Three Major Events
Steen Jakobsen, CIO and Chief Economist for Saxo Bank pinged me regarding “The Nixon Doctrine”, Trump, Equities, Gold, and major events in his life.
There were three “major events” and one of them is happening now.
I think there has been three major ”events” in my life..
- 1989 – Berlin Wall
- 2001 – 9-11
- 2017 – The “US Wall”
- All of them plays into the present political and economic instability.
- 1989 represented the opening of borders – Globalization Maximus
- 2001 turned the political agenda inwards and towards surveillance, distrust and closed borders
- 2017 Is the breaking of established rules, so much that I have done an analogy to the
Nixon Doctrine
1. Took US off the Gold standard – the Nixon Shock
2. Told allies to do more of their own defense – The Nixon Doctrine
3. Nixon had 100% domestic agenda (despite China opening….)
4. The White House bashed Fed constantly so much that Chairman Burns “was forced to move Fed policy against his will…”
5. Where Nixon’s Treasury Secretary John Connally famously told the European at the Rome, 1971, G-7 meeting: “It’s our dollar but your problem”….Of course Trump is not copying Nixon per se, but with an incoming administration which is at best random on policies, I think it’s worth trying to have a “gauge” on other historic major changes..I think Nixon, his administration and the 1970s is worth a look.
This is an presentation so lot of charts needs the “narrative” – but I think you get the points – and more importantly – I look forward to you all pushing back or adding to this conversation.
Safe travels,
Steen
Steen’s Powerpoint Presentation
Click on the button on the lower right to view in a larger size in a new window.
There’s plenty to think about, and I think Steen is generally correct.
Mike “Mish” Shedlock
It’s golden. 🙂
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Is this man a Neo-Liberal? I see some sense but he’s too emotional.
Some of the allocations would be sensible if HC was President as both are starting from the same point.
I wouldn’t follow SJ, do your own leg work and be prepared to change under Mercurial Trump.
I would allocate to international – Japan, Europe (with care) but wouldn’t be so negative about the US.
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If these three events are the big ones in Steen’s lifetime, take out #2 and he’s led a pretty boring life.
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Yeah. Failing to see the difference between a wall used to keep an oppressed population ‘in’ vs one used to keep a population ‘out’ is a problem, and a little push back.
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Machts nichts, it’s the difference between absolute tyranny (North Korea, Cuba, Soviet Union, etc) and relative freedom & prosperity (Israel, U.S.).
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I do not remember when Saxo Bank , I mean Mr Steen Jakobsen was right !
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I agree. He was the most bearish person in the room in the Spring of 2009.
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Tend to agree. Where are his big calls that were right. Russia, perhaps?
Trump and HC would both be starting form the same point so the trajectory matters but small changes now can have big impact 3 yrs out and these are not yet set in stone.
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a castle wall is a barricade.
a levy wall is a diversion.
which wall is your choice?
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See the difference:
Socialists countries build walls to keep people IN.
Capitalistic countries with wealth and freedom and liberty build walls to keep people OUT.
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You do realize that the people of the DDR believed for the first decade the Berlin Wall was built to
keep neo-fascists out ?
Even in 1989, most people older than 40 in the DDR believed that tale
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I had relatives in Warsaw Pact countries.
In several countries.
And they knew exactly what the wall was for.
So you are full of sh*t.
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obviously your Polish relatives were anti-socialist petit bourgeois wreckers
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vooch, you have no idea what you are talking about.
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Really ?
I spent quite a lot of time in the DDR in the 1970s
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Unless you are East-German, your time in the DDR was spent in a bubble. You have no idea what people were thinking and you should stop talking about stuff you don’t know about.
I grew up in a Communist country. Everybody knew that the Berlin wall was to prevent the locals from escaping. Even the commies knew that.
