THE WORLD ECONOMY IS BROKEN. WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?

There are major signs that the world economy is grinding to a halt in a way that may echo a worldwide Wiemar Republic moment. For those not versed in history, the Wiemar Republic collapsed under the weight of brutal hyperinflation caused by the same tactics our leaders are doing today. That's right, the same crap that helped fuel two World Wars and a Great Depression is stomping us under their heel again. And some out there are all for it; those that have been deluded, the gullible and, of course, those that want it to happen. Make no doubt, there is some sort of contingency plan for when all of this goes belly up and the end result is another round of a Hitler-like populist that will rise from somewhere and enslave the lot of us. That is what always happens in history, it will happen again and we will be the DUMBEST idiots in the universe if we let it happen again.

We could fix everything easily, as I have discussed in previous posts. But our leaders don't want their gravy train ended and have given band aid remedies to a missing limb. We are hemorrhaging badly and the GOP and their followers are like lemmings over a cliff. Don't believe me? Ask yourself, which side of the aisle is constantly bitching about how high taxes are? If you said democrat, you're an idiot. Here the rub: according to every piece of data out there, the rich pay near nothing in taxes and corporations not only pay nothing, they get billions back in tax rebates. Here's a list:

General Electric
U.S. Profits: $10,460,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$4,737,000,000

PG&E Corp.
U.S. Profits: $4,855,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$1,027,000,000

Verizon Communications
U.S. Profits: $32,518,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$951,000,000

Wells Fargo
U.S. Profits: $49,370,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$681,000,000

American Electric Power
U.S. Profits: $5,899,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$545,000,000

Pepco Holdings
U.S. Profits: $882,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$508,000,000

Computer Sciences
U.S. Profits: $1,666,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$305,000,000

CenterPoint Energy
U.S. Profits: $1,931,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$284,000,000

NiSource
U.S. Profits: $1,385,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$227,000,000

Duke Energy
U.S. Profits: $5,475,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$216,000,000

Boeing
U.S. Profits: $9,735,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$178,000,000

NextEra Energy
U.S. Profits: $6,403,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$139,000,000

Consolidated Edison
U.S. Profits: $4,263,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$127,000,000

Paccar
U.S. Profits: $365,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$112,000,000

Integrys Energy Group
U.S. Profits: $818,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$92,000,000

Wisconsin Energy
U.S. Profits: $1,725,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$85,000,000

DuPont
U.S. Profits: $2,124,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$72,000,000

Baxter International
U.S. Profits: $926,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$66,000,000

Tenet Healthcare
U.S. Profits: $415,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$48,000,000

Ryder System
U.S. Profits: $627,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$46,000,000

El Paso
U.S. Profits: $4,105,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$41,000,000

Honeywell International
U.S. Profits: $4,903,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$34,000,000

CMS Energy
U.S. Profits: $1,292,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$29,000,000

Con-­way
U.S. Profits: $286,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$26,000,000

Navistar International
U.S. Profits: $896,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$18,000,000

DTE Energy
U.S. Profits: $2,551,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$17,000,000

Interpublic Group
U.S. Profits: $571,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$15,000,000

Mattel
U.S. Profits: $1,020,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$9,000,000

Corning
U.S. Profits: $1,977,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$4,000,000

FedEx
U.S. Profits: $4,247,000,000
Taxes Paid: $37,000,000 (a rate of less than 1%)

Total
U.S. Profits: $163,691,000,000
Taxes Paid: ‐$10,602,000,000

That's right, not one of the above companies paid that so called 35% tax rate that exists only in GOP Congressland, although to be fair, Obama and some democrats also complain that the corporate tax rate is too high as well. Only Fed Ex paid any tax at all and it was a measly less than one percent of their profit. And we wonder why we are broke.

Because of offshore accounts, no tax is paid on most of a multi-national corporation's earnings. If you or I tried that, we'd go to jail. They get praised and sit at the right hand of power. The ultra wealthy have echoed this practice and have hoarded an estimated $30 trillion in stolen funds, with some guesses as high as $300 trillion. Imagine if that money wasn't being stolen from the taxpayers and being used to better all of our lives, not just a chosen few.

However this level of greed is unsustainable and we face two frightening realities: either we will see a total collapse of government and anarchy for the foreseeable future or the rise of a world despot that will usher in a new level of control. Either way it sucks.

The income tax needs to be abolished at this point and a new way of funding government used because this nonsense will bankrupt us any day now. Our tax code is byzantine in method. Our IRS goes after those that cannot defend themselves (like me) and bleed them dry while the powerful go unchecked.

The world is now in recession as seen from the website Investment Watch.

http://investmentwatchblog.com/global-economic-collapse-in-process-billionaires-continue-to-dump-u-s-stocks-traders-are-betting-against-u-s-economy-hedge-funds-preparing-for-market-sell-off-and-they-start-betting-against-curr/

With the disappointing initial GDP releases for Q42012 from Europe out, the “world” as defined by 41 OECD countries across the globe, has plunged into recession. We define “recession” through two alternative definitions for our comparison, either the presence of a single negative quarter-on-quarter growth or the more traditional two consecutive negative quarterly growths. Whichever way you look at it, the number of countries in expansion plunged dramatically between 3Q2013 and 4Q2012.

Now this is a diffusion index, with each country receiving equal weightings, and so it appears that 60% seems to be a viable threshold for the definition of “global recession” using the single-quarter definition (black) and 70% is probably the appropriate threshold for the 2-quarter definition (blue).

With many investors getting out of the stock market, a currency war, rising gas prices and plunging consumer confidence, things look bleak. Considering that many places are in a depression like the US, Greece, Italy and Spain (as confirmed again by reading the actual numbers and not government propaganda), the fact that the rest of the world is back in recession is troubling. Austerity measures are making things worse and that's all the GOP wants to do is cut our way to prosperity, which is impossible. We need to spend more where it is necessary and cut worthless crap like a good portion of the military budget. Yes, people will became unemployed and the numbers will rise past what you can hide but sometimes that is a necessity to get where you are going. Sacrifice has to come from all, not just the few you don't like.

The US economy is dying as even the government's cooked numbers say we shrank by .1% last quarter, a number that is most likely much higher. This is with QE infinity and non existant interest rates in effect which are doing nothing as the only way to actually stimulate the economy is put lots of people to work for a good pay. We have gone the other way.

There are plenty of signs that the derivative bubble may be about to burst and when it does, the world economy will explode with it. All bubbles burst. When this one goes, as it has over a quadrillion in loss exposure, it will wipe out all currencies and lead to rampant hyperinflation and societal collapse. After that, who knows. Stop being a part of this and demand our politicians to start acting like adults and FIX the problem. Or, be a Tea Party member deciding that riding manatees is more important than animal rights. That is a real issue in Florida. We are so screwed.