It’s not just the United States that’s been watching its economy swirling around the toilet bowl like a giant turd. Since mid-2007, global debt has skyrocketed more than 40 percent and now stands at about $100 trillion. That’s a lot of freakin’ zeros. Let’s look at it typed out.
$100,000,000,000,000.
It can glaze your eyes if you stare at it too long. Hardly seems real. We just keep tacking more zeros to the end and nothing ever changes. Except that things have been changing. People aren’t working. They can’t afford to buy a house. They have no savings. And many nations around the world find themselves in even worse economic straits than the good, old USA.
If you pay attention to the mainstream media, you might fall for the lie that our economy is on the rebound. Don’t be that stupid. Marketable US government debt has almost tripled since 2007 and sits at a scary $12 trillion. We’ve become acclimated to the idea of unemployment that runs at around 7 percent, when (pre-Obama) it used to hover in the 3 – 4 percent range.
And it’s probably not going to improve anytime soon. Retail stores have been closing as fast as news outlets can report, taking with them thousands of jobs. Here’s a sample:
- Radio Shack – 1,000 stores to close
- Staples – 225 stores
- Sears / Kmart – 500 stores
Some analysts are even saying that the King of All Retail, Wal-mart, needs to close about 100 underperforming Supercenters and cut the square footage of the rest in half.
But even more troubling than the unemployment rate as a percentage, we have labor force participation at the lowest it’s been in 35 years. Many people have been out of work so long that they’ve quit looking. Of course, these numbers aren’t calculated into that fanciful government unemployment rate.
The truth is that US federal government is running the largest Ponzi Scheme in history, and like all Ponzi Schemes, this one is bound to come crashing down upon our heads eventually.
Then what? Good question – then what? (Image: Flickr | KAZVorpal)
* Read more from JasonHartman.com
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Derek and the Jason Hartman Team
