As we watch the sporadic downward spiral of Europe and the US “economies” (I prefer civilizations) it’s curious that no one acknowledges that all of the underpinnings for this disaster have been in place for MANY decades. The statistics documenting the economy are regularly, if not rigorously collected, distributed and analyzed.
1) Aging population 2) loss of national competitiveness vs other nations 3)morbid obesity/illness growing at alarming rates 4) decliining public school standards and attendance 4) immoral and corrupt political class. With these facts, do statistics really matter?
As an 8+ generation American it saddens me to hypothesize that the American Empire may be the least successful and most incompetent of any major civilization in history. Let’s not take the very real advances in science as something that would have only happened here. Our Founders gave us an extrordinary framework which has obviously served us well. I ask myself, why do we only refer to the Framers and not someone more recent? Because there is no one!
We have essentially taken over one of the most resource rich pieces of land in the world and in a short space of time, recklessly exploited it and now have little to show for the squandering of that extracted wealth. The 300+ years of European colonialism has essentially ended and the free capital that sustained Europe (primarily) is now gone. We are witnessing the results.The argument as to whether the rich should pay more taxes to strengthen our nation is insulting. Of course, the politicians and career bureaucrats currently in place do not recommend any change in direction or outcome.
How will we solve this? I think the smart money has recognized the probability of social (not economic) collapse and confirms the continuous consolidation of the global corporate class. At the end of the day, goods and services will be supplied and consumed. Who manages that process will unfortunately probably not be an elected polity of any value to the average citizen. Increasing rage in the streets, whether in Greece, Spain, Florida or elsewhere only portend the coming disaster. I hope enough of us will recognize the coming train wreck and work to avoid a society that Orwell, Huxley and a host of movies have posited for our future.
- futuresmkt
