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More Pain At The Pump 2007-10-26 16:50:55 Back in the late nineties, I picked up a used Toyota Corolla. I was driving about 30 miles each way to work at that time, so I needed something economical. My logic was (and still is), if it gets me there and back safely, that’s all I care about. Yet, my buddies never stopped “reminding” me that I drove a “piece of crap.” Of course, most of them drove SUVs (I’d driven every Jeep model since the late eighties ‘til that time, and wasn’t impressed). It’s been a while since I’ve talked to those guys, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see them crying at how much it costs to fill up their urban “tractors” these days. And some analysts are predicting more pain at the pump to follow. Earlier today CNN Money said experts are predicting U.S. drivers will see $3 gasoline before the new year. The all-time high of more than $3.18 was reached back on May 18, 2007. One of those interviewed, Stephen Schork, publisher of industry newsletter The Schork Report, declared that, “
Two-Thirds Of Americans See 2008 Recession 2007-10-26 14:45:11 According to a Bloomberg/Los Angeles Times survey taken of 1,209 adults between October 19-22, 65% of those polled say they expect an economic recession in 2008. 51% of respondents said the economy is doing poorly at the present time, as opposed to 46% who are more upbeat about our economic health.
The present outlook is the gloomiest since February 2003, according to Bloomberg. As recent as June did 57% of survey respondents think the U.S. economy was doing well. Poll respondent Roger Sharp, a 63-year-old retired procurement analyst from Milwaukie, Oregon, said, “I’m starting to think there’s a good possibility of recession. The housing industry is driving the economy down and people are starting to get laid off from jobs that have been around for a long time.”
Such negativity was reflected in today’s release of the Reuters/University of Michigan consumer index, which indicated consumer sentiment fell in October from the prior month, reaching its lowest level since May 2006 Read more:Americans
Buffett The Dollar Slayer 2007-10-25 20:46:15 When E.F. Hutton, er, Warren Buffett
speaks, people listen. The “Oracle of Omaha,” the legendary stock market investor now worth $52 billion according to Forbes magazine in March, told reporters during his first trip to South Korea that he expects the U.S. dollar to weaken further. Buffett said, “We are still negative on the dollar. We bought stocks in companies that are earning their money in other currencies,” while visiting a Berkshire Hathaway subsidiary in that country. “We are gaining foreign currency exposure that we like,” Buffett added. The dollar fell against its major counterparts earlier today, after a larger-than-expected decline in the durable-goods orders for September increased market expectations of an interest rate cut by the Fed.
The 77 year-old investor also weighed in on the subprime mortgage crisis in the United States. Buffett said that the subprime problem could last anywhere from another 6 months to 2 years.
Warren Buffett has been negative on the U Read more:Dollar
, Slayer
Hide And Seek 2007-10-25 19:35:16 Kudos to MarketWatch, as I didn’t encounter the following anywhere else in my research today. A congressional report conducted by the Joint Economic Committee said that 2 million subprime-mortgage foreclosures will occur by 2009 if home values continue to decline. The report also estimated that $71 billion in housing wealth will be eliminated, and the states will lose $917 million in property tax revenue. Joint Economic Committee Chairman Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY) and other lawmakers used the findings as ammunition in their attempts to convince the White House to step up foreclosure prevention counseling, let Fannie Mae buy more loans, and encourage loan servicers to work out modifications with borrowers.
Back on June 5, I talked about some of the foreclosure projections in my post for that day. To recap:
Based on a survey of the nation’s 100 largest real estate markets, HousingPredictor.com predicts that at least 2 million residential properties will be foreclosed within the
Jobs Pull A Houdini 2007-10-24 20:34:56 Back on October 5 when the latest U.S. employment numbers were released, President George W. Bush praised the September data and declared the revisions added up to 49 consecutive months of employment growth, the “most on record for our country.” Pretty impressive, I thought, although I questioned what kind of jobs ware actually being created. And then I read the BusinessWeek piece on Yahoo! Finance last night, which said:
It’s official. This is the worst year ever for layoffs in the U.S. financial-services industry — and there’s still more than two months to go.
