This article was written by Michael Krieger and originally published at Liberty Blitzkrieg.
Editor’s Comment: This has been the period of the great looting. The Federal Reserve’s zero percent interest rate has been a wealth transfer to the most rich and powerful on Wall Street, in spite of or perhaps because of the destructive role they played in 2008. The recovery has been hollow and false, and the entire system has been set up to fail once again.
Bank of America Admits – Central Bank Policy Enriched Wall Street While “Steamrolling” Main Street
by Michael Krieger
Wall Street is counting its winnings from seven years of easy money.
The results represent a clear victory for Wall Street over Main Street, according to the team of Michael Hartnett, BofA’s chief investment strategist.
“Zero rates and asset purchases of central banks have, thus far, proved much more favorable to Wall Street, capitalists, shadow banks, ‘unicorns,’ and so on than it has for Main Street, workers, savers, banks and the jobs market,” the BofA team wrote.
– From the Bloomberg article: Here’s How Much QE Helped Wall Street Steamroll Main Street
In a refreshing bit of honesty from “Too Big to Fail and Jail” Wall Street firm Bank of America, the American peasants are informed about a reality with which they are all too familiar. That the U.S. government and the Federal Reserve Bank bailed out the rich and powerful, while leaving average citizens high and dry.
It always amuses me when I come across a mainstream media headline to the effect of: “Why are Americans still so angry?”
Why are Americans so angry? Let’s see. Perhaps it’s because one of the greatest heists in American history was just perpetrated against them by their own government in collusion with the largest multi-national corporations and the country’s most undemocratic institution, the Federal Reserve Bank.
Because not only were the individuals who caused the most severe financial crisis in recent memory not punished for their crimes, but they were showered with trillions and trillions of dollars in bailouts and taxpayer backstops, and made far wealthier than they were before the crisis they caused.
Because 99.99% of the population have been crushed by this policy of “socialism for oligarchs” and they feel the intense pain of this decent into poverty every single day of their live.
That’s why Americans are still angry, and if more of them understood what actually happened, they’d be much more angry.
Moving along, Bank of America essentially admitted the above in a recent research report. As explained by Bloomberg:
Wall Street is counting its winnings from seven years of easy money.
In a report sent to clients on Sunday, Bank of America Corp. strategists totted up the results of 606 global interest-rate cuts since the collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and the $12.4 trillion of central bank asset purchases following the rescue of Bear Stearns Cos.
The results represent a clear victory for Wall Street over Main Street, according to the team of Michael Hartnett, BofA’s chief investment strategist.
For every job created in the U.S. this decade, companies spent $296,000 buying back their stocks, according to the New York-based bank.
An investment of $100 in a portfolio of stocks and bonds since the Federal Reserve began quantitative easing would now be worth $205. Over the same time, a wage of $100 has risen to just $114.
“Zero rates and asset purchases of central banks have, thus far, proved much more favorable to Wall Street, capitalists, shadow banks, ‘unicorns,’ and so on than it has for Main Street, workers, savers, banks and the jobs market,” the BofA team wrote.
Meanwhile, the single most destructive man in modern American history roams free while working at a massive hedge fund as compensation for his shameless bailout of Wall Street at the entire nation’s expense:
For related articles on how the Federal Reserve poured gasoline over the middle class and set it ablaze, see:
The Oligarch Recovery – U.S. Military Veterans are Selling Their Pensions in Order to Pay the Bills
The Oligarch Recovery – 30 Million Americans Have Tapped Retirement Savings Early in Last 12 Months
The Oligarch Recovery – Low Income Americans Can’t Afford to Live in Any Metro Area
The Oligarch Recovery – 30 Million Americans Have Tapped Retirement Savings Early in Last 12 Months
Another Tale from the Oligarch Recovery – How a $1,500 Sofa Costs $4,150 When You’re Poor
Eww… look at me. First post…cool!! 🙂
Anyway, this is why I stack food, ammo, PM’s and tools and have land and animals, and know how to use them all.
