Debt Rattle Bastille Day 2019

 

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  • #48543

    Salvador Dali The hand 1930   • Where the American Dream Goes to Die: House Prices, Rents, and Incomes (WS) • Why Does The Media Only Care About
    [See the full post at: Debt Rattle Bastille Day 2019]

    #48544
    teri
    Participant

    RE: rents and house prices.

    The graphs in that article only go to 2017, but we know home prices keep going up, new starts are down, rents are unaffordable, etc. continuing to the present day.

    Trump imposed lumber tariffs on Canada in 2017, which raised the price of housing at a time when people were already facing affordability problems. US lumber prices went up at the same time, because that’s what capitalism does: if the competition raises prices, it’s just an opportunity to raise your own prices to match and make a bundle.

    Those tariffs are still in place. The Trump tariffs in general are equivalent to one of the biggest tax increases in decades on the average wage-earner.

    And now Trump wants the Fed to lower interest rates and talks about deliberately weakening the dollar. This is called “unfair currency manipulation” when China does it to their currency, and the US – including Trump – insists that China must be punished for doing so, for those keeping track at home.

    Michael Hudson has a great new article out about this topic. The article is in the form of an interview transcript. it’s fairly dense, but really worth the reading, which is always true of Hudson’s work. I thought some of you might be interested in it.

    De-Dollarizing the American Financial Empire

    #48545
    V. Arnold
    Participant

    The Hand:
    Spewing out of the left arm, of the god-like figure sitting on a cello scroll. A woman behind…
    I have no idea; but what a sight…

    #48546
    Tree Frog
    Participant

    I’m looking for a better was to express culpability….

    You often direct your ire at the Fed. Since the Fed is a tool of the ruling class would it not be better to refer to the “bubble-blowing ruling class” directly rather than its agent?

    #48548
    zerosum
    Participant

    • Suspected Leaker of UK Ambassador Cables Identified (R.)

    Hahahahah The only time that they found someone that did bad.
    Oppps! I forgot about all the bad things that the russians did (with no proof)

    #48549

    An email I received yesterday that stopped me in my tracks and left me speechless:

    “I donated $50 today to you. While it’s not much, it’s a lot for me.

    You deserve it. Not so much the money – it helps, it buys stuff – but the appreciation, the recognition, the sharing of the commitment to what’s fine and wonderful about humans.

    A while back, I asked myself “if you were to devise the successor life-form to humans, what traits of humans would you carry forward?”

    Took a long time to decide, but top-of-list was “beauty”.

    The appreciation of beauty. The ethos, the standards that underlie the ability to answer “what is beautiful?”.

    What I like most about TAE is the pursuit of the beautiful, of the wondrous, and the ID of the antithesis, the ugly and small.

    Live long and prosper. Take comfort in the appreciation you’ve earned.”

    What do you say to that?

    #48550
    zerosum
    Participant

    What do you say to that?
    I agree.
    I wish my pension was bigger and my expenses smaller.

    • Why Does The Media Only Care About Dead Migrant Children Under Trump? Ryan)

    In my world
    (-2) + (-2) = -4
    —-

    #48553
    anticlimactic
    Participant

    OIL TANKER

    I am not sure if the British know how sanctions work.

    The EU may have sanctions about oil to Syria, because they are evil and want to inflict as much suffering as possible [and to keep the refugees flowing!], but this simply means EU companies can not supply oil to Syria – it does NOT mean any EU country can seize ANY foreign owned tanker.

    I doubt if the Spanish are happy that this piracy took place in their waters.

    As I have suggested before – If the UK leaves the EU with a ‘no-deal’ then they will be at the mercy of every country in the world when it comes to trade. They will have to stop their belligerent nature or be financially annihilated!

    #48554
    Maxwell Quest
    Participant

    What do you say to that? – Ilargi

    Many years ago, I had the opportunity to teach a few classes via WebEx, using only audio and PowerPoint slides. “This is what it must feel like to be a radio personality”, I thought, speaking into the void without any visual feedback, and wondering if my message was falling on deaf ears. Screw this, and give me back a classroom where I can see everyone’s face!

    Based on that wonderfully written email, I think you can safely say that many of your readers are “getting it”, and I dare say they occupy the higher functioning side of the bell curve where quality supersedes quantity. This is the sort of feedback, like the spontaneous hug from a child, that makes it all worth it.

    #48555
    V. Arnold
    Participant

    What do you say to that?

    Well and rightfully said…
    Keep on trucking Ilargi; keep on trucking…

    #48569
    straightwalker
    Participant

    Beauty integrates the unique and the universal, our most disparate selves. That is why we both relax and wake up in its presence. It demonstrates a way forward: there is nothing we do that cannot be done more beautifully. To appreciate beauty and to strive toward it is a sure guide through life’s wild pantheon of choices.

    I wrote the above after many years of pondering Francis Bacon’s observation, “There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion.” I loved that quote, used it as an epigram in one of my books, but I didn’t understand it until my son and I built a wooden dinghy to gorgeous plans by Iain Oughtred. When I noticed my screw ups and the various choices I’d made during the building, I realized that it was the uniqueness (the strangeness) married to the universal curves that made the boat beautiful.

    In my opinion, this understanding of beauty scales to any media or event or endeavor.

    Thanks so much for The Automatic Earth. I read it every day.
    John Moncure Wetterau

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