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I do not recall that the East Germans kept tunneling under The Wall to let the West Germans in. Also a look at the wall construction shows a no-mans land on the DDR side, while the West Germans could safely walk right up to the wall. Your assertions make no sense vooch. Maybe some East Germans were pretending to mouth the party line for their own safety and you did not realize it.
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Huh? Did you think before writing? DDR had “no-mans land” on their side precisely because the Ossies knew that socialism is BS and wanted to go to the West.
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Someone’s been indoctrinated.
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0% cash? What if,,,,ah, furgetaboutit,,,Fed won’t let “That” happen,,,,will they?
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And wheres the optionality if he’s wrong?
No cash to re-allocate.
Clever? I suspect not.
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If there were three events in Jakobson’s life, starting in 1989 with the fall of the Berlin Wall … how does he make the leap to the Nixon doctrine? Beyond the obvious that Saxo Bank has been critical of Trump from the beginning…
Trump isn’t in office yet. We don’t know what he is going to do. Lots of so-called “experts” opining about their own political beliefs, which is fine as long as they label them as such. If Steen Jakobsen hates Trump, tell him to get in line behind all the hollywood yahoos. Its his opinion, not a market analysis.
The US spent way more than it could afford to on welfare and vietnam — meaning the next guy was going to have to default whether it was Nixon or JFK or the easter bunny. The US can’t spend beyond its means, no matter what some political hack named “Burns” wanted to suggest. Nixon’s doctrine was irrelevant (at least to the economy), whomever was in the White House was going to default on something (bretton woods, treasury debt, entitlements, or some combination).
In the same line of thinking, Obozo spent way more than the US could afford, and “promised” Obamacare bullshit as far as the eye can see. Its an empty promise.
No matter who won this last election, the US government is about to default on debt, the dollar, entitlements, or some of each. Read my lips, hope and change, pant suits and criminal acts — it does not matter.
Lyndon Johnson guaranteed that the next idiot would have to make tough choices on a default. And O-shit-for-brains has also guaranteed that the next idiot will also have to decide what to default on (not if, what).
Obamacare has to get repealed, because no country on earth can afford that stupidity.
After that, someone has to figure out what to default on: debt, entitlements, the dollar (when every country is trying to devalue?) or some combination.
It doesn’t matter if its Trump or some other president. Bush put the country in a terrible position, and Obama made the federal government bankrupt. And given that Obama is such a piece of cr-p coward, he refuses to make any tough choices. So all the tough choices fall on the next guy.
Piss poor leadership under LBJ guaranteed default by the next guy (Nixon had his own issues). Piss poor “leadership” under Obama guarantees an even bigger default by the next guy… and that would be true even if her criminal-ness had somehow rigged the election to her own benefit.
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Ooof … entitlement defaults. I’d hate to be the guy that had to do that. But it does seem inevitable.
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Entitlements were already defaulted on, long ago. Social Security hasn’t been solvent since LBJ — they switched to a “pay as you go” system to raid what was in the trust fund plus all contributions since.
Somebody very soon will be admitting that entitlements are gone — but its just a formality.
Cue the lib-tards and their endless demands for more and more free sh!t. They caused the default, but were too cowardly to accept responsibility.
Anyway, Trump will repeal Obama fraud (because neither he nor the losers in Congress have any choice). He will attack health care COSTS, which might delay the day of reckoning for medicare (if he succeeds).
My guess is whomever is president 2 terms after Trump will be forced to formally default on some debt — but they will call it restructuring or some other euphemism.
In the meantime, federal and municipal pensions are going bye-bye… and voters will celebrate
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the other side of the lib-tard coin is con-tard. does the side matter? it’s still the same coin…
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Of course the side of the coin matters! Heads I win, tails you lose.
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Yes it matters to me
Con-tards want endless wars against people I have never met, much less do I have an issue with.
Lib-tards want to make me into a debt slave, while having that -sshole Obozo smirk at me on TV. Lib-tards are worse (at the moment) because we have that absolute sh-t head loser Obozo on TV every chance he gets –not to mention the media personalities that can’t stop slobbering over him.
