Figure 4, the period 1981 to 2000 shows an uptick in both energy consumption growth and real GDP growth. This period corresponds to a period of relatively low oil prices (Figure 2). With lower oil prices, businesses found it affordable to add new devices to leverage human labor, making workers more productive. The growing productivity of workers is at least part of what led to the increased growth in real GDP.
Figure 5, above, is disturbing. It strongly suggests that the US economy (and probably a lot of other economies) has needed to add an increasing amount of debt to add $1 of GDP in recent years. This pattern started long before President Biden’s $1.9 trillion stimulus package in 2021.
To make matters worse, GDP growth in Figure 5 has not been reduced to remove the impact of inflation. On average, removing the impact of inflation reduces the above GDP growth by about half. In the period 2015 to 2020, it took about $4.35 of additional debt to add one dollar of GDP growth, including inflation. It would take about double that amount, or $8.70 worth of debt, to create $1.00 worth of inflation-adjusted growth. With such a low return on added debt, it seems unlikely that the $1.9 trillion stimulus package will increase the growth of the economy very much.
[4] Falling interest rates (Figure 6) are a major part of what allowed the rapid growth in debt after 1981 shown in Figure 5.
Clearly, debt is more affordable if the interest rate is lower. For example, auto loans and home mortgages have lower monthly payments if the interest rate is lower. It is also clear that governments need to spend less of their tax revenue on interest rate payments if interest rates are lower. Changes made by US President Ronald Reagan when he took office 1981 also encouraged the use of more debt.
A major concern with respect to today’s debt bubble is the fact that interest rates are about as low as they can go without going negative. In fact, the interest rate on 10-year Treasury bonds is now 1.72%, which is higher than the February 2021 average rate shown on the chart. As interest rates rise, it becomes more costly to add more debt. As interest rates rise, businesses will be less likely to take on debt in order to expand and hire more workers.
[5] Interest expense is a major expense of governments, businesses, and homeowners everywhere. Energy costs are another major expense of governments, businesses, and homeowners. It makes sense that falling interest rates can partly hide rising energy prices.
A trend toward lower interest rates was needed starting in 1981 because the US could no longer produce large amounts of crude oil that were profitable to sell at less than $20 per barrel, in inflation-adjusted prices. Lower interest rates made adding debt more feasible. This added debt could smooth the transition to an economy that was less dependent on oil, now that it was high-priced. The lower interest rates helped all segments of the economy adjust to the new higher cost of oil and other fuels.
[6] The US experience shows precisely how helpful having a rapidly growing supply of inexpensive to produce oil could be to an economy.
US oil production, excluding Alaska (blue “remainder” in Figure 7), rose rapidly after 1945 but began to decline not long after hitting a peak in 1970. This growing oil production had temporarily provided a huge boost to the US economy.
Up until almost 1970, US oil production was rising rapidly. Figure 8 shows that during this period, incomes of both the bottom 90% of workers and the top 10% of workers increased rapidly. Over a period of about 20 years, incomes for both groups grew by about 80%, after adjusting for inflation. On average, workers were about 4% better off each year, with the rapid growth in very inexpensive-to-produce oil, all of which stayed in the US (rather than being exported). US imports of inexpensive-to-produce oil also grew during this period.
Once oil prices were higher, income growth for both the lower 90% and the top 10% slowed. With the changes made starting in 1981, wage disparities quickly started to grow. There suddenly became a need for new, high-tech approaches that used less oil. But these changes were more helpful to the managers and highly educated workers than the bottom 90% of workers.
[7] Most of the world’s cheap-to-extract oil sources have now been exhausted. Our problem is that the world market cannot get prices to rise high enough for producers to cover all of their expenses, including taxes.
Based on my analysis, the world price of oil would need to be at least $120 per barrel to cover all of the costs it needs to cover. The costs that need to be covered include more items than an oil company would normally include in its costs estimates. The company needs to develop new fields to compensate for the ones that are being exhausted. It needs to pay interest on its debt. It also needs to pay dividends to its shareholders. In the case of shale producers, the price needs to be high enough that production outside of “sweet spots” can be carried on profitably.
For oil exporters, it is especially important that the sales price be high enough so that the government of the oil exporting country can collect adequate tax revenue. Otherwise, the exporting country will not be able to maintain food subsidy programs that the population depends on and public works programs that provide jobs.
[8] The world can add more debt, but it is difficult to see how the debt bubble that is created will really pull the world economy forward rapidly enough to keep the debt bubble from collapsing in the next year or two.
Many models are based on the assumption that the economy can easily go back to the growth rate it had, prior to COVID-19. There are several reasons why this seems unlikely:
- Many parts of the world economy weren’t really growing very rapidly prior to the pandemic. For example, shopping malls were doing poorly. Many airlines were in financial difficulty. Private passenger auto sales in China reached a peak in 2017 and have declined every year since.
- At the low oil prices prior to the pandemic, many oil producers (including the US) would need to reduce their production. The 2019 peak in shale production (shown in Figure 7) may prove to be the peak in US oil production because of low prices.
- Once people became accustomed to working from home, many of them really do not want to go back to a long commute.
- It is not clear that the pandemic is really going away, now that we have kept it around this long. New mutations keep appearing. Vaccines aren’t 100% effective.
- As I showed in Figure 5, adding more debt seems to be a very inefficient way of digging the economy out of a hole. What is really needed is a growing supply of oil that can be produced and sold profitably for less than $20 per barrel. Other types of energy need to be similarly inexpensive.
I should note that intermittent wind and solar energy is not an adequate substitute for oil. It is not even an adequate substitute for “dispatchable” electricity production. It is simply an energy product that has been sufficiently subsidized that it can often make money for its producers. It also sounds good, if it is referred to as “clean energy.” Unfortunately, its true value is lower than its cost of production.
[9] What’s Ahead?
I expect that oil prices will rise a bit, but not enough to raise prices to the level producers require. Interest rates will continue to rise as governments around the world attempt more stimulus. With these higher interest rates and higher oil prices, businesses will do less and less well. This will slow the economy enough that debt defaults become a major problem. Within a few months to a year, the worldwide debt bubble will start to collapse, bringing oil prices down by more than 50%. Stock market prices and prices of buildings of all kinds will fall in inflation-adjusted dollars. Many bonds will prove to be worthless. There will be problems with empty shelves in stores and gasoline stations with no products to sell.
People will start to see that while debt is a promise for the equivalent of future goods and services, it is not necessarily the case that those who make the promises will be able to stand behind these promises. Paper wealth generally can be expected to lose its value.
I can imagine a situation, not too many years from now, when countries everywhere will establish new currencies that are not as easily interchangeable with other currencies as today’s currencies are. International trade will dramatically fall. The standard of living of most people will fall precipitously.
I doubt that the new currencies will be electronic currencies. Keeping the electricity on is a difficult task in economies that increasingly need to rely solely on local resources. Electricity may be out for months at a time after an equipment failure or a storm. Having a currency that depends on electricity alone would be a poor idea.
Yesterday, by way of its propaganda mouthpiece the BBC, the UK govt gave advance warning that “Masks and social distancing ‘could last years'”.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-56475807
“People may need to wear face coverings and socially distance for several years until we return to normality, a leading epidemiologist has predicted.
Mary Ramsay, the head of immunisation at Public Health England, said basic measures could be in place until other countries successfully roll out jabs…”
The day before they announced probably no foreign travel this year, not for holidays anyway.
