Thread: The strongest economy in the world

As Peter Schiff said in one of his earlier interviews, -- the US financial system is just one big Ponzi scheme.

Old AIG CEO Hank Greenberg has been railing at his old firm's mgmt for months.
Still, $163 mil -- it's money for comp to salesmen innit? Are the CEO and upper mgmt getting any of it? AIG is global, so how much does this cash come to per worker?
I heard that retired US public workers are making more on their pensions than when they were working: CA police chief $200G a year, a train conductor $100 and some odd grand. And who pays for that? All of it from the taxpayer as a company who would elsewise pay half is not in the equation. See Kavuto on FOX news.

Will the Fed buy US Treasuries bills? Can someone with knowledge on this explain it to me. Thanks.

Will the Fed go long?

The Fed won't cut short-term rates at its next meeting, but look for long-term rates to drop if the central bank announces plans to buy Treasurys.


By Chris Isidore, CNNMoney.com senior writer
Last Updated: March 16, 2009
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The Chinese are getting nervous about buying U.S. Treasurys. Does that mean it's time for the Federal Reserve to start buying long-term notes?

The answer could come as soon as Wednesday, when the U.S. central bank concludes a two-day meeting. The Fed has said in its last couple of statements that it was prepared to buy long-term Treasurys as a way to try to further help the economy. But so far, it hasn't given any details about how much it would buy, or when it would start doing so.

The meeting comes in the wake of Friday's comments from Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, who expressed concern that the more than $700 billion in Treasury debt his country holds is at risk of seeing its value fall due to rising budget deficits here.

"We have lent a massive amount of capital to the United States, and of course we are concerned about the security of our assets," said Wen at his annual news conference on Friday. "To speak truthfully, I do indeed have some worries."

Link: Will the Fed go long? - Mar. 16, 2009

^ They're gonna start printing more money.

Here are 3 segments of the same interview by Jim Rogers on March 3, 2009.

This is VERY GOOD. The UK is discussed very heavily. (I put this here, because I couldn't find UK economy thread in Issues main page.) But the US is also discussed a lot. A lot of history is discussed in how it relates to the problems of today.

Part 1:


Part 2:


Part 3:

^^Part 3 is missing. Its part 1.

But very interesting. The UK is now printing money to try to buy its way out of financial meltdown. 75 Billion Pounds in this first run. Thats got to devalue the British Pound, even though its a relatively small amount in the bigger scheme of things. And Britain holds a lot of $USs in reserve, so when the $US devalues its really going to hit UK very hard.

Thailand may have an ace up its sleeve when hyperinflation hits the world.
When paper money loses its value against real goods and services, real goods and services (and especially food) are the only things that maintain value.

When the UK prints money....

These poll numbers below say a lot. They do NOT say what will happen in the future. But these numbers do reflect that many people are worried. And worried people that are spooked do not spend. They save money; the hoard money. In an economy so dependent on consumer spending, this will continue the downtown. It's a circular cause and effect:

CNN poll: Americans fear a new Great Depression
CNN poll reveals a growing number of Americans fear the recession could turn into another Great Depression.

By Paul Steinhauser, CNN
March 17, 2009

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The number of Americans who think another Great Depression will occur within the next year is on the rise, a poll released Tuesday shows.

Forty-five percent of people questioned in a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey said another depression is likely.

"Will the Great Recession turn into another Great Depression? A growing number of Americans think it might," said CNN Polling Director Keating Holland. "Last December, 38% said a depression like the one the U.S. experienced in the 1930s was likely in the next year. Now that number is up 7 points."

Link & Entire: Poll: More Americans fear a return of the Great Depression - Mar. 17, 2009

^ Bladdy heck, MM, these TV polls are for sh*t. CSNBC had BO way down in the ratings (right, y'all said the right-wingers sabotaged the poll). CBS showed their BO poll today and it was 60-some-odd % in his favour. I'd only go with Rasmussen and Pew.

Please watch this short video of Gerald Celente. It's very recent. He's saying it will be 9 months from today (March 18, 2009) that the US will enter the great Depression of all time. He's putting a timetable on it. Comments and opinions?

^ Having your butt parked in Nakhon Nowhere is starting to sound like the safest place to be for the foreseeable future...

USA can fed itself, no problem. So there wont be any starvation and no need for food riots.

Re shelter: a lot more people are going to be forced out onto the streets as unemployment rises. But USA has a surplus of housing too. Just the banks will have them locked up and unoccupied while they fall apart and get vandalized.

