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The New Youth Normal - Your Parents' Basement
Recent times have been particularly hard on young adults. As we look around the world at Europe and the Middle-East, it is all too often the youth that are leading the social unrest as they again and again are the hardest hit by the global deleveraging (and admittedly most socially connected). The US is not insulated from this (though perhaps more Xanax-subdued) as youth unemployment is around 20% (with 16-19 year-olds around 25%). As Pew Research Center notes though, that fully 55% of those aged 18-24 (and 4% of 25-34 year olds) say young adults are having the toughest time in today's economy. The day-to-day realities of economic hard times are somewhat shocking for a country supposedly so far up the developed spectrum as roughly a quarter of adults aged 18 to 34 (24%) say that, due to economic conditions, they have moved back in with their parents in recent years after living on their own. In the 25 to 29 age range a shocking 34% have moved back home with mom and pop (hardly likely to help with the huge shadow housing inventory overhang we discussed yesterday) Finding a job, saving for the future, paying for college, and buying a home are seen as dramatically harder for today's young adults compared to their parent's generation while Facebook saves the day as staying in touch with friends/family is the only stand out aspect of life that is 'easier' for today's youth. As these increasingly disenfranchised young adults make some of life's biggest transitions (or not as the case seems to be), we wonder just how long it will be before Al-Jazeera is reporting on the Yankee-Spring and showing video of young hoody-wearing Americans throwing their 'Vans' at 80 inch plasma TVs; or maybe the BLS will decide to redefine basement-dwelling (or rioting) as a full-time job.
24% of 18-34 year-olds have moved back in with their parents. Somewhat notably, doesn't everyone get a job to 'pay the bills'? Also notable is the 22% who have delayed procreation - that's hardly going to help as Boomers 'drop off' leaving lower demographics behind...
BLS-provided (propagandized) Youth Unemployment Rates (Seasonally Adjusted).
Thank goodness we have Facebook or there would be nothing better than our parent's generation
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Morgan Stanley laid me off 6 months ago.. right after I bought a house. Luckily my roommates are a big help on the mortgage, until Morgan laid off my other roommate 2 days ago. No severance, no help, no suggestions in either case. To be honest, we're both so much better off not working in that pessimistic shithole.. I took an unpaid job at a hedge fund, so I could learn something more than how to push shit product that I don't believe in. The best thing that company gave me.............. was unemployment.
You could always sell dope to the kids of the Morgan Stanly elite.......payback is a bitch!
You want a productive job, dickhead? Pick up a broom.
FUCK ALL BANKSTERS.
It's actually interesting that America has always had, in the past, such a large percentage of kids move out of their parents homes. I don't think there are many other places, anywhere, where the expectation is that you leave home at 18 and either get your own place.
I can really only speak for Asian countries, but it's a lot more rare that kids travel long distances to go to college (there are exceptions of course). Many more kids in those countries live at home while going to college. I've always wondered where American kids get the kind of money they need to move out of the house at 18. It just doesn't seem possible in a financial sense.
My wife is Indian and she says its opposite there than it is here in the US. Families live together. They occupy the same home. Its traditional. Its just what they do. I think the US has gone deficit binge spending for so long to get us so far above everyone elses standard of living that we dont understand that realisticly we should all be living with our families in one home or apartment and driving scooters not cars.
I think the US has gone deficit binge spending for so long to get us so far above everyone elses standard of living that we dont understand that realisticly we should all be living with our families in one home or apartment and driving scooters not cars.
Well, there was an entire generation that came of age during the brief period after WWII when it really looked like we were all going to be that rich forever. Turns out they were mistaken to believe such a thing, but they did their best to pass on the values and expectations.
"A chicken in every garage... & a car in every pot of chicken stock..."
THAT'S MY MOTTO!
That's what every society did - when they were too poor to afford otherwise.
I would rather live in my car then back with my parents.
if this your "car"?
http://www.motorhomesgroup.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/luxury-motorho...
Time to raise that minimum wage again.
One of the greatest public use of taxes was the GI bill following WW2. The decades that followed were the most productive and rich in our countries history. The middle class thrived during this time. Education today ( college or trades ) is to expensive, we need a new "GI bil", lets make education affordable for all. Paying off student loans into your late 40's is not productive.
it was because WW2 destroyed productive capacities in Europe and Japan
today, America is destroying productive capital in the middle east.
No need for war, no need for soldiers (aka. government workers), no need for GI Bill. Start taxing universities and get rid of loan subsidies and demand will decrease along with price.