You have to wonder at what point do the UK public start getting suspicious that these ‘vaccines’ that everybody has to get don’t actually seem to behave like vaccines? indeed seem to be pretty useless at preventing the spread of the virus? So why get vaccinated? (“because it is safe”)
Masks and Soc. Dis may act as calming devices. To survive, people have to reduce their impact greatly–nothing to do with the disease, although the disease might be a metaphor for universal (systemwide) ills? A magic formula: do these calming things that seem easy and cheap enough, be like a school of fish, and we’ll eventually muddle through. What is meanwhile not to be condoned are vaccinations.
I would argue that without constant terror induced by muzzling and asocial distancing, people who don’t follow MSM would forget that they are in the middle of the worst pandemic ever.
This graphic gives a better perspective to the history of pandemics. Though still in process – covid has a long way to go before becoming the worst.
https://www.visualcapitalist.com/worlds-deadliest-pandemics-by-population-impact/
Did I forget the /sarc tag? 😉
COVID-19 is at .03% of the world’s population. The black death was at 51% of population. That is a ways to go.
“COVID-19 is at .03% of the world’s population.”
Counted with one hand on the diseased and one hand on the bible … or maybe not.
“Why isn’t covid affecting you people?”
“We don’t have TV.”
https://www.vaclib.org/images/provoke/Covid/amishcovid.jpg
“The Great Reset is Here: Follow the Money”
F.William Engdahl
3-19-21
Another key part of the financial preparation for the Great Reset, the fundamental transformation from a high-energy intensity economy to a low and economically inefficient one, is the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB). SASB says it “provides a clear set of standards for reporting sustainability information across a wide range of issues… “ This sounds reassuring until we look at who makes up the members of the SASB that will give the Climate-friendly Imprimatur. Members include, in addition to the world’s largest fund manager, BlackRock (more than $7 trillion under management), also Vanguard Funds, Fidelity Investments, Goldman Sachs, State Street Global, Carlyle Group, Rockefeller Capital Management, and numerous major banks such as Bank of America and UBS. Many of these are responsible for the 2008 global financial collapse. What is this framework group doing? According to their website, “Since 2011, we have has been working towards an ambitious goal of developing and maintaining sustainability accounting standards for 77 industries.”
Where this is all going is to create a web of globally-based financial entities who control combined wealth including insurance and pension funds into what they claim to be worth $100 trillion. They are setting the rules and will define a company or even a country by the degree of carbon emission they create. If you are clean and green, you potentially get investment. If you are deemed a carbon polluter as the oil, gas and coal industries are deemed today, the global capital flows will disinvest or avoid funding you. The immediate target of this financial cabal is the backbone of the world economy, the oil and gas industry along with coal.
Hydrocarbons Under Attack
The immediate target of this financial cartel is the backbone of the world economy, the oil, coal and natural gas sector. Oil industry analysts predict that over the next five years or less investment flows into the world’s largest energy sector will fall dramatically. “Given how central the energy transition will be to every company’s growth prospects, we are asking companies to disclose a plan for how their business model will be compatible with a net zero economy,” BlackRock’s chairman and CEO Larry Fink wrote in his 2021 letter to CEOs. Blackrock is the world’s largest investment group with over $7 trillion to invest. Another BlackRock officer told a recent energy conference, “where BlackRock goes, others will follow.”
“To continue to attract capital, portfolios have to be built around core advantaged assets – low-cost, long-life, low carbon-intensive barrels,” said Andrew Latham, Vice President, Global Exploration at WoodMac, an energy consultancy.
https://journal-neo.org/2021/03/19/the-great-reset-is-here-follow-the-money/
Pingback: Today’s News 22nd March 2021 | The One Hundredth Monkey
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble ZeroHedge News – Kolozeg.Org
Dr. Malcolm Kendrick: Scottish doctor, author, speaker, sceptic, writes:
What figures about COVID19 do you believe?
Indeed, what figures can you believe?
Do you simply take them all at face value, and work from there? That would certainly be nice, but it’s not really possible, and you would come to some pretty weird conclusions.
For example, I was running through the Worldometer site the other day. Yes, what an exciting life I now lead. Sitting right on top to each-other, on ‘deaths per million’ of the population were: Singapore, New Zealand and China. They are way down towards the very bottom of the list.
Deaths per million
Singapore (188) = 5 deaths per million (total deaths 30)
New Zealand (189) = 5 deaths per million (total deaths 26)
China (190) = 3 deaths per million (total deaths 4,636)
Just to give you a quick comparison with countries rather closer to the top of that list, where the deaths per million are around four hundred times higher, on average:
Deaths per million
Czechia (3) = 2,206 deaths per million
UK (6) = 1,843 deaths per million
USA (12) = 1,649 deaths per million
Returning to Singapore, New Zealand and China. What do they have in common? From a COVID19 perspective they all locked down pretty hard. At least they say they did. They are all pretty wealthy countries. Apart from that… not much.
On the surface, there is nothing much to get excited, or confused about, yet. However, when you start looking a little more closely, you begin to notice stranger things. For example, if we look at total ‘cases.’
Total COVID19 cases
Singapore = 60,121
New Zealand = 2,432
China = 90,062
So, China with a population of 1.4Bn (One billion, four hundred million) had ninety thousand cases. Singapore with population of just over five and a half million, had sixty thousand cases. Just in case you cannot do the mental arithmetic. Singapore’s population is two hundred and forty-six times smaller than China’s.
Which means that Singapore had two thirds the number of cases in China – resulting in almost the same rate of deaths per million but in a population two hundred and fifty times smaller.
Where does this then take us? It takes us to a place where the case fatality rates are widely different. Not just between China and Singapore, but in all three countries. In fact, these figures are not even in the same ballpark. Not even in the same city. By case fatality rate (CFR) I mean the percentage of people with a clear-cut infection, who then died [terms and conditions apply].
More here:
https://drmalcolmkendrick.org/2021/03/20/covid19-hidden-figures-and-ooda/
In the Age of the Mask, take nothing at face value……
These numbers all joke and dog’s mess as each country is (not) counting something way different #1 in fatality rates as well as #2 PCR test over sampling and or #3 actual noticeable (provable) disease stricken number of real patients out there.. over presenting co-morbidity suddenly (e.g. as typical seasonal flue disappeared all together now) y/y different ways of performing the statistics etc.. some hospital wards are presented in msm drama stories as overwhelmed, others video documented with idle personal and empty rooms with few mild cases over staying so the elevated insurance payments keep flowing inside the healthcare biz etc..
So, it’s a complex intertwined mix of an agenda, real disease, corruption, negligence..
It’s a strange strange world. Glad I have my woodworking interest and my latest tool, a welder – if not I wonder what would have happened to my sanity …
Malcolm has commented on Fast Eddy suggesting he is a bit much and that his forays into darkness are destroying his credibility…
Seems he’s not buying into the oil – covid axis… or the CEP tee hee…
Not unexpected… these ‘thoughts’… are unpalatable.
Fast Eddy has responded with a full page rejoinder…. (all posts need approval so it will not likely appear until later today)…
Looks like most Canadians will be lethally injected within the next 100 days
https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/variants-threatening-our-progress-in-containing-spread-of-covid-19-with-vaccines-tam-1.5354155
Nightmare Covid towards the end of 2021?