Obozo is the worst president the USA has ever had — and we have had some losers. Most of them do a couple things right, even if they get more things wrong.
Obozo f-cked up absolutely everything he touched. He is a lousy excuse for a human being, and an absolute disaster as a president. Good riddance to him
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3 major events during my lifetime
1) cheap & fast international air travel
2) computer revolution
3) success of emerging markets
thank you free market
politicians are not that important
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#4 self-driving cars
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self-driving trucks on highways… maybe. self-driving cars? not so much.
driverless cars in urban/suburban areas are a model-crushing class-action lawsuit waiting to happen. insurance on driverless cars may end up being prohibitively expensive. what’s to stop every homeless person from stepping in front of a driverless car & getting their payout?
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What’s to stop homeless people from jumping in front of human-driven cars right now? I could go on and on, but that is literally the stupidest comment I have read on the subject yet. Congratulations.
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Driverless cars (and trucks) will have dozens (perhaps thousands?) of sensors and cameras that will be continually monitoring the environs to both reduce the risk of accidents and to record anything that goes wrong. Their insurance will go down as they will have fewer accidents and because the footage will show that most of the accidents were the other (human manually driven) cars fault. Think a bum will get a payout when the footage will show him intentionally jumping in front of the car?
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“Think a bum will get a payout when the footage will show him intentionally jumping in front of the car?”
Absolutely.
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SD cars are going to be a massive success with insanely quick adoption. I predict 20-30 SD vehicles on US roads by 2026.
However, SD vehicles ain’t going to change the way we live.
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That’s an interesting side discussion (I think you meant 20-30M cars). I see the impact of self-driving as enormous. All that free time to do things other than drive, massive uptick in road tourism, entertainment, cost-savings on everything from goods to fuel to insurance to law enforcement. A quantum leap in productivity and deflation. I am on the side of life-changing.
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Mish this is the second day n a row I’ve been erased r deposted so im sad,insecure!
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Maybe it was the Russians……
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LOL!!!
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Jakobsen is a European. Europe is against everything good decent and honest about America, like all Europeans including US liberals who are not really Americans but Europeans.
Europe is toast. Sorry Mr. Shedlock. He will go down with the rest of them.
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@Joseph. So basically what you are saying is “Judge not a man by his argument but by his geneology, unless his genealogy is American at which point because of his argument he is a European “.
What is not to like about you. You are e beacon of conservative values.
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There is very real deep seated prejudice in Europe vs USA. The Anglo-Saxon model is disliked. The EU wants to depose the US and Obama has helped that to start.
I thnk Steen has some deep repjudice he can’t identify himself. Not to say Trump won’t be a disaster – he might – but people like Steen appear to like whatever they consider a US version of the EU. Move outside that and they begin to predict decay, disaster etc. They can’t handle it imho. It’s outisde their norm.
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There is prejudice in europe against the US that is true. Hardly unjustified though. I am not sure it is a problem with the anglo-saxon model as much as it has to do with what is perceived to be American abuse of privilege. After all the british are the most “anti-american” europeans. Prejudice against the US is rampant in British society, not just politically but specifically historic and at times even racial. Germans on the other hand have a far more favorable view of the US, they always did, pre war and after, even though they are critical of American policies.
I don’t know Steen personally, but jumping to conclusions that he is against trump because he is a european and europeans are always anti-american, is prejudice. The very same prejudice you are accusing europeans of having against the US.
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Familiarity breeds contempt, the UK is much closer to the US than would appear.
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BPrey: ‘After all the british are the most “anti-american” europeans.’ Woah, no way! Could it simply be that because we speak the same language you understand more criticism that comes from Britain? I’ve lived in the UK, US, and Germany; I suggest that if you want to witness European anti-American sentiment, France might be a good starting point.
