This page has been archived and commenting is disabled.
The "Real Stuff" Economy Is Falling Apart
Submitted by John Rubino via DollarCollapse.com,
Each month one or two high-profile government reports show the US is growing, adding jobs and generally recovering from the Great Recession. But it’s not clear how that can be, when the part of the economy that makes and moves real things keeps shrinking. Here’s a chart, published recently by Zero Hedge, showing that US manufacturing has been contracting for the past year:
Meanwhile, the companies that move physical things around are falling hard:
Railroad stocks drop after companies give downbeat outlooks
Railroad stocks dropped sharply Wednesday, after both Kansas City Southern and CSX Corp. provided downbeat outlooks for the current quarter at an analyst conference.
The sector’s decline helped pull the Dow Jones Transportation Average, down 2.1%, much more than the 0.9% decline in the Dow Jones Industrial Average. Kansas City Southern’s stock was the biggest loser in the group, tumbling 7.1% on volume that was more than double the full-day average, according to FactSet.
The company’s chief financial officer, Michael Upchurch, said at the Credit Suisse industrials conference in Florida, that fourth-quarter revenue would decline in the “high single-digit” percentage range from year-ago levels, according to a transcript provided by FactSet.
Analysts surveyed by FactSet were expecting, on average, fourth-quarter revenue of $622 million, which implies a 3.3% decline.
CSX slumped 3.7% in active trade, after CFO Frank Lonegro said at the same conference that domestic coal movements have declined “more significantly in the fourth quarter than expected.” As a result, he said earnings-per-share growth is now expected to be about 3%. The company had said in October that it expected full-year EPS growth in the “mid-single digits.”
Among the more-active shares of other railroad companies, Union Pacific Corp slid 2.8% and Norfolk Southern Corp shed 2.8%.
One reason for the discrepancy between overall growth and real stuff is that most of today’s economy is made up of services, and they’re doing okay (until this month):
What is the service sector? Mostly software, restaurants, banks, construction companies, retailers, doctors and hospitals.
Can an economy thrive if it doesn’t make or move physical things? Intuitively the answer is no, because most of the services mentioned above either maintain the status quo (like healthcare and restaurants) or (like houses) consume rather than build capital. As for banking, in its current incarnation it’s almost certainly a net negative, draining capital from productive uses and funneling it to trading desks and political action committees.
The US, in short, is engaged in an experiment to see how long an economy can function with services growing and manufacturing contracting. As with so many of today’s monetary and fiscal experiments, no one knows when definitive results will come in. But the data so far aren’t encouraging.
»
- 37 reads
- Printer-friendly version
- Send to friend
- advertisements -
Whaddya mean we don't make real stuff...? We lead the world in making likes and dislikes, movie rentals, apps for i-thingys, bankster fraud, corrupt politicians, media whores, and by far and away, mass shootings by terrorists...
S/
Right. We lead the world in mass corruption, wars, genocide, mass murder of ethnic communities and partnerships with the devil cults. ISIS is CIA and Mossad created and I can't believe the US mass sheeple can't fucking figure out that their guberment has been complicit in generational murder for as long as it has been "declared" as a united states of corrupt banksters and elites marching forward to maintain the UN Agenda and the greater israel project. Zionists are evil and AIPAC proves that it runs the show in DC.
So here is a toast to a fucked up economy. Don't forget to tell your children you are sorry for they have no future the way it looks now.
Don't forget all the flags (the false ones).
Remember when we all read in school how barbaric invasions of the past took place? Guys like Attila the Hun, or Alexander the Great would invade other lands and destroy 'enemies'.
These guys ruled over a nation. They controlled the nations wealth. They controlled the army. They expanded into other areas by stripping the foreign people of their land and valuables. These tyrants would expropriate other nations' wealth by stealing their treasures and securing its resources or trade routes.
Can anyone tell me how the US is any different today?
Well, here in America - people like this are charged with ruling over the nation's wealth and health of the economy. If one can find a more perfect example of smug bastards boasting about free-trade and the TPP, it would be damn near unwatchable.. like this almost is (320 views vs. 2 billion views of gangam style...)
