Tag Archives: AfD

Jan 9 2022

Epic, Jeff Perrine 3 Minute Remarks to Lincoln, California, School Board Go Viral


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on January 8, 2022 | Sundance | 181 Comments

Jeff Perrine is a California dad who has had enough.  A December confrontation with the Lincoln, California, school board is going viral on Twitter because his words speak for so many.   Jeff Perrine Twitter HERE.   Jeff Perrine YouTube HERE.

Only has 294 views on YouTube, but LOL that won’t last long.  There are a few salty words amid the speech.  As noted by Mr. Perrine: “I give an extemporaneous impromptu talk at the local School Board meeting in Lincoln CA Dec. 21st 2021. About the mask mandate and other things, they want to mandate.”  ENJOY:

Another viewpoint showing the faces of the board members.

https://twitter.com/huwhitememes/status/1478983048091873280?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1478983048091873280%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Ftheconservativetreehouse.com%2Fblog%2F2022%2F01%2F08%2Fepic-jeff-perrine-3-minute-remarks-to-lincoln-california-school-board-go-viral%2F
Jan 9 2022

Brilliant, Neil Oliver Goes There


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on January 8, 2022 | Sundance | 235 Comments

Neil Oliver goes there, directly to the epicenter of “build back better.”   In this monologue not only does Oliver highlight the connective tissue and motives of the elite, but he also references their words to point out the bigger leftist agenda at work.  WATCH:

Point One – The “Build Back Better” agenda (in every nation) was never about anything except radical climate change legislation.  Once you accept that baseline, things start to become much clearer.

Point Two – The “Build Back Better” phrase came from the World Economic Forum and was promoted by a multitude of international leaders and left-wing organizations.   That reality then brings up the most important point.  To get to “building back better”, you first need to destroy something.  That thing they needed to destroy was the global economic dependency on carbon-based fuel supplies (oil, gas, coal, etc.).

Point Three – In order to destroy the ‘something of that scale’, the energy program for the entire world, something massive is needed to fundamentally change the entire world approach toward energy production.  Something is needed to create the crisis that provides the origin for the process to initiate.

Point Four – That triggering mechanism was/is SARS-CoV-2, or what we now call COVID-19 and all variants therein.

There you have it.  That’s the summary soup to nuts explanation of why a virus was created, and the subsequent panic pushing to create social structures that would facilitate the global acceptance of an entire new economic system that would be designed around saving the planet.

Through the prism of that motive, all irreconcilable panic-selling from government entities starts to make sense.

You don’t have to be a true believer at the top of the climate change pyramid to see the massive financial opportunities created by an agenda to structurally change the entire foundation of energy use on a global scale.

Factually, I would be surprised if the biggest people within Klaus Schwab’s WEF believed in anything even resembling climate change.  However, they would see the opportunity for a massive shift in global wealth, and with that comes a myriad of mechanisms and more opportunities to control it.

As I have repeated on these pages for a decade, everything is downstream from the economics of everything.  The love of money and power is at the root of all evil.

Fascism was traditionally defined as an authoritarian government working hand-in-glove with corporations to achieve objectives. A centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, using severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition.

That system of government didn’t work in the long-term, because the underlying principles of free people reject government authoritarianism.  Fascist governments collapsed, and the corporate beneficiaries were nulled and scorned for participating.  Then, along came a new approach to achieve the same objective.

The World Economic Forum (WEF) was created to use the same fundamental associations of government and corporations.  Only this time it was the multinational corporations who organized to tell the government(s) what to do.  The WEF was organized for multinational corporations to assemble and tell the various governments how to cooperate with them, in order to be rewarded by them.   Corporatism was/is the outcome.  The government now doing what the multinationals tell them to do, and in return the multinationals install the compliant politicians

Fascism, the cooperation between government and corporations, is still the underlying premise; the World Economic Forum simply flipped the internal dynamic putting the corporations in charge of handing out the instructions.

What results is a slightly modified definition of fascism:

…A massive multinational corporate conglomerate; telling a centralized autocratic government leader what to do; and using severe economic and social regimentation as a control mechanism; combined with forcible suppression of opposition by both the corporations and government.

Doesn’t that define our current reality, especially in the era of COVID?

The instructions from the multinationals to government would be called “Build Back Better”.

