No. 79 - Truth or Consequences

What the demise of the dollar means for you.

October 13, 12:34 PMColumbia Conservative ExaminerAnthony G. Martin. http://www.examiner.com/x-3704-Colum...l-this-article

For several months you have read the warnings issued by economists and columnists, including this writer, concerning the devaluing of the dollar and its ultimate demise. But what, exactly, does this mean for you, the citizen?

It would be too easy for readers to dismiss such talk as the musings of those who get their jollies from engaging in economic lingo, while missing the enormous consequences that the demise of the dollar will have on our everyday lives.

We are speaking here of a cataclysmic, seismological blow to our way of life as Americans.

One of the primary reasons Americans enjoy an affluent way of life when compared to much of the rest of the world is the primacy of the dollar as a world currency. Oil, for example, is bought and sold using the dollar. Thus, dollars are being pumped into various economies around the world for one reason alone--it is in great demand. This helps the American consumer by keeping the value of our currency up, keeping inflation down, and keeping our goods and services affordable to the masses.
But what happens when the dollar is devalued? Or worse still, what happens when global entities, such as the oil barons, stop using the dollar as their currency?

Here is where you and I come into the picture.

We are going to see a major change in our way of life. What does this mean for you? Here it is in as simple of terms as I can possibly make it:

1. Inflation will skyrocket. If you are in the market for new clothing, expect the price for common, ordinary garments to quadruple overnight. Food, even the basic staples, will become so expensive that the largest percentage of what we spend out of our paychecks will be used just to stay alive. The poorest among us will have trouble merely surviving.

2. Paper money will be basically worthless. That means those dollars we use to purchase goods and services will have absolutely no real value any longer. The dollar, at that point, will have been so thoroughly devalued that it will be worth only the paper its printed on. Unless you have invested heavily in gold and other precious medals, you will be in big trouble.

3. Gold and precious medals, which have intrinsic value of their own, will become vastly important. At present, the price of gold has skyrocketed to over $1000 per ounce. This means that a gold coin that at one time carried a value of $20 will now be worth over $1000. Those who have bought these gold coins and bricks as a hedge against inflation will be in a good position to weather the coming storm. Those who have not will be at the mercy of the coming economic storm where goods and services will quadruple in costs and where their paper money will be basically worthless.

4. Starvation will become common. Homelessness will overwhelm American society. Businesses will go under. Joblessness will sweep over the nation, setting us on a course to either match or outmatch the unemployment numbers of the Great Depression.

Barack Obama has hastened the demise of the dollar with his economic policy. The course he has charted through the Federal Reserve and the U.S. Treasury has sent the value of the dollar plummeting faster than a millstone dropped into a pond. The oil barons overseas, sensing that the dollar is quickly becoming irrelevant, are talking seriously about dropping the dollar as the standard currency on the world market.

And what is Obama's response? Fine and dandy. His underlings at Treasury have been known to quietly support this shift away from the primacy of the dollar. What this means, my friends, is that Obama and company are supporting measures that will break you financially when the economic consequences of the demise of the dollar finally hit home.

But lest anyone think that I am so naive as to blame this entirely on Obama, let's remember that these policies were also followed by George W. Bush. The only difference is that Obama has accelerated the process, thus hastening the day when it all hits the fan.

The bottom line? There is no one in Washington minding the store and looking out for our interests. Instead what we have in Washington is an elected group of self-described 'ruling elites' who are looking out for interests other than that of the American people. George Soros, the world banks, the International Monetary Fund, and forces at the U.N. are to be appeased above that of the good of the citizens.

Unless concerned Americans unite--Democrats, Republicans, Independents, Libertarians, etc., to demand that the present government immediately cease and desist from its assault on American exceptionalism, then not only do we face the loss of this free Republic but the descent into economic chaos that will make the 1930s pale in comparison.

We absolutely MUST change the makeup of Congress in 2010, from top to bottom. But in the meantime, unless we take to the streets screaming bloody murder, the charlatans in Washington may well destroy the country before we get a chance to vote in November of 2010.

For an excellent explanation of these concepts, including background and history, consult economist Walter E. Williams' article entitled, Inflation and Deficits below.

NOTE TO MINORITY VIEW EDITORS: THE FOLLOWING COLUMN IS BEING FILED EARLY DUE TO THE LABOR DAY HOLIDAY. THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION. -- CREATORS.COM

A MINORITY VIEW
BY WALTER WILLIAMS
RELEASE: WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 9, 2009
 
Inflation and Deficits
 
With the massive increases in federal spending, inflation is one of the risks that awaits us. To protect us from the political demagoguery that will accompany that inflation, let's now decide what is and what is not inflation. One price or several prices rising is not inflation. Increases in money supply are what constitute inflation, and a general rise in prices is the symptom. As the late Nobel Laureate Professor Milton Friedman said, "(I)nflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon, in the sense that it cannot occur without a more rapid increase in the quantity of money than in output."

Thinking of inflation as rising prices permits politicians to deceive us and escape culpability. They shift the blame saying that inflation is caused by greedy businessmen, rapacious unions or Arab sheiks. Instead, it is increases in the money supply that cause inflation, and who is in charge of the money supply? It's the government operating through the Federal Reserve Bank and the U.S. Treasury.

Our nation has avoided the devastating hyperinflations that have plagued other nations. The world's highest inflation rate was in Hungary after World War II, where prices doubled every 15 hours. The world's second highest inflation rate is today's Zimbabwe, where last year prices doubled every 25 hours, a rate of 89 sextillion percent. That's 89 followed by 23 zeros. Our highest rate of inflation occurred during the Revolutionary War, when the Continental Congress churned out paper Continentals to pay bills. The monthly inflation rate reached a peak of 47 percent in November 1779. This painful experience with inflation, and collapse of the Continental dollar, is what prompted the delegates to the Constitutional Convention to include the gold and silver clause into the United States Constitution so that the individual states could not issue bills of credit. The U.S. Constitution's Article I, Section 8 permits Congress: "To coin Money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign Coin, and fix the Standard of Weights and Measures."

The founders of our nation feared paper currency because it gave government the means to steal from its citizens. When inflation is unanticipated, as it so often is, there's a redistribution of wealth from creditors to debtors. If you lend me $100, and over the term of the loan prices double, I pay you back with dollars worth only half of the purchasing power they had when I borrowed the money. Since inflation redistributes (steals) wealth from creditors to debtors, we can identify inflation's primary beneficiary by asking: Who is the nation's largest debtor? If you said, "It's the U.S. government," go to the head of the class.
          
Inflation is just one effect of massive increases in spending. Some might argue that future generations of Americans will pay for today's massive budget deficits. But is there really a federal budget deficit? The short answer is yes, but only in an accounting sense -- but not in any meaningful economic sense. Let's look at it. Our GDP this year will be about $14 trillion. If 2009 federal expenditures are $3.9 trillion and tax receipts are $2.1 trillion, that means there is an accounting deficit of $1.8 trillion. Is it the Tooth Fairy, Santa or the Easter Bunny who makes up the difference between expenditures and revenue? Is it a youngster who is born in 2020 or 2030 who makes up the difference? No. If government spends $3.9 trillion of our $14 trillion GDP this year, of necessity it has to force us to spend privately $3.9 trillion less this year. One method to force us to spend less privately is through taxation. Another way is to enter the bond market and drive up the interest rates, which put a squeeze on private investment in homes and businesses. Then there is inflation, which is a sneaky form of taxation.

Profligate spending burdens future generations by making them recipients of a smaller amount of capital and hence less wealth.
           
Walter E. Williams is a professor of economics at George Mason University. To find out more about Walter E. Williams and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.
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