I’m not sure at this point if we’ll ever get a collapse but I can foresee things becoming VERY tough for everyone except the well funded and connected.
Best make hay while the sun is shining boys and girls.
“That the U.S. government and the Federal Reserve Bank bailed out the rich and powerful, while leaving average citizens high and dry.”
This shows how ignorant Krieger really is. The US government did NOT bail out the rich and powerful. The US population, for generations to come, bailed out the rich and powerful. That is why we are left high and dry.
This is not news to the well informed with their eyes
wide open and their wallets suffering hunger pangs.
I see others wailing “what’s going on”?
If they are too indifferent to figure it out, then
they have already fallen over the cliff.
Can’t save those too ignorant to see.
We must not forget that Obamacare has also had a part in weakening our economy.
Three recent articles about Obamacare…
In Latest Obamacare Fiasco, Most Low-Income Workers Can’t Afford “Affordable Care Act”
“As for those tens of millions of minimum wage workers, who thought they had a right to “hope” for “change”, and instead ended up even worse off – as well as uninsured and paying a penalty…”
“Actually, considering central planning and government takeover of private industries always leads to disaster, it is more surprising that the number isn’t far, far greater.”
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-10-26/latest-obamacare-fiasco-most-low-income-workers-cant-afford-affordable-care-act
Obamacare Is A Disaster: Co-Op Insurers Across America Are Collapsing, And Now There Is Fraud
“the implosion of Health Republic is merely the latest in what has become an epidemic of governmental failure.
In fact, there are a total of ten co-ops, all of which were created by the Affordable Care Act and seeded with billions in federal funding, that have now failed, leading to questions whether the entire business model underpinning Obamacare is unsustainable…”
“Cooperative health insurers (or co-ops) created under a federal grant and loan program in the Affordable Care Act seem to be falling like dominoes.” … with a 46 percent failure rate.
“In sum, of the 24 Obamacare co-ops funded with federal tax dollars, one (Vermont’s) never got approval to sell coverage, a second (CoOportunity) has already been wound down, and nine more will terminate at the end of this year.”
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-10-30/obamacare-disaster-co-op-insurers-across-america-are-collapsing-and-now-there-fraud
And The Biggest “Contributor” To Q3 GDP Was…
“And so, for the 5th consecutive quarter, Obamacare once again comes to the “rescue” of the US economy.
Now if only all other TAXES could be added as GDP GROWTH line items, then the US economy would be well and truly flying.”
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-10-29/and-biggest-contributor-q3-gdp-was
In other related news, I revealed here, to this community, more than a year ago that the Catholic Church has been money laundering more than 5 BILLION British Pounds of drug money every year.
Its in the archives. 🙁
http://news.yahoo.com/exclusive-vatican-inspectors-suspect-key-office-used-money-145459025–sector.html
So what’ll it be? A Brownie Button, or a Bozo Badge?
@Really,
Stack all you want to, but keep in mind that an Executive Order has been prepared and signed by Obama that allows for the confiscation of everything in the event of a national emergency. This includes items involved in food production (your animals, land and water).
I’ll kill every cop or soldier that comes for me. I’ll hunt down and kill their wives, kids, and extended family. After all, you stripped me of all my stuff, I have nothing else to do.
WHAT THE FUCK
Is up with this recent strain of comments decrying the lack of evidence for an imminent economic collapse?
THE UNEMPLOYMENT RATE IS 25%.
WHAT SIGNS ARE YOU WAITING FOR????????????
unemployment is only 5%, heard it on the news
So don’t play anymore. Have nothing in the market, if you have any excess funds, spend them on your own place to improve you ability to sustain yourself.
I had a Roth IRA with near nothing returns, pulled it out 2007, spent it on solar that gives me a positive return (no electric bill) every month I can see.
