A while back you made mention that there was fear that the dollar would split. I believe this was in the 1970’s, soon after the anchor to gold was lost. If that is the case then it looks like gold reflected that lack of confidence and I wonder whether it really was oil or the lack of confidence that sent interest rates higher?
If the above is true, how can we determine lost confidence today with floating currencies and central banks buying so much sovereign debt? Is there something that will “give way” in your opinion that will be the tell tale sign?
E
ANSWER: Yes, the increased buying of debt by central banks will demonstrate that the appetite for sovereign debt has declined. This is a reflection of the shift from public to private investment. The collapse in confidence came when Jimmy Carter was elected president. Although a nice guy, he was seen as just incompetent. When Russia invaded Afghanistan, that shot gold up dramatically for fear of geopolitical events.
The OPEC price shock created inflation for everything that relied on cheap oil from car production to plastics. This set in motion a systemic wave of inflation as we are witnessing today thanks to the lockdowns which cut off supply routes. Volcker was fixated on inflation and the gold standard so he rose rates excessively to stop inflation but he failed to account for the fact that it would more than double the national debt due to higher interest expenditure. We are witnessing once again a systemic increase in inflation which is once more broad-based.
Civil unrest is rising in Canada due to Trudeau’s tyranny. Transit between the border of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick was closed for nearly a day after the Nova Scotia government announced that those traveling from New Brunswick would be forced to self-quarantine upon arrival. The decision was announced only a day after Novia Scotia’s government agreed to open borders with P.E.I. and Newfoundland and Labrador with no quarantine or testing requirements. “Families have been split apart for months and months and months and looking for that to finally come to an end today. And then at the last minute, the 11th hour, having that dashed? Extremely, extremely disappointing,” one protestor said, pointing out the harm that the border closure to New Brunswick has caused.
Protestors even blocked a truck from entering with what was believed to be COVID-19 vaccines. In a video circling the internet, you can see protestors standing in front of the truck and demanding to know if it is carrying experimental COVID vaccines. The people are livid. Eyes are beginning to open as people realize how much control the government has over their lives, wielding the power to change the rules at any time. You can only push the people so far before they begin to fight back. “If the government can state we can’t do these things against our Charter of Rights, we are going in protest to say, ‘No, it’s not acceptable.’ You can’t keep hanging a carrot in front of all of your people and then yanking the carrot away. You can’t keep giving false promises. Lie after lie,” another protestor demanded. This is all in line with our computer’s forecast – the people no longer trust their governments.
Posted originally on the conservative tree house June 26, 2021 | Sundance | 133 Comments
Several people have written to CTH for an economic review of our current status. Below this post are two primary precursor articles [Primary One and Primary Two] which outline the economic dynamic in play and how we can look forward with accuracy to what is likely to happen. Despite the deflective talking points by the professional financial pundits this massive spike in inflation is entirely predictable due to Biden economic policy and Biden monetary policy.
Keep in mind the FED has already said in April they would “support inflation” but that’s because while they will not say it openly they know there’s no way to stop it. The massive inflation is a direct result of the multinational agenda of the Biden administration; it’s a feature not a flaw, and it has nothing whatsoever to do with COVID. Also keep in mind the first group to admit what is to come are banks, specifically Bank of America, because the monetary policy is the cause.
There’s no way around this. Despite the pundit and financial class selling a counter-narrative, home prices will crash and unemployment will go up. I know this is directly against the current talking points, but the statistical reality is clear. CTH was the first place who said two months ago that home sales will plummet, that is starting to happen right now. There’s no way for it not to happen, the big picture tells us why.
You might remember when President Trump initiated tariffs against China (steel, aluminum and more), Southeast Asia (product specific), Europe (steel, aluminum and direct products), Canada (steel, aluminum, lumber and dairy specifics), the financial pundits screamed at the top of their lungs that consumer prices were going to skyrocket. They didn’t. CTH knew they wouldn’t because essentially those trading partners responded in the exact same way the U.S. did decades ago when the import/export dynamic was reversed.
Trump’s massive, and in some instances targeted, import tariffs against China, SE Asia, Canada and the EU not only did not increase prices, the prices of the goods in the U.S. actually dropped. Trump’s policies led the largest deflation in consumer prices in decades. At the same time Trump’s domestic economic policies drove employment and wages higher than any time in the past forty years. With Trump’s policies we were in an era where job growth was strong, wages were rising and consumer prices were falling… The net result was more disposable income for the middle class, more demand for stuff, and ultimately that’s why the U.S. economy was so strong.
♦Going Deep – To retain their position China and the EU responded to U.S. tariffs by devaluing their currency as an offset to higher prices. It started with China because their economy is so dependent on exports to the U.S.
China first started subsidizing the targeted sectors hit by tariffs. However, as the Chinese economy was under pressure they stopped purchasing industrial products from the EU, that slowed the EU economy and made the impact of U.S. tariffs, later targeted in the EU direction, more impactful.
When China (total communist control over their banking system) devalued their currency to avoid Tariff price increase, it had an unusual effect. The cost of all Chinese imports dropped, not just on the tariff goods. Imported stuff from China dropped in price at the same time the U.S. dollar was strong. This meant it took less dollars to import the same amount of Chinese goods; and those goods were at a lower price. As a result we were importing deflation…. the exact opposite of what the financial pundits claimed would happen.
In response to a lessening of overall economic activity, the EU then followed the same approach as China. The EU was already facing pressure from the exit of the U.K. from the EU system; so when the EU central banks started pumping money into their economy and offsetting with subsidies they essentially devalued the euro. The outcome for U.S. importers was the same as the outcome for U.S-China importers. We began importing deflation from the EU side.
In the middle of this there was a downside for U.S. exporters. With China and the EU devaluing their currency the value of the dollar increased. This made purchases from the U.S. more expensive. U.S. companies who relied on exports (lots of agricultural industries and raw materials) took a hit from higher export prices. However, and this part is really interesting, it only made those companies more dependent on domestic sales for income. With less being exported there was more product available in the U.S for domestic purchase…. this dynamic led to another predictable outcome, even lower prices for U.S. consumers.
From 2017 through early 2020 U.S. consumer prices were dropping. We were in a rare place where deflation was happening. Combine lower prices with higher wages and you can easily see the strength within the U.S. economy. For the rest of the world this seemed unfair, and indeed they cried foul – especially Canada.
However, this was America First in action. Middle-class Americans were benefiting from a Trump reversal of 40 years of economic policies like those that created the rust belt.
Industries were investing in the U.S. and that provided leverage for Trump’s trade policies to have stronger influence. If you wanted access to this expanding market those foreign companies needed to put their investment money into the U.S. and create even more U.S. jobs. This was an expanding economic spiral where Trump was creating more and more economic pies. Every sector of the U.S. economy was benefiting more, but the blue-collar working class was gaining the most benefit of all.
♦ REVERSE THIS… and you now understand where we are with inflation. The Joebama economic policies are exactly the reverse. The monetary policy that pumps money into into the U.S. economy via COVID bailouts and federal spending drops the value of the dollar and makes the dependency state worse.
With the FED pumping money into the U.S. system the dollar value plummets. At the same time JoeBama dropped tariff enforcement to please the Wall Street multinational corporations and banks that funded his campaign. Now the value of the Chinese and EU currency increases. This means it costs more to import products and that is the primary driver of price increases in consumer goods.
