Financial topics

Investments, gold, currencies, surviving after a financial meltdown
xakzen
Posts: 80
Joined: Wed Mar 25, 2009 11:59 am

Re: Financial topics

Post by xakzen »

sadhic wrote:...
3) Here the normal Indian means - he need mere 200$ a month is enough to live happily all over India. Just to understand, you can get a good driver for your car at 75$ for a month.

I think America may open their gates to the rest of world to come and live there which will in fact reduce the American normal day to day expenses without reducing the facilities they are enjoying now. What I meant is you may see millions of Indians( may be Asians ) ready to come America and buy the excess houses and would like to live there. These millions for sure will bring trillions of $ and cheap work force to America which is the only naturally way to restart the economy.They may even live in america and work in gulf or else where .
How is letting people who only make $200/month buy our over capacity of houses help the real estate market? Even if they came to this country and made 10x that, they wouldn't be able to afford a $200k home.
arrowrod
Posts: 5
Joined: Fri Dec 04, 2009 12:02 am

Re: Financial topics

Post by arrowrod »

Of course they could afford a $200K house. In fact, they did. Across the street. Ten people living in one house. Taking the bus to work, until they could afford a car.

Don't think of immigrants as spoiled American children.

Immigrants have attitude: The harder you work, the more you succeed.
sadhic
Posts: 11
Joined: Thu Apr 02, 2009 7:58 am

Re: Financial topics

Post by sadhic »

xakzen wrote:
sadhic wrote:...
3) Here the normal Indian means - he need mere 200$ a month is enough to live happily all over India. Just to understand, you can get a good driver for your car at 75$ for a month.

I think America may open their gates to the rest of world to come and live there which will in fact reduce the American normal day to day expenses without reducing the facilities they are enjoying now. What I meant is you may see millions of Indians( may be Asians ) ready to come America and buy the excess houses and would like to live there. These millions for sure will bring trillions of $ and cheap work force to America which is the only naturally way to restart the economy.They may even live in america and work in gulf or else where .
How is letting people who only make $200/month buy our over capacity of houses help the real estate market? Even if they came to this country and made 10x that, they wouldn't be able to afford a $200k home.

my English is bad I think .....the 200$ reference made to normal Indian( 60% of Indian population ) who lives in Indian villages will not get affected what may come due to forth coming financial disaster.
on the other hand - a 2400 sqft land in prime location in chennai ( 4th largest metro in India ) cost you minimum 1crore rupees -ie roughly 222222 $.and it is tough to find a piece of land there.
Here standard for prime location varies from countries to countries. If you ask me to put a "k" factor for this to match Gulf standard i would give 5. I dont know US standard.
xakzen
Posts: 80
Joined: Wed Mar 25, 2009 11:59 am

Re: Financial topics

Post by xakzen »

arrowrod wrote:Of course they could afford a $200K house. In fact, they did. Across the street. Ten people living in one house. Taking the bus to work, until they could afford a car.

Don't think of immigrants as spoiled American children.

Immigrants have attitude: The harder you work, the more you succeed.
In that case can we do an exchange rather than simple one way immigration? New welfare program: enjoy sunny Mumbai with gov provided one way ticket ;).
OLD1953
Posts: 946
Joined: Tue Aug 11, 2009 11:16 pm

Re: Financial topics

Post by OLD1953 »

I do assure you, there are as many lazy Mexican, Indians, Peruvians and what have you as there are lazy Americans. Lazy people aren't interested in moving halfway around the world to find work.

I don't think an actual indepth analysis on both ends would show much of an advantage in immigration, unless it was highly restricted to the most educated. We used to do that, but not now. So I'm doubtful there's all that much of an advantage now, given that we already have a shinking middle class due to downward pressure on wages at the bottom end. Why increase that pressure? If you do, guess what, you'll be the one paying for the welfare and the retraining, etc. (Oh, no, we won't, we'll elect another strict whatever who'll get rid of all that. I've been hearing that canard for about 50 years now, ain't happened yet, don't think it will. The richest are well aware they have to spend enough to keep the underdogs from eating them alive. And they intend to spend your money, not theirs. Don't believe anything else for a microsecond.)
aedens
Posts: 5211
Joined: Tue Nov 04, 2008 4:13 pm

Re: Financial topics

Post by aedens »

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/leadin ... s-are-true

Imagine people thinking for themselves?

http://online.barrons.com/article/SB123 ... 00275.html

Define irony.... which is Money based on? Yea you can see problem and cost now...