The "President's Export Council"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d36S9l4j0xo
History shows when the fiat currency system reaches it's end cycle, there is always a call for war. This one however, will wipe out billions!
http://beforeitsnews.com/conspiracy-theories/2015/12/road-to-ww3-time-to...
These delusional psychopath NWO/CFR elites can dream on with their NWO one world gov. It will never happen by their hands.
Check this legitimate ways to mak? money from home, working on your own time and being your own boss... Join the many successful people who have already used the system. Only reliable internet connection needed, no prior experience neccessary, that's why where are here. Start here... www.wallstreet34.com
"The US, in short, is engaged in an experiment to see how long an economy can function with services growing and manufacturing contracting."
Should read:
"The US, in short, is engaged in an experiment to see how long an economy can function with services growing and manufacturing contracting while the MSM tells us how awesome everything is."
Another "oldy-but-a-goody". This "transition from a manufacturing to a services economy" has been going on since before NAFTA, and it's now almost finished we'll finally get to see what the Reagan-Bush1 voodoo economics hath wrought.
Good times!
You are in the wrong place cum-quat. Go suck some Obama dick dumb ass.
Do not .. I repeat .. DO NOT put Reagan #40 and Bush #41 into the same sentence in economic context ..
You do not know what you speak here. Whatever college econ prof and/or media talking head taught you and/or informed of this; track him down and punch him in the face ..
https://app.box.com/s/hfgvcqg7gqh7i27at6sv53ywu87lwarp (Read Me First)
Let me guess: You also believe Al Gore is an environmental prophet on global warming ... I mean climate change.
...and invented the intertewbz.
A whole lotta name calling, no substance. This site is becoming a shithole. Keep screaming your irrelevant memes at each other. Maybe I'll check back after the election when tge partisan douches aren't so thick. Maybe.
Thanks, I needed someone of superior intelligence yelling their perception at me.
You bring up two Presidents who have been out of office since 1993 (22 years). One who cut taxes dramatically and who's tax reforms have been totally undone. Another who foolishly raised taxes and lost an election over it. And you claim your arguments have substance? Ha Ha Ha ...
You say Zerohedge is shithole (anus?) and you are just passing through.
You forgot Clinton. Guess you voted for Bill. Clinton signed NAFTA and it would not have been passed by congress without Bill pushing it. Clinton also did GATT and World Trade Organization. Bill was so owned by China they once castigated him for saying something they didn't like and Bill shut up like the good shill he was and is. The thing I despise most about Clinton's reign is Bill cut Social Security (which my mother was dependent on then and for the rest of her life) and no one will call him out for it to this very day. Bill Clinton cut Social Security (using Medicare to do it) without congress voting and the (corrupt) courts supported him. Corrupt Congress and corrupt Media won't even recognize that it happened. He cut retired workers Social Security payments so that he could finance Disability payments to Block voters. Democratic Party Block voters. Free Stuff Army Block voters.
Eyeroller, your added take on it is irrelevant. Try again.
I could only chortle at the depressing pictures the MSM put out with stories of the "better than expected!" jobs report released yesterday.
Story after story, picture after picture...of restaurant workers.
Gubmint counts robot "jobs" in the "jobs" numbers as well, correct? Replace one illiterate burger flipper with two robots = one job gain.
The only thing you should be buying is BTFD!!!
We are approaching 'this time its different'
In politics, "definitive results" do not exist. Causes and effects can be, and are, argued and denied ad infinitum , in spite of overwhelming evidence to the contrary. For example, Cheney & the neocons still claim they did the right thing in Iraq & Afghanistan, and proudly boast that they would do the same thing again today. Keynesian economists will argue that they made no mistakes over the last 8 years, we just didn't apply their prescriptions aggressively enough. And so on.
In politics, confirmation bias is the leading cause of blindness.
Too many people talking for a living. And then lying when they are wrong. Geniuses in their own mind afraid to lose a salary paid to a useful idiot. What happened to education and thinking? We are a pathetic species. Hard rain gonna fall and wash it all away.
Does this mean that Ann Margaret isn't coming?
Is that you, John Wayne?
Is this me?
Damn, you got me and date stamped me.
Oh, she's coming but she's probably, like, 86 years old by now.
