Category Archive: 5.) Charles Hugh Smith

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Fragmentation and the De-Optimization of Centralization

2017-01-05

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2017-01-05

US Healthcare System
Many observers decry the loss of national coherence and purpose, and the increasing fragmentation of the populace into "tribes" with their own loyalties, value systems and priorities. These observers look back on the national unity of World War II as the ideal social standard: everyone pitching in, with shared purpose and sacrifice. (Never mind the war killed tens of millions of people, including over 400,000 Americans.)

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Why I’m Hopeful

2017-01-02

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2017-01-02

santa2010
Readers often ask me to post something hopeful, and I understand why: doom-and-gloom gets tiresome. Human beings need hope just as they need oxygen, and the destruction of the Status Quo via over-reach and internal contradictions doesn't leave much to be happy about.

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Ungovernable Nation, Ungovernable Economy

2017-01-01

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2017-01-01

Wealth distribution since 1917
Yesterday I described the conditions that render the U.S. ungovernable. Here is a chart of why the U.S. economy will also be ungovernable. Longtime readers are acquainted with the S-curve model of expansion, maturity, stagnation and decline.

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What Triggers Collapse?

2017-01-01

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2017-01-01

A variety of forces will disrupt or obsolete existing modes of production and the social order. Though no one can foretell the future, it is self-evident that the status quo—dependent as it is on cheap oil and fast-expanding debt—is unsustainable. So what will trigger the collapse of the status quo, and what lies beyond when the current arrangements break down?  Can we predict how-when-where with any accuracy? All prediction is based on...

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Will Tax Cuts and More Federal Borrowing/Spending Fix What’s Broken?

2016-12-31

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2016-12-31

Wages & Salaries as perfent of GDP, energy crisis, financialization boom, internet boom, housing boom
Charles Hugh Smith combines the best graphs on the declining wage share of GDP in this post. He answers the question if the tax cuts and more federal borrowing and spending can solve what is broken in the U.S. economy.

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When Did Our Elites Become Self-Serving Parasites?

2016-12-31

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2016-12-31

When did our financial and political elites become self-serving parasites? Some will answer that elites have always been self-serving parasites; as tempting as it may be to offer a blanket denunciation of elites, this overlooks the eras in which elites rose to meet existential crises.

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Fake News, Mass Hysteria and Induced Insanity

2016-12-30

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2016-12-30

Obesity Among US Adults Ages 20-74
We've heard a lot about "fake news" from those whose master narratives are threatened by alternative sources and analyses. We've heard less about the master narratives being threatened.

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A Tale of Two Housing Markets: Hot and Not So Hot

2016-12-29

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2016-12-29

GDP Count
If we had to guess which areas will likely experience the smallest declines in prices and recover the soonest, which markets would you bet on?

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Grab-Bag of Resolutions for 2017

2016-12-28

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2016-12-28

Bitcoin One-Year Chart
Here's a grab-bag of resolutions with something for just about every persuasion. I resolve to never utter or write the word "Trump" in 2017. (Good luck with that...)

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Crisis of Meaning = Crisis of Work

2016-12-27

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2016-12-27

Real Average Hourly Wages
Allow me to connect two apparently unconnected dots. Dot #1: The last sugar plantation in Hawaii is closing down, ending more than a century of plantation life in the 50th state.

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When Assets (Such as Real Estate) Become Liabilities

2016-12-27

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2016-12-27

Equity in Real Estate
It will be the middle class that accepted the notion that "real estate is the foundation of family wealth" that will be stripmined by higher taxes on immobile assets such as real estate.

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The Washington Post: Useful-Idiot Shills for a Failed, Frantic Status Quo That Has Lost Control of the Narrative

2016-12-25

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2016-12-25

US Federal Reserve System
Don't you think it fair and reasonable that anyone accusing me of being a shill for Russian propaganda ought to read my ten books in their entirety and identify the sections that support their slanderous accusation?

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The Burrito Index: Consumer Prices Have Soared 160 percent Since 2001

2016-12-25

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2016-12-25

Personal Consumption Expenditures
In our household, we measure inflation with the Burrito Index: How much has the cost of a regular burrito at our favorite taco truck gone up? Since we keep detailed records of expenses (a necessity if you’re a self-employed free-lance writer).

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The Disaster of Inflation-For the Bottom 95 percent

2016-12-24

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2016-12-24

Central banks are obsessed with boosting inflation, but the "why inflation is good" arguments make no sense for households being ravaged by inflation. The basic argument is that inflation makes it easier for debtors to service their debts.

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Why the Massive Expansion of “Money” Hasn’t Trickled Down to “The Rest of Us”

2016-12-22

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2016-12-22

MZM Money Stock
There are numerous debates about money: what it is, how we measure it, and so on. In recognition of these debates, I'm referring to "money" in quotes to designate that I'm using the Federal Reserve's measure of money stock (MZM). Nowadays, "money" is often credit. We buy stuff not with currency/ cash, but with credit extended by lenders.

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What Have the “Experts” Gotten Right? In the Real Economy, They’re 0 for 5

2016-12-20

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2016-12-20

Personal Consumption Expenditures; Services; Housing; Rental of tenant-occupied nonfarm housing
If the "experts" were assessed on results, they'd all be fired. The mainstream media continually hypes the authority of "experts," i.e. people with a stack of credentials from top institutions. But does the mainstream media ever check on whether the "experts" got anything right? Let's compare the "experts" (conventional PhD economists) diagnoses and fixes with the results of their policies.

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Are You a Deplorable? Take This Quiz to Find Out

2016-12-18

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2016-12-18

Media Concentration
Regardless of your ethnicity, class or religion, if you perceive the institutions that govern American life as corrupted, riddled with favoritism and spin or as broken, you're a Deplorable. Are you a Deplorable? The answer might surprise you. Take this short quiz to find out.

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Is the Deep State at War–With Itself?

2016-12-18

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2016-12-18

Deep State Network
The recent pronouncement by the C.I.A. that Russian hackers intervened in the U.S. presidential election doesn't pass the sniff test--on multiple levels. Let's consider the story on the most basic levels.

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Why the Democrats Can’t Let Go of Losing

2016-12-17

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2016-12-17

Democratic party
The Democratic Party has become everything it once was against. The Democratic Party has become everything that it once loathed: elitist, globalist, interventionist, self-serving, warmongering and overflowing with hubris.

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Recovering America’s History of Progressive Populism

2016-12-16

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2016-12-16

Populism
The elites' toadies, lackeys, shills, sycophants, water-carriers and apologists are desperately hyping the context-free, historically ignorant narrative that "populism leads to autocracy" to protect the existing autocracy of the elites.

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