The statistics offered by the government and the FED are not to be trusted. We’ve long known that the Consumer Price Index (CPI) is manipulated in ways that are intended to mask the increases in the true cost of living for the average American. The same is true of the unemployment numbers. Amidst all the happy talk of economic recovery, wages (in real terms) continue to decline and debts continue to mount up. Charles Hugh Smith in his recent post, What If We’re in a Depression But Don’t Know It?, provides some eye-opening charts and convincing narrative that makes it plain that economic depression is the current reality for all but the top 5%.
But it’s not only the U.S. that is in trouble, the depression is worldwide. The financial crisis of 2007-2008 was only the beginning of what some call “the great unraveling” There are any number of commentators that provide further arguments on that score, including Thom Hartmann (The Crash of 2016) and Gerald Celente.
But no one besides myself is pointing out the underlying cause of all these problems. It is the monopolization of credit by a banking cartel, in collusion with top government officials, that creates money based on interest-bearing debt, a formula that centralizes power and concentrates wealth in the hands of what Hartmann calls economic royalists.
By their control of the monetary machinery they are able to lavishly fund weapons, war, and the global corporatocracy, while making money scarce for everyone else. Further, this system is not sustainable because the interest burden causes debts to grow continually with the passage of time. Central governments have assumed the role of “borrower of last resort,” to keep the money supply pumped up and the banks from failing. This cancer has metastasized and the end is near. –t.h.g.
Beyond Money 
Dear Tom;
Great Post – I do look forward to being in your presence once
again. You are coming closer to what I proposed at our first meeting.
– Debt – is a non reality enslavement tool –
In Lak’ech Love&Peace David
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“but no one other than myself” …
Do you know Prof Steve Keen?
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Thanks, Pug, for that link to Steve Keen’s very interesting presentation. Yes, I know him and have a high regard for his work. What strikes me about his presentation is that, while he clearly shows the futility of the Troika’s policy against Greece and other indebted countries, he seems to hold fast to the conventional economists’ belief in perpetual economic growth and the appropriateness of interest (usury) as part of the monetary system.
Back in 2011, at a conference in which Steve and I were both presenters, he presented a simulation that he said showed that a system that creates money based on interest-bearing debt could reach an equilibrium. I later sent him a letter of rebuttal in which I argued that his simulation made some unrealistic assumptions, one of which was that banks spend all of their interest income back into the economy. They don’t; most of it is added it to bank capital which is used as a basis for further expanding their lending.
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Well, you obviously seem to know him and his work better than I do, but my takeaway form his work has always been the ignored primacy of private debt in the boom-bust cycle, so I’m surprised to hear that he holds a conventional view on the role of debt in general. Thanks for your response!
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