Quotes For The Week
We’ve hit the trifecta this week…
Since last year’s collapse of the banking system, hundreds of billions of dollars have been spent to bail out some of the major players. Additionally, governments all over the world, and their central banks, have implemented huge stimulus programs to combat the consequences of the burst real estate bubble.
Economic history is being written right before our eyes. Hence, I refer to this episode as the largest economic experiment since the implementation of communism. And here’s what really frightens me:
None of the experimenters saw this crisis coming, but all of them claim to know the remedy!
-Claus Vogt, “The Sorry State of Modern Economics,” in the November 11 edition of Weiss Research’s free investment newsletter Money and Markets
During the boom, we spent money we did not have to buy things we did not produce and could not afford. As a result, we are now deeply in debt and must sharply reduce our spending to replenish our savings. By focusing solely on consumer spending, the Administration is neglecting the capital investments necessary to improve our infrastructure and productive capacity.
To generate legitimate economic growth and meaningful jobs, we must reverse the trends that brought us down. Consumers may have led us into this recession, but they can’t lead us out. The road to recovery is a one-way street, and it’s paved with savings, capital investment, and production. It’s not an easy road, but we must follow it to ensure our future prosperity.
-Peter Schiff, from “Lousy Jobs, In Such Small Portions,” on the Euro Pacific Capital website (November 6)
So what should Ben Bernanke do?
Jim Rogers: Resign. Close the Federal Reserve and then resign.
Raise rates first?
Jim Rogers: Oh no, resign. Let the market deal with rates. He hasn’t done it right.
If it weren’t for the Federal Reserve, the market would be setting the rates and then we wouldn’t have to deal with this. I mean these are bureaucrats – you think these guys are any smarter than you or me?
American has had three central banks, the first two have disappeared and this one will disappear too, after Greenspan and Bernanke. The market would do a much better job of setting rates than Mr. Bernanke. Certainly Mr. Greenspan and Mr. Bernanke have been dead wrong for 22 years, whatever it’s been. Mr. Bernanke is taking on gigantic amounts of debt, huge amounts of debt. They have at least tripled the government’s balance sheet, the Federal Reserve’s balance sheet in the past two years. [It] used to be 800million dollars of government bonds, now its trillions of dollars of garbage.”
-Jim Rogers, in an interview posted on TheStreet.com (November 13)
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