Is the stock market a sham for the middle class? Retail investors expected to pull out $475 billion in funds. Volatility index under pricing real risks.
The stock market is largely a source of entertainment or awe for most Americans instead of being a true source of wealth. In the United States roughly 42 percent of all financial wealth is aggregated with one percent of the population. One third of Americans have no savings at all so for this group, the [...]
Diving into the fiscal economic mess – Fiscal cliff a reckoning for decades of poor financial management and massive debt based spending.
The media is making it appear that the fiscal cliff is a sudden event. Like a countdown to a New Year’s party. Yet this cliff was as predictable more than a decade ago as we spent more than we took in as an economy. The challenge is real because our spending is so much more [...]
Deleveraging on good debt and ramping up on consumption debt – growth in auto loan debt, collection amounts, and revolving debt.
The grand US household deleveraging event continues as debt is paid off or more likely, wiped away via foreclosures and bankruptcies. What is hidden in the deleveraging trend is the growth of debt in certain spending categories. Keep in mind that not all debt is bad. For multiple decades the US had a cautious lending [...]
Young, educated, and deep in debt – College debt over 18 percent of all consumer debt. Half of college graduates under 25 are unemployed or working in a field where no degree is required.
I doubt anyone is opposed to education or advancing your knowledge in life. Who can oppose something so valuable? Now this lofty aspiration is great but becomes problematic especially when the cost of higher education has gotten so expensive. How expensive you ask? The fact that we have over $1 trillion in student loans outstanding [...]
Economic duplicity with low wage capitalism – Nearly half of those that lost their job between 2009 and 2011 are working in a lower wage position. The hard financial reset button.
All jobs are not created equal. It is unfortunate that last month the drop in the unemployment rate was largely driven by hundreds of thousands of Americans simply dropping out of the labor force. Not exactly a way to build the middle class but to many it gives the false impression that things are getting [...]
Healthcare jobs expand servicing many older Americans with little to no savings – Since the recession started top employment fields related to healthcare. Over 10 million Americans no longer in the labor force.
Get used to sluggish growth. Although the political season is in full force and every candidate is promising you unicorns and roads to utopia if you vote for them, the reality is we have some built in challenges that neither party can easily fix. The unemployment rate has trickled lower thanks to lower wage jobs [...]
Refinancing debt into prosperity – most mortgage activity for refinances with applications up 97 percent from last year and car sales are down by over 50 percent from 2001.
Shuffling papers around on your desk does not mean you are being productive but might give the appearance of activity. Refinancing debt in countries in an insolvent position may feel good for the moment, but ultimately the position is unsustainable. You buy yourself a window of opportunity. With the Federal Reserve pushing mortgage rates to [...]
Federal Reserve continues shadow bailout of banking industry – $947 billion of overpaid and low demand mortgage backed securities sit on the massive $2.8 trillion Fed balance sheet. The price of this hidden bailout will hit all Americans.
The Federal Reserve continues a secretive bailout of the banking system by purchasing more and more questionable mortgage backed securities. You would think that $1 trillion would catch the attention of the media but they seemed focus on other trivial items. The Fed balance sheet is still at record levels above $2.8 trillion to be [...]
The desert mirage of easy housing profits – Phoenix Arizona home prices on track for four consecutive years of year-over-year home price declines. 55 percent fall from peak and nominal home prices back to 2000 levels. What happens when investors dominate the market?
The foreclosure epidemic in states like Arizona and Nevada is breathtaking and incredibly disheartening. Prices have cratered much more quickly than the methodical rise up in the last decade. Home prices in Phoenix now sit precariously where they did in 2000 without adjusting for inflation. These desert communities largely built on a dream, fast construction, [...]
The financial avarice of the global banking system – U.S. banks insolvent to the tune of $3 trillion. FDIC pretends to have funds to support over $7 trillion in banking deposits.
Part of the big delusion in our banking system is the reality that debt has become a large source of money flowing through the economy. This is why housing made the perfect vessel for Wall Street and banking speculation. Banks create money by issuing loans and there is nothing larger to loan on than a [...]