Simultaneously a lower dollar means cheaper exports for the multinationals (Big AG and raw materials). China, SE Asia and even the EU purchase U.S. raw materials at a lower price. That means less raw material in the U.S. which drives up prices for U.S. consumers. It is a perfect storm… Higher costs for imported goods and higher costs for domestic goods (food). Combine this dynamic with massive increases in energy costs from ideological policy and that’s fuel on a fire of inflation.
Annualized inflation is now estimated to be around 8 percent, and it will likely keep increasing. This is terrible for wage earners in the U.S. who are now seeing no wage growth and higher prices. Real wages are decreasing by the fastest rate in decades. We are now in a downward spiral where your paycheck buys less. As a result consumer middle-class spending contracts. Eventually this means housing prices drop because people cannot afford higher mortgage payments.
Gasoline costs more (+50%), food costs more (+10% at a minimum) and as a result real wages drop; disposable income is lost. Ultimately this is the cause of Stagflation. A stagnant economy and inflation. None of this is caused by COVID-19. All of this is caused by economic policy and monetary policy sold under the guise of COVID-19.
This inflationary period will not stall out until the U.S. economy can recover from the massive amount of federal spending. If the spending continues, the dollar continues to be weak, as a result the inflationary period continues. It is a spiral that can only be stopped if the policies are reversed…. and the only way to stop these insane policies is to get rid of the Wall Street democrats and republicans who are constructing them.
Hope that makes sense, and love to all.
~ Sundance
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Be patient, be respectful, be kind and caring toward all. Don’t look for trouble. However, when the time comes to get in the fight, drop the moral approach and fight for your family with insane ferocity. Fight like you are the third monkey on the ramp to Noah’s arc…. and damned if it ain’t starting to rain.
Posted originally on the conservative tree house on June 26, 2021 | Sundance | 12 Comments
Reposting an earlier article by request as more people are starting to understand why CTH has focused on the financial motivations behind the political ideology for over a decade. It is critical that people understand the landscape. Underline it. Study it. Research the issues and teach everyone about it.
Consider if you will, the backdrop of current U.S. politics; the influence of Wall Street and the multinationals who align with globalism; the reality of K-Street lobbyists writing the physical legislation that politicians sell to Americans; and then overlay what you are witnessing as those same multinationals now attack the foundation of our constitutional republic. All of this is CORPORATISM, a continuum that people were ignoring for decades… Now, thankfully, there is a new awakening.
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Positive debate on solutions and constructive criticism of approach is always appropriate for our elected officials; heck, that is the essence of our discussion. However, recently there have been many critics of President Trump; many people only just now understanding the problem and proclaiming that President Trump specifically did not do enough to block, impede, stop and counteract the globalist forces that were/are aligned against his effort to Make America Great Again.
Hindsight is 20/20, but there are people who proclaim that Donald J Trump should have been more wise in his counsel; more selective in his cabinet; more forceful in his confrontation of corporate globalists. Let me be clear….
I will never join that crew of Trump critics because I have understood his adversary for decades. CTH did not just come around to the understanding of the enemy. CTH has been outlining the scope of the enemy, the scale of the specific war and the financial and economic power of the opposition for over a decade. We understand the totality of the effort it will take to stop decades of willful blindness amid the American people. We also see with clear eyes exactly what they are doing now, even with President Trump forcefully removed from office, to destroy the threat he still represents.
Donald J Trump was/is a walking red-pill; a “touchstone”: a visible, empirical test or criterion for determining the quality or genuineness of anything political. I have been deep enough into the network of the Deep State to understand the scale and scope of this enemy. To think that President Trump alone could carry the burden of correcting four decades of severe corruption of all things political, without simultaneously considering the scale of the financial opposition, is naive in the extreme.
♦ POTUS Trump was disrupting the global order of things in order to protect and preserve the shrinking interests of the U.S. He was fighting, almost single-handed, at the threshold of the abyss. Our American interests, our MAGAnomic position, was/is essentially zero-sum. His DC and Wall-Street aligned opposition (writ large) needed to repel and retain the status-quo. They desperately wanted him removed so they could return to full economic control over the U.S, because it is the foundation of their power.
You want to criticize him for fighting harder against those interests than any single man has ever done before him? If so, do it without me.
I am thankful for the awakening Donald J Trump has provided.
I am thankful now for the opportunity to fight with people who finally understand the scale of our opposition.
Without Donald J Trump these entities would still be operating in the shadows. With Donald J Trump we can clearly see who the real enemy is.
In these economic endeavors President Trump was disrupting decades of financial schemes established to use the U.S. as a host for their endeavors. President Trump was confronting multinational corporations and the global constructs of economic systems that were put in place to the detriment of the host (USA) ie YOU. There are trillions at stake; it is all about the economics; everything else is chaff and countermeasures.
The road to a “service-driven economy” is paved with a great disparity between financial classes. The wealth gap is directly related to the inability of the middle-class to thrive.
Elite financial interests, including those within Washington DC, gain wealth and power, the U.S. workforce is reduced to servitude, “service”, of their affluent needs.
The destruction of the U.S. industrial and manufacturing base is EXACTLY WHY the middle class has struggled, and exactly why the wealth gap exploded in the past 30 years.
Behind this dynamic we find the international corporate and financial interests who are inherently at risk from President Trump’s “America-First” economic and trade platform. Believe it or not, President Trump is up against an entire world economic establishment.
When we understand how trade works in the modern era we understand why the agents within the system are so adamantly opposed to U.S. President Trump.
♦The biggest lie in modern economics, willingly spread and maintained by corporate media, is that a system of global markets still exists.
It doesn’t.
Every element of global economic trade is controlled and exploited by massive institutions, multinational banks and multinational corporations. Institutions like the World Trade Organization (WTO) and World Bank control trillions of dollars in economic activity.
Underneath that economic activity there are people who hold the reigns of power over the outcomes. These individuals and groups are the stakeholders in direct opposition to principles of America-First national economics. Collectively known as “The Big Club”.
The modern financial constructs of these entities have been established over the course of the past three decades. When you understand how they manipulate the economic system of individual nations you begin to understand why they are so fundamentally opposed to President Trump.
In the Western World, separate from communist control perspectives (ie. China), “Global markets” are a modern myth; nothing more than a talking point meant to keep people satiated with sound bites they might find familiar. Global markets have been destroyed over the past three decades by multinational corporations who control the products formerly contained within global markets.
The same is true for “Commodities Markets”. The multinational trade and economic system, run by corporations and multinational banks, now controls the product outputs of independent nations. The free market economic system has been usurped by entities who create what is best described as ‘controlled markets’.
U.S. President Trump understood what had taken place. He used economic leverage as part of a broader national security policy; and to understand who opposes President Trump specifically because of the economic leverage he creates, it becomes important to understand the objectives of the global and financial elite who run and operate the institutions. The Big Club.
Understanding how trillions of trade dollars influence geopolitical policy we begin to understand the three-decade global financial construct they seek to retain and protect.
That is, global financial exploitation of national markets.
FOUR BASIC ELEMENTS:
♦Multinational corporations purchase controlling interests in various national outputs (harvests and raw materials), and ancillary industries, of developed industrial western nations. {example}
♦The Multinational Corporations making the purchases are underwritten by massive global financial institutions, multinational banks. (*note* in China it is the communist government underwriting the purchase)
♦The Multinational Banks and the Multinational Corporations then utilize lobbying interests to manipulate the internal political policy of the targeted nation state(s).