The triggering mechanism to create the crisis (BBB is designed to solve), is called SARS-CoV-2.

The program to control backlash and ensure sheeple compliance from various populations would be called “a vaccine.”

Driving fear of the Rona would be needed and disproportionate to the risk itself.   This keeps backlash in line (lockdowns, regulations etc).  If any opposition to the agenda begins to mount, the same people pushing the originating narrative then create and push a variant.  The variant, real or imagined, is then pushed forward in order to get compliance (acceptance of the BBB objective) back on track.

In my opinion, structurally changing the global economy around the threat of climate change is what this entire Coronavirus mess is all about.  They needed the virus to trigger the crisis.  The crisis then creates the roadmap to rebuilding all society -on a global level- away from fossil fuels.

Put another way: the motive behind the origin of the Coronavirus is climate change.

Jan 9 2022

Things to Look For…


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on January 8, 2022 | Sundance | 524 Comments

Things that seem disconnected, but ain’t.

(1) A shortage of processed potatoes (frozen specifically).

And/Or a shortage of the ancillary products that are derivates of, or normally include, potatoes.

(2) A larger than usual footprint of turkey in the supermarket (last line of protein).

(3) A noticeable increase in the price of citrus products.

(4) A sparse distribution of foodstuffs that rely on flavorings.

(5) The absence of non-seasonal products.

(6) Small to little price difference on the organic comparable (diff supply chain)

(7) Unusual country of origin for fresh product type.

(8) Absence of large container products

(9) Shortage of any ordinary but specific grain derivative item (ex. wheat crackers)

(10) Big brand shortage.

(11) Shortage of wet pet foods

(12) Shortage of complex blended products with multiple ingredients (soups etc)

(13) A consistent shortage of milk products and/or ancillaries.

These notes above are all precursors that show significant stress in the supply chain.

At first, each retail operation will show varying degrees of the supply chain stress according to their size, purchasing power, and/or private manufacturing, transportation and distribution capacity.

Remember, the dairy farmers in 2020 dumping their milk because the commercial side of milk demand (schools, restaurants, bag milk purchasers) was forcibly locked down?   Plastic jugs were in short supply, and the processing side of the equation has a limited amount of operational capacity.

Potato farmers and fresh food suppliers were also told to dump, blade or plough-over their crops due to lack of commercial side demand.  These issues have longer term consequences than many would understand.  These are fresh crops, replenishment crops, which require time before harvest and production.

The retail consumer supply chain for manufactured and processed food products includes bulk storage to compensate for seasonality. As Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue noted in 2020, “There are over 800 commercial and public warehouses in the continental 48 states that store frozen products.”

Here is a snapshot of the food we had in storage at the end of February 2020: over 302 million pounds of frozen butter; 1.36 billion pounds of frozen cheese; 925 million pounds of frozen chicken; over 1 billion pounds of frozen fruit; nearly 2.04 billion pounds of frozen vegetables; 491 million pounds of frozen beef; and nearly 662 million pounds of frozen pork.

This bulk food storage is how the total U.S. consumer food supply ensures consistent availability even with weather impacts.  As a nation, we essentially stay one harvest ahead of demand by storing it and smoothing out any peak/valley shortfalls. There are a total of 175,642 commercial facilities involved in this supply chain across the country

The stored food supply is the originating resource for food manufacturers who process the ingredients into a variety of branded food products and distribute to your local supermarket. That bulk stored food, and the subsequent supply chain, is entirely separate from the fresh food supply chain used by restaurants, hotels, cafeterias etc.

Look carefully at the graphic.  See the fork in the supply chain that separates “food at home (40%)” from “food away from home (60%)”?

Food ‘outside the home’ includes restaurants, fast food locales, schools, corporate cafeterias, university lunchrooms, manufacturing cafeterias, hotels, food trucks, park and amusement food sellers and many more. Many of those venues are not thought about when people evaluate the overall U.S. food delivery system; however, this network was approximately 60 percent of all food consumption on a daily basis.

The ‘food away from home‘ sector has its own supply chain. Very few restaurants and venues (cited above) purchase food products from retail grocery outlets. As a result of the coronavirus mitigation effort, the ‘food away from home’ sector was reduced by 75% of daily food delivery operations. However, people still needed to eat. That meant retail food outlets, grocers, saw sales increases of 25 to 50 percent, depending on the area.

