Grandfather-economic-report.com is famous for presenting whole constellations,
in graphic form, of horrors about the mess that fiat money and government, in
the hands of incompetent do-gooders, has allowed.
He writes that, in 2009, people worked "three times longer per year to pay all
taxes more than they pay for food, housing and clothing combined.” Yikes!
This is where I learned that the combined onslaught of government (from local
corruption to Congressional corruption) consumes half of all income in the USA!
And this grasping, gobbling government colossus spends half of
GDP, which to this day - to this day! - makes me have nightmares full of every
post-apocalyptic horror movie I ever saw, pervasive darkness and gloom,
dripping in despair and suffering, where government goons and killer robots
relentlessly track down "undesirable” citizens, who, you gotta admit, are
always the best looking men and the hottest hubba-hubba women of the whole
bunch, which gives rise to the lesson that if you have to go down, these are
the people to be with until then!
Of course, there are many lessons in these movies beyond this timeless
philosophical gem, such as not trusting anybody because they are probably
aliens from outer space or government killer goons. Or both.
Anyway, I thought I had made peace with myself about our system of governments
consuming half of everything, but I entered a whole new land of fear and
loathing (as Hunter Thompson might have termed it), when Grandfather goes on,
"Increased government (at all levels) not only consumes national income by its
spending, but their employees continually issue new regulations aimed at the
reduced private sector, with the cost of compliance passed to the private
sector as un-funded mandates to the tune of 15% of national income.”
By this time you are hardly paying attention, and are saying to yourself "Yeah,
yeah, yeah. Tell me something new” in a kind of bored, I’ve-seen-it-all, "we’re
screwed” ennui, but without yawning.
I was the same way! So, like you, I was not ready for him going on to say
"Adding this 15% to the 49% spending ratio increases government’s control-share
of the economy to 64%”, which bring our taxpayer’s share of income down to
36%.” Wow! The government consumes two-thirds of my income!
And so we learn that in 2009, people worked " times longer per year to pay all
taxes, more than they pay for food, housing and clothing combined” when, in
reality, the taxpayer is left with much, much, much less than that paltry
estimate of 36% of gross income, and everyone is getting lesser and lesser,
too, since taxes are rising and there is talk of, and the certainty of, new
taxes, while inflation (which has the same effect as a tax) is rising and
rising, and destined to rise some more, and then more and more until the very
life is being crushed out of you by inflation in prices, which will happen
because inflation in prices is caused by inflation in the money supply, which
is caused by the monstrous Federal Reserve creating the extra money, which it
does so that the despicable federal government can borrow and spend the extra
money, which drives up the proportion of the economy that the government
consumes, making it all worse and worse in a big, ugly spiral, spinning around
and around, spinning, spinning, spinning until you are so dizzy that you are
think you are going to throw up, and then you realize that you are not puking
your guts out because of vertigo, but because the government has destroyed the
country!
Of course, there is much, much more at grandfather-economic-report.com, and
there are graphs of gold and gold-related things, too, making you come away
both dazed and scared out of your freaking mind, but with the idea floating
around in your mind that "Hey! Maybe that Horse’s Butt Mogambo (HBM) was right
about that buying gold thing that he was always yammering on about! And it
looks like he may be right about silver and oil, too! How could such an idiot
be right about anything, much less three things?”
How? The answer is that the Austrian school of economics - found free at
Mises.org - makes it easy! So easy, in fact, that it makes you squirm in
delight and exclaim, "Whee! This investing stuff is easy!”
Richard Daughty is general partner and COO for Smith Consultant Group,
serving the financial and medical communities, and the editor of The Mogambo
Guru economic newsletter - an avocational exercise to heap disrespect on those
who desperately deserve it.
(Republished with permission from
The Daily Reckoning. Copyright 2010, The Daily Reckoning.)
Head
Office: Unit B, 16/F, Li Dong Building, No. 9 Li Yuen Street East,
Central, Hong Kong Thailand Bureau:
11/13 Petchkasem Road, Hua Hin, Prachuab Kirikhan, Thailand 77110