So be slow and gentle with her and remember that her heart pills are in her purse.
This is what you get when you have too many economists riding around in the Choom Wagon.......
Meh, we were making way too much useless crap anyways.
Now we're tapering off buying useless crap. I'm on a personal crusade to find good quality tools and machinery from the US industrial age, when America was at it's peak. Most of it is better than anything available to the consumer today.
On another note: I just contracted a graphic design on fiverr.com with a guy in Morocco. He never understood my simple request so I'm still in want. It only cost me ten bucks for the experience.
But after about an hour of him sending me useless images, he was "SO TIRED"
I'll try US based and see where I get.
I have a shovel that is 60 y/o; and a pair of garden shears from the turn of the century, both in perfectly good working order. It's fun to shop for items like this. Remove rust as needed.
Demand is going up for GUNS & AMMO, in the U.S. The one bright light for U.S. manufacturing.
Great. So when does any of that translate into fewer terrorist attacks and domestic mass shootings? Serious question.
When all the terrorists are dead. Foreign and domestic.
Less than 4% of population nationally have carry permits. California: 0.1%
If you have a permit, you don't have a right. Plus your gun can be confiscated simply by sending you a polite letter in the mail explaining that you have to turn in your gun (serial # XXXXX) by next Friday or some very unfriendly people are going to come visit you and won't be leaving until they have found it. A voluntary database of people who want their guns confiscated when the time comes and for which they are willing to pay extra to the government.
That is total bullshit Tarabel. A concealed carry permit has zero to do with gun identification. A CCP requires the person and not the gun to be vetted by the authorities. You can get a CCP and not even own a gun!
You can not buy a handgun in NJ without getting your request to do so ok'ed by the local police chief and then granted by the NJ State Police - takes 3 to 6 months. If you have no criminal record, you will be able to purchase a handgun.
Different states no doubt have different requirements.
But, in general, a permit from the government is an admission that you are getting an exemption from them to do something which would otherwise be unallowed. It is thus transformed from a "right" into a "privilege".
At least in this state, a CCP is only for a single specific weapon which must be listed on the permit application. If you want to carry some other gun, you will have to change the information on which gun you are allowed to carry concealed.
tarabel: No idea who down voted you but add this to your verbal ammo...
If it's illegal to do something if you don't get permission from .gov first, then .gov is licensing illegal activities that are really natural rights.
Applying for (begging permission)from any .gov agency for a "license" to do something means you WORK for them in the same way WalMart employees must obey corporate acts, statues, and bylaws of that corp if they wish to stay employed. Governments everywhere are literally corporations like WalMart and you can look up any state, city, town or whatever on the Dunn and Bradstreet website.
The difference between Wally World and .gov is that if you work for Wally you get paid. If you have some kind of license from .gov it allows them to rape you financially for speeding, pissing in your own backyard, or whatever.
In about 2 years I will have no ties to any .gov identification. I will never renew a drivers license since I don't need it to TRAVEL FREELY. Licensing a basic human right such as driving to travel and conduct ones life as needed is a crime against peaceful humans that want no part of the .gov slavery and corruption.
So endeth my rant!
I have mine. Big Deal. Live in NJ - invalid. Only the NJ State Police grant CCP - I will never get one - no criminal record - no civil record - makes no difference. My CCP invalid in NY. Good in PA, where I carry a 44 Mag to defend against bears when trout fishing.
I carry when and where I wish. If I never need it no one will be the wiser. If I do need it that won't matter. Very simple arithmetic really.
When you can actually carry one around without a lawyer and public relations rep in tow. In Isreal the police asked all permit holders to carry all the time and they claim it made a difference.
Otherwise vote for a difference (TM).
Now all we need to do is manufacture guns in the U.S.
Smith & Wessons are some of the best guns made in the world. Model 29, 686 Plus, M&Ps can't be beat. And of course Colt's 1911s are outstanding.
Funny how all of the good old time firearm manufacturers in the US were or are in CT, NY, MA etc.
Ain't that the truth.
Not Henry rifle.
They were there for a lot of good reasons but not any longer. More and more, they are moving to where they are welcome, such as down South. In a new Civil War, it might be the Yankees who have to import or capture guns and the Confederates who manufacture their own.
