The US Government Spent a Record Amount of Money on Interest in 2018 – How Does That Affect You?
In the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis the Federal Reserve engaged in a massive amount of quantitative easing (QE). In addition to pushing interest rates to near zero, the Fed also purchased nearly $2 trillion worth of US government debt. That incentivized the US government to take advantage of the low interest rate environment to issue trillions of...
With an Economy This Fragile, Investors Need to Be Prepared
Building up a nest egg for retirement is only one half of retirement planning. The other half consists of planning to safeguard and maintain that wealth well into the future. Business cycles have been a regular part of the economy for over a century. The booms and busts that occur with regularity are something that need to be taken...
Has President Trump Successfully Cowed the Fed?
Stock markets soared last week in the aftermath of Fed Chairman Jay Powell’s speech to the Economic Club of New York. In contrast to Powell’s statement in October that the Fed was still a “long way” from the neutral interest rate, Powell last week stated that interest rates now “remain just below the broad range of estimates of the...
Russia Ditches Dollar in Response to US Sanctions
Russia has announced its decision to forgo use of the US dollar in response to US sanctions against the country. While the Russian government would prefer not to have to take that measure, it feels that it has no option, seeing what has happened to Iran and not wishing to be cut off from world financial markets if it...
Relying on Social Security Is Like Playing Russian Roulette
For nearly 80 years the Social Security system in the United States has been paying benefits to retirees. Generations of Americans have grown up and gone to work in the expectation that the Social Security taxes they paid throughout their careers will be repaid with interest once they retire. But as demographic changes alter the makeup of American society...