♦With control over the targeted national industry or interest, the multinationals then leverage export of the national asset (exfiltration) through trade agreements structured to the benefit of lesser developed nation states – where they have previously established a proactive financial footprint.
Against the backdrop of President Trump confronting China; and against the backdrop of NAFTA renegotiated; and against the necessary need to support the key U.S. steel and aluminum industries; revisiting the economic influences within the modern import/export dynamic will help conceptualize the issues at the heart of the matter.
There are a myriad of interests within each trade sector that make specific explanation very challenging; however, here’s the basic outline.
For three decades economic “globalism” has advanced, quickly. Everyone accepts this statement, yet few actually stop to ask who and what are behind this – and why?
Influential people with vested financial interests in the process have sold a narrative that global manufacturing, global sourcing, and global production was the inherent way of the future. The same voices claimed the American economy was consigned to become a “service-driven economy.”
What was always missed in these discussions is that advocates selling this global-economy message have a vested financial and ideological interest in convincing the information consumer it is all just a natural outcome of economic progress.
It’s not.
It’s not natural at all. It is a process that is entirely controlled, promoted and utilized by large conglomerates, lobbyists, purchased politicians and massive financial corporations.
Again, I’ll try to retain the larger altitude perspective without falling into the traps of the esoteric weeds. I freely admit this is tough to explain and I may not be successful.
Bulletpoint #1:♦ Multinational corporations purchase controlling interests in various national elements of developed industrial western nations.
This is perhaps the most challenging to understand. In essence, thanks specifically to the way the World Trade Organization (WTO) was established in 1995, national companies expanded their influence into multiple nations, across a myriad of industries and economic sectors (energy, agriculture, raw earth minerals, etc.). This is the basic underpinning of national companies becoming multinational corporations.
Think of these multinational corporations as global entities now powerful enough to reach into multiple nations -simultaneously- and purchase controlling interests in a single economic commodity.
A historic reference point might be the original multinational enterprise, energy via oil production. (Exxon, Mobil, BP, etc.)
However, in the modern global world, it’s not just oil; the resource and product procurement extends to virtually every possible commodity and industry. From the very visible (wheat/corn) to the obscure (small minerals, and even flowers).
Bulletpoint #2 ♦ The Multinational Corporations making the purchases are underwritten by massive global financial institutions, multinational banks.
During the past several decades national companies merged. The largest lemon producer company in Brazil, merges with the largest lemon company in Mexico, merges with the largest lemon company in Argentina, merges with the largest lemon company in the U.S., etc. etc. National companies, formerly of one nation, become “continental” companies with control over an entire continent of nations.
…. or it could be over several continents or even the entire world market of Lemon/Widget production. These are now multinational corporations. They hold interests in specific segments (this example lemons) across a broad variety of individual nations.
National laws on Monopoly building are not the same in all nations. Most are not as structured as the U.S.A or other more developed nations (with more laws). During the acquisition phase, when encountering a highly developed nation with monopoly laws, the process of an umbrella corporation might be needed to purchase the targeted interests within a specific nation. The example of Monsanto applies here.
Bulletpoint #3 ♦The Multinational Banks and the Multinational Corporations then utilize lobbying interests to manipulate the internal political policy of the targeted nation state(s).
With control of the majority of actual lemons the multinational corporation now holds a different set of financial values than a local farmer or national market. This is why commodities exchanges are essentially dead.
In the aggregate the mercantile exchange is no longer a free or supply-based market; it is now a controlled market exploited by mega-sized multinational corporations.
Instead of the traditional ‘supply/demand’ equation determining prices, the corporations look to see what nations can afford what prices. The supply of the controlled product is then distributed to the country according to their ability to afford the price. This is essentially the bastardized and politicized function of the World Trade Organization (WTO). This is also how the corporations controlling WTO policy maximize profits.
Back to the lemons. A multinational corporation might hold the rights to the majority of the lemon production in Brazil, Argentina and California/Florida. The price the U.S. consumer pays for the lemons is directed by the amount of inventory (distribution) the controlling corporation allows in the U.S.
If the U.S. lemon harvest is abundant, the controlling interests will export the product to keep the U.S. consumer spending at peak or optimal price. A U.S. customer might pay $2 for a lemon, a Mexican customer might pay .50¢, and a Canadian $1.25.
The bottom line issue is the national supply (in this example ‘harvest/yield’) is not driving the national price because the supply is now controlled by massive multinational corporations.
The mistake people often make is calling this a “global commodity” process. In the modern era this “global commodity” phrase is particularly nonsense.
A true global commodity is a process of individual nations harvesting/creating a similar product and bringing that product to a global market. Individual nations each independently engaged in creating a similar product.
Under modern globalism this process no longer takes place. It’s a complete fraud. Massive multinational corporations control the majority of production inside each nation and therefore control the global product market and price. It is a controlled system.
EXAMPLE: Part of the lobbying in the food industry is to advocate for the expansion of U.S. taxpayer benefits to underwrite the costs of the domestic food products they control. By lobbying DC these multinational corporations get congress and policy-makers to expand the basis of who can use Food Stamps, EBT and SNAP benefits (state reimbursement rates).
Expanding the federal subsidy for food purchases is part of the corporate profit dynamic.
With increased taxpayer subsidies, the food price controllers can charge more domestically and export more of the product internationally. Taxes, via subsidies, go into their profit margins. The corporations then use a portion of those enhanced profits in contributions to the politicians. It’s a circle of money.
In highly developed nations this multinational corporate process requires the corporation to purchase the domestic political process (as above) with individual nations allowing the exploitation in varying degrees. As such, the corporate lobbyists pay hundreds of millions to politicians for changes in policies and regulations; one sector, one product, or one industry at a time. These are specialized lobbyists.
It is ironic when we discuss corporate financial payments to government officials in foreign countries we call them corrupt. However, in the United States we call it lobbying, the process is exactly the same.
EXAMPLE: The Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS)
CFIUS is an inter-agency committee authorized to review transactions that could result in control of a U.S. business by a foreign person (“covered transactions”), in order to determine the effect of such transactions on the national security of the United States.
CFIUS operates pursuant to section 721 of the Defense Production Act of 1950, as amended by the Foreign Investment and National Security Act of 2007 (FINSA) (section 721) and as implemented by Executive Order 11858, as amended, and regulations at 31 C.F.R. Part 800.
The CFIUS process has been the subject of significant reforms over the past several years. These include numerous improvements in internal CFIUS procedures, enactment of FINSA in July 2007, amendment of Executive Order 11858 in January 2008, revision of the CFIUS regulations in November 2008, and publication of guidance on CFIUS’s national security considerations in December 2008 (more)
Bulletpoint #4 ♦ With control over the targeted national industry or interest, the multinationals then leverage export of the national asset (exfiltration) through trade agreements structured to the benefit of lesser developed nation states – where they have previously established a proactive financial footprint.
The process of charging the U.S. consumer more for a product, that under normal national market conditions would cost less, is a process called exfiltration of wealth. This is the basic premise, the cornerstone, behind the catch-phrase ‘globalism’.
It is never discussed.