Suck it generation Z. No soup for you.
I've said it before and I'll say it again. The intellectuals keep trying to circumvent the natural economic cycle. Nature so to speak. (actually, it's a pretty common message on ZH too..LOL) This is robbing precious TIME from younger generations to earn their livings, save, start families. The leverage upon leverage upon more leverage built off a foundation of rotting debts is taking the future away from those whose turn it is to shape it. For the Nth time Ben: you studied how to avoid the Depression's second coming but you didn't research if its coming was necessary. You are all (central planners) holding back the future.
The unemployment rate was really high back in 1774 in a couple of towns in Mass. Young people could not buy farmland and the British made it impossible to move west. What did these people do? They just formed mobs of armed groups and bought into the idea of liberty, partying and libertarianism. All the conditions are set for a mass revolt. When the weather gets warmer I think that we will see a Yankee Spring. That is way this IRAN WAR stuff is so important to folllow. It is the distraction that TPTB think will keep the young from revolting. I think they have miscalulated. The revolt is going to happen no matter what they do.
There are even more parallels, from Shay's Rebellion to today.
Immediately after the Revolution, states raised taxes to pay their war debts. Veterans tried to pay these with the promissary notes they'd been given, by the Continental govt, but states said those notes were not satisfactory tender. Lots of the vets lost their farms (and this is where Shay's got involved). "In order to help", Alexander Hamilton and the other bankers of the time provided the innovative financial service of buying up those promissary notes, at 5 cents on the dollar. Hamilton and the others then pushed a bill through the young federal govt that made those notes payable at 100% face, in gold. A second round of vets lost their farms, paying the taxes to pay off the bankers.
In other words, MaidenLane II was just a retred of a very old scam.
banks profit off of debt. government debt, consumer debt, mortgage, etc. that's how they create "wealth".
banks hate savers with no debt so they privatize social institutions such as education and force people into debt to be repayed with lifelong labor.
banks hate governments with balanced budgets, so they create war and make governments get into debt with budget deficit.
banks hate liberty and private ownership, so they try to tax it with government force and then make governments get into debt.
Criminy, I hope when I cover the "Yankee Spring Training" on my baseball blog this year I won't get flagged by DHS as some kind of subversive. Although I could use the gubmint hits.
In 1774, the British didn't have sound cannons to herd the stupid iPhone tweeters...I just don't think its going to be glorious this time, if you catch my drift.
wonderful.....we can stay in better touch with family and friends today so we can commiserate on how shitty things are in real time.
....that's so 42 seconds ago...
Ditto the article, My 22 YO just graduated with an econ degree from a New England school . He had a full ride academic scholarship . He is now working on two start ups and working minimum wage at a restaurant,living at home.He is hoping for a real job, but at least his minimum wage job works for Obama. The silver lining may be in the start ups , we'll see.
Have him pay off a rich Jewish kid to be his friend and pal around with him. Perhaps he might get lucky with an angel fund and the startup could get some cash. Of course the Jewish friend will steal the businss and leave your son with nothing. But he'll have "experience". So sad that the future prospect for any young graduate is gettng in on the IPO scam.
when your country does not export anything then it sells bullshit and citizens work on that.
China says no more UST so no more cushy US government work for new workers.
wall st fluff up Facebook bullshit as the next big thing.
China says ok we don't know what it is but looks good so we buy.
IPO is way for US workers, investors to flip bullshit shares to the rest of the world.
Kind of like the housing flipping.MAke money, show foreigners how much they made, flip the hot potato over, let it explode in their faces.
Sure Americans lost home but they were overpriced anyway. It is the Chinese and Arabs who were screwed because US Treasuries bought Fannie Freddie bullshit after Americans flipped it up multiple times.
Real Estate agents made more money flipping houses then chinese factory worker's lifetime earnings, then US forced china to pay with that worker's savings.
My daughter and her husband now in their late 30's were teaching in a rural community in Wisconsin. Fortunately they saw the writing on the wall a few years back before things got really tough with all the lay-offs as education got thrown under the bus to bail out the banksters ( but I digress ). Anyway they moved to Europe and started teaching at international schools.
They live in Switzerland now and are both very gainfully employed and really have no prospects or incentives to move back to the States.
We've been sold out, folks. Our kids need to move out of the country to find decent employment, a livable wage and decent prospects for the future.