Party poopers. Anyway, Chicago-based outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas reported that as of this month, finance companies had announced 130,000 job cuts for the year to date. This number is more than double the 50,000 cuts announced in 2006 and way ahead of the previous record of 116,000 back in 2001. BusinessWeek said fallout from the subprime mortgage crisis and from risky corporate bonds and loa
Jim Rogers Dumps His Dollars 2007-10-23 21:41:48 Tonight Bloomberg is reporting that legendary investor Jim Rogers
is shifting all his assets out of the dollar and buying other currencies, including the Chinese yuan, Japanese yen, and Swiss franc. Rogers told a crowd in Amsterdam gathered for an investors’ meeting organized by ABN Amro Markets that:
I’m in the process of — I hope in the next few months — getting all of my assets out of U.S. dollars. I’m that pessimistic about what’s happening in the U.S.
The 65 year-old commodities guru is forecasting that the Chinese yuan will quadruple in value over the next decade, while the U.S. dollar continues to lose value. According to Rogers:
It’s the official policy of the central bank and the U.S. to debase the currency. The U.S. dollar is and has been the world’s reserve currency, the world’s medium of exchange. That’s in the process of changing. The pound sterling, which used to be the world’s reserve currency, lost 80 percent of its value, top to bottom, Read more:Dumps
Peak Oil 2007-10-22 16:14:20 How much do you know about “peak oil”? I first became familiar with the term back in 2005 while reading Jim Rogers’ Hot Commodities on a plane bound for San Francisco. Real disturbing stuff. Peak oil is the theory that the worldwide production of oil has reached or is about to reach its zenith, after which production levels will decline. Investors such as Boone Pickens, chairman of Dallas-based BP Capital LLC, and analysts like Matthew Simmons of Houston investment bank Simmons & Co. International support the peak oil theory. Optimists claim peak oil won’t occur until between 2025 and 2040.
Today, the German-based Energy Watch Group released a study that shows global oil production peaked in 2006. The report, which is entitled “Crude Oil: The Supply Outlook,” said that world oil production has already peaked and will fall by half as soon as 2030. It warns that extreme shortages of fossil fuels will lead to wars and social upheaval. Official industry estimates put global Read more:Peak Oil
Jim Rogers: ‘Madman’ Bernanke Leading U.S. To Disaster 2007-10-30 08:46:19 On Monday, Bloomberg caught up with legendary commodities investor Jim Rogers
in London. Bloomberg’s Sal Giangrasso interviewed George Soros’ former partner, who told listeners that the September interest rate cut was “a mistake” which the Federal Reserve might repeat again on Wednesday. Rogers claims that the Fed does not care about the U.S. dollar and want it to decline. He also notes that despite their actions, long-term interest rates aren’t going down. As a result, Rogers says:
This is a disaster for the United States. I would urge everybody listening to your show to figure out ways to start getting money out of the U.S. dollar. I’m certainly doing it.
The chairman of Beeland Interests also had this to say about Federal Reserve chair Ben Bernanke
:
I know that the mandate of the Federal Reserve was to maintain a sound currency. We now have a madman at the head of the Federal Reserve whose main goal, whose whole intellectual career is studying the printing of money. Now Read more:Madman
, Leading
, Disaster
Double-Digit Decline For Home Prices? 2007-10-29 17:09:37 Tired of all the bad news coming out of the U.S. housing market? Me too. The Associated Press reported this weekend that many private economists are forecasting U.S. home prices, which exploded during the housing boom, will fall by around 10% before housing bottoms out late next year. Median existing home prices increased 54% during the boom which ended in late 2005.
According to David Wyss, chief economist at Standard & Poor’s, home prices have declined close to 4% from their peak set in early 2006, when measured with the Standard & Poor’s/Case-Schiller home price indices. Wyss predicts that before we see a turnaround in housing, prices will fall by 11%. Wyss is not alone when it comes to having a negative forecast. Even the National Association of Realtors is predicting the median home price will fall by 1.5% in 2007. Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Economy.com, predicts that median existing home prices will fall 10.4% (using the NAR gauge) before things get bett Read more:Decline
, Prices
Buffett: “Fairly Significant” Chance For U.S. Recession 2007-10-29 15:03:52 CNBC’s Becky Quick, who is a co-anchor on the morning program “Squawk Box,” traveled exclusively with Warren Buffett
on his Far East tour. On their flight back to the United States, the legendary investor talked about the likelihood of a U.S. recession sometime soon. From the CNBC website earlier today:
Becky: Caterpillar suddenly looking a lot less optimistic about the economy, worrying about a recession itself. Does any of this become a game changer as we start to hear from more and more companies in the earnings season?