Any money we’ve had since, we’ve invested in our place….green house to grow food, water lines to help raise critters, etc.
Got excess beyond that ? Buy silver, don’t lend it to a bank.
you did exactly what the bernank wanted you to do…he pretty much FORCED america(ns) to SPEND all their savings, to keep the economy churning along, delaying the inevitable. in the process, the end will be MUCH WORSE than it would have been!….i did the same thing, so don’t feel pregnant. samuel l. jackson said it well in “jurassic park”….”HOLD ONTA YER BUTTS!”
Yep, hold on, cause that big fat O equals something else.
“Something else”, is what is located in the eye of the hurricane, a giant circle. The economy, as well as other pertinent parts of the collapse, are still spinning around that eye, strengthening, and about to hit again.
The eye, or the zero, is just the calm before the storm. Many that have gotten hit hard in the past eight years or so, are the ones that were on the front of the economic hurricane as it moved along slowly over the world.
The rest of the world, and those that didn’t get hit the first time around, are sitting in the calm of that eye. The calm before the storm is setting up a false sense of security among the naysayers, and wealthy. Their greed is causing them to pump more dollars into the markets, and useless shit/material possessions that will be of no help when shtf.
Especially debt that is linked to that cheap interest rate, will be the ruin of many a poor boy. The banks are not just gonna forget it, nor are they gonna go away. When they come for those expensive toys/material things, used as collateral, there will be nobody wanting to buy them, unless it is those that have stockpiled cash, and can get them for pennies on the dollar. The balance of said loan, will be held over the heads of those debtors.
Not a good place or situation to be in, anytime, much less a shtf scenario.
Andy, if you’d left that IRA intact it’d be worth twice as much today, or more.
Hindsight, I know , I dialed back our IRAs after ’09, thinking the worst. Didn’t heed the advice “don’t fight the FED”, as in money printing would mean all asset classes would rise, a lot.
Left a lot of money that coulda, woulda..
Guess what ? My conventional IRA I took out, paid the tax/penalty, bought silver at 6 bucks in 2005. Even at the crappy low price it is today, it’s worth almost 3 times that.
Excellent idea.
This article is informative as far as our wealth being stolen from us. We have to play their game for it is the only game in town.
But the bankers and wealthy are nervous. Why because they know their game is going to stop. They are so nervous they have been building bunkers, buying survival stores and guns and planning to go to the far reaches of the earth to be away from the ones they robbed.
Will the rich be hunted down as were the NAZI’s?
“will the rich be hunted down..?”
One can hope.
I don’t believe it will be that simple. it’s kinda like the draining of the swamp saying thing.
When there is nothing but chaos going on, around every corner, it will be hard to remember that the initial objective is to punish the vermin that caused it all.
We will be looking out for the roving bands, and leave the punishing of the banksters to God.
Banksters go good with a side of fries ,.. their fries
The rich won’t be hunted down……They won’t have to. There greed and arrogance will be their ultimate downfall, as they begin eating themselves. The first sign of their panic is exactly what your seeing now with remote locations, bunkers, and off-shore accounts. There will be no place to hide when the SHTF. Last place i would want to be after the collapse is in a rich mans bunker.!!!!!!
Tell you what, I’ll take the rich guys bunker at a remote location any day. It will be well stocked, well fortified, and hidden away so odds are nobody ever finds it. I’ll live a lot longer than you will also. I always wonder just who is going to hunt them down, the people who will have their hands full merely trying to survive? Who’s going to travel to hunt them down after shtf when there’s no way of traveling except car, motorcycle, bicycle and on foot? How dangerous would it become to even try and make it 50 miles, even if you DID know where their bunkers where? It’s nice to fantasize about how the rich guys are all going to die first but it’s the farthest thing from the truth , the fact is they’ll be the last ones to go, they’re BOL and preps have been spent on ranging in the millions, nobody short of a well organized and well equipped army will be able to take them on, and that’s a Hell of a lot different from an angry, disorganized mob with nothing but some guns and anger on their side. And it’s not like they’re going to turn around and eat each other any more than you or anybody else in your prepper group either, in fact, it’s people who DON’T have a lot of preps or room that will end up turning on each other. So it may give you a degree of comfort to think the way you do about them, but it’s never going to be the truth.