Many young Americans moving to
What is the value proposition of America for young and the ambitious?
pay for boomer retirement by overpaying for a shitty house?
pay taxes for government worker pensions at age 55?
pay taxes to subsidize businesses who hire illegal aliens?
pay $100,000 for useless degrees and academic institutions who waste money on fancy buildings?
pay tolls for bridges that were paid off years ago so uneducated union labor can make $50k/year manning toll booths?
pay for AMA union doctors ($200k-500k/year) and for-profit hospitals (fancy buildings) for routine procedures?
pay more for your income than capital gains for the rich?
vote between liberal fascist and republican fascist?
pay more taxes for more wars to subsidize oil industry?
How many US citizens will end up being hired for purposes of repatriation of these people? Not so much now, but consider if it becomes a large enough problem down the road that people will be. That will change the value proposition to negative for moving out.
Those who aid and abet countries like China (HK SAR, Shanghai) and Singapore are aiding and abetting the US's enemies. In a sane and just world, life would get a lot harder for them, as they are contributing to unfree economies that only have a friendly face towards business.
I'm not here to defend The Fed, I'm suggesting that these people that move are doing more harm than good. The US can be saved without such unnecessary destruction.
Accreditted eye - you get it - this is why the central bankers are litterally committing an abject crime - more than the money given to cronies and more than the corruption - they are litterally stealing the future , the hope and dreams of an entire generation and that is utterly unforgivable.
awww man 50% of young people submitting to wage slavery "just to pay the bills"... .......Did everyone remember to pay their local land baron this month with a majority of their harvest?? We must not anger his majesty Lloyd "Longshanks" Blankfein!!
I was watching a documentary on making rum the other day on TV. They were producing something like 40'000 liters of rum a day. I could count on one hand the employees actually working at the factory. It was all machines. So you do the same thing with everything we consume and no wonder there are no jobs. Until the machines stop for whatever reason. Then the shit hits the fan, because nobody knows how to do much of anything anymore other than shopping.
I am used to the current situation as I graduated in 2000. My dad let me live in the house for three months before he kicked me out. While I was trying to find a job with my advanced degree from a top 10 college, which left me overqualified for nearly everything, I took a crap retail job paying $1200 a month and got a $500 a month apartment. Then I got my great $60k a year job, lost it three months later when the company folded. Companies wanted to hire new graduates over everyone in my position. 2000 graduates were seen as tainted. Most people I keep in contact with are still not as succesfull as those that graduated a few years later into a better job market. People who graduated over the past few years will suffer the same fate. Years of being forced out of the labor force and not learning new skills will put them at a serious disadvantage. In today's world, one year out of the labor force might as well be 30. You can say, I know software X 2010 like the back of my hand. But it won't matter if the job requires knowledge of software x 2012. That and the most sought after qualities in the job market today are being a dishonest, ass-kissing, corruptable total moron. Just like the guy hiring you.
That's what happens when you allow business to make those unfavorable decisions.
Make it harder (if not impossible) for business to not hire in good faith, and things can turn around.
H1B
those indians are hiring managers now. They only hire indians. Business love the indentured slaves, and governments love stupid immigrants moving into expensive housing areas to pay more real estate tax.
Any wonder why only immigrants move to California and California welcomes them?
H1B's are only the tip of the iceberg of the whole faulty guest worker system. You'd have to get rid of the entire alphabet soup of visas and start over with something that doesn't have the fraud and waste.
Guest workers are a government-provided way for business to have its cake and eat it.
" In today's world, one year out of the labor force might as well be 30"
I think you need some time off :) Anyway, sounds like you need a less stressful life.
This is the way it has been in Italy, Spain and Greece forever. We are just sinking to their level now.
Debt will destroy the birth rate, (fine with me!!), just like it did over there.
Viva Socialism
Nonsense. Europe had been stable with the same level of social spending (what you called socialism) for decades. It was the bankers, and derivatives - the ability to take out 100X insurance on debt you don't own - that did the Europeans in. And it will continue to do them (and America) in, until they tell their banks to go piss up a rope.
Europe ain't shit without her colonies to exploit.
America exploited native americans, blacks, chinese.....
now with illegal mexicans, chinese factory workers, middle east oil colonies America is still ok.
No nation state empire gets wealthy without exploits for exploitation is the profitability to the maximum....the fastes way to increase wealth.
they know what they have to do .......the question is will they ?
Gee, smithcreek, did you read what you posted ? $7/hr job to pay for 1980s prices. That's the equivalent of a $25/hr job today, paying today's prices. See the problem there, bud ?