Warren: Well, we’ll find out. Business has slowed down some, not as much you might think. Unemployment has been very good but we won’t know that we’ve been in a recession until well after we’ve been in it. It could easily happen. A lot of the ingredients are there for it. I will guarantee you, you are young, in your lifetime you will see 6 or 7 recessions, probably. That is just part of capitalism. And I don’t know, I don’t know exactly when they wi Read more:Significant
Sunday Edition: October 28, 2007 2007-10-28 21:33:40 Alarm Bells For America
The freedom of the press is one of the great bulwarks of liberty, and can never be restrained but by a despotic government.
-Thomas Jefferson, 3rd U.S. President and Declaration of Independence author
In my 11 years of public sector employment, I worked with a number of civil servants who always placed the public interest first. Then again, I also had the displeasure of working alongside some incompetent and unprofessional individuals who looked out only for themselves. Thinking I had seen everything, I was upset to learn from the Washington Post this weekend that the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) staged a fake press conference last Tuesday as FEMA employees posed as reporters and asked questions, while real members of the press listened in on a telephone conference line and were unable to ask questions. According to the Post, FEMA announced the news conference about 15 minutes before it was to start, making it unlikely that reporters could attend. Read more:Sunday
, Edition
, October
Sunday Edition: November 4, 2007 2007-11-04 20:00:32 Skeletons In The Vault
Last Friday, Bloomberg reporter Betty Liu interviewed Beeland Interests chairman Jim Rogers. Rogers, co-founder of the Quantum Hedge Fund with George Soros in the 1970s and well-known investment author, has been quite vocal lately regarding his negative outlook on the U.S. economy. However, this interview caught my attention as the legendary investor warned specifically about the dangers from something called level 3 assets held by investment banks. What are level 3 assets? Basically, it’s a classification given to assets that barely trade and whose values are largely the result of informed guesswork by a bank’s own employees. Level 3 assets may include mortgages (subprime included), securitized credit card obligations, leveraged buyout bridge loans, asset-backed commercial paper, complex derivatives contracts, and credit default swaps.
Here’s what Jim Rogers had to say in the interview:
Betty Liu: I want to get your take on the investment banks. Do you thi Read more:Sunday
, Edition
, November
U.S. Recession Will Affect Asia 2007-11-02 16:47:08 Stephen Roach, Chairman of Morgan Stanley Asia
, gave a speech earlier today in Mumbai, India, where he talked about the U.S.-Asian economic outlook. Roach is well-known on Wall Street as a perennial “bear” on the U.S. economy. In November 2004 (while still Morgan Stanley’s chief economist), he attended a meeting with a select group of fund managers and shocked the audience with his observation that the U.S. had no better than a 10% chance of avoiding an economic “Armageddon”.
On the probability of recession in the United States, Roach told his audience:
I want to make three points with you today in my discussion. Number one, I think the global economy is going to be very challenging over the next couple of years. Unlike the situation of 10 years ago, when global problems were made in Asia, I think global problems will be made in America. I think the risk of a recession in the US in 2008, is high and rising. You don’t want to put any real precision on probabilities like that Read more:Affect
HOPE For Homeowners 2007-11-02 15:35:59 On Capitol Hill this morning, Robert Steel, Under Secretary for Domestic Finance in the U.S. Treasury Department, told a House Financial Services Committee hearing that at-risk borrowers will be the target of a direct-mail campaign commencing on November 19. A collaborative effort of mortgage servicers, lenders, and counselors formed with the encouragement of the Treasury Department and the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the HOPE NOW Alliance will mail 200,000 letters to endangered homeowners to educate them about refinancing options. Brian Montgomery, Assistant Secretary for Housing with HUD, said, “If the industry works together, it is possible to reinstate or refinance many of these loans, but only if borrowers respond to offers of assistance.” Citing industry sources, Montgomery said that more than 40% of delinquent borrowers do not respond to contact from their lenders until it is too late.
Back on October 10, CNBC’s Real Estate reporter Diana Olick talked abo Read more:Homeowners
Wall Street, Financial Services Jobs In Jeopardy 2007-11-01 17:47:51 Several news services today are announcing that Boston-based Fidelity Investments told some of its managers to begin letting employees know of impending layoffs. One report from the Wall Street
Journal says that 200 employees could receive their layoff notices today. According to CNN Money this morning, James Lowell, editor of the independent Fidelity Investor newsletter, told the Journal that he’s expecting “the largest number of layoffs Fidelity has made in years.” Back in 2002, Fidelity cut 1,695 jobs, or 5% of its staff.