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I’m in the UK most of the times and don’t recognise that at all. There is anti-Obama sentiment, not anti-US.
Anglo-saxon model is discussed in the hierarchy of the EU – not liked.
Comparison in the EU are vs US and the target is to displace US militarily (no joke) and on population (done), market size and global influence.
Obama has helped.
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@JC – woah that’s a sweeping statement. I think you should use a more refined word than ‘Europe’. I’d suggest most of Europe is very admiring of the US and what it stands for. Do not confuse the ‘institutionally liberal/left-wing’ EU media with reflecting the views of the people. Be aware for example that say the BBC domestically is far more liberal than the BBC World export version one might watch abroad. See the long-running BiasedBBC blog for daily examples of how egregious the domestic bias is.
@The Fish – that sweeping statement again, and I strongly disagree with it. Historically Anglo = Britains, Saxons = Germans. The UK as a whole, at the street level of the citizenry, is a great net admirer of the US. A question might be who is it in Europe that has a bug up their * about the US. The Germans, because the US were a core part of the allied effort to fend off their expansionism in WW2. The French, because in WW2 they ‘rolled over’ in the face of the Germans, and arguably are still in a symbiotic relationship with Berlin, just now as it’s poodle. I’d suggest the citizenry of former communist, now EU, states like Poland, Hungary and so on are great admirers of the US.
Citizens in the EU are wakening to the fact that they originally believed the EU was simply a free-trade bloc, that IS what the politicians have lied about since the 1970s. Instead it’s now clear for all to see that it is on the cusp of morphing into a geopolitical super-state dominated and/or effectively ruled by Berlin. All of this has happened entirely according to Jean Monnet’s French 1950s blueprint to get the EU to where it is now [ cf. entry on Wiki titled ‘Monnet Plan’]. Despite which it is no accident, rather it is by design, that apart from students of modern European history 98% of EU citizens have never heard of Monnet. No one, perhaps not even the Germans themselves voted for that an EU super-state. And this is why you’re now seeing broad push-back vs the EU; from Italy, Greece, Spain, Portugal, the UK, Netherlands, France and even in the rise of the hard-left ‘AfD’ party in Germany itself.
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@phoenixw2. Yes you are absolutely right, the french are prejudiced but then again almost against everybody :). It’s harmless prejudice. Apple tart vs apple pie.
To make the picture of prejudice of europeans a little more clear. Greece is probably the most anti american country in europe, and rightly so. This sentiment initially was the result of American support of Papadopulos. A military junta leader and an american sercret service agent. The picture of polytechnic students being murdered by his thugs is very vivid still in the minds of many greeks, to this day.
English racism predates the germans. It is a consequence of history. Being an empire and all tends to leave people with a sense of unjustified superiority. True the english don’t display the same level of vulgar anti americanism that one might find in france, but it doesn’t mean that they are not prejudiced. The english display their prejudice as contempt, and the french as anger, a difference of technicality but not of sentiment.
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Being a brit. I’ll say most brits don’t give a toss for the US, one way or the other.
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Contempt!
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How ironic, your phrasing directly contradicts the point you [were trying to] make.
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A lot of you brits have American blood… Our servicemen were very busy in the 40’s
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Yeah, I see where you’re coming from; just please don’t imagine ‘we’re all like that’ as we definitely are not.
I think the UK is still in the hang-over stage after losing a lot of colonial era influence. Sometimes we can still view the world via the prism of what we once were, versus the foreigner’s prism of the reality of what we are today. Wounded pride, and all that. That’s why the whole ‘front/back of the queue’ shtick can be quite totemic for us. Oh, and the bust of Churchill in the Oval Office hehe…
Some of the European anti-American sentiment you mention is IMO jealousy mixed with wounded pride. Like if you were still at school and the best ball player they had. Then a younger boy joins school and in a short time smashes every one of your records. Your ego is crushed. You might quietly admire his skill, try and imitate his swing, but at any opportunity you can’t help but publicly mock him, his vocal self-confidence, his bold haircut, his $$-$hoes. I think a lot of it really is as shallow and infantile as that.