Covid regulations destroyed this complex supply chain in 2020.  It takes time to recover because the replenishment is based on harvest cycles.  This stuff must be grown.

When the food at home sector was forced to take on the majority of food delivery, they immediately hit processing constraints.  The processing side of the supply chain to funnel food into suppliers for the grocery store has “x” amount of capacity.  That system cannot (not feasible) and did not expand to meet the 20 to 50% increase in demand.

Think about potatoes.  A potato farmer sells into one of the two paths “food at home” (retail stores, or a processing supplier) or “food away from home” (commercial food or commercial food processors).   Other than bulk raw potatoes, the harvest goes into: (1) processing or (2) storage.

(1a) processing for retail sales (40%), ex. Ore Ida frozen potatoes, canning, or any of the other thousand retail products that use potatoes, whole or mashed.

(1b) processing for commercial sales (60%), ex. McDonalds french fries, or any of the thousand restaurant, lunchroom and cafeteria needs that use potatoes, whole or mashed.

♦ Processing – When 1b was shut down in 2020, 1a quickly reached maximum retail processing capacity.  Massive multi-million machines and food processing systems have a capacity. The supplies they use also have a capacity: plastic bags, cardboard, trays, bowls, etc.  The 1a processing system can only generate “X” amount of retail product at maximum capacity.

The remaining 1b commercial product was shut down.  A massive percentage of 1b (commercial) potatoes have nowhere to go, except waste.

♦ Storage – Each processor in 1a stores product (deep cold or frozen storage) for 365-day processing and distribution.   Those storage facilities have a limited amount of capacity.   The 1b customers need fresh product for the majority of their outlets. Ergo storing for 1b customers who might eventually be allowed to open later only works for a short period of time.  The fresh potato sales missed by 1b outlets = the 1b discard by potato farmers.

When you restart 1b suddenly the 1b short-term (fresh) storage product is quickly depleted.  Refilling that 2020 storage is dependent on a new 2021 harvest, which simultaneously has a greater immediate demand because the supply chain on the processing side was boxcar’d (over capacity) and then reset to a higher capacity playing catchup.

The amount missing from 2021 storage, because it was used instead of saved, is essentially equal to the amount that was wasted in 2020.

Now you end 2021 will less reserves because storage is depleted, because a greater percentage of the current harvest was immediately used.  You enter into the beginning of 2022 (winter) in a race to try and spread out the stored potatoes as you cross your fingers and race against the clock for the next harvest before running out.

You probably noticed, but there’s another motive to keep people (employees) away from large industrial cafeterias and even students from school lunchrooms.   The total food supply chain needs time, and harvests, to catch up.

In the example above you can replace *potato* with just about any row crop or retail/commercial food commodity like milk.

The reason I list potato as the #1 precursor is because every food outlet sells a potato in some form.  Every supermarket and every single restaurant (fancy or fast food) sells some form of potato.   Potatoes are demanded by every single food outlet; therefore, a shortage of potatoes is the first noticeable issue.

The 2020 demand disruption problem now becomes a 2021/2022 supply chain problem on both the fresh and processing side (depleted inventories), with each vector now competing for the same raw material: wheat, soybeans, grains, beans and stored row crops.

Making matters worse, the protein suppliers also need grain as feed for cattle, pigs, cows, chickens, etc.

[Note: who gets the short straw? The pet food manufacturers]

That’s the nub of the background supply chain issue in the food sector.   Additionally, recovery is not a single-issue problem.

The recovery price and shortages relate to everything from current oil and gas prices to diesel engine oil prices, to fertilizer and weed killer costs, to plastic costs and petroleum packing shortages (Styrofoam especially), to cardboard and sustainable packaging costs, to energy costs and transportation/delivery costs.   All along this complex supply chain there’s also workers and higher payroll costs.

Thus, we get the double-edged sword of higher prices (inflation) and simultaneous shortages.

Here’s what you can do to offset shortages (while possible):

(1) Buy the generic or store brand equivalent (sub-set inside retail supply chain)

(2) Purchase the organic version (another sub-set inside retail supply chain)

(3) Purchase the powered/dehydrated version (potatoes, milk, etc) and experiment (jazz it up).

Each retail operation, or chain of stores, will show varying degrees of the supply chain stress according to their size, purchasing power, and/or private manufacturing, transportation and distribution capacity.