The situation at Fidelity is part of a growing trend of layoffs in the financial services sector that are taking place on Wall Street
and elsewhere in the United States. 140,000 financial services jobs have already been cut in the United States this year, according to Chicago-based Challenger, Gray & Christmas. This number surpasses the previous record of 116,647 pink slips issued back in 2001. Wall Street alone has already lost 42,404 financial jobs Read more:Financial
, Services
, Jeopardy
Finally, A Movie About Real Estate Agents 2007-11-09 16:12:52 Still at work this Friday afternoon? For a good laugh, watch “The Realtor,” a short parody (only 4 minutes) of real estate agents that I came across on YouTube.
You can watch the movie by clicking here.
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, Estate
, Real Estate
Bear Fund Manager Says U.S. Stocks Could Fall 60% 2007-11-09 15:55:22 David Tice, who manages the $800 million Prudent Bear Fund, talked with Bloomberg reporter Betty Liu this morning about the outlook for the U.S. credit and equity markets, his expectations for a recession, and the possible impact of the Federal Reserve on the credit market.
During the interview, the head of David W. Tice & Associates said the U.S. stock market was going lower. A lot lower:
Betty Liu: I want to get your take on how much lower you think the markets can go right now.
David Tice: We think that the markets could decline 50 or 60 percent. We hate to say something so somber, but this is not a time to be optimistic or pessimistic. It’s the time to be realistic. Our whole system has been built on credit expansion. We have to grow credit year over year in order to keep the economy growing. The economy is not going to grow, it’s going to suffer a recession, and once it enters recession it’s going to cascade on itself.
Later on, the Bloomberg reporter asked Tice what he Read more:Stocks
Credit Crunch May Cost Banks, Brokerages $500 Billion 2007-11-08 19:01:55 Last Friday, legendary investor Jim Rogers told Bloomberg in an interview:
I am short the investment banks, as you know. I added more not too long ago. There’s a lot of phony bank bookkeeping going on. You should learn the word level 3 accounting, level 3 assets, because you’re going to hear a lot about it in the next 6 months.
Forget the 6 months. The Royal Bank of Scotland Group’s chief credit strategist Bob Janjuah put out a report yesterday that predicted the credit crunch will cause $250 billion to $500 billion of losses at banks and brokerages globally. According to Bloomberg, Janjuah said, “This credit crisis, when all is out, will see $250 billion to $500 billion of losses. The heat is on and it is inevitable that more players will have to revalue at least a decent portion” of assets they currently value using “mark-to-make believe.” He explained the significance of level 3 assets in his note. “The Financial Accounting Standards Board’s rule 157 makes it more Read more:Crunch
, Credit Crunch
Future Home Values: Gloom To Doom 2007-11-08 15:39:38 In my September 20 post, I talked about how Yale economics professor Robert Shiller had recently appeared on CNBC and told Maria Bartiromo that U.S. home values could decline 50% in cities that have boomed a lot in real inflation-corrected terms. He suspected that the fall in prices would take place over a number of years, and that likely areas to feel the brunt of the decline would include California, Arizona, and Florida (Miami).
Back on October 29, I talked about how the Associated Press was reporting that many private economists were forecasting U.S. home prices would fall by around 10% before bottoming out in late 2008. David Wyss, chief economist at Standard & Poor’s, predicted that prices would decline by 11%. Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Economy.com, envisioned that median existing home prices would fall 10.4% (while using the same methodology as the National Association of Realtors). These gloomy forecasts were made in the wake of an American housing boom tha Read more:Future
, Values
, Gloom
Wall Street’s Player Haters? 2007-11-07 14:59:15 Earlier today I talked about how the U.S. dollar sank to new lows partly because of comments made by Chinese officials at a conference in Beijing. One political official, Cheng Siwei, vice chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, said that regarding its $1.43 trillion of currency reserves, “We will favor stronger currencies over weaker ones, and will readjust accordingly.” Analysts interpreted this as meaning China should shift more of its $1.43 trillion of currency reserves into “stronger currencies,” such as the euro, to offset “weak” currencies like the dollar. However, they were quick to point out that Siwei’s views probably didn’t reflect official Chinese policy. Or do they?
