A study from the National Bureau of Economic Research as well as an admission from none other than the Chairwoman of the Federal Reserve recently indicated that 90% of Americans in 2014 are poorer today than in 1987.
A Washington Post article on the ‘Wonkblog’ section actually broke down the study, and said “The new, harsh reality is that the bottom 90 percent of households are poorer today than they were in 1987,” and “It’s been a lost 25 years for the bottom 90 percent, but a lost 15 for the next 9 percent, too. That’s right: altogether, the bottom 99 percent are worth less today than they were in 1998.”
The info from the chairwoman was presented less boldly than to simply admit that the dollar is inflated beyond repair, and it was phrased to imply that the value of the dollar will continue to improve from the 2008 recession.
Federal Reserve Board Chairwoman Janet Yellen spoke at a conference called the ‘Federal Reserve Bank of Boston Economic Conference on Inequality of Economic Opportunity’ last month, presenting the statistics in a much less dramatic sounding way. She said,
“The wealthiest five percent of American households held 54 percent of all wealth reported in the 1989 survey. Their share rose to 61 percent in 2010 and reached 63 percent in 2013,” she said. “By contrast, the rest of those in the top half of the wealth distribution ‒ families that in 2013 had a net worth between $81,000 and $1.9 million ‒ held 43 percent of wealth in 1989 and only 36 percent in 2013.”
“The extent and continuing increase in inequality in the United States greatly concern me,” she noted. “I think it is appropriate to ask whether this trend is compatible with values rooted in our nation’s history, among them the high value Americans have traditionally placed on equality of opportunity.”
People such as Karim Basta, chief economist at III Associates, praised the Fed chairwoman in a seemingly not very effective attempt to gloss over the problems of the inflated dollar. She said “I think she broke new ground in terms of a Fed chair looking at such a serious socioeconomic issue with that degree of rigor,”.
However, a baby step towards something slightly resembling honesty coming from the fed is ultimately insignificant in the larger scope of things. Whether or not they recognize the increasing devaluing of the dollar and the wealth disparity in America is irrelevant, because they continue to inflate the dollar to avoid the consequences of The Federal Reserve’s previous actions, and all of that inflation has to catch up with us some day.
Meanwhile, as Zero Hedge reports, the stock market continues to set record after record as the number of homeless children reaches an all-time high.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average now stands at 17,633, just off its all-time high.
Also near its all-time highs is the bond market, and coincidentally, the US debt—which is now within spitting distance of $18 trillion.
In other words, if these kids ever do manage to pick themselves up off the streets, they’ll work their entire lives to pay off a debt that they never signed up for.
And it all comes down to a completely perverse, corrupt, debt-based paper money system.
Please share this with anyone who could use some perspective on our economic situation with the dollar.
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