The horizon is not so far as we can see, but as far as we can imagine

The Fed’s Taper Decision

The Fed had finally decided to reduce purchases (from 85 billion a month to 75 billion.)  I will simply note that 10 billion from the Fed doesn’t matter all that much when other Central Banks (like the the Bank of Japan) are also doing the same thing (and Japan is talking about increasing such purchases) and when China is creating far more new money than the US.

China does have currency controls, but they are less and less effective, but most other countries do not.  It matters little if it is Japan or the US engaging in these policies, the money goes transnational.

I do not, thus, expect this to have much effect.  So long as developed nations banks are as a group flushing the markets with money, and so long as China does have a financial crisis, this economy can go on for many more years like this, especially as the various bubbles are being reinflated, in large part with leaking Chinese money.  Expect the stock market to continue to rise, with occasional selloffs, but generally in an upwards trend.  Expect housing prices in most markets to continue to rise as well.  Expect large corporations, especially financial corporations, to continue to make money.  Expect the rich to continue to get richer.

Don’t expect that to mean your personal economy will get any better, mind you.  Any improvements will be marginal.

 

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12 Comments

  1. Celsius 233

    Apparently 7% unemployment is the new metric. Oh wait, it’s actually 18% in real numbers.
    Just got notified of my 1.5% SS increase; I’d like Obama to shove it up his ass, but it’s so small he wouldn’t even feel it…

  2. Formerly T-Bear

    @ 233ºC

    My thoughts exactly, mine is so small it would not need a prophylactic, in fact, a prophylactic would cost more than what it covers. The banksters get most of that 1.5% for their alleged service fees.
    It is getting to be that regard for the Washington/Wall St.-10 Downing/City-Tel Aviv axis of evil is commensurate with the generosity on display – vanishingly small.

  3. someofparts

    Always with the bracing (and welcome) cold cup of coffee to jar me out of my corporate media induced stupor.

  4. Victor Debs

    Long live Rentism and Value Stripping! Oh late capitalism, your own internal contradictions mean that productive capital is no longer profitable. Yay! Free QE hugs!

    Seriously though, the point about China is instructive. This is a global problem of surplus capital absorption and so far the only solution has been massive money printing to goose asset prices. We’ve got a economy that’s basically a ponzi scheme stealing from the working class and the environment to blow bubbles in the capital markets.

  5. VietnamVet

    Somewhere decades ago in my mid-life crisis I recognized that home mortgages where set to extract the maximum payments from the owners. But in the second decade of the 21st century, we have time warped back to the Robber Baron era when working people’s pay is so low that one will ever get ahead. We owe our soul to the finance company store.

    PBS broadcast “Living Micro: Single Residents Embrace Tiny Apartments” about a young man living within 260 square feet in Vancouver BC. No doubt, claustrophobic warmth is better than an open air underpass for the young salaried single man. But, when does one see the reality about being screwed by the Elite and react.

  6. Taper? Ha. This is how they do nothing while being able to say they did something. This is what Obama calls “change”.” Nibble at the edges of the status quo and break your arm patting yourself on your own back.

  7. Celsius 233

    Yeah, but the interest rates are still zero or minus zero for the galoots! WTF?
    We have savings (?) maybe; but why? It pays a pittance, not worth the risk of ones money out of hand!
    Withdraw everything (unless you’re in a credit union) and let the banks self sustain.
    Fuck the whole financial construct; get out and be free.
    Dump your stupid, self destructive credit cards.
    Total economic boycott. There will be nothing left for the capitalists to plunder.
    But, it must be total or it won’t work.

  8. Celsius 233

    ^ Sorry, I had a dream…

  9. Formerly T-Bear

    @ 233ºC

    To live is to dream, dream on, it may become true (or true enough).

    Once there was a line concerning a budding burger empire – 1.3 millions sold, only 6 eaten. Wonder what the largest bank in the world with 3.4 Trillions in assets would look like with only 1000 customers.

    Boycotts work, look at the zionists rave, rant and rail against the BDS assembled against their evil doings against the Palestinians, they’re trying to make free speech illegal in the US, the slime.

    To cover the topic, tell me again how effective is a 10 Billion decrease in debt creation compared to a 17 Trillion economy? Something like a dribble of piss in the Pacific ocean?

  10. Celsius 233

    @ Formerly T-Bear
    December 20, 2013
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    Thanks for that (To live is to dream, dream on, it may become true (or true enough).
    And actually, I’m not sorry at all. I’ll continue dreaming (dreams of human empowerment) till the day I die.
    I just can’t wrap my mind around the apathy, the violence (police against citizens)(our military against the world with impunity), the lies, the corruption (of the government), the lies uttered from the mouth of the “president”, the apathy (again), and the certainty of our impending enslavement.
    I need a vision of a future that has hope and possibilities. Not one of wanton avarice and greed.
    It’s beyond me how a population can go on under the present circumstances; I mean, fuck, are we that bloody blind, powerless, impotent, stupid, ignorant, nonsensitive, and just, what?
    I guess we are all of the above; no mercy, just fucking die!

  11. David Kowalski

    Celsius 233, I read recently that the big banks are not only going to stop paying interest but will soon be charging service fees on savings. Yes, save $10,000 (for example) and it will literally be worth less and less as long as you keep it in the bank.

  12. Celsius 233

    @ David Kowalski
    December 26, 2013
    Celsius 233, I read recently that the big banks are not only going to stop paying interest but will soon be charging service fees on savings. Yes, save $10,000 (for example) and it will literally be worth less and less as long as you keep it in the bank.
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    Unfortunately, that would not surprise me in the least. I quit banks decades ago when I switched to a credit union.
    It was like going from living in a black and white world to full color. The difference was not insignificant…

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