Two Wall Street
Journal blog posts earlier today discussed Cheng Siwei and his comments, and played down the importance of both. In the Journal’s MarketBeat, David Gaffen has this to say about Siwei:
But Mr. Cheng is hardly the Ben Bernanke of China; he’s not Read more:Haters
, Wall Street
Chinese Officials Torpedo Dollar 2007-11-07 12:18:56 The troubled U.S. dollar sank to new lows today, partly because of comments made by Chinese
officials at a conference in Beijing. Cheng Siwei, vice chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, said that China should shift more of its $1.43 trillion of currency reserves into “stronger currencies,” such as the euro, to offset “weak” currencies like the dollar. Xu Jian, a central bank vice director, added that the dollar is “losing its status as the world currency.” Earlier today, the U.S. currency fell to a record versus the euro and is at its weakest level since 1981 against the pound. The greenback also declined to its lowest level against the Canadian dollar since the end of a fixed exchange rate in 1950 and stands at a 23-year low against the Australian dollar.
Larry Smith, who manages $400 million as chief investment officer at Third Wave Global Investors, told Bloomberg today that, “The big issue on any currency is if its rate of depreciati Read more:Dollar
And Homeowners Make Fun Of Renters? 2007-11-06 19:39:12 As citizens of the United States, we’ve been brought up to believe in something called the “American Dream.” As part of this “dream,” we’ve been told that we should aspire to own the roof over our heads. At no other time was this more apparent than with the dawn of the new millennium. Back on December 16, 2003, President Bush declared:
This Administration will constantly strive to promote an ownership society in America. We want more people owning their own home. It is in our national interest that more people own their own home. After all, if you own your own home, you have a vital stake in the future of our country.
And so homeowners were held in the highest esteem throughout American society. But, there were still the renters, who were incapable of holding a mortgage (let alone a decent job). Those scum of the earth. Back in the glory days of the housing bubble, I read about a landlord here in Chicago who complained that she couldn’t find any decent tenants. What she r Read more:Homeowners
Sovereign Wealth Funds Buying Up Gold, Other Commodities 2007-11-14 16:07:49 No surprise here. Late Monday night the Financial Times (UK) reported:
State-owned sovereign wealth funds are beginning to diversify their investments into commodities, potentially having a significant impact on international raw material prices because of their immense resources.
Sovereign wealth funds, or SWFs, are investment vehicles backed by governments in the Middle East, China, Russia, and elsewhere. According to The Times (UK) from October 28:
Sovereign funds have been around since 1953, when the Kuwait Investment Authority (KIA) was established to benefit future generations of Kuwaitis when the oil stopped flowing. But it is only since the turn of the millennium that the power of sovereign funds has mushroomed. The rising price of oil and gas has prompted Middle East countries to look for new ways to invest their piles of cash. Russia has money to spare as energy prices have soared. At the same time, funds in Singapore, and more particularly China, have been boosted by income Read more:Wealth
, Funds
, Buying
Is TOUT-TV Back? 2007-11-14 12:28:37 Back on September 24, I noted that every now and then I come across allegations that CNBC is guilty of being a “cheerleader” for stocks and bonds. As I said earlier in the fall, I’ve always been suspect of business news channel programming due to the presence of network sponsors whose bottom lines depend on rosy economic news and bullish investment commentary. Turn on any of the business channels during the day and you’ll see tons of commercials for the financial services industry. Too much bad news, too little interest in buying financial products, and sponsors may make waves.
Anyway, when I woke up Monday morning, the first thing I did was turn on the satellite TV to see what was going on in the business world. The ticker showed that commodities were getting hammered. Not too surprising, as I expected there may be a correction, possibly a big one. However, I became a little disturbed when I turned on CNBC’s “Squawk On The Street.” As usual, Mark Haines and Erin Burnett
The Spouse From Hell 2007-11-13 20:00:53 I thought I’d never see this commercial again. Then, a colleague over at HousingPANIC decided to haunt his readers with it last week. Whenever I saw this Century 21 commercial, I used to throw a fit. Watching the spouse from hell bully her significant other into buying a home- classic. Making the purchase near the top of the U.S. housing boom- priceless. Even back in Spring 2006, I had a pretty good idea of where the U.S. residential real estate market was heading.