This is where field to fork supplier relationships can make a big difference.  However, every outlet regardless of their operational excellence, is going to have significant shortages in their inventory.   It’s an unavoidable outcome of the previous chaos.

On average the retail shortages will last for about the same time as one full harvest schedule (4 to 6 months) depending on the commodity.   By September of 2022 the sector should be relatively recovered, depending on how government responds when people get seriously stressed in a few weeks.

The short-term prices will likely go up again, another 10, 20 up to 50% depending on item.  Those prices will eventually level off, but it’s doubtful they will be able to come back down until supply and demand find some equilibrium again, if ever.  Right now, that’s too far off to even fathom.

Jan 8 2022

1976 Vaccine Mandate Disaster


Armstrong Economics Blog/Vaccine Re-Posted Jan 8, 2022 by Martin Armstrong

https://youtube.com/watch?v=_NELRAz2Xqo%3Ffeature%3Doembed%26wmode%3Dopaque

This is why vaccine MANDATES are simply unconstitutional and a violation of human rights. We are not all the same.

Jan 8 2022

Minnesota Trucking Company CEO Warns About What Vaccine Mandate Will Do to Economy


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on January 7, 2022 | sundance | 110 Comments

Here’s a solid reference point for just one of the multitude of aspects related to the mandatory COVID vaccine and overall COVID mitigation rules that will come together to present an unavoidable outcome within the supply chain.

As CEO Eric Lawrence notes, even without the vaccine mandate, the testing mandate itself becomes an issue.  How and where exactly are truckers supposed to get these weekly, and depending on state, perhaps daily, Covid-19 tests.   How are they expected to modify their cross country routes, to avoid running afoul of the law, without having any idea where this testing is supposed to take place?

Follow the implementation of all these mandate tentacles across multiple industries & sectors, and what you end up with is a merging of unworkable nonsense into a logistical and supply chain mess.   For the U.S. economy, a SNAFU of that significance only ends with one result.

Jan 8 2022

Antifa Sleeper Cell Terrorist Arrested in Pinellas County, Florida, with Homemade Bombs and Weapons on January 6th


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on January 7, 2022 | sundance | 197 Comments

A 22-year-old man identified as a member of Antifa was arrested in Pinellas County, Florida, after he was caught with an explosive device near the location of a protest at the Pinellas County courthouse.   Something spooked the suspect who was caught running from the scene according to the sheriff’s office.

The local media is trying to avoid noting that Garrett James Smith previously travelled to Portland, Oregon, for training on how to function as what authorities describe as a “sleeper cell.”

Unfortunately, the media reports show “federal agents” quickly responded to the arrest and took over the investigation.  We all know what that means.

TAMPA –  Garrett James Smith was arrested on charges of making and possessing a destructive device and loitering. He remains in jail on a bond of $300,000.  Pinellas County Sheriff Bob Gualtieri said Smith was seen running away from a political assembly supporting an arrested Oath Keeper on the evening of Jan. 6, 2022.

[…]  Smith did not detonate or place the explosive device he made. Gualtieri said Smith has not been cooperating and the Sheriff’s Office doesn’t know why he abandoned his plan or what his political beliefs are.  “Smith is what we call a sleeper, and these are the most concerning individuals because there are no opportunities to intervene and thwart their criminal activity before they actually act,” Gualtieri said.

[…] Federal agents who searched Brown’s home found a sawed-off shotgun, short-barrel rifle, hand grenades and more than 8,000 rounds of ammunition.

[…]  When deputies searched a black backpack Smith had, they found a homemade pipe-style explosive device, Gualtieri said. Sheriff’s deputies found a piece of paper titled “direct action checklist,” where Smith made a list of clothing, armor and gear to bring, including listed items such as a helmet and shaded goggles, a gas mask, duct tape and flammable rags.

[…] In his backpack, they also found a helmet with a logo on it that had been seen at other protests in cities such as Portland, where Smith had spent time, Gualtieri said. (read more)

Press Conference:

Jan 8 2022

The Most Dangerous Part of Biden’s Economic Plan Is that He Believes in It – Read What He Says, and You Will See What Is Coming


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on January 7, 2022 | sundance | 252 Comments

The people behind Joe Biden rushed him to the microphones today to proclaim the success of his economic policy.   Biden read from their prepared script for almost fifteen minutes [VIDEO HERE], then told the assembled press pool that “COVID was here to stay”, but not really “here to stay”, but his policies, rules and regulations that are driven by COVID are “here to stay.”

