Investors are fleeing the markets and parking their money in U.S. Treasuries at effectively *negative* interest rates. Why? Because it's become clear that the markets are rigged. Whether you're talking about bond markets where worthless "mortgage-backed securities" that turn out to be backed only by liar loans are marketed as AAA-grade "just as good as Treasuries" bonds, or stock markets where computerized trading algorithms get special access to the markets on the part of the major brokerage houses to suck all the profits out of the market long before they get to you, the old rules seem to no longer apply.
But of course, there *are* rules nowadays. They’re just completely corrupt rules, like “You take without conscience or shame. If you see a blind man selling pencils on the street, steal the pencils. Steal his pennies. Steal his dog.” In short, our rulers view us as a nation of suckers, to be fleeced at will.
But the problem is, you can’t run an economy that way. Not efficiently, anyhow. What you end up with is a corrupt banana republic where people don’t even bother trying anymore because if they get ahead, the oligarchs will just find some new way to take everything away from them again anyhow, so why bother? Corruption on that scale corrodes everything in an economy. It just doesn’t work.
- Badtux the Non-corrupt Penguin
(thus why I’m not rich).
Things will have to get a hell of a lot worse before it has any effect on me, like George Carlin said, I don't have any stock in the outcome.
ReplyDeleteSaw it all coming, got ready for it, went boating today.
That's great. Do nothing because it at best only tangentially affects you. When it does blow up, and it will if it keeps going the same direction, what will you do about being collateral damage? You old enough that you expect to be dead before the brown hits the whirlies?
ReplyDeleteBBC, you might at least have the basic courtesy not to brag about your good fortune. Unless you are part of the infamous 1 percent, or unless you die in the next couple of years, you may just be surprised how much the collapse affects you when it arrives.
ReplyDeleteOr you may carry your self-satisfied smile to your grave many years from now. There's no way of knowing.
Either way, with an attitude like yours, no one will miss you when you're gone.
The actual sad thing is watching people who keep trying but can barely fit in around the fringes. There simply isn't enough work out there to keep us all employed. We can't all give massages, walk dogs, teach yoga and fix light switches for a living. There simply isn't enough demand.
ReplyDeleteb.t.w._ Here's to BBC getting a nice capsize and treading water instead of trolling. He can think about how nobody really deserves rescuing.