That; and cannbis. We grow the best.
The US economy exports financial fraud.
Saturates the home market with it as well.
New highs coming. Shit, can't wait.
Toxic Mix Hits Trucking, Orders for New Trucks Totally Collapse, Pummel Manufacturers
4 December 2015, by Wolf Richter (Wolf Street)
http://wolfstreet.com/2015/12/04/orders-for-heavy-trucks-collapse-worst-november-since-2009/
We'll probably consume until the nation goes completely bankrupt.
Kinda like a kid does this stuff until Dad's bankrupt. Liability, not an asset.
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/millionaires-son-torched-ferrari...
This country is already bankrupt.
The lemming population BLM are just to stupid to know it.
No. Afraid to lose the paycheck because they have been taught that they cannot do anything useful.
The U.S. is the Kingpin of creating DEBT & GOV. surfdom.
www.usdebtclock.org $166 TRILLION in U.S. FIAT Debt and counting, RFF Real Focking Fast!
https://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/CUSR0000SASLE
in the service economy we all do each others laundry. the services economy is a real jungle. sometimes you have people undercutting one another, other times everyone charges too much. the consumer has more discretion in a services economy, you do your own laundry. some years ago the suppliers used to discriminate against retail consumers, carpenters electricians all bought material at wholesale and there was a big markup. you couldnt really afford to fix your house, or your own car. now we have home depot and autozone, i still dont know how you can do a lube and oil for what those places charge. when i was a kid my dad changed his own oil but people then grew up doing mechanical work. now nobody knows anything, and the education system works to keep it that way. so we have all been prepared for the service economy, but the technology of labor saving devices is a huge fraud, just like all those kitchen appliances to help you make dinner, when you used to have a cook. now you have a cook again you dont need all that stuff.
What the folks making money today don't realize is that their "job" will not exist in the absence of a 'real economy'.
As awesome and powerful as all this tech and high-finance IS, it is totally dependent on the mundane (and apparently forgotten) physical economy where things are actually MADE out of other things that are mined, caught, grown, developed, etc by actual human beings. Those things are then shipped around the world.
Or maybe not, as the BDI would seem to suggest.
The thriving world economy that made all this possible in the first place, and without which it CANNOT survive, is now contracting. Mines are being idled, factories shut down, and workers jobs outsourced.
The "economy" we have is now running on fumes. At some point, all the tech will begin to seize up as supply-chains are broken. All the infrastructure necessary to make it work was built during the greatest economic boom in human history...such a building will never happen during a contraction. And by the time the economy turns around, that infrastructure will be long gone, or unsalvageable. Just like the post-fall Romans scavenged the materials from their great monuments to build their simple homes, we'll be picking at the towers and plants and empty factories for shit we can use for our newly simplified lives.
You can't have high-tech without low-tech. The best I-Phone on the planet is nothing but an expensive paperweight without the servers and satellites and workers and overseas supply-chains, etc, that make it so useful today. In order for you to make a hotel reservation with your smart phone, there must be many low-paid grunt workers all doing their respective jobs properly, all over the world.
A lot of our tech requires specific materials, available in limited places and quantities, outside of our control. A few strategic mine strikes in China would create chaos in Silicon Valley, and cause a scramble for the remaining stocks of 'unobtanium', or whatever they're pulling out of the rocks over there.
When I look at silver, I see low prices causing mines to stop producing. Yet silver, unlike gold, is actually used up by the current applications...so where does the new supply come from at current prices? At some point, there's going to be a big squeeze. So either prices go up, and hard, or a lot of devices become very expensive...too expensive for most. Sure, there could be other things that can be used...but if you can't get the silver, what makes you think you'd be able to get that other thing in the quantities you'd need?
Everyone seems so transfixed by the gadgets in their hands...little do they realize how ephemeral it all is. And while they are so wrapped-up in their fantasies, they ignore the collapse of everything real around them. Like a guy who is so addicted to computer-porn that he ends up driving the very REAL woman in his life away. He gives up the actual sex for a fantasy. In the end, he's just a lonely recluse with only his own hand for comfort.