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Yep, there was a hint of irony/sarcasm in my comment.
Anyway, they deserve it, and it keeps them on their toes… we don’t want any country getting above itself really.
A Brit .
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@Phoenix, and wrldtrst – though it was before my time accounts of US presence in the UK from people familiar bore a lot of resentment. Not only the reality that the UK became technically subservient to US use of its territory, but the arrival towards the end of the war of comparatively well off troops who made a show of that grated on British pride deeply. Still haven’t learnt either if Iraq or other conflicts are examined.
I think the US will learn the hard way, the contempt IT has displayed over the last decades is beyond reasoning, Not saying the British were saints but they were comparatively respectful and restrained in what was a cruel era. That is part of why British authority now carries a certain respect. Contempt from abroad should be welcomed if it is argued, as domestically countries often become blinkered. If the UK oversteps, if it goes right off track in its dealings, if a leader is understood as detrimental, I welcome that that is voiced from abroad.
The more eyes the better.
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It was before my time too, but during the time of my parents [my father was conscripted into the British Navy]. I have never heard them nor their friends ‘resentful’ of the Americans during WW2. We were then in the teeth of a world war and grateful for all the help we could get, hardly a time to resent help. I have never, ever, heard anyone suggest we were ‘technically subservient’ to the US during WW2.
There was [I understand] an expression among some civilian elements at home during WW2 that the American forces in the UK were ‘Overpaid, over-sexed, and over here’. I put that down to perceived ‘unfair competition’ during very austere times, on the otherwise open playing field of suddenly majority young single females.
I still don’t think I’ve heard any Brit of any age resent US assistance during WW2. What sits less well is say 75yrs later still talking about it, and presenting it [via Hollywood etc] as if you were the only ones fighting in Europe, the only country involved in D-Day, rather than one of the several allies involved in it. I’m sure that is [similarly] a minority US viewpoint; I’d hope that most Americans and citizens of other Allied countries know how grateful we were and will always be.
One thing i think has radically changed recently is how foreign intervention is almost streamed live to the home audiences. Maybe that begun during the Vietnam war, on the evening news every night. The citizenry back home sit in judgement of the facts *as presented* on a daily basis. However well intentioned or noble the cause, I think it enables earlier and far deeper criticism than might be warranted.
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Well I must come from a slightly more cynical background.
Firstly, there is no question or confusion over US sacrifice and the assistance received, especially by those directly involved. It is not, to my thinking, above or below anyone else’s, it just simply was, and as part of a combined effort.
We can go into policy meanings, self interest, but we would be missing the most profound of reality.
That said, US servicemen were, from where I am from, regarded with a certain reluctance, and even injury, at a certain level. Misplaced … misunderstood… maybe, and it does not detract from anything else that occurred, it is just a small part of the reality that lingered along with much else. I can quote the words I have heard spoken, that centred on the ‘Yanks’, turning up at the end, with their show and gifts. Petty, but real, an influence and impression that remained well after the war.
It extends to modern writing, did Churchill have to woo the US
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1207763/Privately-Churchill-called-bloody-Yankees–lovers-ardour-fawned-flattered-flirted-woo-U-S.html
Or did FDR save civilization
http://rooseveltforward.org/special-relationship-between-great-britain-and-united-states-began-fdr/
If you look up the special forces Act of 1942 you will find most articles refer to its use as a means for US military to be able to discipline own troops. Elsewhere, and I have not the link, it is part of what is described as a total exemption of US accountability on UK soil, immunity at all levels, that accompanied a near complete cessation of the UK to US presence and use. It was wartime and that was chosen, but the reality that followed is undoubtedly affected also. To argue that ‘ At least the UK was not invaded, and the continent was freed ‘ is besides the point of what I am saying, though very very clearly that was the priority.