Perhaps sooner
Remember — nobody will understand the vaccine is causing the Nightmare… so the unwilling will soon be willing — when they are informed of the Nightmare… so this actually increases lethal injection uptake
Eddy, you and Ted Cruz could end up being the last of the Canadians.
Whoops, I forgot Neil Young. He could perform at the national wake singing,
“I’ve seen the needle and the damage done.
A little part of it in everyone.
But every vaxhole’s like a settin’ sun…”
>>Looks like most Canadians will be lethally injected within the next 100 days
According to the article, that is for the first shot. Is it not the second shot that mainly does the damage? I don’t know, but that is the impression I get.
The 2nd shot triggers more adverse effects but one is enough to screw the immune system.
VFatalis “The 2nd shot triggers more adverse effects but one is enough to screw the immune system.”
Please post a reference supporting the validity of that statement.
Thank you.
It seems to me that it would be true by definition.
It’s partly in french, partly in hebrew. To fully understand it’s advised to watch the embedded video (which is also in french).
https://www.francesoir.fr/videos-les-debriefings/israel-3
BURN IT DOWN! tee hee (with video)
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-britain-protests/police-officers-hurt-vehicles-set-on-fire-in-violent-protest-in-bristol-england-idUSKBN2BD0QU
According to the patents, the coming cryptocurrency blockchain financial regime will be a digi-organic system comprising…
1. Low earth orbit satellites powered by a combination of solar and rechargable military grade batteries. For relaying the data and powering the network… https://www.newscientist.com/article/2220346-spacex-plans-to-put-more-than-40000-satellites-in-space/
2. Human bio-energy will function as an intermediary power supply via your DNA… https://odysee.com/@psychoNWO:9/DNA-Frequency-Bioweapon-Links-Targeted-Individuals-to-Artificial-Intelligence-Hive-Mind-Control-Grid:5?r=HYhpPxhtnxGvBNzPhcLxLYsSSaanjx1L
3. Courtesy of the nanotech in the mRNA vaccines, your DNA will also function as an antenna and storage device, ie,, a 5G enabled hard drive. … https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_OMEQ5SORg
Bill Gates has the patent that will connect you to all of the above – Vaccine Small Print – Blockchain Brainwave Monitoring… https://odysee.com/@psychoNWO:9/The-not-so-obvious-patent-Is-this-really-about-block-chain-mining:f?r=FtVmbRiRzWDfFCHs2deiU7vtqXQnywiu
VIRUS NANOTECHNOLOGY – Vaccines… Bio nano implants; Utilising Terahertz(6G) frequencies to facilitate instantaneous data exchange between humans and the ID2020 Alliance Blockchain ledger .. https://odysee.com/@psychoNWO:9/Terahertz-Frequencies-and-the-Coronavirus-Nanotechnology-Blockchain-Identity-Agenda:5?r=FtVmbRiRzWDfFCHs2deiU7vtqXQnywiu
Bi-Directional Brain to Computer Interface for the coming CBDC cryptocurrency blockchain financial system. They have been testing these systems on Targeted Individuals since the 1990’s.. https://www.medicaldesignbriefs.com/component/content/article/mdb/insiders/medical-design-briefs/stories/34496
Crony capitalism is out – Stakeholder capitalism is in. See Alison McDowell at Wrench In The Gears for more info.
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble | AlltopCash.com
Pingback: Altstream Alternative News Source Headed For A Collapsing Debt BubbleZeroHedge News
Hey Gail, you should do an April Fools Day post! Maybe something along the lines of “Good news–all our problems will soon be over forever!”
Nah, we have such posts all over MSM every day …
LOL!
Pingback: Headed for a Collapsing Debt Bubble - HotNewsCast
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble | awarecitizen.com
Pingback: Headed for a Collapsing Debt Bubble | Financial Survival Network
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble | altnews.org
José Baselga, renowned cancer researcher and AstraZeneca oncology R&D head, dies at 61
José Baselga, a storied oncology researcher and pharmaceutical executive whose discoveries helped pave the way for new breast cancer therapies, died Sunday at the age of 61.
His death was confirmed by AstraZeneca, where Baselga had been serving as executive vice president for research and development in oncology. The company did not provide a cause of death; the Spanish newspaper La Vanguardia reported it was Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, a rare brain infection that causes degeneration and death.
Baselga had joined AstraZeneca two years ago, after his academic career ended amid a conflict-of-interest scandal at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.
https://www.statnews.com/2021/03/21/jose-baselga-astrazeneca-renowned-cancer-researcher-dies-at-61/
And?
Did he get high on his own supply?
Blessing by way of medicine: These pastors preach COVID-19 vaccination as God’s healing power
Once the coronavirus outbreak rocked Pittsburgh’s historically Black neighborhoods, Father Paul Abernathy knew that when a COVID-19 vaccine arrived, it would be time to swap his pulpit for the streets in order to convince residents to take the vaccine.
Father Paul, as he’s known to members of St. Moses the Black Orthodox church, donned a yellow neon vest over his Roman collar and began walking door-to-door, infusing faith into his plea for residents to take the vaccine.
“This is very important,” he said to one hesitant neighbor as he knocked on doors in Pittsburgh’s predominantly African-American Hill District. “Sometimes when we pray, he gives us blessing by way of medicine, by way of vaccines.”
Once the coronavirus outbreak rocked Pittsburgh’s historically Black neighborhoods, Father Paul Abernathy knew that when a COVID-19 vaccine arrived, it would be time to swap his pulpit for the streets in order to convince residents to take the vaccine.
Father Paul, as he’s known to members of St. Moses the Black Orthodox church, donned a yellow neon vest over his Roman collar and began walking door-to-door, infusing faith into his plea for residents to take the vaccine.
“This is very important,” he said to one hesitant neighbor as he knocked on doors in Pittsburgh’s predominantly African-American Hill District. “Sometimes when we pray, he gives us blessing by way of medicine, by way of vaccines.”
https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/blessing-medicine-pastors-preach-covid-19-vaccination-gods/story?id=76367456
Experts in brain diseases say there are many unanswered questions about a possible degenerative neurological syndrome recently disclosed by New Brunswick health officials. Many people are worried and want to know how concerned they need to be.
At a news conference updating the COVID-19 pandemic on Thursday, the public learned about a mysterious neurological disease infecting a cluster of people in New Brunswick province.
The mystery illness has similarities to Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, a rare and fatal brain disease, similar to Mad cow disease and other prion-caused disorders. Prion diseases are a group of rapidly progressive, fatal, and infectious neurodegenerative disorders affecting both humans and animals.
Here’s what is known about the disease. The first case of the disease was diagnosed in 2015, according to the memo sent out by the chief medical officer of health to the New Brunswick Medical Society and to doctor and nurses associations.
After the initial diagnosis in 2015, three years later, in 2019, 11 additional cases were discovered, with 24 more cases discovered in 2020 and another six in 2021. Five people have died. The cases seem to be concentrated in the Acadian Peninsula in northeast New Brunswick and the Moncton region in the southeast.
http://www.digitaljournal.com/life/health/what-s-happening-today-with-n-b-s-mystery-neurological-disease/article/587300
Then, over the last half century, symptoms for Marek’s worsened. Paralysis was more permanent; brains more quickly turned to mush.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/science/tthis-chicken-vaccine-makes-virus-dangerous
Perhaps this is the sort of thing that is in store for all of us with Devil Covid… and these people with the brain disorders are early symptoms of what is to come once the seriously nasty variants get concocted.
Sounds gruesome …. but better than being beaten to death by bad guys while trying to save your children from being raped then cooked in a pot….