Did anyone else catch that?

Whiskey – Tango – Foxtrot… he said the quiet part out loud.

In essence, what Biden was saying was that even when the virus is no longer being a daily driver of government policy, the policies themselves will never go away.  Just like the Patriot Act, under the guise of anti-terrorism created the permanent security state, so too is COVID-19 creating the permanent government control state under the guise of public health.

As if that isn’t alarming enough, what the White House occupant outlined regarding the economy just has to be watched or read [Transcript Here] to be believed.  The most eye-opening part of his comments is that he really believes this stuff they tell him to say. So, obviously the people typing the words into the teleprompter either: (a) believe it themselves; or (b) more likely, know what they are doing is going to end up with the total collapse of the U.S. economic system, and that’s okay because the guy reading it is disposable for their plan.  I believe the latter is accurate.

Take a look at one metaphor Biden read from his teleprompter to see exactly how insane these policies are when said out loud.  Keep in mind, this is a direct quote from the transcript as he read it (emphasis mine):

Joe Biden – […] “I’m not an economist, but I’ve been doing this a long time.  But here’s the way to look at it.  If car prices are too high right now, there are two solutions: You increase the supply of cars by making more of them, or you reduce demand for cars by making Americans poorer.  That’s the choice.

Believe it or not, there’s a lot of people in the second camp.  You’ll hear them complain that wages are rising too fast among the very middle-class and working-class people who have endured decades of stalled incomes.

Their view of the economy says the only solution to our current and future challenges is to make the working families that are the backbone in our country poorer or keep them in the state they’re in.” (link)

The guy, whose policies are making more people poorer faster than any prior time in U.S. history, doesn’t see the hypocrisy of his statements.  Forget cars as the example, use bread or milk or anything else.

The Biden economic policies are driving prices through the roof.  No one is contemplating buying a new car, heck we are trying to figure out if we should buy a loaf of bread or a single gallon of gasoline to get to work.

Go stand in the line of any convenience store, and watch how people are trying to cope with the price of gas.  Not the people who pull in, gas up, pay at the pumps and exit.  I’m talking about the people who walk in with ten dollars in cash, have no electronic connection to the digital economy, and who just spent half of a $20 bill on a single loaf of bread and a package of bologna.  That remaining $10 buys them two gallons which are needed to get them to the jobsite for the next few days.

This pontificating pustule of sanctimonious bulls**t has the audacity to use “making Americans poorer” in his metaphor for car prices, as if any essential worker with dirty fingernails standing in the f**king line at 7-11 is contemplating their preferred interior and exterior color selection.

My blood pressure cuff just exploded.  ‘Scuse me for departing…

Jan 8 2022

Biden Sends $8 Billion of COVID Recovery Relief as Payments to Offset Outcome of His Energy Policy for Democrat Constituents


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on January 7, 2022 | sundance | 88 Comments

Many people have wondered how the Biden administration could implement massive economic policies against the interests of their own constituents.  The answer to that question is hidden inside the COVID relief bills, which are used as a method to pay the expenses of his policies so that targeted Democrat groups in urban regions do not have to pay for the policy.

One example of this policy and urban dependency scheme is found in the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP).

The “American Rescue Plan”, the mechanism to use taxpayer monies as redistributive subsidies to special interests under the guise of COVID bailouts and relief, contained $8 billion in funding to pay for the electricity and home heating costs of low income families.

WHITE HOUSE – […] In 2021, the Biden-Harris Administration and Congressional Democrats delivered $8 billion in LIHEAP funding nationally, more than doubling typical annual appropriations, thanks to an additional $4.5 billion provided by the American Rescue Plan. These funds represent the largest appropriation in a single year since the program was established in 1981. (more)

In essence, what this scheme allows is the Biden administration to trigger ‘Green New Deal‘ energy policies that drive massive increases in the cost of electricity, home heating, and energy use for the middle class and working class families, and yet the federal government pays those costs for the constituents they need to keep voting for them.  Lower income families do not feel the energy policy burden, but middle class families are punished.

