The economy is strong. The American consumer is resilient. Everything is great. At least that’s the mainstream narrative. In this episode of the Friday Gold Wrap podcast, host Mike Maharrey explains why it’s all just an illusion of prosperity. Along the way, he covers the September retail sales data, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell’s speech this week, and the recent gold rally.
Global debt rose $10 trillion to a record $397 trillion in the first half of 2023, according to the Institute of International Finance (IIF).
The big increase in debt occurred despite tightening credit conditions, and it is an increasingly worrisome problem because the “free lunch” of artificially low interest rates is over.
The CPI has cooled in recent months, but Americans say they’re still struggling with rising prices and they’re worried about inflation. Why is there this dichotomy between people’s perceptions and the official data?
Peter Schiff recently appeared on Real America with Dan Ball to talk about the economy. He said the problem is the government isn’t being honest about inflation.
Great news! The inflation war is over and we won! At least that’s how Paul Krugman sees it. But he’s playing tricks with the data and making assumptions that are meaningless in the real world. In this episode of the Friday Gold Wrap, host Mike Maharrey dissects Krugman’s claims in light of the September CPI data. He also talks about market reaction to the CPI and shares some interesting gold news from Zimbabwe.
After a more than 3-year pause, government student loan repayments started again this month and it’s already putting the squeeze on borrower’s wallets. This is bad news for an economy already strained by massive levels of debt and rising interest rates.
Interest accrual on student loans resumed on September 1 with the first payments coming due in October.
American consumers continued to pile up debt on credit cards while borrowing for big-ticket items fell into the basement in August.
This is the behavior of extremely financially stressed people.
The markets seem to think that everything is fine. They believe the Fed has effectively beat price inflation and it can mop it up without crashing the economy. In his podcast, Peter Schiff said in reality the Fed is at a fork in the road, and there is an imminent disaster waiting no matter which way it goes. He also warned that the biggest crisis is the one nobody sees coming.
The Fed people insist the economy is strong. They upped their GDP growth projections at their last meeting. Joe Biden thinks the economy is strong. He keeps bragging about the marvelous achievements of “Bidenomics.” Mainstream economists keep telling us the economy is strong.
But the average American isn’t buying any of it. (Perhaps price inflation makes it too expensive?)
Interest rates continue to push relentlessly higher. As Peter Schiff explained in his podcast, that’s a big problem when the entire economy is built on a foundation of cheap money. But most people in the mainstream don’t seem to grasp the gravity of the situation. They don’t realize that we are at the beginning of the end of this whole phony economy.
Americans are worried about a looming credit crunch. That’s a big problem for an economy that runs on credit cards.
One of the reasons for economic optimism you’ll hear bandied about out there in the mainstream is “the American consumer is strong” and consumer spending is “holding up” despite price inflation. But nobody seems to ask an important question: how have Americans been able to continue spending?