WOW! Thanks for the link.
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble - Red State Talk Radio
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble : by Tyler Durden | Dawson County Journal
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble - Bugle Call
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble – Maris Research
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble – Understanding Deep Politics
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble - MAGAPAC
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble - SixPips Trading Online Analysis
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble - Investing Matters
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble - Open Mind News
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble – Not Mainstream News
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble - The Republican Ballot
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble - Grand Ole Party
HOW The Health Passport WILL WORK
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble | Political Bomb Show
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble - Nemos News Network
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble – iftttwall
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble | New Covenant Network News
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble – BREAKING News, Politics, and Opinion
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble – Biz Patriot
Pingback: Headed For A Collapsing Debt Bubble – Freedomizer Radio
It is kicking off in Bristol tonight, an old port city in the SW of England that has a long established ‘anarchist’ element. TP has introduced permanent legislation that limits protest in UK.
> Police blast ‘disgusting mob of animals’ who broke officers’ bones, BURNT cop vans and smashed up police station as ‘Kill the Bill’ demo in Bristol over right to protest peacefully turns into a riot
Six police officers have been seriously injured with some suffering broken arms and ribs after a ‘mob of animals’ turned on officers Sunday evening, smashing through the windows of a police station and setting a police van alight during a ‘kill the bill’ riot in Bristol. Thousands of activists, claiming to protect the right to demonstrate peacefully, had gathered in the city centre for the ‘Kill The Bill’ demonstration to oppose plans to give police more powers to deal with non-violent protests. But footage captured the descent into anarchy as protesters clashed with police armed with batons and pepper spray (inset). Mounted officers were seen attempting to disperse a large crowd gathered outside Bridewell Police Station. Later a group of hooded protesters tried to smash the windows (left and top right) of the glass-fronted building and another mob set fire to a police van (main) parked in nearby Bridewell Street. In other scenes, officers with police dogs were seen attempting to hold back large crowds as demonstrators scaled the walls of the police station and threw fireworks (bottom right).
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9386167/Hundreds-chanting-Kill-Bill-protest-Bristol-controversial-Police-Crime-bill.html
England will probably cease to exist within this generation
More mainstream media lies… https://odysee.com/@hugotalks:8/What%27s-Goin-On-In-BRISTOL-Hugo-Talks–lockdown:d?r=HYhpPxhtnxGvBNzPhcLxLYsSSaanjx1L
Nice double entendre—”kill the bill!” Provocative to say the least.
If I was a British bobby I would be quite irate.
Every new genome simulation is a variant. Hell they already have 6000 of them! Variant means weekly uploads upgrades via DOC VAX syringes.
Perhaps they should have a Halloween contest for the
newest scariest variant?
flesh eating?
been done
zombies?
been done
This is a time of opportunity for medical animators!
I bring you the incomparable BEYONCE!
Regarding item #7, above, one cost not mentioned in Gail’s assessment of costs that need to be covered is the cost of properly closing and reclaiming spent oil wells.
In Alberta (at least), there is supposed to be a fund set up, paid for by taxes on oil production, for spent well reclamation. But most analyses estimate that the fund is adequate for reclaiming less than 0.1% of spent oil wells. Total cleanup costs is estimated as high as $2.5 trillion dollars!
These spent wells are a grave environmental problem. They often vent greenhouse gas, or even toxic gas like hydrogen sulphide, which will kill you at concentrations similar to the current concentration of CO2 (~400ppm) They pierce aquifers and introduce toxins into drinking water. The land surrounding them is heavily polluted, and is no longer fit for other purposes (such as agriculture), unless expensively remediated.
These “externalities” wind up being paid by taxpayers, and must show up on the ledger sheet somewhere, eventually!
That is a good point. Furthermore, bankrupt companies are unable to pay for well clean up. Bankrupt governments don’t do any better, I am afraid.
yes, that’s a good point.
“These “externalities” wind up being paid by taxpayers, and must show up on the ledger sheet somewhere, eventually!”
probably not!
I would word it thus:
since companies and governments will be unable to afford the cleanup costs, there will be very few cleanups.
Clean up – when TSHTF, not going to happen.
Spent fuel ponds, spent oil wells… Interesting times
And….
Dr. Scott Gottlieb has warned that the New York variant of COVID-19 could reinfect survivors of the virus and people who have been vaccinated.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/medical/scott-gottlieb-says-variant-could-infect-vaccinated-new-yorkers/ar-BB1eOvch
Oh gawd Duncan… what will you do now??? Keep in mind the variants keep coming … and at some point the variants are going to breed and create a ‘Nightmare Covid’
I actually believe this is likely what is going to happen after everyone gets jabbed…
The variants will ‘breed’… and we’ll get the Nightmare version — and that is going to be the one that kills everyone.
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/world/2021/02/coronavirus-mutant-covid-19-virus-dubbed-the-devil-causing-concern-in-california.html
The problem is never ending!
But there’ll be more jobs!
https://www.aol.com/finance/covid-vaccine-jobs-create-mini-132900219.html
This is priceless!
I was on a 3 hour call with a good mate last night discussing Covid, 911 false flag, the fake moon landings (and I was suggesting that they are all tied together in various ways)… he is on board with most of it and firmly believes the moon landings are a total joke (he’s also one of the most senior people at a large US investment banks so not a fool)…. he thinks the covid response is nuts but believes that is group think at work — no sinister intentions…
He will get the jab soon because he believes he will travel. I mentioned that I won’t get it until I am guaranteed I can get on a plane and travel quarantine free. We’ve been lied to before on Covid…
I made the following prediction at 3am – here’s what I see happening — travel will be a carrot convincing people to get vaxxed… but because hundreds of millions are already vaxxed… yet nobody can travel still … I do not see us ever getting to bite the carrot…. what I think will happen is the variants will be trotted out as an excuse to break the travel promise.
And lo and behold … I get to my computer at 9am and see in my mail box:
Holidays Abroad “Extremely Unlikely” This Summer Due to Increase in ‘Variants’ of Covid
Scientific advisers and other senior figures are becoming extremely concerned by an increase in infections that is forcing some regions on the Continent back into lockdown. They fear a rise in cases here within weeks.
European holidays in May – and even in the summer – look doubtful. Scientists are wary of outbreaks of the South African variant in some European countries and some are calling for tougher travel restrictions.
Although the British data is heading in the right direction, with a record 660,276 vaccinations yesterday and the seven-day average of deaths falling below 100 for the first time since October, science advisers are urging caution.
A Government scientist warned there was a danger that travellers could bring back new variants of the virus that are less susceptible to vaccines.
Dr Mike Tildesley, a member of the Spi-M modelling group, told Today on Radio 4: “International travel this summer is, for the average holidaymaker, sadly I think, extremely unlikely. I think we are running a real risk if we do start to have lots of people going overseas in July and August because of the potential for bringing more of these new variants back into the country.”
“What is really dangerous is if we jeopardise our vaccination campaign by having these variants where the vaccines don’t work as effectively spreading more rapidly.”
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/482b39c8-88d3-11eb-bb21-db0220819036?shareToken=a0662f5f3e017bfe9858e57eca6ffebf
My powers of clairvoyance are incredible… no?
Or could it be that I am on the committee that is pulling the strings and I am having a little fun telling people in advance to see if any of them will wake up…..
