The Bush administration and Republicans in Congress may not be terribly concerned about the U.S. economic outlook, but the rest of us had better be.
Via Blog Left, there’s an unsettling item that originates from Australia. Here’s a portion of it:
The main cause of concern is the fact the US is running a trade deficit of about $US600billion ($760 billion) and a budget deficit of about $US430billion for 2005.
US imports are almost 50 percent greater than the country’s exports, with the deficit being financed by international central banks and fund managers.
Despite signs that the deficit is getting bigger, money is pouring into the US from Asia and Europe at such a rate that the US has been able to keep its long-term interest rates steady at 4.2 per cent since the middle of last year.
Dr Henry said the flood of money was “worryingly reminiscent of Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan’s warning in 1996 of irrational exuberance in US stocks.”
He said that, as with the dotcom bubble in the 1990s, one could not tell how long it would keep going, but it would burst eventually.
Take a look back and you’ll see that 1928 was a pretty good year for the economy. Then came 1929.
What can you do? Try writing your U.S. representative and senators. Tell them you want steps taken to roll back Bush’s tax cuts for the wealthiest taxpayers and to curb the trade deficit, whatever it takes.