Now imagine media with a clue...

Recall Keynes's erroneous prediction that within a century people's material wants would be satiated. When that happened, the demand for capital (to finance consumption) would plummet and rentiers (people who live on income from passive investments, such as stocks or bonds, and thus are hoarders) would be wiped out--a prospect that delighted Keynes, who looked forward to "the euthanasia of the rentier," though fortunately he did not mean this literally. He questioned free trade--that holy of holies of conventional economists--by pointing out that a country whose people had a low propensity to consume could stimulate investment by depreciating its currency so that its exports were attractive, because that would encourage its industries to invest in producing for foreign consumption and therefore to employ more workers. The country would accumulate foreign currency that it could use to invest abroad--the policy that China has been following lately, with pretty good results. He even had kind words for usury laws, arguing that they had reduced interest rates and thus discouraged hoarding. He favored a heavy estate tax, reasoning that it would increase consumption by reducing accumulation for bequests. (The standard economic argument against the estate tax is identical--it encourages "wasteful" consumption!)

There are three reasons for a closed-end fund to sell at a discount from its net asset value: management incompetence, management corruption, or a fear that the fund has undertaken unfavorable speculations. Goldman Sachs partner Sydney Weinberg was asked why his company had formed so many closed-end funds so rapidly in 1929. His reply was: “Well, the people want them”

There was a telling moment in 2005, at a conference held to honor Greenspan’s tenure at the Fed. One brave attendee, Raghuram Rajan (of the University of Chicago, surprisingly), presented a paper warning that the financial system was taking on potentially dangerous levels of risk. He was mocked by almost all present — including, by the way, Larry Summers, who dismissed his warnings as “misguided.”

Washington ignored reality -"Paul Volcker, Stanford, Feb 11, 2005
A few selected excerpts:
"Altogether, the circumstances seem as dangerous and intractable as I can remember."
"Boomers are spending like there is no tomorrow."
"Homeownership has become a vehicle for borrowing and leveraging as much as a source of financial security."
"I come now to the heart of the problem, as a Nation we are consuming and investing, that is spending, about 6% more than we are producing. What holds it all together? - High consumption - high leverage - government deficits - What holds it all together is a really massive and growing flow of capital from abroad. A flow of capital that today runs to more than $2 Billion per day."
"What I'm really talking about boils down to the oldest lesson of financial policy in Central Banking: A strong sense of monetary and fiscal discipline."

We have years to go not month's. We are not advancing forward so observe that first.

On his trip to England in 1979, Deng Xiaoping learned why free economies were outperforming Russia and China, and he returned to launch the Sino-Capitalist Revolution which keeps astonishing the world even as faith in capitalism fades across much of the OECD. He had learned why Hong Kong, Taiwan and South Korea could keep creating jobs and wealth by rejecting socialism—whether on the Maoist, Bolshevik, or Indian models.) Putin calls the collapse of Bolshevism, “The greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th Century.” It was certainly bad news for him and his fellow KGB officers, but they regrouped amid the chaotic Yeltsin era and eventually took control of Russia. The KGB were the Jesuits of Russian Communism, and they worked loyally to advance the Kremlin’s goals. But their relationship to the Party was—like the Jesuits’ relation to the Vatican—at times problematic. Example: Khrushchev once claimed that he had personally shot Beria, the KGB leader, who wasn’t deemed sufficiently submissive to the Central Committee, (although the later version was that he’d died before a firing squad). Like the Jesuits, the KGB considered themselves the elites, and remained loyal to each other. Now that they are the ruling class, they no longer have to answer to bureaucrats and theorists.
Obama may fear serious voter backlash about the scale and wisdom of the new programs being legislated, but at least for now, he doesn’t need to fear the Republicans. The Republican Party is leaderless, and frequently clueless, so Obama doesn’t need to be a Roosevelt or Reagan to stay on top. Principle in mortgages that dates back to the 14th century and the emergence of Courts of Equity. (That’s where the word “equity” comes from.)Equity was based on the Chancellor’s religious-based concern for welfare of people of the middle- and lower-classes who suffered under the rigors of Common Law. If more US courts decide that those ancient protections for homeowners need to be protected. As we learned from the aftermath of the Midnight Massacre, commodity stocks can be savaged at least as ruthlessly as other stocks when the margin clerks take charge. However, owning the shares of the companies which own the resources that China, India, Korea and other major new economic powers need most is, surely, the soundest of long-term-oriented equity strategies.

