Inflation And The US Dollar

A few different topics going on at once...
So I won't add much of anything, but has anyone else noticed that one of the underlying factors to this whole mess isn't discussed much? At one end is the behavior of banks who created highly-leveraged MBS of dubious worth. On the other end is the American consumer, who for the past few decades has been saving less and spending more on extremely leveraged lifestyles. Just consider the savings rate against credit balances and real estate leveraging such as mort equity withdrawal. The banks did their part in pushing for higher credit volumes, hence the crazy mort products of the last few years--and the consumer did more than their part by spending at absurd levels. I should add this happened in Europe too.

So how will this play out? Will our govt. somehow backstop all this bad debt and the liquidity game enters a new round? Oh yeah, sure...whatever.

Founding Fathers. Graves. Spinning. Assemble your own sentence!

Amazing, our species evolved and survived over two million years without big government, but... oh, never mind, that discussion does not belong here.

I mentioned the whole living beyond your means thing in another thread & it didn't go over too well. I think I understand the current situation as well as the next guy. Some of our problem comes from the people that took out bad loans. The rest of it comes from the financial institutions that created questionable financial instruments in the search for ever greater profit. There's plenty of blame to go around, & you can split it up to suit your viewpoint.

That doesn't take away the fact that people live beyond their means. I don't know how many times I've heard someone complain that health insurance is too expensive & they can't afford it. Then they get in the brand new truck they use to pull their matching bass boat. Or they'll say they can't save in one breath, & in the next talk about their week long vacation at the luxury resort in the Bahamas. Or say they can't afford to retire as they drive their Lexus to the 3000 sq/ft home they "need" even though the kids have moved away.

as well.
Me thinks our priorities are outta kilter

I agree that living within one's means is imperative--I also think it's quite heinous that the average "means" of a Fortune 500 CEO is $14.2 million per annum.

Not just a 6, but a hearty 666 to those CEOs and their minions
Shareholders should take this flagrant inefficiency to task--make'em walk the plank, arrr! Take "creative destruction" like a man, ye scurvy dogs!

again! Yet, ultimately I subscribe to the principle of irony. There is no escape, and we all become what we do.

Well, I bought some financial stocks when it was in the dumps a couple of days ago. Let's see how this rally turns out. I've got a few coins I'm eyeing with the proceeds.