Or maybe I am cheating because I have the leak out of Canada and I am just looking at that to find out what happens next 🙂
If I wanted to go to Armenia (and I do), I could get a flight this week. I’d have to show a negative Covid test certificate in Yerevan. The main drawback is having to spend two weeks in quarantine when I got back to Taiwan, which has managed the pandemic substantially better thanks to policies like this. Oh, and there’s also the risk of catching Covid along the way, since vaccines mostly aren’t available here yet (or in Armenia).
Did you sign up for this? If so, you just might be traveling again in 2023!
https://dearmoon.earth/
key word: “.. for the average holidaymaker..” aka lower (disposable) caste
It is pretty much impossible to fix the problem with vaccines. Too many people aren’t vaccinated, and there are too many variants.
It depends how one defines the problem.
Marek’s Disease and “Leaky” vaccines 🙁 Please read the last paragraph carefully.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marek's_disease
OMG!! This sounds a lot like what Dr Geert Vanden Bossche has been warning us about. Our chickens are about to come home to roost!!
From the wiki:
However, because vaccination does not prevent infection with the virus, Marek’s is still transmissible from vaccinated flocks to other birds, including the wild bird population. The first Marek’s disease vaccine was introduced in 1970. The disease would cause mild paralysis, with the only identifiable lesions being in neural tissue. Mortality of chickens infected with Marek’s disease was quite low. Decades after the first vaccine was introduced, current strains of Marek Virus cause lymphoma formation on throughout the chicken’s body and mortality rates have reached 100% in unvaccinated chickens. The Marek’s disease vaccine is a leaky vaccine, which means that only the symptoms of the disease are prevented.[11] Infection of the host and the transmission of the virus are not inhibited by the vaccine. This contrasts with most other vaccines, where infection of the host is prevented. Under normal conditions, highly virulent strains of the virus are not selected. A highly virulent strain would kill the host before the virus would have an opportunity to transmit to other potential hosts and replicate. Thus, less virulent strains are selected. These strains are virulent enough to induce symptoms but not enough to kill the host, allowing further transmission. However, the leaky vaccine changes this evolutionary pressure and permits the evolution of highly virulent strains.[12] The vaccine’s inability to prevent infection and transmission allows the spread of highly virulent strains among vaccinated chickens. The fitness of the more virulent strains are increased by the vaccine.
The evolution of Marek’s disease due to vaccination has had a profound effect on the poultry industry. All chickens across the globe are now vaccinated against Marek’s disease (birds hatched in private flocks for laying or exhibition are rarely vaccinated). Highly virulent strains have been selected to the point that any chicken that is unvaccinated will die if infected.[citation needed] Other leaky vaccines are commonly used in agriculture. One vaccine in particular is the vaccine for avian influenza. Leaky vaccine use for avian influenza can select for virulent strains which could potentially be transmitted to humans.
A good article about that vax induced disease.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/science/tthis-chicken-vaccine-makes-virus-dangerous
Is this what is meant when the MSM hints at ‘Nightmare Covid’?
https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1402278/California-Covid-strain-coronavirus-variant-kent-south-africa-brazil-joe-biden-us
I believe that hypothesis will be put to test next winter. It seems higly probable that the “covid” will become much more lethal then. And the ensuing excess mortality will be attributed by MSM to the “variants” and to the unclean “anti-vaxxer-negacionists-kill-em-all”.
But I don’t see how a society can survive a process of culling as brutal as that outside a concentrationary environment (and even that…. tall order….!)
That is another huge piece to the puzzle — when combined with the Bossche presentation.
It is as good as confirmation that the Elders intend to exterminate us with Devil Covid.
From FEs Express article:
“They also fear it could combine with the strain already identified in the UK to create an even deadlier virus.”
>>an even deadlier virus
Most of the data I have seen shows that total deaths from coronaviruses (flu + CV19) was roughly the same last year as in previous years. So CV19 is not that deadly at all, no more deadly than normal flu. The Express article suggesting how deadly CV19 is now when in fact it isn’t, is just propaganda.
Interesting double-whammy developing though. If the ‘vaccine’ does not get you, the virus will. The rest of life on Earth will be glad.
«The Dasgupta Review is an independent, global review on the Economics of Biodiversity led by Professor Sir Partha Dasgupta (Frank Ramsey Professor Emeritus, University of Cambridge). The Review was commissioned in 2019 by HM Treasury and has been supported by an Advisory Panel drawn from public policy, science, economics, finance and business.
The Review calls for changes in how we think, act and measure economic success to protect and enhance our prosperity and the natural world. Grounded in a deep understanding of ecosystem processes and how they are affected by economic activity, the new framework presented by the Review sets out how we should account for Nature in economics and decision-making«.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/final-report-the-economics-of-biodiversity-the-dasgupta-review
This sounds like an ambitious undertaking.
This kind of evaluation has been going on for quite a while. I am reminded of this book:
Cleveland, Cutler J.; Stern, David I.; Costanza, Robert (Eds.) The Economics of Nature and the Nature of Economics, Advances in Ecological Economics Series, Edward Elgar Publishing, 2007. ISBN 1-85898-980-9
I am starting to read a recently published book: Bright Green Lies: How the Environmental Movement Lost Its Way and What We Can Do About It by Derrick Jenson, Lierre Kieth and Max Wilbert.
It comments about these kinds of valuations on pages 32-33:
Another quote from the book (p.4):
I am afraid I agree with theBright Green Lies authors.
“Sustainable agriculture is an oxymoron.”
Being involved with agriculture and land, this is something I have a bit or experience with as well as a significant economic interest in maintaining as much soil value going forward as possible. A simple conundrum:
RTK makes possible tillage of +-1cm or so which in turn allows the land to be strip tilled between say last years corn rows; the rows are left from year to year and help hold soil in place without covering the bare ground between the previous rows and causing a delay in warming the soil for efficient seed growth. Ground coverage keeps the soil cooler in the spring, later planting, etc.
My soil is not strip tilled, the problem is economics and politics. The machinery is very expensive and yet allows say $20/acre increased profits, those who have money get. If one is the largest landowner in MN, the cost of equipment is trivial, for my tenants who are good farmers, conservative farmers and good people, it is not trivial. If I were to change tenants I lose a valuable connection to my rural community, I also enable someone who is large to become larger and when smaller farmers are gone, the tenant can push down land rentals as they have economic momentum. Power is going to technology and the money and ability to exploit it. See Ivers farms: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6LJ0vQr-o4s&t=1152s Probably a $1M rig, for planting, tillage is a different game. Ivers is a “family” farm, about 19K acres, 40 miles from one end to another.
Tough to find a win- win here.
There would seem to be a maintenance issue as well; farm implements wear, keeping something which is constantly in the dirt from wearing and affecting planting accuracy is a problem. Implements now travel 10 mph across soil, 40+ feet in width – maintaining equipment accuracy over those 40 feet, +- 1 cm on each row results in significant accuracy issues across the implement. The goal is to till, fertilize, and plant in the same row, or very close to one side.
Early settlers mined the soil and moved on effectively resting worn soil, maybe a good system.
Dennis L.
Thanks for the title of the book, Gail!
“The Review calls for changes in how we think, act and measure economic success to protect and enhance our prosperity and the natural world.”
no chance that TPTB change how they think and act and measure.
no chance that anything will “enhance our prosperity” in the future.
“Grounded in a deep understanding of ecosystem processes and how they are affected by economic activity…”
grounded in a shallow understanding of the imminent decline in net (surplus) energy, or perhaps more accurately no understanding at all.