http://econompicdata.blogspot.com/2010/ ... force.html

Think about this. In January 2010, almost 3 more people out of EVERY 100 that can work, are no longer even looking and more than 6 more people out of EVERY 100 that can work aren't as compared to the workforce in January 2000.
aedens
Posts: 5211
Joined: Tue Nov 04, 2008 4:13 pm

Re: Financial topics

Post by aedens »

The law of expediency is higher than any current principle. If in the name of social justice, as they might define it, private property was confiscated and the integrity of contract destroyed, that was all right. And they hated above all else the profit motive.
Then came the Russian Revolution. Tolstoy warned in 1899 the path it would follow before it was Born. The Bolshevik, no matter what else, was a man of strong entrails. He did not mind spilling blood to bring his world to pass nor has any other time. Moreover, he had the scientific technique of revolution. His appeal to the intellectual disaffectionists, too pale to start a revolution of their own, was irresistible. It immediately reddened the textbooks they wrote, their teaching, and their contributions to the academic literature of economic and political science.
Before the Great Depression, four student generations had been exposed to the alienating influence of this new education; and the disaffected intellectuals, all with one voice, acclaimed the Depression as proof of their thesis that the profit motive could lead only to disaster and that capitalism was morally and economically bankrupt. The curious fact was that the leaders of capitalism, all in a panic, behaved as if they were guilty. They deny the Encyclical to the roles and responsibility of capital and labor to this day it appears.
But for all of that, it was no activity of the intellect that moved the American to return to Europe with his sword — to the Europe from which his forefathers fled. After the first time his disillusionment was so bitter that he vowed never, never to do it again. The fathers had been right. Americans should have nothing to do with the quarrels of Europe. Then, within one generation, he did it a second time. Why? The spectacle is one that will not easily dissolve in the generalizations of history. There was no profit in it. There was nothing he could get out of it, and in each case he made it a stipulation that he would take nothing for himself.
It is a familiar saying that leadership was the decisive factor. It is undoubtedly true that if either the Wilson administration or the Roosevelt regime had been resolute against war the country could have been kept neutral. There was not only a strong habit of isolation; there was a powerful tradition behind it. That could have been built upon to almost any point, in place of the war fever; but in both cases isolationism became a word of reproach and a political liability.
On the other hand, if the people had been resolute against war they could not have been pushed, led, or lied into it. This holds notwithstanding the fact that the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor instantly united the people for World War II. That was a simple reflex action. If the Roosevelt administration had not been looking for the perfect pretext to enter the war against Hitler the attack on Pearl Harbor might have been averted and even afterward Hitler was the number-one enemy. Many forces were acting over time. The Bismarck knew long before that the Social Security System build a better Soldier as was learned from Caesar. Not all of them visible. That would be so. But one may well believe that the controlling truth was romantic. The true matter of our Social Security sown was a Coal Miner Widow with two children and that was the file on their desk. The family failed, the church failed the Community at large and the State failed but as we are reminded even the poor can save from the wisdom of Capital I have also seen in my lifetime. Both Woodrow Wilson and Franklin D. Roosevelt were deemed Messiahs, one by temperament and the other by evolvement. Thus in each case there was the messianic voice of a president calling to something in people that was stronger than reason. The only name for it would be the crusading spirit, which was latent then and always had been. Since the Colonial Revolution, liberation had been the most evocative word in the American language. In neither World War I nor World War II was there a single selfish or self-regarding slogan. For what was written on the banners? Peace Without Victory. The Armageddon of Right Against Might. A New World for Mankind. Down with Aggression. It was not art of title making that caused General Dwight D. Eisenhower to name his book Crusade in Europe. That is what he thought it was. You could make a list of slogans derived from fear; but they were afterthoughts and, anyhow, the fear was unreal. From the point of view of a cynical world the American who entered two world wars and won them both, when his own interest was not paramount, was either an inscrutable hypocrite or an unbelievable romantic, and in either case a dangerous possessor of the world's ultimate power. And afterward, unconsciously perhaps, the only symptom of a unifying thought in the world was distrust of that American power. Normalcy as we are reminded forwards three conditions of morality if they see it or not on a context they deny in motive. Benjamin Franklin conveyed that there is, or is not, and you better hope not loosely translated from my memory of his writings to the affairs we will deal with.
It is not in their nature? To leave us be until we are pressed to exercise our Libery from the virtue they do not have.
Independent and Open Source…

What isn the Value of Money Citizen?
Last edited by aedens on Mon Nov 21, 2011 8:03 am, edited 1 time in total.
indyboy
Posts: 13
Joined: Tue Feb 16, 2010 1:48 am

Re: Financial topics

Post by indyboy »

Ok, I have been reading the generational dynamics forum for some time. I find it quite interesting and informative, even though I may not understand everything especially with regard to economics. I have never taken an economics course in all my life, so you can say I educate myself by general reading.

