GUALFIN, Argentina – We are delighted with all the back talk we got from our Diary on the absurdity of the “living wage.” The responses were lively… and entertaining. We laughed. We cried.
Many people thought that we had given priests too much money… and prostitutes not enough. We could go either way on that.
Still, we got no complaints from prostitutes, but many from doctors. They wrote in to tell us how hard they worked and how outraged they would be if they earned less than nurses. (Scroll down to today’s Mailbag for more.)
They may not have noticed how far our tongue had reached into our cheek. But what fun it is setting other people’s wages!
We even got a letter from a former resident of Communist Yugoslavia who had participated on a government board charged with setting salaries for different job classifications. He was so disgusted by it he emigrated to the U.S.
Finally, one reader probably spoke for thousands: “This is the most idiotic article in the history of articles.” We are too modest to believe it. But if it is so, it is certainly an achievement!
After all, Larry Summers and Paul Krugman write articles too. So do doctors! It is hard to believe that we could top them all.
But enough of this. We have to turn to other things… Such as the collapse of the whole world economy!
A New Global Recession
Yes, it seems to be coming. Our friend and longtime Bonner & Partners Family Office member Hense Ellis summarizes:
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Another friend, economist and author Richard Duncan, adds detail via his advisory, Macro Watch:
- China’s economy is slowing rapidly.
- India’s economy is more fragile than generally understood.
- The plunge in commodity prices is taking a heavy toll.
- The sharp drop in emerging market currencies is destabilizing.
- The slump in global trade is a blow to corporate profits.
- Excess industrial capacity is worsening.
- Credit quality is deteriorating rapidly.
- Credit availability has begun to dry up and will become much tighter.
Duncan has a theory about why these things are happening – a lack of “excess liquidity.”
As he puts it, “It’s liquidity that moves the markets. When liquidity is plentiful, asset prices tend to rise, and when it is scarce, asset prices tend to fall.”
What investors need, therefore, is some way of measuring and forecasting liquidity.
Duncan’s answer is something he calls a “liquidity gauge.”
When the Fed creates dollars through QE, it injects liquidity into the financial markets. Also, when foreign central banks invest their dollar foreign exchange reserves back into the U.S., it adds to liquidity.
On the other side of the equation, when the government borrows dollars to fund its budget deficit, it absorbs liquidity. Duncan:
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Right now, according to Duncan’s model, liquidity will turn negative in 2015 and stay negative for every year until 2019.
This is why Duncan is warning his subscribers that this is a “very dangerous moment” for asset prices.
Broken Pumps
Yesterday, we showed how excess liquidity bubbled up in the mortgage finance market.
As money was easier to come by – thanks to low rates and rampant securitization of mortgage debt – people bought more houses at higher and higher prices.
This pushed up the value of the collateral – houses – which enabled people to borrow even more… and it drove the industry to build more houses and sell them to increasingly marginal (subprime) buyers.
Debt and equity raced each other higher and higher until both collapsed in 2007-08. Home prices plunged. And the value of mortgage debt plunged along with them.
Today, thanks largely to the Fed’s bubble, homeownership levels are back to where they were nearly half a century ago.
Now, we see the same phenomenon happening in other sectors. As we reported yesterday, student debt, auto debt, and corporate debt are all headed for trouble.
And the bigger picture is that the pumps just aren’t working the way they used to. The growth of the last 20 or 30 years came largely – maybe entirely – from expanding credit.
Banks lent. Consumers, businesses, and government borrowed.
Many of the factory orders went to developing markets, where costs were lower. This left these economies and their central banks with lots of dollar foreign exchange reserves, which they reinvested in U.S. assets.
Mike Dolan at Reuters:
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An Ominous Peak
You see?
Dollars borrowed out of thin air in the U.S. ended up as foreign currency reserves in the hands of foreign central banks – mainly China’s.
What could they do with them?
Buy more U.S. government debt. Drive down U.S. borrowing costs. And make it even cheaper for Americans to borrow dollars and send them overseas!
Here’s a graphic our research team created to help you get a clearer picture of what’s been going on…
So you could track much of the global growth binge by looking at China’s foreign exchange reserves. As they went up, more and more money flowed back into U.S. financial assets… and Americans borrowed and spent more and more.
But whoa, whoa, whoa! Those foreign exchange reserves have now peaked. Dolan:
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Of course, as we told you yesterday, we don’t know anything. And even as to that we have our doubts.
But it appears that the end of this cycle is in sight.
Watch out.
Regards,
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Bill
Further Reading: China also recently joined the “currency wars” being fought around the globe. As its economy implodes, it’s joining the U.S., Europe, and Japan in the race to the bottom for fiat currencies.
This is a highly dangerous situation for investors. Fortunately, there are some simple steps you can take to prepare for – and even profit from – the drastic monetary distortions on the horizon. Go here for a two-minute video presentation.
Today’s chart shows that peak in the dollar value of China’s foreign exchange reserves.
As Bill explained, China amasses forex reserves by exporting goods and receiving foreign currency as payment.
And as you can see above, last year, these reserves peaked at a dollar value of $4 trillion.
That’s roughly the same amount as the Fed spent buying U.S. government-backed bonds under its three QE programs.
Now that trend is going into reverse…
China is switching from an export-led growth model to a domestic consumption-based model.
As its exports shrink, less foreign currency is flowing into the country to pay for exports…
…and that means less forex reserves being recycled into financial assets outside of China.
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Mailbag
As promised, more feedback on the absurdity of a “living wage.”
The fact that you would pay nurses more than doctors is laughable. I would expect more intellect from an educated man such as yourself.
The path to becoming a doctor is long, brutal, and filled with sacrifice. That’s why there are fewer doctors than nurses. Very few have what it takes.
The nurse is the workhorse, and the doctor is the brain. A nurse works in the moment due to his/her limited knowledge, whereas a doctor’s expansive knowledge allows him/her to think five steps ahead.But since you esteem nurses over doctors, go ahead and let the nurse wield the scalpel the next time you need surgery.
– Levi J.
First, let me state that I find your rantings a much enjoyed and happily anticipated part of my day.
Your recent attempt at establishing a livable wage was very much appreciated, since it gave me a much-needed raise as both an entrepreneur and a whacked-out metaphysician.
Although I don’t feel whacked-out, and my PhD in metaphysics hasn’t made me a single penny to date, I do feel that a couple of adjustments to your proposal should be made, though, since it is not comprehensive or final.
Prostitutes should be moved up the list and be equal with the entrepreneurs, since most are freelance and work very hard for every dollar they get. They also have the added costs of the drugs taken to forget what they do to earn their money.Much as auto mechanics, who also decide if they will do something for the money offered and the pain associated with it.
Professional sports players were missing from your list and should be in the lowest bracket, since they are playing a game… and therefore are having a great deal of fun on a daily basis by choice.
As a final thought, I feel that all professions that are known as a practice should be in the lowest bracket, since they are not really professionals… and therefore should not be paid much for using their customers as test subjects.
– Bruce W.
A liberals’ paradise would be a place where everybody has:
- Guaranteed employment
- Free comprehensive healthcare
- Free education
- Free food
- Free housing
- Free clothing
- Free utilities
- And only law enforcement has guns
Believe it or not, such a place does indeed already exist: It’s called prison.
– Fred C.
In Case You Missed It…
Here’s this week’s most popular letter – “The Best Strategy for M Market Volatility” from our friends at the Oxford Club.