Enjoy the YouTube video. If it were up to me, I’d give that actress an Oscar. That head shirk, oh my…
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U.S. Property Values May Take $233 Billion Hit 2007-11-13 19:12:35 Back on June 5, I wrote that the Center for Responsible Lending was predicting 2.4 million foreclosures nationwide will take place before the U.S. housing bust is done. This figure exceeds the 2 million homeowners thought to have been created by the housing boom (2 million being the most optimistic estimate). The Center is a nonprofit, nonpartisan research and policy organization based in Durham, North Carolina, and is dedicated to protecting homeownership and family wealth by working to eliminate abusive financial practices.
Today, the Center released a report saying that an expected surge in home foreclosures will result in U.S. property values declining by $223 billion, with most of the impact taking place in minority communities. Because of a “spillover effect” impacting 44.5 million homes across the country, roughly 1 in 3 households will see their property values drop by $5,000 on average. Local government tax revenues will be also be hit hard by the decline. “These foreclo Read more:Values
Wall Street Superstar Predicts Worst Recession Since 1930s 2007-11-13 14:48:18 The New York Sun interviewed hedge fund superstar Jim Melcher on Monday, who is “worried about a recession. Not a normal one, but a very bad one. The worst since the 1930s. I expect we’ll see clear signs of it in six months with a dramatic slowdown in the gross domestic product.” Melcher heads Balestra Capital, a $350 million New York-based hedge fund which has increased in value by 175% as of the interview. Melcher is known for his uncanny ability to spot nearly every market meltdown over the past 25 years, including the stock market crashes of 1987 and 2000, the bond woes of 1994, and the emerging market crisis of 1998.
According to the Sun:
Mr. Melcher, a market bear, had some pretty discouraging words. ‘What I think is not good for the country, but good for me.’ he says. His basic advice to the country’s roughly 80 million stock players: Run for the hills — the worst is far from over… Our bear figures the next six to 12 months will be awful for investors as the mark Read more:Street
, Superstar
, Wall Street
China Fires Another Salvo At Dollar 2007-11-12 16:35:55 It’s open season on the greenback again. Earlier last week, Cheng Siwei, vice chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, said that China
should shift more of its $1.43 trillion of currency reserves into “stronger currencies,” such as the euro, to offset “weak” currencies like the dollar. Xu Jian, a central bank vice director, added that the dollar is “losing its status as the world currency.” According to the Shanghai Securities News on Friday, Tang Shuangning, one of China’s “senior financial figures,” is also suggesting that China cut the proportion of dollars in its foreign exchange reserves.
The chairman of China Everbright Group, a major state-controlled financial conglomerate, talked about cutting the ratio of dollars in China’s $1.43 trillion of reserves at a financial industry forum in Beijing last Thursday. The suggestion came as part of a series of steps he proposed to resolve China’s balance of payments problems, the Read more:Salvo
, Dollar
Beware Of This One-Two Punch 2007-11-12 13:31:07 Yesterday, MarketWatch talked about University of Maryland business professor Peter Morici, who won his second straight “Forecaster of the Month” award from the news service. Morici had the most accurate forecasts of any of his colleagues on 10 major U.S. economic indicators released in October, and capitalized on this notoriety to share the following:
• The Federal Reserve and U.S. Treasury Department are “naïve” about the global economy. Both Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson “look out of their league.”
• Wall Street is infected by “petty corruption.” Morici claims, “There’s a petty corruption that infects Wall Street firms. Everyone feels entitled to make $40 million a year.” The high salaries are justified by “lying to Americans about the value of their creations.”
• The capital markets, the mainspring of the U.S. economy, “are broken.”
Talk about no holds barred. Morici went on to say that, “If the U.S. economy me Read more:Beware
, Punch
Sunday Edition: November 11, 2007 2007-11-11 13:47:41 The United States Of Debt
On November
6, the Denver Post talked about U.S. Comptroller General David M. Walker as he participates in the “Fiscal Wakeup Tour.” In an earlier post I spoke of tour, which is sponsored by the Concord Coalition and attempts to explain in plain terms why budget analysts of diverse perspectives are increasingly alarmed by the nation’s long-term fiscal outlook. Walker, who is the chief auditor of all federal programs and activities, is a political independent who is pleading with American voters to elect only presidential candidates who make budget reform a top priority. Why is he so concerned? According to the Post:
The federal budget is crumbling, he says. The nation continues to borrow at an alarming rate and to saddle today’s toddlers with exorbitant debt they may not ever be able to repay. The country can’t afford the Medicare and Social Security benefits it has promised. And politicians seemingly refuse to level with Americans about how much fin Read more:Sunday
, Edition
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