Peter Predicted Economic Crisis (but few listened)...

[Red Devil]

Will anyone listen now?

http://money.cnn.com/2009/01/20/magazines/fortune/okeefe_schiff.fortune/index.htm?source=yahoo_quote

Excerpt:

'Ponzi economy'

As he outlined in 2007 in his first book, Crash Proof: How to Profit From the Coming Economic Collapse, Schiff believes that the U.S. economy has become dangerously and unsustainably dependent on consumption - fueled by trillions of dollars borrowed mainly from Asian countries like Japan and China.

"We have an economy that's based on the same principles as Bernie Madoff's investments," he says. "It's a Ponzi economy. It's not real. We don't save and we don't produce anything anymore. We simply borrow from the rest of the world, and then we spend it. We've had a giant party. We bought all these plasma TVs and iPods. We remodeled our houses and took vacations. But you know what? The bills are coming in."

Schiff is predicting a wicked post-party hangover. He sees a multiyear recession ahead marked by rampant inflation, a steadily weakening dollar, soaring commodities prices, slumping U.S. stock indexes, and falling wages.


Saved the best for last:

http://money.cnn.com/galleries/2008/fortune/0812/gallery.market_gurus.fortune/index.html

[AcneVulgaris]

He got the crash right, but I don't think he's right about hyperinflation or investing in foreign stocks...other countries are every bit as hosed as we are.

[mrtwosheds]

Maybe inflation or deflation, all depends on how governments and financials respond, Most likely it will be inflation as they try to get the failed financial juggling system running again the easy way, by borrowing more or printing money, Deflation would be the better option, but we would have to work and trade our way out of it somehow, nobody seems to know to start doing this anymore. Its like we've been cheating at poker too long and can't remember how to do an honest days work!
Here in the UK it is clear that our Gov plans to try the "easy" way, by "borrowing" (printing?) even more money that we can't pay back.
Its fairly clear that this will not work in the long run and will simply make things much worse, there is no sign at all of them doing anything that will boost the "real" economy, I assume this is because they don't know what a "real" economy is or how one would work.
Clearly things need to get allot worse than they are now before their entrenched post colonial mindset is forced to consider getting our nation to actually earn its own wealth.
So its onward with the ever increasing bonuses and pay rises for the rich and powerful and ever increasing taxes, bills and prices for everyone else, resources who needs em! we can buy it all cheap from somewhere else and pay the idle population to do nothing and keep quiet like good little serfs should.

[bigbadbogie]

Some things never change...

[TheJamsh]

if the media and government over here would shut up about this so called 'eco-crisis' people would just get on with their lives and the problem would iron itself out.

[mrtwosheds]

if the media and government over here would shut up about this so called 'eco-crisis'

eco-crisis? economic or ecological? is there a difference? Not growing trees is a bad way to go bankrupt!