To control the market price some contracted product may even be secured and shipped with the intent to allow it to sit idle (or rot). It’s all about controlling the price and maximizing the profit equation. To gain the same $1 profit a widget multinational might have to sell 20 widgets in El-Salvador (.25¢ each), or two widgets in the U.S. ($2.50/each).
Think of the process like the historic reference of OPEC (Oil Producing Economic Countries). Only in the modern era massive corporations are playing the role of OPEC and it’s not oil being controlled, thanks to the WTO it’s almost everything.
Again, this is highlighted in the example of taxpayers subsidizing the food sector (EBT, SNAP etc.), the corporations can charge U.S. consumers more. Ex. more beef is exported, red meat prices remain high at the grocery store, but subsidized U.S. consumers can better afford the high prices.
Of course, if you are not receiving food payment assistance (middle-class) you can’t eat the steaks because you can’t afford them. (Not accidentally, it’s the same scheme in the ObamaCare healthcare system)
Agriculturally, multinational corporate Monsanto says: ‘all your harvests are belong to us‘. Contract with us, or you lose because we can control the market price of your end product. Downside is that once you sign that contract, you agree to terms that are entirely created by the financial interests of the larger corporation; not your farm.
The multinational agriculture lobby is massive. We willingly feed the world as part of the system; but you as a grocery customer pay more per unit at the grocery store because domestic supply no longer determines domestic price.
Within the agriculture community the (feed-the-world) production export factor also drives the need for labor. Labor is a cost. The multinational corps have a vested interest in low labor costs. Ergo, open border policies. (ie. willingly purchased republicans not supporting border wall etc.).
This corrupt economic manipulation/exploitation applies over multiple sectors, and even in the sub-sector of an industry like steel. China/India purchases the raw material, coking coal, then sells the finished good (rolled steel) back to the global market at a discount. Or it could be rubber, or concrete, or plastic, or frozen chicken parts etc.
The ‘America First’ Trump-Trade Doctrine upset the entire construct of this multinational export/control dynamic. Team Trump focused exclusively on bilateral trade deals, with specific trade agreements targeted toward individual nations (not national corporations).
‘America-First’ is also specific policy at a granular product level looking out for the national interests of the United States, U.S. workers, U.S. companies and U.S. consumers.
Under President Trump’s Trade positions, balanced and fair trade with strong regulatory control over national assets, exfiltration of U.S. national wealth is essentially stopped.
This puts many current multinational corporations, globalists who previously took a stake-hold in the U.S. economy with intention to export the wealth, in a position of holding contracted interest of an asset they can no longer exploit.
Perhaps now we understand better how massive multi-billion multinational corporations, and the political institutions they pay for, were/are aligned against President Trump; and they will never relent in their need to see the risk he/we represents destroyed.
I will never relent in my support for anyone who fights this enemy.
I will align with and encourage anyone who joins this fight.
If you are looking for criticism against the only person I have ever witnessed who actually fought our correct enemy, look elsewhere.
Posted originally on the conservative tree house on June 26, 2021 | Sundance | 5 Comments
In April of this year the federal reserve announced they will support the economic agenda of the Biden administration by allowing rapid inflation. The FED was trying to provide cover for JoeBama’s economic plan. The era when the FED could impact inflation is long past. However, the Joe Biden policy impact will be clear, immediate and concise. The U.S. middle-class and blue-collar worker are about to be crushed under rising prices for consumable products.
Increases in inflation hit the working class (Main St) much harder than the investment class (Wall St) and financial elites. Factually the multinationals benefit from U.S. inflation as it puts pressure on domestic companies to ship their manufacturing overseas. Wall Street likes that. This dynamic has been an issue not-discussed by the financial media for decades. First, the Reuters article (when you see “commodity prices” think about the term “consumables”):
REUTERS – The U.S. Federal Reserve has signaled it will tolerate faster inflation for a time to cement the post-pandemic recovery and boost employment, but the side effect is likely to be a faster rise in commodity prices.
[…] After its latest meeting on Wednesday, the Federal Open Market Committee confirmed it will seek to achieve the *twin objectives of maximum employment and inflation at the rate of 2% over the longer run.
[*NOTE: in the new era of global economics these two are mutually exclusive. The FED is intentionally ignoring this point.]
[…] The committee noted price rises have been running persistently below target, so it aims to achieve inflation moderately above 2% for some time to make up the shortfall and anchor expectations at around the 2% level.
[…] The plan is to run the economy hot to achieve faster job gains, especially among disadvantaged groups that are marginally attached to the labour force, before shifting back to inflation control later in the cycle.
But the resulting pressure on global supply chains while the Fed pursues employment increases is likely to generate significantly quicker price rises for raw materials and a range of manufactured items. (read more)
This perspective is fundamentally false and based on assumptions that are decades old economic arguments. The reality of what will happen is exactly the opposite on the employment front.
The JoeBama administration is attempting to hide their economic program behind the smokescreen of a COVID economic bound; but the reality of what will happen is exactly the opposite. Employment is going to drop far below pre-COVID numbers.
The problem that people do not understand, and the federal reserve will intentionally not consider, is that Macro Economic principles no longer apply in the era of global economics and multinational trade. I have outlined this dynamic for years. What did Trump see that politicians were intent on hiding?
WHAT WAS THE PROBLEM?
Traditional economic principles have revolved around the Macro and Micro with interventionist influences driven by GDP (Gross Domestic Product, or total economic output), interest rates, inflation rates and federally controlled monetary policy designed to steer the broad economic outcomes.
Additionally, in large measure, the various data points which underline macro principles are two dimensional. As the X-Axis goes thus, the Y-Axis responds accordingly… and so it goes…. and so it has historically gone.
Traditional monetary policy centered upon a belief of cause and effect: (ex.1) If inflation grows, it can be reduced by rising interest rates. Or, (ex.2) as GDP shrinks, it too can be affected by decreases in interest rates to stimulate investment/production etc. However, against the backdrop of economic Globalism -vs- economic Americanism, CTH is noting the two dimensional economic approach is no longer a relevant model. There is another economic dimension, a third dimension. An undiscovered depth or distance between the “X” and the “Y”.
I believe it is critical to understand this new dimension in order to understand Trump’s MAGAnomic principles, and the subsequent “America-First” economy he was building.
As the distance between the X and Y increases over time, the affect detaches – slowly and almost invisibly. I believe understanding this hidden distance perspective will reconcile many of the current economic contractions. I also predict this third dimension will eventually be discovered/admitted, and will be extremely consequential in the coming decade.
To understand the basic theory, allow me to introduce a visual image to assist comprehension. Think about the two economies, Wall Street (paper or false economy) and Main Street (real or traditional economy) as two parallel roads or tracks. Think of Wall Street as one train engine and Main Street as another.
The Metaphor – Several decades ago, 1980-ish, our two economic engines started out in South Florida with the Wall Street economy on I-95 the East Coast, and the Main Street economy on I-75 the West Coast. The distance between them less than 100 miles.
As each economy heads North, over time the distance between them grows. As they cross the Florida State line Wall Street’s engine (I-95) is now 200 miles from Main Street’s engine (traveling I-75).
As we have discussed – the legislative outcomes, along with the monetary policy therein, follows the economic engine carrying the greatest political influence. Our historic result is monetary policy followed the Wall Street engine. THIS PART IS CRITICAL:
[…] there had to be a point where the value of the second economy (Wall Street) surpassed the value of the first economy (Main Street). [This important acceptance is just common sense. The U.S. GDP is currently around $20 trillion, but the total valuation of the Wall Street stock market is much larger than our GDP. Wall Street is more valuable than Main Street. It is a simple albeit important reality to accept.]
