Sunday
I began my first business (cleaning cars) aged fourteen, fifty-eight years ago. I’ve seen the ups and downs of the business cycles created by economic central planners. I survived the recession of 1982 a lot better than most. Prior to right now, that is the worst that I have experienced.
Now we have gone beyond the point of recession and into the beginnings of a depression. Why does it not feel like it? Why are there no starving hordes on the streets? This is the picture that people need to see to understand the gravity of the situation. Why is it missing – how is it missing?
It is the ability of governments to borrow from the future, with neither the means nor intent to ever repay that is destroying our societies. That same mechanism is being used to hide its grim effects in the present.
The borrowed ‘money’ is doled out in ever-increasing amounts to ever-increasing numbers of recipients – those on welfare.
The official unemployment figure has become almost meaningless in terms of gauging the health of the economy. A far more telling measure is the number on welfare. It is more difficult to obscure the truth of a positive number than a negative one. In other words, how many people are on welfare is harder to hide than how many people are not working.
The depression is being obscured by the ability of governments to borrow more and more ‘money’ to pay for welfare. 44{781366457d9c05ca9285c5eb3e04ac75968647e24436986cab65f74e6f4b3aad} of Australians are now receiving some form of welfare. The money for that largesse is borrowed by government and serviced by taxpayers – for as long as they are able.
Instead of trudging the streets looking for work, the unemployed are dining on Take Away meals. You and I are servicing the interest on the debt, for as long as we can, but no one will ever repay the debt. It will be defaulted on.
At the point of default, the depression will no longer be hidden. It will not be pretty.