Financial, Economic and Social Mood Update (April 2, 2026) The subject of this month’s blog is housing, which has become too expensive for most people to afford and where high quality in new construction has all but disappeared.  Housing and other real property comprise the biggest piece of the entire financially quantifiable asset base on planet earth and is continuing to change for reasons beyond what most people comprehend and certainly beyond our control. Much of the change is due (as always) to evolving human demographic change.  Put simply, the population of the earth is continuing to age which translates into an increasing median age, lower fertility (fewer and fewer children being born), smaller family size, smaller household size, less of a need for primary education staff (school district employees), fewer working people and more retired people.  The older the population, the less vibrant, the less active and the less mobile it becomes.  This is the reason why the average age of owner occupied housing is now no less than 16 years or more than double what it was during the seven decades immediately after the end of the Second World War in 1945. Decades of asset inflation due to credit inflation caused by governments continuing to create credit (people often inaccurately refer to this as “printing money”) have made asset prices artificially high.  At the same time purchasing power has continued to fall with declining real wages in particular in much of the so-called industrialized world.  Much of the so-called developing world is no longer under so-called “imperial” or “colonial” authority which means that they are no longer as subservient to the so-called developed world.  This means that more of the world has become more “competitive” in the modern industrial sense and that developed countries and their peoples no…

Financial, Economic and Social Mood Update (March 1, 2026) The subject of this month’s blog builds upon my blogs from the most recent months.  In other words, how are we to address long-standing issues related to the grossly unequal distribution of wealth, how are we to protect the natural environment and how are we to do this fairly while at the same time shoring up our cherished freedoms and democracy? The concept I shared last month with respect to the very real life and real time proposal to the governments of Papua New Guinea, Bougainville (an autonomous province still within Papua New Guinea), the Philippines, Australia as well as the United Nations has been forming since 2016 or for the last ten years.  It is being presented by individuals with solid credentials in the fields of business and government who are long standing voters with center-right leanings (entirely different from the “far right wing” now unfortunately visible in the USA, in parts of Europe and in certain other parts of the globe). 78 percent of the currently quantifiable financial and economic wealth on earth is now in the form of commodities including (in this order) real estate, crude oil, gold, copper, natural gas (methane), silver, platinum and palladium.  The surface area of the earth is currently 25 percent land and 75 percent water.  Of the surface land 12 percent is currently used for agriculture (crops), 25 percent for agriculture (meadow and pasture land for ranching and grazing), 31 percent consists of forest cover and the remaining 32 percent of the surface land on earth is a combination of deserts, glaciers, barren land and the smallest amount built-up for human habitation. Much of the meadow and pasture land is now used for domestic herds of farm animals used for human consumption…

Financial, Economic and Social Mood Update (February 1, 2026) The subject of this month’s blog is about how to address the (global) problem of the gross inequality of the distribution of both wealth and income, and how to tackle this issue while at the same time conserving the earth’s resources and halting the destruction of the natural environment.  In my December 2025 monthly financial and economic blog I discussed the issue of “estate planning” – necessary for everyone but at its highest level a vehicle which allows multinational corporations to legally avoid taxation – not a good thing and the way in which wealth becomes ever more concentrated at the very top of society. Note: this is based upon a real-life proposal which addresses both the grossly unequal distribution of wealth & income and which addresses climate related issues as well (environmental degradation / climate change / global warming).  This requires a globally-concerted effort.  If not, it will never succeed.  This has nothing to do with “socialism” or “communism” as those on the extreme political and social right wing claim.  This is in fact supported by a very broad political and economic spectrum including everyone else outside of the extreme right wing including interests such as mainstream conservatives, the center-right and interests in business, finance and politics.  As we shall see, the global distribution of wealth is so grossly lopsided that those at the very top deserve tax brackets all their own – including the British Royal family (who own 21 percent of the earth’s surface land) and the likes of billionaires such as Elon Musk who as the earth’s wealthiest individual has a net worth almost 3 times as much as the second richest individual on earth. We must first quantify in monetary terms the value of all global…