“Sir” and “Dasgupta” should not be used in the same sentence.
Covid and its positive effects lol
I work in the Natural Gas Industry and thankfully for Covid lol we actually can afford to buy a new er used CNC machine which we desperately needed. Another company went broke because of Covid and we picked up their beauty for less than half the new purchase price which is apparently some 1 million dollars. We got it for 400 hundred thousand but alas had to finance it which the bank gave us? The bank however, won’t give us a credit line which is what we really need as we are constantly on credit hold. We can’t even take any more orders because we can’t afford to build any more due to parts shortage? lol How’s that for the mouse eating its own tail?
The insanity just continues?
Hey, maybe the bank will give me a million to buy a house of my own at 0% interest? er sorry 0.25%.
Yeah, the great reset where you will own nothing and be happy about it? Schwab should put on a blue collar and come work for us for awhile?
I had to look up “CNC machine.”
“CNC machines are heavy machines used for cutting wood, any other hard material to give it a certain shape. Most CNC machines have a strong build quality and can be used for a number of different purposes like cutting, milling and turning.”
I see them advertised fro between $3,800 and $35,000.
You are in the natural gas industry. You are saying that you are having troubles both with getting a credit line and with part shortages.
All of the stimulus being put in place ramps up demand for a whole range of finished goods. But many of these will not be available because of bottle necks in supply lines. The big question is, “Which pieces, where, fail first?”
Hopefully your nature gas business will do OK. If coal and oil are failing, natural gas is actually a product that is moderately plentiful, if it can be transported to the right place, cheaply enough. It is sort of “green,” too.
@ Gail Tverberg
Please we are not talking about toys but actual large scale industrial capacity machines and I’m in Canada similar to this one here:
https://cncmachines.com/mazak-integrex-i630v-6-2012/l/4447
Thankfully the cutting tools are compatible from our old machine to new otherwise as my foremen said each drill bit is roughly 1200.a piece and we have almost 100 of them. What I replied for the price of the new it doesn’t come automatically with the ancillary pieces? Nope was his reply.
Further to this was the cost of delivery, set up and buying the needed overhead crane to handle the raw steel. We are talking extremely expensive pieces.
As for your comment about credit line yes we are constantly under credit holds because many of our suppliers don’t care for our 90 to 120 day hold. Parts shortages are because we can’t pay upfront for what we need. It’s crazy. The cost well imagine this last year I was called upon to go to another city to buy 27 cap screws and guess what it finally cost. was about 76.00 dollars and thats not taking into consideration my time and gas. So roughly all in about 100.00. Further we were given a discount on the screws. Affordability? Wow, truly wow!
The banks refusal to create credit isn’t simple to explain, and I’m pretty rubbish at explaining this.
You may not be interested in the math, so I’ll skip that bit.
The fundamental problem is this Private Profit = Government Deficit. (I’ve trimmed off a bunch of what abouts)
That means that profits are being squeezed into the banks and the MIC like toothpaste out of a tube. Darwin-like it displaces all other riskier methods of turning a profit. So anything that doesn’t create a profit by debt extraction gets looked at very carefully.
Worst of all, to a banker, other banks may be huge risks. A case of only lending to those who have no need to borrow.
So, zero or minimum credit to sectors of the economy where bankruptcies begin to appear.
I was talking to the owner of a small machine shop a few months ago, while wondering how he was staying in business. He cut his staff in half and doubled his prices. Half the staff are on furlough.
It takes a level of bravery bordering on the foolhardy to acquire new machine tools these days.
I wsh you all the luck in the world.
Locally a large regional national gas distributor put a facility upgrade project on hold. They are experiencing financial troubles since many customers have stopped paying bills due to COVID income loss.
I’m not sure you’d want the crony club anywhere near a productive piece of equipment or people. Let him write books you and I won’t read.
That CNC machine will be shipped to the slave shop floor (China) so that useless people can continue but shit they don’t need, for money they don’t have, to impress people they don’t like.
Isn’t it nice when that house increases in “value”?
🤣👍
@ Kowalainen
You want something to laugh and cry about I will be turning 60 soon and am taking early CPP. Guess how much? $489.00 a month! Now if i wait to 65 or in the best case to 70 i will get a whopping 1700. a month. But as friends say to me get what you can because by the time i reach your age there will be nothing left. And guess what that 489. is taxable income? So here I sit working full time and getting CCP and taxed to death. Should I move to where you are?
Oh, I see, you expected to be treated with some respect and decency after chucking in half a century of petroleum extraction and operation efforts keeping the FF spigot open?
It is not how equality of outcome works. When you stop delivering MOAR to the MOARons, they cut your daily allowances. Because, you see, they are busy with trite drivel and compete in vanity among each other.
With other words; that country doesn’t exist. The planet is all stocked up to the tilt with useless eaters. You have been too busy working hard to feed useless eaters for seeing the big picture here.
But don’t get me wrong, thanks for the petroleum. I use as little of it as I can barely moving the needle of my sanctimonious hypocrisy-o-meter.
With love from an expat Laplander in Scania.
🥰
Five axis, I assume. Haas or other? Large cost of such a machine seems to be coolant expense, good luck.
You are in business for yourself, you are resourceful, you will make it and do well.
Dennis L.
At that price it’s likely a Makino or other top of the line 5 axis, not a Haas.
Whats ahead?
The other week I overheard a conversation at work of someone who bought a house over 100,000 asking price. My friends were in disbelief really and I complained bitterly how absurd that was and unbelievable really. It’s just going to cause more and more homelessness. I then gave my friends and fellow co-workers a quote by a central banker Paul Warburg who wrote and complained bitterly about the political incompetence of his day 1920’s. After watching the roaring 20,s he said:
“The world lives in a fools paradise based upon fictitious wealth, rash promises and mad illusions. We must beware of booms based upon false prosperity which has its roots in inflated credits and prices.”
I have a dear friend who owns a house valued at 1.2 million dollars. It is a nice house but for a house that is worth that kind of money i just shake my head in disbelief. You would think for that kind of money the home would come with real wood flooring but no its laminate. What about the fixtures all no name cheap brands. What about views any? No nothing. No mountain views, no river views, no nothing but the neighbors next door? As for the layout? the laundry room is next to the living/kitchen and so narrow the door doesn’t open fully? As for the location hardly anything to write home about. It is actually in an area that 20 years ago was known as the least desirable.
1.2 million? I wouldn’t give you 500,000 for the place. So what makes it worth that kind of money? If one were to build it from scratch today just the materials alone would hardly come to 200,000.
If Paul Warburg were around today he would be aghast truly aghast that nothing changes. It’s all greed, that’s all it really is. Lets just sing and dance ourselves into the graves folks and as for our children don’t have any I’d say! I know my friend has nightmares about what his teenage children will face and how is he going to afford it all?
I also have another dear friend a maintenance apprentice working towards his ticket and says to me he would be more than happy to work for 10.00 dollars an hour if only the cost of everything would come down. As he sees it by the time he gets his ticket even at 35. an hour he wouldn’t be able to afford a blasted thing. I mention to him the story above and he concurs the new way to become wealthy its through greed and stupidity. Buy something one day for 250,000 spend some money on renovations and turn around and get someone to give you double that price. Meanwhile the homelessness just continues to grow because guess what there are no jobs at 100 dollars an hour?