Let's see, in 1980 the cost of a gallon of gas was $.57. The cost of my insurance for a POS paid off car was about $70 a YEAR. I could buy food for under $50/month and still eat the occasional steak. In 1982, not very long out of college, I was making $14k for a full time IT job and buying my first house on that salary for $61k, a 3 bedroom townhouse, after having managed to save about $10k on that same salary. SS taxes were lower, and my fed tax rate was lower than the equivalent rate an equivalent salary must pay today.
In every respect, making $7/hr in 1980 was a lot better than making $25/hr in 2012.
i just finished my basement......my kids are only 4 , so i wanted them to be comfortable in their surroundings for the next 80 years
FYI- basement apartments are illegal.
They usually give basement apartments letters instead of numbers.
I don't think you've posted one intelligent thing yet.
Well... after reading these comments I am thoroughly depressed... even more than I was...
Cheer up, there's always pancakes :)
My 16yr old son has become quite interested in corporate control in society and has read many books on the subject - he subscribes to Adbusters and volunteers at a local Anarchist book store. When I was 16 I didn't have a goddamn clue about the world and what was going on -
I think he will do just fine.
I graduated in 1979, a very bad year. First job paid $175 a week. Lived in a 5th floor walkup in Hoboken when it was considered a slum. Struggled for quite a while. Started doing pretty well in the mid 1980s when the debt spiral took off. Now that the debt spiral is unwiding, I'm not sure I can be too optimistic for people graduating now, but I know that despair never pays off, that's one eternal certainty.
During the 2008 gas price panic, my old man said, "well, time to dust off the old locking gas cap I bought in '79." He and my mother actually lived in North Jersey for a time then, my father worked at a small factory making those black metal rear window visor things for Camaros, etc. one summer. He also attempted to get into Studio 54 with my mother, they only wanted to let her in, and she refused to enter without her husband. "Those were the daaaays...."
Thank business for choosing higher unemployment.
Thank government for letting business get away with it.
30 YO, been an IT engineer for 12 years, mostly Financial Services. Quit C back in 2006 sold all my options at 56 (pre rev split),did the made up .com startup world for a while, but got tired of moronic no nothing executive saying do more with less. now im back at C as a C2C contractor pulling as many hours, and as much cash as possible. There is no job security anymore. all workforces are temporary. Its a pirate life for me!!
Here in CA we don't even have basements. Add to the list of reasons why CA is truly f**cked
But unemployment is not that bad according to the American Pubic Radio (APR) program "Marketplace." Astonishingly vacuous commentary --
Interview with Chris Farrell Marketplace Morning Report for Friday, February 10, 2012
Jeremy Hobson: It was exactly one week ago that the government gave us some good news. The unemployment rate dropped last month to 8.3 percent. But some economists say the news isn't as good as it sounds, because some workers have simply dropped out of the labor force.
Marketplace economics correspondent Chris Farrell joins us now to clear this up. Good morning, Chris.
Chris Farrell: Good morning Jeremy.
Hobson: So Chris, is the unemployment rate really dropping, or are people just leaving the labor force?
Farrell: This is always a key question because you're absolutely right. The unemployment rate -- which is at 8.3 percent -- that could reflect that you know, people have been pounding the payment, they finally get work; or they could finally say: you know what? I'm not even going to bother, because no one is hiring. And usually, it's a mix.
But the recent improvements -- in the past several months in 2011 -- reflected a lot of people getting discouraged. So, we got this good number, 8.3 percent. What economists did is they looked at the employment to population ratio, and that measures how many people are actually working. And what it did: it confirmed this was a good number.
Hobson: By the way, what does it mean to leave the labor force? Do you wake up in the morning and go down and file paperwork and say, "that's it for me, don't bother"?
Farrell: Exactly right. You know, it's that image you always have of someone just throwing open their window and just saying, "I'm not going to take it anymore! I've had it, I've had it!"
So what it is, it's a household survey; a survey of 60,000 households by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. And there's these 2,200 trained workers who ask all these questions that are trying to see who's actually looking for work -- you know, you're unemployed but you're looking for work, or maybe you're working part-time and you want to be working full-time.
And then there are people who drop out of the labor force. So some of it can be people not working, people being imprisoned, people being active duty in the military, and then of course, people going to school.
Hobson: So what's the real unemployment rate at this point? Is it 8.3 percent?
Farrell: Well, I like the number of 8.3 percent. Then you can drill down, get more accurate data -- if you make certain adjustments the real unemployment rate's 11 percent. But then you have to make adjustments farther back.
The advantage of 8.3 percent is that it's a consistent time series. It's like the Dow Jones Industrial Average -- is the market up, is the market down. Is the unemployment rate up, or is it down? And the message of the market is, it's down.