Investments, and the bets therein, needed to expand outside of the USA. Hence, globalist investing.
However, a second more consequential aspect happened simultaneously. The politicians became more valuable to the Wall Street team than the Main Street team; and Wall Street had deeper pockets because their economy was now larger.
As a consequence Wall Street started funding political candidates and asking for legislation that benefited their interests.
When Main Street was purchasing the legislative influence the outcomes were beneficial to Main Street, and by direct attachment those outcomes also benefited the average American inside the real economy.
When Wall Street began purchasing the legislative influence, the outcomes therein became beneficial to Wall Street. Those benefits are detached from improving the livelihoods of main street Americans because the benefits are “global” needs. Global financial interests, investment interests, are now the primary filter through which the DC legislative outcomes are considered.
Here is an example of the resulting impact as felt by consumers:
♦ TWO ECONOMIES – Time continues to pass as each economy heads North.
Economic Globalism expands. Wall Street’s false (paper) economy becomes the far greater economy. Federal fiscal policy follows and fuels the larger economy. In turn the Wall Street benefactors pay back the politicians.
Economic Nationalism shrinks. Main Street’s real (traditional) economy shrinks. Domestic manufacturing drops. Jobs are off-shored. Main Street companies try to offset the shrinking economy with increased productivity (the fuel). Wages stagnate.
Now it’s 1990 – The Wall Street economic engine (traveling I-95) reaches Northern North Carolina. However, it’s now 500 miles away from Main Street’s engine (traveling I-75). The Appalachian range is the geographic wedge creating the natural divide (a metaphor for ‘trickle down’).
By the time the decade of 2000 arrives – Wall Street’s well fueled engine, and the accompanying DC legislative attention, influence and monetary policy, has reached Philadelphia.
However, Main Street’s engine is in Ohio (they’re now 700 miles apart) and almost out of fuel; there simply is no more productivity to squeeze.
From that moment in time, and from that geographic location, all forward travel is now only going to push the two economies further apart. I-95 now heads North East, and I-75 heads due North through Michigan. The distance between these engines is going to grow much more significantly now with each passing mile/month….
However, and this is a key reference point, if you are judging their advancing progress from a globalist vessel (filled with traditional academic economists) in the mid-Atlantic, both economies (both engines) would seem to be essentially in the same place based on their latitude.
From a two-dimensional linear perspective you cannot tell the distance between them.
It is within this distance between the two economies, which grew over time, where a new economic dimension has been created and is not getting attention. It is critical to understand the detachment.
Within this three dimensional detachment you understand why Near-Zero interest rates no longer drive an expansion of the GDP. The Main Street economic engine is just too far away to gain any substantive benefit.
Despite their domestic origin in NY/DC, traditional fiscal policies (over time) have focused exclusively on the Wall Street, Globalist economy. The Wall Street Economic engine was simply seen as the only economy that would survive. The Main Street engine was viewed by DC, and those who assemble the legislative priorities therein, as a dying engine, lacking fuel, and destined to be service driven only….
Within the new 3rd economic dimension, the distance between Wall Street and Main Street economic engines, you will find the data to reconcile years of odd economic detachment.
Here’s where it gets really interesting. Understanding the distance between the real Main Street economic engine and the false Wall Street economic engine will help all of us to understand the scope of the economic inflation lag during the Trump administration. Which, rather remarkably I would add, was a very interesting dynamic.
Trump was in charge… Now think about these engines doing a turn about and beginning a rapid reverse. GDP could, and as we saw did, expand quickly. However, any interest rate hikes (monetary policy) intended to cool down that expansion -fearful of inflation- would take a long time to traverse the divide. That is exactly what happened.
Jerome Powell attempted to block the America First program with interest hikes; however, his efforts were futile because of the distance between the two economic engines. President Trump was focused on assisting Main Street, and Powell’s attempts at impacting Main Street growth couldn’t impact Trump’s program.
During the Trump era we actually imported deflation because China and other nations were attempting to avoid tariff cost increases; so they devalued their currency. The problem for them was that devaluation of their currency not only made their tariffed goods cheaper, it made the non tariff goods cost less. As a result we were importing deflation from around the world.
Inflation on durable goods could not be significant until those nations stopped devaluing their currency. Simultaneously, as international trade agreements were renegotiated the originating nations of those products were forced into the same type of economic detachment described above.
The global manufacturing economies first responded to increases in export costs (tariffs etc.), by devaluing their currency; then they began driving their own productivity higher as an offset, in the same manner American workers went through in the past three decades. The manufacturing enterprise and the financial sector (connected to the consumer) remained focused on the pricing.
♦ Inflation on imported durable goods sold in America, while necessary, was -as we expected- ultimately minimal during this initial period of Trump policy. Predictably, if we stuck with the program inflation would have expanded significantly as time progressed and off-shored manufacturing found less and less ways to be productive. Over time, imported durable good prices would increase – but it was going to come much later; and by that time our own industrial base would be re-established.
♦ Inflation on domestic consumable goods ‘would’ likely rise at a faster pace. However, as we saw U.S. wage rates were respond faster, naturally faster, than any monetary policy because inflation on fast-turn consumable goods became re-coupled to the ability of wage rates to afford them…. and the labor market was on fire. Wages were factually growing faster than inflation during Trump’s term in office.
The economic policy impact lag, caused by the distance between federal monetary action and the domestic Main Street economy, was -under the Trump policy- now working in our favor. That is, in favor of the middle-class. Within the aforementioned distance between “X” and “Y”, a result of three decades traveled by two divergent economic engines, that was our new economic dimension….
What JoeBama 3.0 is proposing now, and what the Federal Reserve just announced they are going to support, is a return to the prior economic model where Wall Street multinationals benefit and the U.S. middle-class is pushed into their intentionally created “service driven economy”.
Inflation on domestic consumable goods (food, fuel, energy) hurts the U.S. middle-class, it does not hurt the multinationals, the elites and Wall Street investors. It takes a long time for inflation to push up wages when the workforce is experiencing lay-offs due to downsizing, outsourcing and expanded imports of multinational products.
But it doesn’t stop there…. If we get too granular, missing the larger picture, it is difficult to understand. However, if we stay at the elevated perspective, understanding leads to awakening. We start to see how the various JoeBama policies intersect.
In generally approximated terms 2020 has delivered a serious financial blow to Main Street businesses.
The COVID-19 lockdowns and shutdowns have led to business in your local community suffering massive losses of income while simultaneously taking on debt directly from lenders or indirectly from government relief efforts. Main Street has been hit hard, some analysts estimate 40 to 50 percent of those service businesses may not recover.
Conversely, the COVID-19 lockdowns and shutdowns have created a massive income benefit for multinationals, Wall Street corporations and big tech. Amazon, Walmart and massive tech companies had their highest earnings ever recorded.
According to most maco-analysis somewhere around forty percent of Main Street economic wealth was lost or suspended in 2020 due to COVID-19. Simultaneously the multinational firms have seen increases in stock evaluations of forty percent. These two almost identical numbers are not coincidental. The billionaire class (multinationals) have gained wealth in an almost identical amount the middle-class (Main Street) lost.