Yes, this is fundamentally class warfare, using the federal government to select the groups they do not want to feel the pain.  It’s the same principle of increasing food stamp and SNAP food subsidy assistance by 25% this year, while those who do not qualify are forced to pay for higher food costs and the subsidy -via income taxes- of those same groups.

Additionally, “The American Rescue Plan provided other critical resources that states and localities can use to address home energy costs. ERA programs, which received an additional $21.5 billion in funding from the American Rescue Plan, can provide help with past-due utility bills or ongoing assistance with energy costs to help distressed renters avoid shut-offs and keep current on expenses.” (link)

So, when people ask how Joe Biden and the Democrats are able to drive policies that massively hurt the American economy overall; remember, the pain we are feeling from the collective weight of these policies is not hitting the constituents the Democrats need in order to keep them in office.

The champagne socialists and investment class are protected.  The lower income and willingly subsidized class are protected.  It is the middle class who are being punished by the collective weight of this economic mess.

None of this is accidental.  This is a continuance of the ‘share/spread the wealth’ economic roadmap used by Obama.

Lunch-bucket Joe?…  Ya, sure.

Jan 8 2022

We Have Less Than Two Weeks to Finalize Preparation


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on January 7, 2022 | sundance | 386 Comments

I do not know how better to emphasize the points other than to be direct and brutally honest.  Sometimes you just have to call the baby ugly.  The window to prepare for the incoming crisis of our lifetime is now down to two weeks.  Hopefully, that is specific enough.

As we have discussed on these pages, the interventionist policies and regulations from the people creating the COVID response (writ large) have been fubar from the beginning. {Go Deep} When they shut down the restaurants and hospitality sector (2020 lockdowns), the advisors and bureaucrats triggered a cascading series of events inside the food supply chain {Go Deep}.

Every policy implementation since then has made matters worse {Go Deep}

Adding to the supply chain and inflation crisis, in about a week the vaccine mandate and subsequent commercial passport means 30,000 cross border truckers are about to get shut down from operating between the United States and Canada.

“70% of the 700 billion in trade between Canada and the US is moved by truck. This will have a dramatic effect on supplies and services reaching their destination and getting in the hands of those who need them. One needs to look no further than the recent UK fuel shortage, where the military had to be brought in to deliver fuel as a result of a lack of truck drivers. We are already seeing shortages, if these shortages reach critical levels on items such as fuel, food, blood, medicine or medical supplies, we will see real long-lasting damage.”

~ Mike Milliam, President of the Private Motor Truck Council of Canada

As noted by those following the issue(s) closely: “Starting January 15th, 2022, truckers must show a proof of vaccine to cross the Canada/US borders. Since March 2020, drivers were considered “essential”. They could cross the border without a covid test or the vaccine. Under Biden/Trudeau administration, this is about to change”:

22 000 truckers are about to lose their job. But this estimate is from the Canadian Trucking Association. The Private Motor Truck Council of Canada (PMTC) estimated this number closer to 31 000 truckers.

We are looking at a meltdown of the supply chain, or at least some severe disruption.

Get everything you need now. Inflation is about to get real. (read more)

CTH readers are already well versed in the domestic side of this issue {Go Deep}.  When you overlay the USMCA aspect and recognize the critical sectors of the North American economy that are reliant upon each other; and when you realize that no one outside of the blue collar crews who have specific expertise in applying commonsense to this equation are talking about it, then you begin to realize what is obviously about to hit, and yet all will claim they never saw it coming.

We have approximately two weeks left.  After that, I genuinely do not know what things will look like…. but I do know it will not be good.  We are in very uncharted and unstable waters.

Act as if… or be acted upon.  Ultimately, this appears to be our choice right now.

If we are wrong, then we will breathe a sigh of relief.  However, if we are correct….

….. FUBAR!

Jan 8 2022

December Jobs Report Shows 199,000 Gains, 400,000 Were Expected


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on January 7, 2022 | sundance | 112 Comments

The pundits are just not getting it.  It’s the inflation, stupid.

The Bureau of Labor and Statistics (BLS) released the December jobs report today [DATA HERE] showing 199,000 job gains in December, approximately half of what was expected.  Most financial pundits are perplexed as the employment rate drops to 3.9%, because many people have dropped out of the labor force.  The labor participation rate remains unchanged at 61.9%.

