What is happening in the financial markets?
Something we've been harping on around these parts this Summer is the fact that the official economic KPIs that we so aimlessly target around the world are broken. They do not accurately reflect the underlying health of society. The stock market is at all-time highs. Unemployment has never been lower. GDP growth is chugging along between 2-3%.
2. first of all, every time you hear about 'the economy' or 'growth', what you are being told is the rate at which consumption is increasing.
— Allen Farrington (@allenf32) August 22, 2019
this is completely irrelevant to society's economic wellbeing.
4. your savings represent your past time devoted to productive work, so what this is really saying is no more than: in general, spend as little of your time as you can having fun, and as much of it as you can building useful things.
— Allen Farrington (@allenf32) August 22, 2019
6. you increase the possibility of future consumption at the rate at which invested capital compounds.
— Allen Farrington (@allenf32) August 22, 2019
THIS AND THIS ALONE is the proper measure of 'economic growth': the growth in the stock of productive capital, or, equivalently, society-wide return on reinvested equity.
Something we've been harping on around these parts this Summer is the fact that the official economic KPIs that we so aimlessly target around the world are broken. They do not accurately reflect the underlying health of society. The stock market is at all-time highs. Unemployment has never been lower. GDP growth is chugging along between 2-3%.
Yet, if you look around, all does not seem well in the world. Populist movements are spreading like wildfires. The gap between the haves and have nots is getting wider and wider. And more and more families find themselves struggling to get by. How can this be if all of the data is telling us that everything is A-Okay?
Here's a good thread from Allen Farrington that gets to the heart of the problem and the reason this rag exists. The world is in a deep state of confusion as the masses frantically attempt to understand why the ability to stay afloat and flourish financially has been taken away from them. Too many have misdiagnosed the core of the problem as a lack of political will by one side or the other to make the world a better place via legislation. Very few have come to understand the actual core of the problem; a broken economic system operating on top of a broken money system build on unsound money.
We target consumption and ephemeral growth at all costs to keep the charade alive. Slowly but surely destroying the ability of individuals to pull themselves up from their bootstraps by accumulating capital to deploy to a (hopefully) profitable endeavor in the future. This simple act is made nearly impossible in a world run on easy money as individuals cannot simply accumulate wealth via a sound monetary good, but are forced into volatile markets to chase yield in hopes that they will preserve, and, if they're lucky, increase their purchasing power over time.
A true waste of both monetary and mental capital that could have been put to much more productive undertakings.
Allen's thread is a 26-banger filled with extremely cogent thoughts on the current state of how our economy "works". Grow your know on this Friday and give it a read. Also, increase the quality of your Twitter experience by giving Allen a follow.
Final thought...
Another Bluegrass cover morning in the Bent household.
Enjoy your weekend, freaks.