Hobson: Marketplace economics correspondent Chris Farrell. Chris, thanks a lot.
Farrell: Thank you.
About the author
Christopher Farrell is economics editor of Marketplace Money, a nationally syndicated one-hour weekly personal finance show produced by American Public Media.
@tekhneek. Are you familiar with a web site called Codeacademy.com ? I saw it as a segment on Bloomberg TV and was going to encourage my teens to sign up, just as we're encouraging them to help out with home repair. Plumbing, electrical etc. again CODEACADEMY.COM Any thoughts greatly appreciated.
Codeacademy is excellent. Any visual vidual/console based learning tool is ideal because it gives you the best of both worlds. You get to see an expert write the application and then try your hand at it live in the browser without needing additional software.
www.codeschool.com is great too, they explain things in due detail and take time to test you and assure that you've understood what they've taught you.
Thank-you. Information much appreciated.
duplicate
I'm surprised the number is that low. Considering their "outcomes based" Socialized Education, its no wonder more of them don't consider dependency on Parents, instead of rolling up their sleeves and making it themselves.
Tell the kids to move over for Granny. With Chairsatan Bernanke policy of ZIRP apparently going on forever my only income is social security and the "nest egg" on which I hoped to earn interest on in retirement is rapidly dissapating.
Go to a trade school or into nursing. You can get a job in any town with a trade like welding or as a nurse. After you start making a living Then you can go to school at nights for your, "sexy" job. I know a guy who is going to school to be an underwater welder. Big $ doing that stuff. I hope the world lasts long enough for him to reach his goal.
My parents' basement is the tits.
Haterz.
What's really frightening is the 35% who have gone back to school. Those people are accruing new debt and subsequently entering a non-existent job market. They are debt slaves from day one and will eventually default or go into bankruptcy. Doesn't bode well for economic growth.
"maybe the BLS will decide to redefine basement-dwelling (or rioting) as a full-time job."
Nooooo.... that's too hard. It's easier to define them as no longer looking for work.
Health care is making very diseased people with multiple organ failure live as long as they possibly can and to use tremendous amounts of money and resources to do so.
In the past, the old croaked out and the young took their place. But not in our brave new world.
What, if anything, is society supposed to provide? Whose fault is it that there are no jobs? I don't know the answer, but I do know the answer is not simple. The problem is not just the result of going off the gold standard or having a fractional reserve banking system, though some here like to think so. I might blame those two things for elevating expectations beyond what is reasonable or rational, but not necessarily for the problem itself. I may be wrong, but I sense a view in this thread that it is somebody's fault that society isn't providing young, willing, and able people with jobs that allow them to live a comfortable life.
Where I reside, until very recently there was no fractional reserve lending because there was no banking system. There was no credit, no credit cards, no checking accounts, no mortgages, no car loans, no student loans, no nothing except that which a vendor might allow a good customer. There are no pensions, and there is no insurance, not life, not property, not medical. Above all else there were no expectations that there was any ticket to success other than a combination of hard work and good luck, with luck taking the upper hand.
There is education even to the university level, but it is not very good. Education is not compulsory, and since there are no child labor laws, many forego school and begin work as young as five or six years of age. It is not uncommon to have as one's tea shop waiter a ten year old boy who cannot write but can memorize an order. He'll work seven days a week, from eight in the morning until eleven at night, and for that earn perhaps $30 a month.
To survive, people have to be imaginative and resilient. Somebody starts digging ditches and earns enough to buy some scrap steel and two bicycle wheels. He constructs his own cart. He then pushes his cart through a neighborhood collecting trash, charging a small amount for each pick-up. He might later sort the garbage and try to recycle, or else a group of kids will rummage the piles he makes and capture that value.
Another person learns to repair all those cheap umbrellas that get mashed when a strong wind blows. He walks about carrying spare umbrella spokes, some swathes of nylon, and a needle and thread, calling out his service as he walks through the neighborhood. Still another person sits on a street corner with a block of ice sitting atop a piece of cheesecloth. She has a catch bucket underneath the cheesecloth, and a spare bucket of water to the side. She has two plastic cups. For thirsty people, she'll pour water over the ice once or twice and catch it below the cheesecloth. A cold drink on a hot day. Same cup for everybody. She makes enough to survive.