Expect a lot of confused and frantic jerking-off in the future as a society wakes up to its 'WTF?' moment.
upvote
Very incisive. Can't build an iThing without materials and can't live in a virtual world no matter how much you want to.
Refrain: hard rain
One of the best summaries of the current status quo I have read in a long time - thank you.
The underlying premise for value is that it is the end-product of work. The problem is that currency is manufactured without work. And, those in charge want it that way because they reep where they do not so sow and profit greatly. And the status quo must collapse for all of the reasons you stated.
This is why I read ZH.
Bemused: I'm literally speechless! Best comment ever. I think the same stuff all the time, just don't have the talent to write it the way you did.
Thanks guys, it means a lot. After several years of being censored, bumped, etc, by numerous other sites, I finally stumbled upon ZH, and here I've been ever since.
My comments aren't always well-received, but I've yet to have one removed, or to be scolded by Admin, or to get the dreaded 'pack-attack' from the disgruntled or offended...what I usually get are intelligent and well-thought replies that get me to thinking further about my position, and I've had to make adjustments on occasion when new info comes my way, or I see a different viewpoint I hadn't considered before....
It's why I love this site, and keep coming back. The folks here don't just react to the comments, they REPLY to them. I don't feel like I'm screaming into a noisy room when I post here...people actually READ your words, and engage with you!
And I never get scolding messages from the Tylers, telling me to mind my language or 'tone'...(fuck you, Huffington Post!)
So thanks to my fellow posters, and to the Tylers, for this little corner of the Internet where I can speak freely and actually be heard!
Bemused: Welcome home.
We, well the government, manufacture lies.
OK lies are not tangible but bullshit might be
It's called "Dutch Disease" when a flood of unearned wealth corrupts a nation into building a "service sector" economy funded with that wealth. When you have unlimited funds it's always easier to buy stuff than make it yourself, so the affected nation's industry declines.
Dutch Disease is usually caused by oil, guano, or some other valuable, easily extracted natural resource, but in our case it's the fact that the whole world wants to hold US dollars as its reserve currency.
What? Barista-brewed cups of coffeee isn't "real stuff'?
But it’s not clear how that can be, when the part of the economy that makes and moves real things keeps shrinking.
Start with a false premise ... you end with a false conclusion. An economy is "not" about stuff. It's not about "services".
An economy is about "trade"
It is entirely possible to have a flourishing economy built totally on trading of services. In fact, if you view agriculture as trading in services rather than trading in stuff ... and energy as trading in services rather than stuff, then it's easy to envision an economy where all the traders have all the stuff they need ... but still engage in vibrant trade for services.
Software is a service industry. Hmmmm..... I work in the electronic design automation industry, we provide software for designing integrated circuits (chips). You can't make a chip today without high specialized & complex software. So is this a 'service' or part of the 'atoms' industry?
Automobiles & airplanes have highly complex control systems throughout and wouldn't be able to function without extensive software. The GE engine on a Boeing would be a brick without the engine management software. So this is a 'service'?
The number of new chip designs (hardware) are falling because we have sophisticated microcontrollers that have so much capability built in that its cheaper to buy an off-the-shelf chip and not use 1/2 of its capabiliites than to design one from scratch. All the 'customization' is done in software and that's where most of the engineering expense is. So that work is counted under the 'service' industry?
Makes no sense. Its more complicated than that.
You make a good point but that was not what the author was trying to imply..
he's looking at the software products that apple, hp, microsoft etc are selling which I would like the author consider a service.
I was a little surprised to see construction listed as a service as well. Construction is just a portable manufacturing facility that moves its factory from location to location rather than staying in one place all the time.
The author's definition would probably classify mining and logging as services as well, since these are things you COULD do yourself but choose to hire someone else to do it for you instead.
You make a point, but realistically, how much of the contemporary "software" sector is in embedded or in EDA software development? Not very much. The GE engine on a Boeing's BOM for the FADEC software is an extremely small fraction of the overall cost of the engine. Very likely similar to the cost of a couple turbine blades at best, if even.
Data isn't perfect, and there will always be obscure hybrids of roles that don't neatly fit into the categories. But that doesn't invalidate the overall message.