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Not returning to this thread, but to end it on an almost conspiratorial note that underlines the precarity of the time, and not to mention US wavering for/against the axis
http://rexcurry.net/
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‘Vive la différence’….. they all shout…together.
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That was for Birdofprey re. French.
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I agree phoenix. The US needs to wake-up also. It has no real friends in the EU outside Britain.
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No, that’s not what I suggested. The US has a lot of friends in Europe. Much EU media is ‘of the left’; the left have a problem with the US [yawn]. IMO from a Brit perspective only the French citizenry and some Germans ‘have a problem’ with the US. It’s snobbery. You’re more successful, they’re jealous. If you consider it in that way, perhaps you can indulge their disingenuous loser whining hehe…
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At ground level there is not a large US population in Europe, so there is not a great amount of true friendship around, that simple. What goes on at business and political level is something else, but you could not really call it friendship, just agreement and influence. That is not to say people dislike or don’t get on with US citizens, it is just not a guiding force to the average person. They will be more affected by impressions they gather from media and TV shows etc.
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Gail Tverberg thinks 2017 will see start of the collapse of the economy world wide; That would be a big Number 3′
https://ourfiniteworld.com/2017/01/10/2017-the-year-when-the-world-economy-starts-coming-apart/
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Nison had a 100% domestic policy? I’m sorry, Vietnam and Cambodia are domestic? Mmmmkay.
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Nixon godfuckingdammit
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Nixon inherited vietnam/SEasia. He famously campaigned on the condition of ending that war… which he did.
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He sure as f@ck didn’t inherit Cambodia. That was the evil spawn of him and Kissinger.
Whatever, see how many friends you make defending war criminals.
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Chile isn’t domestic either, at least not according to anyone who’s not the CIA. Under whose watch was Allende overthrown in 1973?
My initial point stands proved. Nixon’s agenda wasn’t even close to 100% domestic. I’m not even sure how someone could dream up such a thing about any US president except maybe Washington.
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interventionists see ALL actions, foreign and domestic, as being 100% American.
Lost in words.
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I saw Steen’s idea this morning. Very interesting. The initial facts though from what he has done and said so far, as Bill Gross said a couple of days ago, are that Trump seems to be more of a fascist rather than a Nixon. Meaning he likes the state to interfere with decision making process of private enterprises. He likes to channel productivity, by threats, maybe investigations later on, by intimidation etc, in a way that fits the political goal of the state. He has a distaste for laws that guarantee freedoms to individuals whom he doesn’t like, an ego and a cult personality that closely resembles every other fascist idiot. For now i am sticking with trumplestilsking as a fascist. Nixon would be a welcome improvement at this point.
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Pure conjecture.
A whole lot of people seem to be convinced that DT is a fascist… with very little tangible evidence to back up their pet theory.
Opposing the TPP is hardly fascist.
Coercing employers to re-domesticate is hardly fascist.
Repealing the ACA is downright anti-fascist.
Supporting a re-instatement of Glass-Steagall is absolutely anti-fascist.
I’m starting to wonder if americans even understand what the word ‘fascist’ means, because they use it in PRECISELY the wrong context 95% of the time…
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I am not an american, i have seen “fascist” “communist” being used to label opponents and you are right the usage in the US is almost always wrong. But in this case we are talking about ideology, and trump seems to be so far more of a fascist than anything else.
Opposing TPP is hardly something that disqualifies him from being a fascist. Bernie did too. He is a socialist he opposed TPP for different reasons to a degree, so did all bernie supporters who are progressive democrats. One can be against TPP by being a republican, or a democrat, or a socialist and finally even a fascist.
Coercing “employers to re-domesticate”. Very astute choice of words there. Of course assuming that such choice of words would take away from the fact that “employers” are private owned enterprises, and “re-domesticate” involve public threats and coercion, instead of an economic platform.