Energy Gail Tverberg? There are so many variables at work and at the heart of it all is sin! Paul Warburg had it right didn’t he “false prosperity” and its roots is where? Ultimately, in the human heart.
The insanity of it all is just so well insane. I’d actually like to see interest rates go back to 18%. lol Everybody would be homeless then what? Go visit the grave of the one guy who understood it all really. Paul Warburg.
It is, “The love of money is the root of all evil.” It is not the money itself.
I had to look up Paul Warburg. He was an American Investment Banker, born in Germany in 1868. He favored a highly centralized banking system. In much modified form, this became the Federal Reserve System. He was a Member of the Board of Governors when it was first founded (1914-1916). He served as Vice Governor from (1916-1918).
There do seem to be a lot of greedy people, but I don’t think everyone is.
We know that a lot of animals are hierarchical in their social structure. Money is one of the things that allows such a hierarchy for humans.
But there are other ways as well. Fame might work for some. Being known for being knowledgeable might also work. Mother Theresa was known for something else.
Religions have tried to encourage other approaches besides greed.
@ Gail,
Yes of course the love of it.
Who and whatever Paul Warburg was that quote is true, perfectly true! One should read The Warburgs by Ron Chernow.
The Warburg book is excellent.
A thought.
$1M at 3% interest is $30K/year, deductible, so say $20K/year with tax deduction, or $1666/month. Hard to rent reasonable space for that, positive probability that with inflation one will make out.
It is becoming more expensive to live, still opportunities, hard to find time for everything. Today a balance in life is 80% profession, 20% family – assuming one does not sleep.
As for the house, if they go down, you are only out rent, sell at a loss, do bankruptcy, rinse and repeat. Not cynical, it is life. Look at housing costs since data tracked, life long enough and it never has been a losing bet even if one purchased at the top in 2008 or so, one still had to rent a roof. The hedge guys were buying at the bottom.
Dennis L.
It is hard for one generation to tell another generation what they should do. Things are very different now. Baby boomers in general came out well, when it came to available jobs and incomes. Their homes appreciated a lot.
People in professions like dentistry and in actuarial work often did well. That made a lot more choices available to us than people today have available.
Gail,
It is obvious I am sort of a realistic optimist. We are dealt a metaphorical hand of cards, it is the game we are given; someone always makes it.
Yes, it is hard now, it is the time we have to live, we don’t get a choice. They first guy going out the front door on Omaha Beach on D day didn’t get a real good deal, the goal of the day was to duck. Within limits, stress will improve your ability to deal with everyday life.
If today’s kids coming up have one huge disadvantage it is their self esteem has been raised too high, not only is the cost of living higher, but there is inflation in grades – I have seen it up close. But, look around carefully and there are some very exceptional individuals who could coast, get high grades but work like hell and learn. In the real world, they are the competition.
Tough times: I have related many times my parents began life in a tent, US Coast and Geodetic survey, it was what was available. When they moved home my grandmother lived with us, her husband had been killed on the railroad. They made it, one foot at a time.
We have to believe, we already know the worst news, we will die; every day is an opportunity.
Enough, thanks for your patience.
Dennis L.
@ Dennis L.
In Canada which is where I am interest is not deductible. Further if you read my comment you will see that I am talking about a home worth that kind of money and no real wood floors etc etc etc. I can’t imagine if the owner were to replace the laminate with wood how much would that add to the value? I’m sorry but for me it all just so wrong. The two of us even went for a drive through a new subdivision and the homes i just had to ask what do they all do to afford it. He laughed at me and said yep thats the question isn’t it! And they all come with suites to rent out of course which is the only way many of them can afford it including my friend. His income is only 70,000 a year?
But what I didn’t mention is of course his children in about 3 years will be wanting their own cars and such and with insurance for new drivers at 6000. a year lol the cost of an automobile is well? and so it goes.
If this Paul Warburg were around today he would be horrified truly horrified yes?
I disagree with nothing you say; it is the world in which we live , we weren’t asked when born, indeed most of us come out screaming. All we can do is deal with the cards we are dealt, someone is purchasing those homes, on average a good guess is most who purchase will have more at retirement than those who rent – at least it has been so historically.
It is harder, but it has been hard in the past; a very high house payment beats a lottery ticket that wins a position as first man off the boat on a certain beach. It has never been easy to make a life.
Thanks for the note, I write to understand myself better for the most part.
Dennis L.
Last week I visited my physician. We talked about the vitamin D already during the start of the pandemic last year. Now she told me that she has got some patients in a social care facility which are given vitamin D and that no serious case of Covid-19 was recorded among them.
Glad to hear that. I keep taking my vitamin D. I started taking some K2 as well, hoping it would help the calcium go where it is needed.
I take both– a lot of us are challenged on these.
But the data on Covid and D is not there.
(in late sage it may be harmful)
But take that D and K2!
UK is holding its decadal census today and everyone is eager to see how the society has changed, although we will not get the stats for a year. Changes in ethnicity and religion will be particularly interesting. British State Plc. currently admits about 700,000 per year, so it is a rapidly changing society. Religion is no longer being transmitted on an intergenerational basis since 1940s and I ticked ‘no religion’ myself. Many tick a religion on the census to indicate their perceived heritage rather than any belief, which skews the results.
> Less than half of Britons expected to tick ‘Christian’ in UK census
The “post-Christian era” in the UK will be cemented by data emerging from Sunday’s census which is expected to show further generational disengagement from organised religion, according to a leading academic.
Church of England data shows that average Sunday attendance in 2019 was 600,000 adults, or fewer than 1% of the population. A third of those attending church were aged 70 or over.
Figures from the 2018 British Social Attitudes (BSA) survey showed that 52% of the UK public said they did not belong to any religion, 38% identified as Christian, and 9% identified with other faiths.
“The census question, ‘What is your religion?’, implies everyone should have one… You end up with very different results.”
A survey from YouGov on behalf of Humanists UK, published this month, asked people the same question as the census, but then asked those who identified as Christian the reasons for their answer.
Almost six in 10 (59%) said it was because they had been christened, and 49% because they were brought up to think of themselves as Christian. More than a quarter (26%) said it was “because this is a Christian country”. Over half (51%) said they never attended a place of worship or did so less than once a year.
Only a third (34%) said they ticked Christian because they “believe in the teachings of Christianity”.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/mar/20/less-that-half-of-britons-expected-to-tick-christian-in-uk-census
You think the Christians have problems? The numbers for “Jedi” will probably plummet!
In the UK and most of Europe, the state has come in and provided a safety net for individuals. It almost serves as a religion. The state observes Christian holidays, perhaps more so than in the US.
In the US, the government provides less of a safety net. Church groups have play a bigger role in quite a few areas.
Many church groups sponsor hospitals and homes for the aged. These started years ago.
There are many grade schools and high schools sponsored by catholics and by some other religions. Minority children who graduate from these schools seem to do quite a bit better academically than those who go to public schools. (Of course, there is a small fee involved in sending the children to these schools, so there is some selection involved.)
There are a lot of colleges started by religious groups. I graduated from St. Olaf College. My parents met at St. Olaf. One of the buildings is named after one of my great uncles. I grew up not really knowing that there might be another school I might want to attend.
Quite a bit of work with respect to care for the homeless and those in need of food and clothing is done under church sponsored organizations. Admittedly, there is increasing governmental funding in recent years. There is also more government regulation.
The US census doesn’t ask a religion question, I am fairly sure.