These empirical results are accepted. No-one is challenging the shift of financial resources was/is directly related to regional COVID policy. The math is the math.
Where things change from simple economic math to downstream consequences is where the story is really told.
This is where we are going…
This is where we have been going ever for decades, COVID-19 has (not coincidentally) just sped up the process.
If you take out a national map and: (1) put a green pin in the areas where the lock-downs are most severe (draw a 100 mile circle); then (2) put a red pin in the areas where the riots and local anxiety was highest in summer 2020; then (3) put a white pin in the seven counties where election fraud was prevalent; then (4) put a blue pin in the areas known as “Opportunity Zones“, what you will see is a direct correlation. This is not accidental.
There are more than 8,760 designated Qualified Opportunity Zones (PDF) located in all 50 States, the District of Columbia, and five United States territories. Investors can defer tax on any prior gains invested in a Qualified Opportunity Fund (QOF) until the earlier of the date on which the investment in a QOF is sold or exchanged or until December 31, 2026. (link)
If you are a member of ‘THE BIG CLUB’ with a massive influx in capital due to the benefits of the COVID-19 lockdowns, limits and regulations, the Opportunity Zones are now the perfect place to expand ownership and wealth. Take advantage of the Main Street weakness, make moves with government authorization, and do so without capital gains.
The regions where real property will be purchased at a low cost will, not coincidentally, be the “opportunity zones” where investment transactions without capital gains can be made. The areas where riots took/take place will sell cheap. “Opportunity zones” allow for mass investment moves from billionaire class without paying capital gains taxes.
The mass accumulation of wealth (multinationals) at the upper tier of Big Tech and the multinational billionaire class (technocrats) during COVID is approximately +40% since it began. 40% of Main Street businesses wiped out. Not coincidentally almost 40% of wealth has been transferred from Main Street to the Wall Street mega-corps and multinationals.
“Never let a crisis go to waste”…
Only in 2020 the “crisis” was (yet again) by design. The highest level of COVID mitigation control in the Blue states is not coincidentally in the same states with the largest number of Opportunity Zone regions. As a direct result of this mass transfer of wealth to the upper tier the “opportunity” is an unprecedented level of Main Street ownership by elite interests and foreign nationals.
It gets worse… Just like the banking and real-estate crisis of ’07/’08 the government steps in to back-fill the Main Street losses to the mass U.S. population. When an individual or family receives the relief money, they still cannot support Main Street because in many areas they remained forcibly closed. Paying down debt and making purchases in the same lock-down strata only ends up putting those relief funds into the hands of the banks and multinationals who were allowed to operate.
Continued consumer spending only feeds the beast that is -by policy via purchased politicians- designed to destroy us. In essence, we are paying the Technocrats, bankers and multinational corporations to fatten their bank accounts while the U.S. government re-opens the economy with a finger on the scale to benefit the multinationals.
This is by design….
This has always been the design…
CTH has been warning about this for well over a decade and we exhibited the (un)natural conclusion with this graphic:
The interesting thing about small dogs is they do not realize they are small. We need to think the same way. For years I have watched the pros focus on statistics and get caught by surprise. The stats reflect what the average person already did last month, quarter, or year. Plenty of times I remember my nothing watching TV and they announced inflation declined and she would say then how come food cost more this week? The average person looks at what is taking place on the street. The pros look at the numbers reflecting the past. Plenty of time the little guy beats the pros but they just don’t pay attention.
We can win this one. The average person already has rejected Fauci no matter how much CNN, Washington Post, and the New York Times try to pretend otherwise. Only 17% of the population believe Fauci while 54% now believe this was just a lab leak. Confidence in government is collapsing. Biden has made a very serious mistake aligning with the World Economic Forum.
I have warned that RELIABLE sources have been telling me that the plan was to introduce climate lockdowns once the got people complying with the health lockdowns. Even the Guardian reported, perhaps by mistake, that we would need lockdowns every 2 years to save the planet. I really wish this was a CONSPIRACY THEORY I could just ignore. But this was the REAL agenda all along -climate change.
These people have DELIBERATELY exploited Greta Thunberg and this virus which was MADE in a lab and I believe it was strategically released and China needs to investigate but it realized the USA and EU will not cooperate because they need to hide the source. This is the Kennedy assassination all over again. They falsely implied Russia but ensured Oswald was killed to guarantee no trial. The West is already setting the stage to say China was sloppy. They will never accept that just maybe this consortium paid for its release.
If someone would investigate they would find Gates began selling shares in December 2019 and Schwab sold ahead of the COVID Crash telling people a “virus was coming” we would start to expose the connections. But I fear China is like deer in headlights, frozen and unclear as to how to defend themselves.
QUESTION: Regarding the G7, which committed us to more stimulus, I can totally see where this is going. You are the historian. Do you not think this is where we end up – capitatio-lugatio. Same exact pattern.
Anonymous
ANSWER: For those who are not familiar with capitatio-lugatio, this was the tax collection system developed by Diocletian (284-305AD), which determines the amount levied on agriculturally productive land. This was a major tax reform following the collapse of the Roman monetary system following the capture of Emperor Valerian I (253-260AD) by the Persians.
Most of the historical analysis is lacking mainly because they never saw the magnitude of the collapse in the monetary system. In the course of just 8.6 years following the capture of Valerian I in 260Ad and the assassination of his son Gallienus in 268AD, we can see the Antoninianuc, which was largely silver in 260AD, because just a debased coin that was simply bronze chemically plated with a thin coat of silver must like our clas coinage which began in 1965.
Inflation went nuts because once the people saw that Valerian I had been captured and turned into a slave, suddenly Romans saw themselves as vulnerable. This had profound implications for it was the primary reason Christianity soared. Diocletian began fierce persecutions of Christians under the theory that the gods were angry with Rome because they would not worship them so they were punishing Rome. That is why the persecutions took place.
Then because word spread that Valerian had been captured by the Persians in the East, suddenly all the barbarians in the North began to invade believing that Rome was then vulnerable. At the same time, there was a plague. Emperor Claudius II(268-270AD) had assassinated Gallienus but then died of the plague. They called him Gothicus because he defeated the Goth invasion which brought them all the way down to Milan. This led his successor Emperor Aurelian (270-275AD) to construct the wall around Rome which was not necessary previously. Additionally, it was Aurelian who sent in the Troops into Rome to do battle with the bureaucrats running the mint who were debasing the coinage, not by official decree, but they were robbing the silver for themselves. They were then plating the bronze coins with silver which previously had been a trick of counterfeiters.
Unfortunately, the Historia Augusta (HA) which is a collection of thirty biographies of Roman emperors, co-emperors, and usurpers in chronological order from Hadrian to Carus and his sons, stops just shy of Diocletian. As usual, this was claimed to be a fraud because some of the names of emperors nobody ever heard of. But when two coins were discovered in Egypt with the name of Saturninus, these historical accounts were proven to be authentic and this became the rarest of all Roman coin that is probably worth between $5 and $10 million today (one remains in the Louver).
Diocletian (284-305AD) was the great reformer. Diocletian completed the monetary reforms introduced by Aurelian in 274AD after he waged war on the corruption in the mint. In 286AD he began to try to fight inflation by reforming the coinage. The gold he raised the weight of the Aureus striking them at 60 to the pound raising that from 70 to the pound previously.