At the heart of fascism is their version of corporatism. In economics it is the interconnection of the state and private enterprise to meet political often nationalistic goals. The common struggle so to speak. The degree and the methodology by which it manifests itself often under different names “alt right” etc, varies from country to country.
Repealing ACA is the republican’s goal not necessarily trump’s. So far the repubs are the ones pushing for it, while trump has made few public announcements in support of some parts of ACA.
Protectionism, nationalism, militarism, intolerance, all are fascist traits and trump is all that, what more he is, remains to be seen once he takes office.
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Nice try. I could list 5 fascist traits of every career politician, too That proves nothing, other than politics attracts potential fascists.
The loser in the Nov. US elections – Hillary Clinton – is a FAR more qualified ‘fascist’ than DT could ever be.
Let’s not pretend like DT is some sort of corporate/crony insider. He’s operated as an outsider his entire career. Attempts to paint DT as a corporate monster ultimately fail because DT has always been his own boss – never a corporate lackey… never. In contrast, every single career politician in D.C. is a corporatist BY DEFINITION. Look at who funds the re-election campaigns of 99% of D.C. politicians… and you fear Trump’s fascist potential? Puh-lease.
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I don’t see Trump as fascist. There is fascism in the US and Trump will be leader of the US, so it is fair to be concerned how it will play out, but denigrating Trump beforehand is not clever as he is the one person who should be asked to protect from it. How can you later call him out if you have already used the accusation ?
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Fascist “traits”. Is that like “racist” traits?
Are we complete idiots here?Are we going to pretend that virtually EVERYTHING that our government’s do is a direct attempt to direct business, to create incentives and punishments for every action they might take? It is the height of absurdity to suggest that a president who promotes policies that “encourage” business to on-shore jobs is a fascist, KNOWING that every tax law, every trade policy, every regulation, is an absolute effort to control business actions!
It is simply STUPID and is a deliberate effort to denigrate, to “name call” people in hopes of marginalizing them. NOTHING different from racists who used the term NI**ER for the same purpose. We have no rational debate from progressives as they will universally engage in personal destruction as their first response. Now we have “golden showers” to consider thanks to them.
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I think the fall of the Berlin Wall was more symbolic, the reunification of two halves back into a historic whole. The policy of open borders within much of the EU, the Schengen zone’, has had a far deeper and wider impact, including the ongoing crisis with mass economic migration from the Middle-East/North Africa into Europe.
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The ‘US Wall’ seems an ill fit too. It is merely a suggestion, probably a political ‘dog-whistle’ to voters before the US election. Whether it ever comes about is entirely another thing. But if border-check free travel was being proposed from the Darien Gap all the way to Nunavut, then the consequences might be note-worthy, as the EU is discovering.
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Career politicians know nothing about politics or
business, Trump doesn’t care about politics and
only know’s about “Funny business.”
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Three major events in my lifetime.
1) Technological advances
2) Internet
3) Globalization and trade
1) Tech advances in computers, robotics, manufacturing, Healthcare, transportation, agriculture, energy production, smartphones, etc. continue to improve the lives of virtually everyone in the world, and are deflationary. Self driving cars, which are a favorite topic on this site, are just one more example of tech advances which will improve our lives.
2) The internet has allowed everyone in the world to access information that governments (particularly dictatorships) tried to prevent them from discovering. This has led to much greater personal freedom and has contributed to the fall of many dictatorships over the last 4 decades. In addition, the internet contains almost all human knowledge, which is the greatest education tool ever created. Our ability to advance requires much higher levels of education for all.
3) Globalization and free(er) trade have improved the lives of many previously impoverished people around the world. This is the free market working at its best and is very deflationary. If we allow each country to produce what they are best at, we are all better off.
If we continue to promote these three things, we will all be better off.
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The economic concept of comparative advantage was used extensively by Bill Clinton in his push for NAFTA and again his push for China to be admitted to the WTO.