There's no reason why a govt sponsored rental scheme couldn't provide cheap housing to the unemployed by utilizing the housing surplus currently owned by the banks. I know these kinds of projects can end up as bureaucratic nightmares, but there is no reason why it couldn't be done if there is a will to make it work.
The alternative is bigger tent cities and families living in cars.

Originally Posted by Muadib

Having your butt parked in Nakhon Nowhere is starting to sound like the safest place to be for the foreseeable future...

Theres no hiding place from all this. Everyone has to bend over and take the rough end of a pineapple I'm afraid.

Originally Posted by Panda

USA can fed itself, no problem.

So the FED is buying treasuries and the governmint is creating record amounts of treasuries.

Ponzi scheme, no?

^ Yes, just like Social Security...

In my home state employment is usually better than the rest of the country but the State Dept. of Labor is forecasting 10% unemployment (U3) before the end of the year. It will get interesting, IMO.

Financial fears grow

More consumers are just a paycheck or two away from ruin

By Jennifer Waters, MarketWatch
Last update: 7:03 p.m. EDT March 18, 2009

CHICAGO (MarketWatch) -- Americans are in a collective state of financial depression as many admit they could only cover their bills for two months at most if they found themselves suddenly jobless, a nightmare more and more worry may come true.

The results of a bevy of surveys found a growing number of consumers are only a couple paychecks away from a household collapse even as many scramble to shore up savings. Rainy-day funds appear to be a distant memory as households burn cash to cover food and energy bills as well as mortgage and car payments.

Link: http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/Fears-grow-more-consumers-just/story.aspx?guid={504D22FD-CC66-4FC1-BF8D-2F199C2AD042}

I was watching the show with the Liddy hearing this night, it really is quite bad and his decision (I am sure correct seen from an AIG point of view) to go on with the bonus payments jeopardises all future rescue packets like the ones coming up to the Auto industry, the American taxpayers really have had enough.

At the same time the outrage and AIG's subsequent about turn, now asking the recipients to pay back the bonuses will according to Liddy highly likely result in the necessary people that is winding down the enormous risk's 1,6 trillion Dollars will leave AIG posing, again according to Liddy, a very big risk of a collapse/ bankruptcy of AIG.

Apparently the risks is highly complex and must be managed in detail every single day and can in Liddys view really only be done by the very same people that created the "risk's" in the first place.
Especially this point seemed hard to grasp for the Sen's grilling Liddy.

Liddy is really in a very unenviable situation having agreed after pressure from the very same Senate/Us treasury to come in (September 2008) and try to rescue AIG for the payment of 1 dollar a year, he is of cause a cool head you must be to occupy a position like he does, but I would have stood up and walked out and said, OK you take care of this yourself without me, especially after one of the Sen's very personal attack making it sound like it was all Liddys fault in the first place.

Originally Posted by Spin

Fed announces to expand its balance sheet and an array of other madness.

Monetizing the debt. They are basically talking about printing an extra 1.15 trillion ON TOP of what they had already printed. (1 trillion ish)

If anybody was in any doubt, let me tell you now, AMERICA IS FUCKED.

Originally Posted by Milkman

Will the Fed buy US Treasuries bills?

Yes they just announced they will buy 300 billion $.

Spin, this seems odd, to me. Here is an article about my question and your answer:

Fed to pump another $1 trillion into U.S. economy


By Edmund L. Andrews
Published: March 18, 2009


WASHINGTON: The Federal Reserve sharply stepped up its efforts to bolster the economy on Wednesday, announcing that it would pump an extra $1 trillion into the financial system by purchasing Treasury bonds and mortgage securities.

Having already reduced the key interest rate it controls nearly to zero, the central bank has increasingly turned to alternatives like buying securities as a way of getting more dollars into the economy, a tactic that amounts to creating vast new sums of money out of thin air. But the moves on Wednesday were its biggest yet, almost doubling all of the Fed's measures in the last year.

The action makes the Fed a buyer of long-term government bonds rather than the short-term debt that it typically buys and sells to help control the money supply.

Link & Entire: Fed to pump another $1 trillion into U.S. economy - International Herald Tribune

It's cut and run that's the Art like the AIG touts who pissed off with taxpayers loot over the pass

Time for a posse

Amazing how moral USA is over pregnant Palins a couple of muslim fanatics or an abortion but bankers seem immune