Diocletian then reintroduced silver coinage (argenteus) with weight and fitness which effectively reestablished the old standard from the time of Nero (54-68AD) who began the debasement.
Tetrachy
Diocletian then turned to political reform. He is also the first Emperor to actually retire and hand power to the next in line. There were 22/23 emperors/usurpers who followed Gallienus’ assassination in 268AD. Diocletian sought to end the constant waring and split the empire between East and West and appointed a co-emperor and each had a Caesar who was to be their successor. This political structure was called the Tetrarchy. This was set up in 293AD but it was most likely following his attempts to reform the empire alone which proved to be formidable.
Finally, about 297AD he introduced a reform of the bronze coinage which he reintroduced. However, his monetary reform failed to halt price inflation. People simply hoarded the new currency, especially silver. This had the opposite effect and inflation accelerated.
Meanwhile, corresponding with the introduction of bronze coinage in 297AD, we also see that Diocletian radically restructured the tax system, in an effort to re-establish economic stability. largely by changing the property tax base and strengthening the system of perception. However, the Diocletian tax reform was carried out as early as 287AD in hopes of suspending inflation. Diocletian attempted to gain control of the chaotic usurpations of nearly 23 emperors in the 26-year period before his reign by preventing travel as we see once again with the attempt to impose COVID Passports.
Indeed, if you were discharged from the Army you needed your papers which were really etched in bronze plates. Diocletian’s response to economic pressures and in order to protect the vital functions of the state, he restricted social and professional mobility ending the freedom of profession and the freedom of movement. Diocletian decreed that the peasants became tied to the land creating a form of serfdom. Workers in various trades such as a store-keeper, blacksmiths, public entertainers, and various bureaucrats all became occupations made hereditary. We find tomb markers depicting their trade in life.
Even soldiers’ children were forced to become soldiers regardless of their ability all because there was then an increase in trying to recruit soldiers. This made the draft really draconian.
Diocletian also took it upon himself to restructure society and tried to resurrect and preserve the ancient virtues. He sought to obligate children to feed their parents in old age which of course was a retirement directive. Parents were directed to treat their children justly. He also ordered that spouses should end adultery and respect the laws of marriage. In matters of law, children were not to bear witness against their fathers, or slaves against their masters. In respect to private property, he upheld a creditor’s rights but also insisted that contract clauses were to be protected. He also outlawed the use of torture if truth could be discovered otherwise and encouraged governors to be as autonomous as possible. The United States is proficient at torture and simply pretends that also long as a physical mark is not left of the body then it is not torture. Threats, isolated confinement, deprivation of heat, and waterboarding are not torture in the eyes of American judges. The corruption in American courts is no different than what Diocletian forbid.
Consequently, Diocletian imposed social changes that were more totalitarian in his effort to gain control of the economy. He this also create a uniform system of taxation throughout the empire. Rome did not have income taxes. Instead, Rome had a property tax, known as the annona, which Diocletian then based on the available labor and livestock (capita) as well as after the cultivated land (iugera) calculated by tax estimates (censitores). Therefore, the assessment of taxes was based on the categories of people and animals (caput) and land (iugum) combined with each other (which mainly affected the rural population) and also subjected Italy to direct taxation, which had not been the case before Diocletian. This became what people today are calling for as a wealth tax on everything you own, but on top of your income taxes.
This system combined two pre-existing taxes, the iugatio (affecting land rents) and capitatio (affecting individuals) failed to subdue the inflation in addition to the monetary reforms. According to this methodology, the complex of arable land was divided into the various regions, according to the type of crop and their yield, into fiscal units called iuga, while the population was instead divided into fiscal units called capita. The value assigned to iuga and capita was not fixed but varied according to the individual provinces and the needs of the state budget.
Consequently, Diocletian took into account the individual performance. While contemporary authors complained, such as Lucius C.Lactantius (c. 250–325AD) who was the first Christian writer in Latin to attempt a general account of the religious history of humanity and of Rome, we must take into account that the backdrop was also the end of freedom of movement, not just religious persecutions.
The amount of tax to be paid was initially determined every five years. However, this changed to then every 15 years in 312AD. Without question, the new tax system enabled steadily flowing income, especially for the eastern part of the empire which was more secure than the West which could be easily invaded by the Germanic tribes. Diocletian tax reform merged the land and personal taxes into this single tax, the capitatio-iugatio, which was a form of wealth tax rather than income for it was based on the factors of production: men, beasts, lands. Diocletian created a massive land register of the wealth of the entire Empire.
Eventually, the Persians admired the tax reforms of Diocletian and adopted a similar tax reform in the Sassanid Empire during the 6th century. However, since the capitatio-iugatio ended up tying the peasant to the land, contributing to the training of serfs, this created what seemed to emerge as the “norm” for when Rome fell in the West in 476AD, what emerged thereafter was serfdom as the normal state of society. We see this carry forward into the 14th century which took the Black Plague to bring to an end and for capitalism to reemerge. Under this system, land without peasant labor that remained uncultivated cannot be subject to tax for it produced nothing. Therefore, the Roman government under Diocletian set in motion a structural change in society that would prevail in itself for about 600 years. With the Black Plague and the loss of 50% of the population, landlords began to offer wages for peasants to work their land.
The failure of Diocletian’s monetary reforms to suppress inflation forced Diocletian to introduce wage and price controls. We see the very same mistake that is made in modern times by the hard-money people who assume that it is the lack of a backing of the currency that leads to inflation. Here we have a major monetary reform that failed despite the restoration of silver coinage and the increase in weight of the gold aureus. Clearly, the issue was not even the quality of the money. The most profound impact leading to inflation was the collapse in confidence in government and even the power of the Roman Empire to remain invulnerable.
The Romans used the reverse side of their coinage as newspapers. Here we have Diocletian striking a coin with Fortuna who is typically pictured as holding the ancho or rudder of a ship in one hand and the cornucopia in the other. This is typically the origin of the hope for good fortune meaning on a whim she can change the course of your life like turning a rudder on a ship or give you everything you ever dreamed of. Clearly, this is something intended to inspire confidence that the “luck” of Rome is changing.
Moneta holding scales in one hand and cornucopia in the other symbolized plenty. The Roman goddess Juno Moneta (Latin Iūno Monēta) is where we derive the word “money” and also the “mint” where the money was created and flows from. As the legend goes, the Gauls attempted to invade the city of Rome quietly but had frightened the sacred flock of geese who made a lot of noise at the Temple of Juno. This alerted the Romans to the surprise attack giving us the word “monere,“ meaning “to warn” in Latin. The Temple of Juno then became popularly known as the Temple of Juno Moneta. Since this is where the coins were minted, we now arrive at the word “money” that springs from the origin of this legend and place that was an ancient mint.
Our term, such as capital flow, emerges from the Latin word “currere” meaning “to run” or “to flow.” This is where the money flowed from and gives us the word “currency” meaning the “flow of money.” This is why Juno Moneta is pictured on Roman coins as holding the balance scales in one hand and a cornucopia in the other symbolizing endless bounty or wealth. This is the birth of the terms “money” and “currency.” Diocletian is clearly suggesting that the monetary reform will restore the confidence of the ages.