Originally comparative advantage and open trade meant that Spain producing great olives efficiently could sell them to England and increase their employment doing so. And England which was good at producing Stilton cheese could increase their employment by exporting to Spain.
Instead what happened was that production was moved to China increasing their employment while reducing it in the US and Europe. This is not what was promised.
It hurts me every time I am forced to buy from China, a police state which wants to make Taiwan a prison island modeled on the successful prison island of Cuba.
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I always find it very amusing that people who haven’t predicted any of the major market movements in the past before they happened try and predict the future. The sky is not falling!
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What “US wall”?
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The day the Berlin Wall fell I told my wife the world was going to undergo major changes. The Cold War held the world in a post WWII stasis. Where we end up is not yet determined. Overpopulation, famine, droughts, civil unrest and economic collapses are ahead. It is plain to see for those who honestly look.
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Thomas Malthus has been bumping his head against the inside of his coffin for about 200 years.
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How can:
1989 – Berlin Wall
2001 – 9-11
2017 – The “US Wall”
be three major ”events” in a life that also includes:
On July 20, 1969, humans walked on the moon – useless in n practical terms but hard to discount as a human achievement.
Birth of the cell phone: The first truly portable phone, the MOTOROLA MICROTAC 9800X was released in 1989. Of the 350,000 (total!) cellular phones before it, almost all were car phones. Apple sold its 500,000,000th iPhone 3 years ago.
Birth of the Internet. In 1996 less than 1 percent of humans had internet access. Last year more than 50 percent of all humans had Internet access.
The euro came into existence on 1 January 1999, now the second most traded currency on earth.
In 2014 China passed USA in GDP becoming the only nation to do so in 70+ years.
Steen has gotten himself caught up in ephemeral hype.
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Steen hates Trump…. Steen’s entire rant is a political manifesto, not a market analysis. Saxo should be embarrassed for publishing it — banks are required to have a supervisor review items sent to more than 25 people (like mass emailings). Saxo lost a lot of credibility — even if one agrees with some of their political opinions.
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Agree again. He’s shocked and awed and relatively clueless.
He forgets the Asian crisis too that was massively important, but he’s only European and the world revolves around them, we all know that.
Ignore him henceforth.
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OK Mish did u support Desert Storm when we liberated Kuwait?
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Until we know fully why Sadam Hussein invaded Kuwait we cannot get a proper perspective. If you find out that the US encouraged the invasion your opinion goes 180° .
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I can’t recall Mish supporting any war ever.
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So it wasnt the Russians or the Israelis or Colonel Mustard in the library with the candlestick…
The Russian connection was completely made up by a hacker group, who passed their fictional story to a known Trump hater, who passed the info to McCain and several Clinton news networks.
Not only were the “intelligence” communities sources wrong (and poorly vetted) — the source was a known political jack-ss, passing along a work of complete fiction.
.
Yet another humiliation for the war-mongers that be, and their media puppets
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As I recall the various Nixon Doctrines, (eg., wage and price controls, the war on drugs) it was to win the Vietnam War (on the Korean model), separate the Soviets from China, groom Iran under the secular Shah to be the regional counter balance to the Soviets in Egypt and the house of Saud (sort of what Barack had in mind only with the revolutionary Islamic Republic of the Imams instead of the western oriented Persian Shah). Of course, now done with LBJ, the McGovern democrats and the New Left went on a head hunting trip for Nixon after Watergate, failed to enforce the Vietnam peace treaty while Barack got a pass for much more egregious Watergate type conduct, and while torching the middle east and getting Russia and China back together again while getting fu…’ed by Carter’s revolutionary Iran. So, welcome back to a multi polar world brought to you by a bipolar president reliving the ’60s and ’70s. Apparently Steen wasn’t around for the killings of JFK, M. King, and R K and those long hot summers in the cities when the cops were pigs and the best of Barack dripped down his mother thighs after consummation.
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