Keep in mind, the November jobs report showed a decline in retail jobs of 29,000, and this report shows that despite November & December being the largest shopping months for holidays, the retail sector jobs were nonexistent.

The issue is what we have discussed here for months, inflation.

The job quits and JOLT turnover reports from last week showed massive numbers of employees quitting their jobs.  In part this is pressure from the vaccine mandate (more on that later).  However, in the majority what we are seeing is employment decisions based on inflation hitting the labor market.

Additionally, the current BLS report does not have the Omicron “winter of death” employment impact within it.  That impact will come in the January report, and it will not be good.  But let’s get down to reconciling December jobs data with reality on the ground.

Inflation is chewing up income amid the workforce.  This is not debatable, and this is reflected in every opinion poll and economic statistic that has surfaced for the past six months.   The BLS report somewhat surprised people in the 0.6% wage gains, and average wage increases are now 4.7% year over year.  That should be a good thing.  However, inflation at 20 to 50+% on energy, fuel, gasoline and food means a 4.7% growth in wages is a pittance.

A nickel more for a dollar earned is futile against food store inflation at 20 to 40% average price increases.  We have never seen food, fuel and energy increase in price at such a rate and in such a short period of time (6 months).  That real price situation is not going to improve.  Economists call this “sticky” inflation, but that catch phrase does not adequately explain the foreboding issue of how damaging this is.

As this inflation relates to jobs and employment, the situation is obvious.  Pundits pretend not to know things, but the two issues are connected.  Ordinary workers need much higher wages to compensate for massive increases in housing costs, energy costs, gas prices and, more importantly, food prices.

The fastest way to get a quick pay increase to compensate for fast and furious inflation is to switch jobs and start the new job, in the same sector, at a higher wage.  That is what we are seeing with the overall turnover rate, quits report, and larger employment data.  They are all connected.

Beyond inflation, you can see from this BLS data that things are tenuous in the economy.   The November retail employment figure (-29,000) was a big red flag that everyone ignored.  Additionally, holiday sales at +8% when the prices are +15% or more, means that people were buying less stuff at higher prices.  Overall, less stuff (units sold) was purchased.

The December BLS data shows us actual hours worked in manufacturing declined (0.1 hrs), and overtime declined (0.1 hrs).  Remember, the third quarter productivity rate dropped a stunning 5% overall.

Big Picture = less stuff is in demand, less stuff is being made, and less hours are being used; however, the amount of available labor in the creation of durable goods still exceeds the demand for those durable goods, hence productivity has dropped.

Construction employment is modest at +22,000 in December, but it is lower than the prior three months average of +38,000. Some of this is seasonal, but the trendline is much softer than a customary 3.9% total unemployment economy would show. Again, more evidence of weakness in the structural economy (no pun intended).

Two-thirds of the U.S. economy overall is dependent on people buying stuff. When people cannot afford to buy stuff, because their disposable income has been wiped out by inflation, things in the data start to show the wobbly wheels of a tenuous economic train.

When the number of people quitting their jobs, or switching jobs, is twice the number of people getting officially hired in the BLS jobs report, then you know things are sketchy.

Let me repeat the issue and try to emphasize the problem. It’s the inflation, stupid.

We have a looming problem that does not reconcile with 3.9% unemployment.  The pundits are perplexed.

The confusion is because NO ECONOMIC data has ever shown this level of inflation in such a short period of time.   There are no models.  There is no experience in this situation.  This is not like the 1970’s where oil prices were the direct and primary cause.  This is different, because we are experiencing shortages and price increases specifically due to policy.

Energy policy is killing us (oil and natural gas prices).  Legislative policy is killing us (spending and bailouts).  Monetary policy is killing us (cheap lending, quantitative easing, devaluation).  All of this is causing massive inflation at a level we have never seen in history, and it’s on everything.

Then we throw in a vaccine mandate, and perpetual fear of a virus that hits both the demand side and the employment side simultaneously…. and, well, here you go.  The disruptions inside the economy are like deep cuts, thousands of them, and they are not accidental.

Many, if not most, of these disruptions are being done at the altar of climate change and the Green New Deal.

COVID-19 mitigation and mandates only make this worse.

The disruptions in the supply chain are a direct result of policy.  Now, we have to prepare for inflation AND shortages.  This will not get better in 2022.

Prepare your family accordingly.  I believe those of you reading this article represent the people best prepared for what is about to happen.