A man walks by carrying a shoulder yoke. At each end is a two level box. On one side, lower level, is a coal-fired hibachi atop which sits a wok with boiling water. Above that are both dry and cooked noodles. On the other box, one level has a plastic pot with water, for cleaning dishes. Above that are bowls, spoons and condiments. The man is a walking al fresco restaurant. He even has some ten-inch high primary-color plastic stools hanging on a hook off the yoke, so that his customers can sit if they decide not to do take-out.
Not everyone has electricity, much less refrigeration, so shopping for food is a daily task. Vendors drop a cloth or piece of plastic on the street, line up their fruits, vegetables, herbs, meat and fish, and sell. The produce arrives daily, because somebody can make a living growing, transporting, or selling it. Truckers are uninsured, but they still truck. If one has money, one will eat.
This is how much of the world lives. It isn't easy, but it's no Mad Max. People are not hoarding freeze dried turkey tetrazini nor waiting to gun down the zombies out scrounging for a meal. They adapt. It's Galt's Gulch, but out of necessity rather than conscious choice. I doubt this is the US' future, as innovation, a critical mass of ideas, and even the debt system allowed the society to move beyond this, but if this is a bad as it gets, it is not all that bad. There is a lot of socializing, since people cannot afford the diversions that have given the "developed" world virtual, instead of genuine friends. Those who can read do read, and they both share and recycle books and magazines. People also learn useful skills in their spare time, such as how to fix things so that they don't have to buy new stuff when the old stuff has some miles left in it.
At worst, the US needs to pass through the period of dashed expectations, which this place never had to do because nobody ever had expectations, but it can come out the other side livable, if not quite as wildly optimistic as it has been. I suspect the US maintains many of the comforts it has, though not all, and never quite falls to the level here, which as I noted, is still livable.
What I see here is illustrative of a few things. People will do what is necessary to survive. People can still get along even when there is a paucity of comforts and conveniences. It can be both harsh and compassionate, with both extremes in evidence. Some don't make it. Many make it, however, through the kindness of strangers, which I guess falls into the category of luck. Of course they live in mutli-generational households, or even across the gene pool to second cousins. There is no shame attached to it. It is not only practical, it is a necessity.
Lack of a gold standard, too much debt, or fractional reserve banking are not the sole reasons for lack of comfort and a modest level of development, and righting those (supposed) wrongs will not be a panacea for a new golden age in the US or OECD world. The only way we survive is to accept the limits of growth and accept the limits of reality. We would also do well to shift focus so that satisfaction can come not from the attachment to material comforts, but from the attachments we make with those with whom we share space and time. It is not such a bad way to live. It isn't everyone's first choice, but when choice is taken away, people find it is not an impossible way to live, and even enjoy.
****************************
(Now to go way off topic....
All that being said, this place is changing. Ironically, it is changing for two reasons that would please both the sound money people and the fractional reserve/fiat people at the same time, since each can point a finger toward the other and throw scorn. Though this society is suposedly closed, Chinese found a way to come in with their endless fiat and bid up prices of everything, which has among other things contributed to a 100,000% increase in property prices since 2001. Of course few properties change hands, and the ones that do change hands multiple times, but the effect has been to cast the illusion of value across the entire swathe of this country's real estate. The second thing that contributed to massive price rises has been the same thing Spain faced when its South American silver mines were producing record amounts hundreds of years ago. Because this nation has massive amounts of gold, silver and platinum, which has been heavily mined since about 2006, all that wealth is moving through society, albeit in the hands of the few who control its mining and production, and this has contributed to the real estate price spike. Too much "money", whether fiat is money or gold is money, leads to inefficient and reckless use of that "wealth", and it invariably ends up in the hands of a select few.
From this microcosm it has become clear to me that no economic theory---not Keynesian, Monetarist or Austrian---can even begin to explain or predict economic behavior in a society of a million different inputs and a moving target of societal tastes and mores.)
I always look for your posts, chindit13, as I enjoy your writing very much. You give me a lot to consider.
I guess if TPTB can keep these kids dumbed down and apathetic then all is well.
But if (or when) they decide to take to the streets, well, as Gerald Celente puts it: "When people have nothing to lose, they lose it."
Long: Pepper spray, quick-zip hand-cuffs, tear gas, rubber bullets
I wonder...when the wheels come off the buggy and the protestors start getting shot for real (Kent State Redux), I wonder what sovereign country will be beating the drums for "regime change in the US?" However, that will probably not happen considering by then every state will have a law on the books making it a felony to take pictures of anything in public. Events will be whitewashed and will disappear just like the protestors (thanks NDAA).
hopefully the inheritance will be enough to buy the house before the government figures everything out