I have a lot of experience with the personality disordered and one thing they can’t handle is confinement of any kind. They have a side of them that has the mentality of a six year old. Their curiosity of what is going on above ground will do some of them in. The aggressive narcissistic types will stop at nothing to get even, if offended. A bunker full of egotistical, greedy and competitive individuals is the last place I’d want to be. In the beginning they will be laughing at the useless eaters and zombies fate above ground but I can assure you they will turn on each other at some point. I know because this is their nature and they cannot change it. Of course some will make it but many will be done in by their own kind. Now that’s what I call real justice.
And yes the odds of these character disordered, greedy individuals turning on each other is far greater than the odds of the mentally stable turning on each other in a prepper group situation.
Hardly. Like I said, people who have less resources and space, security for everyone , read average joe prepper will turn on each other first. People with plenty of food, water, space, and security have no REASON to turn against each other. You’re kidding yourself if you think ” mentally stable” average joes are just going to sit back and watch you eat and live when they’re dying, you’re in for one Hell of a surprise when you see how quickly they become ” mentally unstable”. And they’ll be able to get to you a hell of a lot easier than the rich guys too, you’ll be the low hanging fruit that’s first to go. It’s not your prepper group that will be spell the end for you, it’s the gangs that are going to wipe you out for your stores that will get to you, The rich guys won’t have to leave their bunkers, they’ll have a periscope type unit to see what’s going on, you wont, You won’t need one, you’ll be seeing all the fighting going on firsthand because you’ll be in the middle of it. Like I said, this type of thinking might make you feel better, but it’s all illusion, they’re going to out live everybody else because they’re simply better prepared for it than you and I and everybody else could ever hope or afford to be.
No reason? You know nothing of the psychopathic mind and how they behave when they are together and confined. These people could have 10 years worth of doomsday preps. It won’t keep them from double crossing each other and fighting to be “King” of the bunker. How do you think some of these people got where they are. It’s not because they are nice, upstanding people.
Are we afraid to give war a chance.
Lets face it we are pissing off 1.5bn muslims, a few billion in China and Russia too without counting back streets places like India or Africa.
We are, as they say part of the international comunity and must help our brothers in Isreal to exspand into Syria because Gaza and Palistine is too small for an extention.
All we need is a little world war like the second one where we lend Germnay money whilst selling our British freinds “Ronson Lighter” tanks and then when them stupid Russians had done all the fighting and dying we jumped in to occupy half of Europe, all of Japan and took Canida back from the English, hell we took half the world and not only managed to keep it but keep on taking more.
Now Surly one more little war and the world will be all ours and then we won’t need to deal with anything, well except the debt of fighting the war but thats OK because we looked after our bankster friends in Isreal so we can repay our loans.
Watched sen Cruz talk about funding govt he gave an hour and a half speech about the Washington cartel. They like to vote on unimportant things and show that they are two parties
But when it comes to something important it’s a one party cartel for big business and lobbyist
Interest. They have ” back home agendas” but then it’s business as usual. The rebublicans
Apparently have given up on the important issues and are giving the White house everything
It wanted in funding for the rest of the current administration.Plan on funding it all without
Doing anything more about our debt.Social security to be ” borrowed from again”to fund disability.
This will be from present until 2017. All lame duck politics,So Personaly I think we are glued
Together until then after that who knows? All to be paid for by our future generations. We need
To keep newer politicians like Cruz coming on board he was a breath of truth and fresh air!
ALERT: Stock Market Mutual Funds See Largest Outflows In 30 Years!
I read this on the internet that for the past 6 months, investors have yanked out over 100 Billion dollars from domestic us funds.