They don’t. They used to, from 1850 to 1946, but were made to stop due to objections based on privacy (especially since answering the census questions is mandatory) and church / state separation:
https://www.pewforum.org/2010/01/26/a-brief-history-of-religion-and-the-u-s-census/
This is not in the article, but I vaguely recall that Christian Science was especially vocal in objecting to a “religion” question on the census.
OK, USA seems weird from a European perspective. We do not see it as a matter of the adoption by the state of religious functions but rather the retention of state functions by the churches. Thus the churches are reinforced by the pre-modern order of USA society.
We take the ‘welfare’ aspects of the state for granted. From this perspective it looks like the churches are compensating for failures of the state – and indeed education, health, care for the elderly and welfare can be seen as proper functions of the state, depending on how the state is understood.
So, it is more akin to ‘rights’ for us than ‘charity’. In UK we see the ‘charity’ angle as Victorian, Dickensian, and it comes across as sanctimonious and obnoxious. Society is not properly ordered when the well-being of citizens is ordered to the ‘virtue’ of the ‘self-satisfied’.
Europe and USA start off from different societal axioms and that alters the perceived character of the phenomena. What is perceived as ‘virtuous’ in one society can be seen as ‘mean’ and ‘vain’ in the other – and conversely what is a ‘right’ can be seen as state ‘theft’.
So, the ‘virtues’ of a professedly ‘Christian’ society like USA do not necessarily commend it to us – nor does our more ‘social’ approach to society necessarily commend to Americans. It is a matter of different ways of doing the same thing, and which is the ‘better’ is debatable.
But I take your point that those functions used to be performed by churches, in so far as they were performed, in Europe back in the 19th c. and they still are in USA – and that reinforces the churches in USA. I think that you are right about that. USA may have a ‘formal’ separation of state and church but Europe has a material separation.
On the other hand, most state schools in UK are nominally C of E but the religion is still not transmitted. RCC force the parents to attend weekly mass and to raise the kids in the sacraments, for the kids to go to the UK RCC schools, so they have more continuation through the generations – that element of ‘force’ is controversial here and the situation may legally change some day. C of E/ British State would never try that force here.
In the USA, there is a sort of “civil religion” which considers public prayers and religious-themed mottos (“In God We Trust”) not to violate church / state separation, even though these are generally Christian in character.It is a holdover from a time in which mainline Protestantism was considered the default. Of course atheists and the like are constantly challenging this. As I was growing up, the Supreme Court had already banned the public prayers that traditionally began the school day, but my grade school held them anyway. I doubt that they had any effect whatsoever on the religiosity of their listeners.
The number and variety of US religious groups is immense, and the fact that none of them are “established” as the official religion has made the religious market far more competitive than in the UK. The fundamentalist, evangelical, charismatic, and/or prosperity-oriented churches (or mega-churches) account for many of the most robust. They support a number of schools and colleges, as well as a home-schooling movement, not to mention their own musical and literary genres, and have become a major force within the Republican Party. US Catholics and Jews are also quite formidable, and maintain their own educational networks. They mostly support the Democratic Party, except on certain issues (abortion, Israel) where they are divided. “Nones” are growing in numbers but very diverse in their religious and political views, and anyway tend not to form large organizations. Mainline Protestants are declining / aging, and divided internally over issues like gay marriage, but still maintain a number of schools and colleges, and a certain amount of political clout.
Trump was a Presbyterian (mainline) who later described himself as non-denominational, and was supported especially by fundamentalists / evangelicals / charismatics etc (like Paula White, Kat Kerr, or his VP, Mike Pence). Biden is a Catholic (and only the second Catholic president, after Kennedy) who disagrees with the Church on abortion and other issues. Hillary Clinton is a Methodist who married Bill, a Southern Baptist. Obama joined the United Church of Christ as a young aspiring politician in Chicago, where a church of that denomination held considerable power within the black community, but distanced himself from it later due to the behavior of its pastor, Jeremiah Wright. Kamala Harris is a (black) Baptist like her father. George W. Bush converted to Methodism (from Episcopalianism) when he got married, and a decade later got “born again” with the help of Billy Graham. A lot of these affiliations seem to be lip-service, political opportunism, or at least suspicious convenience, but they do suggest which religious groupings are perceived as having clout, or at least respectability.
If some religion wants to start its own grade school, or university, it generally can, subject to the laws of the particular US state. They can also generally impose whatever religious requirements they please. An ongoing controversy is to what extent it is legal, or good public policy, to offer tax “vouchers” to parents who send their children to such schools (in effect allowing them to redirect funds that would have gone to the public schools, into religious coffers).
Yes, the US is rather weird as viewed through the “god is dead” European mind, while having our coffee black as the night, hot as hell and sweet like an angel. Never mind the sweet.
I guess most religious Europeans is having issues with identifying themselves in a community/group religious setting.
Preaching and sermon is just that, not part of some pseudo-guvmint organization impinging on their for all intents and purposes agnostic-individualistic lives.
Is god dead? Who cares.
🤔
St. Olaf is wonderful, sort of a competition with Carleton down the street. I have never made it to the Christmas program, but it is still going and seems very well attended.
Churches would seem to provide a commonality to their community as well as knowing fellow members, lack of anonymity, the lady’s aid gossips well, civil privacy violations ignored over coffee, no need for FB, etc.
In La Crosse, the Catholic schools were generally better than public, in my day a ruler across the knuckles was still common by a very stern but loving nun.
It was an easier way to live, simple set of rules that worked for most of the population and thus seemed to lead to a society which worked better for everyone. Housing was cheap on the north side, but high school was weak, Aquinas on the south side was a way to buy out of that problem at a pretty modest fee; school choice in the sixties. We weren’t Catholic, money would have been an issue, made do.
My experience with government programs is most of the money goes to those administering the programs. Government allows for more centralization, higher salaries as one goes up the pyramid, more meetings, more power point presentations, more meetings around a table set in a circle, everyone’s input is important, great agenda with all issues agreed to be further discussed at the next meeting.
Dennis L.
UK Announces Vaccine “Certificates”, Says They Are Not Vaccine Passports
The UK government Culture Secretary announced Thursday that “Covid-19 certification” is coming to enable people to attend sports events and go to theatre performances, but in the same breath denied that COVID passports are being introduced.
Appearing on Sky News, Oliver Dowden said that the government is trialling a system to ensure those who can prove they have taken a vaccine will be able to attend mass gatherings.
“We will be testing whether we can use Covid-19 certification to help facilitate the return of sports,” Dowden said, adding it will “help the return of the things that we love.”
Dowden asserted that the certificates “won’t be a vaccine passport”, yet defined them as “a way to facilitate proving” that people have had vaccines, in order to get “more people get into stadiums,” which he described as “vital not just for our sense of national well-being, but to the whole national economy.”
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/watch-uk-announces-vaccine-certificates-says-they-are-not-vaccine-passports
That is kind of scary to think about the success of a national economy that is based on the return of professional sports. I realize what they are not saying is that it is all dependent on advertising. Once the advertisers realize nobody has money to spend on new Nike gear, it all goes away.
Actually, I was under the impression that the UK economy has been, for a long time, supported almost entirely by nail parlours, take-away burger joints and diversity officers. And that disgusting Indian businessman who runs sweatshops to make insta-fashion sold online. And PPE speculators…..
They are probably only hinting at the reopening of sports venues to sucker more fools into getting injected – just as they did with the false promise of foreign holidays……