The Middle East, Iraq, and the United States

OK, you’re sick and tired of this issue and want it to go away. But it never does and it may never, at least not in our lifetimes. So I challenge and urge you to read a recent interview and the comments made. As someone who started life amid bombs raining down from time to …

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Time US Leadership Woke Up To New Economic Era

My Comments: As many of you know, my professional life has revolved around financial issues and economics. The world I’ve lived and worked in was largely shaped by the global forces at work following World War II. That era has ended. We can shake our heads and whine about what might have been but it …

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‘It’s the Weather…!’

My Comments: The cacaphony of negative comments by Republicans about the Obama administrations efforts re the economy used to be deafening. Now, not so much. As an economist, I’m sensitive to the fact that there are too many variables at play to attribute success or failure to an individual in the White House or to …

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America Will Lose Patience With European Appeasement

My Comments: It is much easier to imagine a future as an extension of the past as seen in our minds than to visualize a future with totally new and different dynamics. This is where I have a problem with leaders like Israel’s Netanyahu, with the likes of Rand Paul and others on the right. …

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The Monetary Illusion

Global Nominal GDP Growth, as Measured in Dollars, Is Projected to Decline My Comments: It has been argued that Wall Street is corrupt and greedy and doing its best to create further income inequality in this country and across the globe. And that as a result, we should hold Wall Street accountable, send people to …

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Rate Hike Rally

My Comments: Interest rates and where they are going is a relatively hot topic. For those of you with savings accounts and Certificates of Deposit know, the returns you get are anemic at best. But if you need to borrow money for whatever reason, low interest rates are good. Since there is an expectation that …

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Yellen’s problem with US felons

My Comments: We are a nation of approximately 316 million people, of which roughly 30% are “youth dependent” and 20% are “elderly dependent”. This leads me to assume that roughly half of us are capable of employment of some kind. The next assumption is that if the employable number of people is about 158 million, …

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The Glass Ceiling on Rates

My Comments: I’ve recently shared this chart with you that shows the historical ups and downs on interest rates in this country going back 224 years. They have been trending down since 1981, a long time. Right now they are nearly zero. When this happened in the past, they began an upward climb until they …

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When Patience Disappears

My Comments: We’ve talked extensively about the likelihood of a market correction, if not a crash, coming in the near future, maybe this year. What many have not talked about are the implications of a rise in interest rates. This is going to happen, given that they’ve been on a downward trend for twenty plus …

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Border Security Is Not An Immigration Cure-All

My Comments: Many of you know that I am a documented alien who in 1959 was granted US citizenship. Hopefully, this gives me some right to comment on the immigration issues facing us today. While I’m not an admirer of the Mexican political system, I do accept that if you achieve the status of President, …

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