I get your point. Now hear this REALITY.
I don’t fly in, or use any “services” that you create. I care not if a plane falls out of the sky due to a software malfunction or other issues. You can be the smartest guy on the planet but if you don’t have the basic skills to feed your giant brain, you die. I’m the MFWIC when your software world crashes.
And MFWIC means, MotherFucker What’s In Charge! I will be the guy that teaches you how to feed yourself, assuming you even want to live after your software gig ends and electricity becomes an issue, and all your computer skills have no use.
The vast bulk of humanity can’t light a fire, never mind other less challenging jobs. Computers, software, are NOT serviceable skills when you can simply throw the computer away and everyone and their dog is giving away free software that can mesh with any Windows/Apple crap that costs hundreds of $$$. Why the fuck would anyone go into debt at college or university to learn this stuff when it has been FREE since time immemorial? Best to view the movie Good Will Hunting. $1.50 in late library fees gets you the same education if you are truly meant to do whatever it is you want to do, without the debt or university sanctioned paperwork that says you’re a genius.
Speaking of boiling water, in the past 2 years I have seen 3 boil your tap water advisories from local .gov areas. People literally freak out.
Big problem, people confuse virtual world values with the real world...all those algos from the start ups are not going to save us now...tangibles need to speak up louder as that's what we put on our plate to eat.
http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2015/06/virtual-world-values-and-real-world-we.html
I keep saying this
The function of current " trade" practises is not to facilitate consumption.
It is to destroy consumption.
If you are a financial entity in control of the real world then to maintain wealth concentration you must increase the friction of commerce at every opportunity
I come from a port that within living memory was very traditional.
Dockers waited in early morning pubs waiting for the next ship to come in.
They would get drunk.
Sober up and work hard....then get drunk again.
Now in reality this was a terrible life.... But colourful in parts.
But the point I am making is a observation of the physical economy.
The entire production / distribution and consumption system of the stuff you could make was very tight.
The stuff you could not make, let's say bananas was imported.
The waste was kept to a minimum as 90% of the pubs were within 15 minutes walking distance from the two breweries, one located at the north side of the river and the other on the south side of the river.
If you study the manufacturing history of medival towns ?uch as Florence (a major textile industry) you will witness the very same patterns.
Outside of the town boundaries it's hinterland was very agrarian but served the purpose of suppling the town with what it could produce, stuff that was impossible to make was imported.
In Cork as it was a major food processing center the less good cuts of meat was cheap
( SHEEPS STOMACH WALL etc) was very cheap.
Better cuts of meat was expensive.
But the point is cheap or nearly freely produced goods was not expensive.
The point of euro was to make nearly freely produced goods expensive and expensive goods cheap.
Destroying the entire production / consumption chain
Why is everyone always denigrating restaurant jobs. Daughter-in-law makes $600 on a good Friday night waiting on tables. Why go to college?
Restaurant "jobs" are forever?
When she is 50 and a criple, ask her that question...
Where does she dance at?
Does she work for Hooters?
Power it's self has for a long time produced nothing but the signs of its resemblance.
And at the same time another figure of power comes into play due to the collective demand for signs of power -- a holy union is reconstructed around its disappearance.The whole world adheres to this more or less in terror of the collapse of the political.
And in the end the game of power becomes nothing but the critical obsession with power -- obsession with its death, and obsession with its survival which increases as it disappears.
What economy, ohhh, the fake one, i get it now...
It's just a 'shadow' of it's former self...wink wink
This article raises an excellent point then mistakenly shoots it down. Services are indeed outsized valuable with respect to manufacturing in the production of consumer goods. Most of the value delivered by physical goods these days is a function of their software and abstract design rather than just their basic materials or physical craftsmanship.
This is why America need not manufacture anything, and indeed should not, if it has a comparative advantage in design rather than manufacturing.
America can just send a car design to China to build, and in exchange China will gladly send back many physical cars. The Chinese derive enormous physical world material benefit from having far superior cars to drive themselves at far lower cost. They are able to specialize in manufacturing while outsourcing all the design heavy lifting to America. Such as costly engineering R&D and educational infrastructure development. America has invested heavily in building a deep pyramid of knowledge capital in people's heads around technology and design. America produces best-in-class programming, creativity, and design services that are even more value-add to the consumer goods we all want than material fabrication is.