Saw that at King world news.
Perhaps now wall street can start sweating.
I was involved in those crucial crisis events as the Western financial system had a giant ‘margin call’. The biggest douche bag in the whole thing? It has to be ex-British PM Gordon Brown. No other actor ‘saved the system’ like Gordon did. He pumped it up good and fat and then let it drop nice and hard so he could hand over the levers of the economy to the top banks and the central banks.
I remember hanging out in some bars after we did the deals, and just seeing every guy who I knew working in the City with a new bespoke suit. These guys looked slick! And they knew, they knew – we were going to rain money from heaven right on to them and into their pockets.
All these years later, I reflect on the heist from my new place, surrounded by dudes from hedge funds digging out their basements, and I think: “Is there anything dumber and more gullible than your average citizen?” Because they just got hosed!
“Stuff” does not a “life” make. A friend of mine… really wonderful woman, owns three houses and she only lives in one at a time. She loves stuff and stimulates the economy accordingly. But, she and her extended family will be in the same boat as the rest of us if the shtf, needing food and basic things. I see a lot of normalcy bias at work in the lives of folks I know with lots of money. Believe me, the apocalypse is the last thing they are expecting. They are at the supermarket with the rest of us comparing beef prices. They just actually buy a little more;-) Thing is, they have a ranch out on rural property, so that would provide a buffer for them if needed. Chances are, we would be invited because, like I said- she is a good-hearted person and would try to save as many of her friends as possible. Not all rich people are creeps. Not all rich people are prepared either.
Election day. How many will ignore the chance to do something about this mess?
Don’t tell me – you believe your vote doesn’t count ROFL
None of our votes count. Whoever gets in – Rep or Dem – will lie and not help or change anything for the good. We’re on our own people. Get prepping.
Vic,
You ‘might’ make some difference in local elections, but if you think your vote makes one iota of difference in national elections, you don’t understand elections are merely for show.
The BEST statement you can make is to withhold your vote, and support, of a system that is now illegitimate. Once the numbers drop to a low enough point, they can not claim to represent anyone.
Sure, you can go ahead and vote. I always do, but I don’t delude myself into thinking that anything is going to change.
“And the Band played on.”
If you don’t want to support our fine commie bourgeois…
“That puts the number of Americans who have renounced their citizenship at a whopping 3,221 so far this year. In 2014, a record 3,415 Americans gave up their passports, according to government data analyzed by CNNMoney.”
So now you have no taxes to support our communist gov. Defunding your enemy is a great way to get things started.
Or shoot’em/hang ’em after SHTF.
ht tp://money.cnn.com/2015/10/30/news/american-renunciation-citizenship/index.html?iid=ob_article_footer&iid=obinsite
The general public has been carefully educated into a state of gullibility and a lack of knowledge as to the basics of science, mathematics, economics, politics, phylosophy, or anything that would qualify them to hold a really important position within our society. Is it no wonder then, that the average American neither understands the mechanisms of the financial elites (thieves) or possesses the ability to protect themselves from financial harm from those who have knowledge but not respect, empathy, or a belief in fairness to all, but only to themselves and their favored fraternity. And they wonder why the ignorant masses rise up against them every so often. For everyone’s benefit, there must be a transition into an equal relationship of equality and respect for all. Honesty is the first step toward a relationship which is sustainable. Live together in peace and harmony not as master and slave or else we all perish and no one wins.
Research Bitcoin. My personal belief is that we must remove any and all government interfere with our monetary system. Bitcoin achieves this, as no one controls it.
I agree with KY Jelly Mom.
Prolly want to Google Bitcoin Hacks first.
Its NOT going to be a big One day wake up and boom headshot for america. This is going to be a long drag grind DOWWWWWWWwwwwwwwnnnnnnnn. Way down but still down. We are in the fall now. Where will it end?? Don’t know. How low will the bottom be?? Don’t know that either.