In 301AD, Diocletian attempted to control inflation by issuing a maximum price edict and salaries of workers which is the same reaction that was taken by President Richard Nixon following the collapse of Bretton Woods. Diocletian’s edict has survived and it shows the same attempt to regulated wages and prices as implemented in Babylon by the Hammurabi Legal Code of 1780BC. This complied with the ECM of 242 intervals of 8.6-years. We will find the many periods in time along the way that comply with this same frequency from Solon the Lawgiver of Athens to the fall of Athens to Sparta in 404BC.
Despite all the reform efforts, the Roman Empire was collapsing because the confidence just imploded. Even the Roman officials in the periphery provinces had begun to just rule on their own taking the spoils of taxation for themselves. With the collapse in confidence and Diocletian restriction of movement, shortages in supply added to the inflation. Innovation came to a halt and commerce began to stall much as we have witnessed with the lockdowns thanks to COVID.Video
Once again, as the confidence in governments is collapsing and the socialistic system of endless borrowing had met a brick wall thanks to Marco Draghi taking interest rates negative in 2014, we see a very similar situation developing. While the head of state may not have been captured by the Persians, the election of Donald Trump in 2016 represented to them a usurpation of power since he was a “populist” rather than a career politician. I am not being a Trump supporter nor partisan, Career politicians simply do not want any outsider playing in their backyard. It has nothing to do with what Trump said or did not say. He was just not one of them.
When we look closely at the events around Diocletian, we have a very similar crisis waiting for us. The social system is crashing for governments will be unable to continue to borrow at these absurd low levels of interest rates. They are cleverly planning their release of cryptocurrencies so all money can be traced and taxes collected. They too are seeking to create an identity-based accounting of all money. The cryptocurrency has been allowed to blossom with the end-game to simply seize everything and swap it for government cryptos.
Today, and in the 3rd century, people have been hoarding their money until Biden took office and inflation has begun to rise. This is why inflation did not appear despite the rising supply of money because people did not trust the future post-2008. The collapse in real estate back then really upset the average person who regarded that as their retirement. We find massive hoards of even debased coins from the 3rd century provide it was not even the metal content. With barbarians at the Gates, people simply did not spend money leading to deflation and the economic decline. When Diocletian came to power and introduced all of these reforms, that is when we begin to see inflation rise sharply.
Perhaps most important concerning Diocletian’s program of domestic reform, he clearly followed some of the leads of his predecessors who had made some tentative attempts in the same direction of reforms. The emperor Gallienus had excluded senators from the army and separated the control of the military from civil careers. The Senate had progressively been deprived of its privileges in an effort to reduce its power. Diocletian recognized this same trend and structurally arranged the government in such a manner that led toward the centralized control that put all powers at his disposal. We see the very same strategy to end democracy unfolding today.
Diocletian designated the consuls to watch over the affairs of the state and distanced the senators from any collaboration with respect to making the laws. Today, we have the structure of the European Union whereby the people can vote for the Parliament, but they have no power to create law – that is done by the Commission which never stands for election. Klaus Schwab’s World Economic Forum is pushing this very same structure to eliminate elections and reduce them at best to symbolic.
We also see that Diocletian used bureaucrats, unelected actors, as imperial counselors (consilia sacra) which he appointed to run specialized offices with their loyalties to his administration – not the senate. He expressly defined the power of the praetorian prefects (personal bodyguards to the emperor) and limited that for this is where often usurpers arose. The number of bureaucrats increased dramatically under Diocletian. Over the next 50 years, it would often be said that there were more people in government than there were paying taxes. This was the beginning of the bureaucracy and technocracy that was eventually overrun the empire and became excessive under Byzantium rule. This is once again emerging here in modern times as there is always an expansion of government for the more the economy declines, the more power they try to claim to maintain that power.
Diocletian even reorganized the army sending the local troops to the frontier and the main movable army was made domestic. He also increased the size of the army Troop strength was increased by a fourth (not multiplied by four as Lactantius claims). There too, Diocletian’s reforms became our norm whereby he exempted soldiers from duty after 20 years of service which became our standard for retirement into modern times.
It appears that these reforms did manage to create some short-term financial stability. However, the rise of Constantine I the Great following his father’s death, who was an heir in line for succession, led to the collapse of the political reforms. Constantine, which mother was a Christian, promoted Christianity for political purposes saying that there is one God and there should be one Emperor – in heaven as on earth.
Israel’s 120-member Knesset voted to swear in a new government Sunday, ending the historic 12-year rule of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The new prime minister is Naftali Bennett, who is considered to be a Far-right politician. AS we head into 2022, there will be a lot more political upsets to come.
The G7 meeting +1 (EU) met in Cornwall in southwest England. The London Financial Times, which has openly come out and advocated the Great Reset, reported that “Joe Biden has won support at the G7 summit for a ‘carry on spending’ plan, as western leaders rejected austerity in a post-Covid world and vowed to tackle inequality at home and abroad. Biden’s call for continued economic stimulus was backed by fellow leaders at the summit, in a gathering framed by leaders as the moment the west starts a fightback against an ascendant China.”
On Friday evening, the G7 leaders and partners traveled to the Eden Project, a futuristic environmental park, to meet Queen Elizabeth and other members of the royal family. The Eden Project is a futuristic view of a Green planet that is billing as connecting us with each other and the living world and this is the future they envision. It is located in Cornwall, UK, which is WHY this G7 meeting was staged at this location. There are massive Biomes housing the largest rainforest in captivity.
They have stated that this is “the moment and support the economy” and Mario Draghi, former head of the European Central Bank who destroyed the bonk market by moving to negative interest rates in 2014 which failed, is now Italy’s prime minister, said that “there is a compelling case for expansionary fiscal policy.” They have destroyed the financial economy with artificially low interest rates which means they can no longer borrow endlessly. Consequently, they have adopted Modern Monetary Theory arguing that they can now simply print money endlessly and any inflation is purely temporary due to the shortages caused by COVID.
The Federal Reserve has joined the party with its own propaganda saying in April that it will continue its ultra-low interest rate policies and bond-buying program, a sign that it wants to see more evidence of a strengthening economic recovery before it considers easing its support. The Fed continues to call inflation is just short-term and they are saying they will not yet intervene.
The absolute nonsense coming from the G7 is really amazing. Boris Johnson had the guts to claim that it was vital the pandemic did not cause a “lasting scar” of inequality claiming that the last big economic recession of 2008 saw a recovery that was not “uniform across all parts of society.” This is just such propaganda all intent upon ushering a new system of totalitarianism under the pretense of “equality” and fairness.
Their greatest fear is “populism” and they all keep trying so hard to stab Trump as if this were the assassination of Julius Caesar when the senators stabbed Caesar 23 times also claiming they were defending the Republic which was hopelessly corrupt and controlled by an oligarchy as we see once again today. That claimed that after four years of Donald Trump’s presidency, the G7 was suppressed in the division and now they are in harmony to change the world for the Great Reset. Boris Johnson even stabbed former Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron’s policies of austerity calling them “a mistake.” The G7 thus concluded that they will commit to higher spending to “help” the developing world from a crisis they themselves have orchestrated. Of course, the G7 has also committed to funding for climate change.
This was all about justifying spending with artificially low-interest rates to create EQUALITY which is seriously calling into question that this all leads to only one place – totalitarianism.
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This is a library of News Events not reported by the Main Stream Media documenting & connecting the dots on How the Obama Marxist Liberal agenda is destroying America