I have a question for fellow experts. I apologize if these are really dumb questions, but I am unable to find the proper answer by reading around.

It seems John Xenakis and co. hypothesize that since we are in a period where institutions at all levels are paying down debt, then contrary to popular opinion we will continue to be in a deflationary spiral for quite a long time. On the face of it, it makes sense to me. My questions are
1) Does that mean that the Fed can continue to print money and use it to buy Government Bond withs impunity ? It seems the main reason to stop quantitative easing at some point is the fear of increasing money supply and *inflation*. However, it seems to me that if Bernanke continues to see deflation, he could continue with quantitative easing for quite some time. This also means that long term mortgages would continue to be held low since that is probably what he is doing with the printed money, i.e. buy MBS.
2) It seems that some governments are already tightening monetarily. Like Australia. Also, it seems UK saw a big jump in inflation in December.
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/rba-mi ... _news_stmp
http://www.ecpulse.com/en/topstory/2010 ... inflation/
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-0 ... rates.html
Given that the US economy is in a conceptually similar state, why do the folks here think that we will see deflation and not inflation ?

Any insight is appreciated.
Indyboy.
Higgenbotham
Posts: 7983
Joined: Wed Sep 24, 2008 11:28 pm

Re: Financial topics

Post by Higgenbotham »

indyboy wrote:Given that the US economy is in a conceptually similar state, why do the folks here think that we will see deflation and not inflation ?

Indyboy.
My reasoning is that when the economy is in a natural (cyclical) deflationary state, the market will destroy excess money faster than the government or the central bank can create it, no matter how much excess money is created. As an example, worldwide oil production has been relatively constant for four years. Two years ago, lots of people predicted that gas prices would quickly reach $8 or $10 per gallon after the Fed fired their first salvos at the credit crisis in 2007/2008. Instead, $4 gas prices probably had the effect of destroying more money than the inflation created as many people simply reduced or quit driving because they had no money to pay for gas. As driving was reduced, fewer cars, tires, oil changes, etc., were sold and the deflation fed on itself. The Fed then fired off larger salvos to try to stop the ensuing credit crisis and deflation with less effect. The result of those policies should be similar, with less inflation and eventually even deeper deflation, but we haven't seen the deeper deflation quite yet. In the most abstract sense, it comes down to whether the Fed has a means to pump money into the economy faster than the market can destroy it. At some point, the answer to that is no because the market can destroy money almost instantly during a panic but the Fed cannot pump it back in instantly.

Here, a panic is more or less defined as the instantaneous movement from an incorrectly perceived state (perhaps a delusional state) to a correctly perceived state. The incorrectly perceived state would result from excess money and the correctly perceived state would result from the market's destruction of the excess money (and more).

Going further, if a society is unable to distinguish between fantasy and reality (as appears to be the case at present) or more generally has no means to self-correct toward a non-delusional state of being then neither inflation nor deflation will occur and the society will simply collapse.

This is mostly my own theory/words. I haven't read anything exactly like this, though something like it probably exists out there somewhere.
While the periphery breaks down rather slowly at first, the capital cities of the hegemon should collapse suddenly and violently.
aedens
Posts: 5211
Joined: Tue Nov 04, 2008 4:13 pm

Re: Financial topics

Post by aedens »

Current
http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/ ... nt/g17.pdf

www.chrismartenson.com This information will clarify the issues on banking and a start to
credit, money and the logical path of deflation and inflation. As for the definition
of deflation or inflation I feel since the utililization of resources answer that question in research.
That is the point in the forums a link was supplied to the current rate of resources left and the
rate of consumption of said market resources available. To distill the report 3x the amount Earth material
are being consumed at said rate of that date. I will search the forums later for that report linked as a random
act of kindness. Given the rate of exhaustion, Globalist are rearranging carbon based resources in sector's
in this new predicated Business cycle. Depends on your Utility, which is what puts you at ease
in your lifes journey and capital issue your acountable for.
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