Goods and services are both valuable to human life in tangible ways. Specialization of labor and trade across goods and services is the root source of the enormous prosperity we enjoy. National borders do not invalidate the power of this to enrich all parties. Don't condemn it or throttle it, instead promote and encourage it.
I got out of the BS economy 7 years ago and into the real one. No more trading pieces of paper and empty promises. When I look out my window now I see the value of my labor....30 bred black angus cows due to calf in may-june. If I look to the left I can see the 50 ACRES of hay that I cut this summer and sold at 6 dollars a bale. i see the old barn that me and my partner straightened, and the 7 cord of wood neatly stacked that heat my house. In my freezer I see good grass fed meats, beef, lamb and some chicken. In my other freezer I see vacum sealed greens, carrots, and beets piled to the brim. In my basement I have sacks and sacks of potatoes hanging. our chickens are good for a dozen eggs a day on little more than feed corn and left-overs. We eat good, get plenty of fresh air and exercise, the bills are paid and my son rides horses and hunts turkey while city kids lose their souls staring at computer screens. I'm sure there's plenty here that have more in the bank then me, but I am one of the wealthiest men on earth
We don't make anything in the way of "every day stuff" in this country anymore. It'll be fun to see what happens when the dollar finally crashes. What will the sheep do when all that imported shit in WalMart goes sky high in price?
When a small number of people can produce so much, but can't consume it all then somehow you have to get value to those not producing and thereby they can consume.
IT IS THAT SIMPLE.
Take your pick hand people money = benefits / welfare or tax the value stashed by the wealthy to put it back into the system.
IT IS THAT SIMPLE ALSO.
Instead they cripple the middle class reducing consumption further and making mopre poor people that need handouts to get by.
Most individuals wrongfully want to believe they are insulated from the bone crusher. No matter who you are or what you have done to prepair you will not be immune to what has alread hit the shore. As Henry David Thoreau said "When you pull a string in nature it affects everything". Ones greatest assets for surviving the SHTF'd are standing in thier shoes. Skill sets and the ability to adapt to adverse and negative conditions along with knowing when to cut bait and run are what will save your Six.
As Tyler Durden said in Fight Club "You can't achieve anything until you have lost everything". The path for infinite achievement is in all our futures.
God Speed...803Mastiff
I disagree with the article's premise SOMEWHAT.
Manufacturing is a service too. When I buy a bicycle, I am hiring the manufacturer's personnel's labor to make a bicycle* for me that I could make on my own, if I really, really wanted to expend the time, effort, and money to.
So manufacturing is a service that results in a tangible good that is (typically) reusable**. Restaurants are a service provider that result in tangible goods that are usable once. Software developers are service providers that result in intangible goods that are reusable. Live performers like singers are service providers that result in an intangible good that can be used once (an "experience").
Thus, the argument of this article is that producing tangible goods that are reusable is a necessity for a thriving economy. I tend to agree with this somewhat, but I do think it is possible to have a thriving economy that does only the other kinds of services. It really comes down to what the economy in question includes. If you were to say, we are only talking about the US domestic economy, then yes, it is highly probable that within the US economy, on domestic soil, we need some manufacturers that provide services that result in tangible, reusable goods.
But the US economy as a whole is really global. We have tendrils extending into all sorts of other countries' economies. So to a degree, we DO have plenty of manufacturing. It just happens to be in China, etc.
---
* A bicycle is a good middle example--I probably COULD design and build a bicycle myself. I certainly cannot design and build a Boeing 777. BUT, I can probably figure out a way to get from point A to point B without having to build a 777 or by building a bicycle or a boat or renting a car (a service that results in an intangible good, used once).
** typically reusable. A manufacturer can make a tampon, but people probably don't want to reuse it. I guess "durable and storable" is probably a better term than reusable.
When they started adding "services" into their contrived GDP number, even the dimmest bulb should have seen that the fix was in. Double ledger leads to double counting.
And when you measure debt created by politicians versus other people's income, you know they are going to steal it all.