As Peter Schiff put it in a Facebook post, Trump promised to drain the swamp, but today, “The swamp is now bigger and more expensive than ever!”
The US government spent a record $433.3 billion last month, running up a monthly deficit of $214 billion, according to data released by the US Treasury Department.
That’s $433 BILLION spent in a single month.
The SchiffGold Friday Gold Wrap podcast combines a succinct summary of the week’s precious metals news coupled with thoughtful analysis. You can subscribe to the podcast on iTunes.
One of the favorite Republican talking points is that tax cuts will “pay for themselves” by spurring economic growth. This seems plausible. But GOP talking heads underestimate just how much growth would be necessary to pay for the massive tax cuts and spending increases recently passed by Congress. In fact, the Congressional Budget Office released its analysis Monday and said that the tax cut plan will “balloon” the deficit over the next several years.
Ten-year Treasury yields flirted with 3% this week, hitting a four-year high of 2.95. Does the Treasury yield hold the leash of the stock market?
Peter Schiff talked about it in an interview with Liz Claman on Fox Business, saying the Fed has kept rates artificially low for years, but given current conditions, it’s inevitable that the market will lift rates toward “normal.”
The result?
Gold is going to “go ballistic.”
The SchiffGold Friday Gold Wrap podcast combines a succinct summary of the week’s precious metals news coupled with thoughtful analysis. You can subscribe to the podcast on iTunes.
The US federal government is spending money like a drunken sailor.
And that’s probably unfair to drunken sailors.
In November alone, the US government reported a $139 billion deficit.
The Federal Reserve is in the midst of inflating its third big bubble. During an interview with Greg Hunter last month, Peter Schiff said the third time isn’t going to be the charm.
The middle class is not getting tax relief under the Senate plan currently under consideration. It’s getting big government on a credit card.
Here’s a fun fact. Did you know virtually all of the individual tax cuts in the Senate version of tax reform are temporary?
Indeed, what the Senate giveth, it also taketh away. Most of the tax cuts for individuals would expire in 2026 under the Senate plan.
So what’s the reasoning behind sunsetting the tax cuts?
Every once in a while, a mainstream news outlet publishes a piece about the national debt. Here and there, politicians trot out the surging debt as a talking point to make some political hay. Now and then, an economist will wave the red flag. But by-and-large, the national debt just kind of looms over us.
We’ve gotten used to the shadow it casts, and we generally don’t give it much thought. It’s kind of like people living at the foot of a volcano. They know it’s there. It might cause some low-level anxiety. But they really don’t pay much attention to it – until it erupts.
So, just how bad is the national debt? We all know it’s pretty bad. But would you believe it’s actually worse than you probably think?
There’s a lot of optimism out there that passage of the Trump tax plan will juice the economy. Many analysts say tax cut optimism is one of the factors that continue to push stocks up, and that has created headwinds for gold and silver. But as we’ve pointed out, there are reasons to question this mainstream narrative.
Now some in the mainstream are even starting to question the mainstream narrative.