Financial, Economic and Social Mood Update (January 2, 2026) The subject of this month’s blog is about the political history of the United States going back to the time before the USA declared its independence from the British Empire in 1776.  The USA is among a few modern day nation states which has a parliamentary system largely inherited from England.  This system is called a “first past the post system” in the modern day UK where seats in parliament are contested by individual districts across the entire country and not awarded according to “proportional representation” as they are in much of the rest of the world.  This latter system traces historical roots to the French Revolution of 1789.  Many authoritarian governments around the world have representative parliaments with governments of “national unity” which do allow for multiple political parties – but these parties are not allowed to go against the will of the national government – examples here include the People’s Republic of China, North Korea and the former German Democratic Republic (1949 to 1990). Modern democracies with a “first past the post” parliamentary electoral or voting system include the UK, the USA, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.  Most democratic electoral and voting systems in the rest of Europe, Latin America, Africa and Asia use proportional representation or even a hybrid system using some of each of the two described systems.  The political system of the modern day UK traces much of its parliamentary origins to the “Magna Carta” of 1215 in which the nobility obtained concessions from the ruling monarch (king). It is much more difficult to have third or multiple political parties in a “first past the post” system whereas in a parliamentary system we often see many smaller political parties who are represented in parliament.  The two…

Financial, Economic and Social Mood Update (December 1, 2025) The subject of this month’s blog has to do with how corporations legally avoid paying taxes worldwide.  This is the reason why so much of the wealth in the world has been literally transferred from the middle classes not just to the upper classes but specifically to the oligarchy of the small but very powerful billionaire class of about 3,000 individuals and families around the globe. This is the highest level of what one would call estate planning – something which concerns everyone on the planet.  The most basic form of an estate plan is for someone to write and sign a last will and testament.  Even if someone has no financial or physical wealth this person would need a last will and testament if they have children.  They would state who would raise their minor children in the event of their incapacity or death – say siblings (aunts and uncles) or parents (grandparents of the children). The second level of estate planning which also concerns everyone (even people with little or no financial or physical wealth) is something called a living will or medical power of attorney.  In the even one becomes incapacitated or one has a terminal health condition a person should state if they do or do not want to kept “artificially” alive.  Most people would say “no” but in any case this is a very necessary and important decision to make. The third level of estate planning concerns everyone with financial and physical assets.  In the event of a death if one only has a last will and testament these assets will go into legal probate – a very expensive and lengthy process which eats up too much money and time and leaves legal heirs in an…

Financial, Economic and Social Mood Update (November 1, 2025) The fiscal predicament of the American federal government continued to deteriorate at an alarming rate in the month of September 2025.  At least 60 percent of what the federal government now spends is money we do not have – brand new debt in the form of credit created out of thin air and backed by nothing.  The amount of “new” debt issued in calendar year 2025 equals the following:  US Treasuries = $5.657 TRILLION, federal agency securities = $1.6926 TRILLION and municipal bonds = $0.6762 TRILLION = a grand total of USD $8.0258 TRILLION.  The federal government portion alone = USD $7.3496 TRILLION.  Tax receipts in calendar year 2024 were USD $4.9 TRILLION and they are falling this year due to the collapsing economy and due to the “big beautiful” tax cuts plus a 40 percent staff cut at the IRS.  Here is a 24-minute video detailing the upcoming collapse of the bond market featuring speakers such as Jamie Dimon and Ray Dalio: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dwOuTMa9iLs&t=1127s.  The reports in late October 2025 with respect to the increase in the national debt of the USA have gotten even worse.  The national debt of the federal government has surpassed USD $38 TRILLION and it surpassed USD $37 TRILLION only two (2) months ago.  If this is the case tax revenues have to be collapsing due to multiple reasons: the so-called tax cuts in the “Big Beautiful Bill,” tariff revenue in no way making up for these cuts, no taxpayer audits being done at the IRS (due to the government shutdown and due to reduced human resources / personnel), and on top of all this a collapse in consumer spending which leads to a collapse in economic activity which leads to a collapse in government tax…

Financial, Economic and Social Mood Update (October 1, 2025) The labor market is facing lethal headwinds not just due to the impending deflationary collapse (like the “Great Depression” from 1929 although it will be much more severe this time around) but due to the rise of “Artificial Intelligence” (AI).  Here is a video with a chilling message – forecasting global unemployment of not merely 10 percent but of a staggering 99 percent:  https://www.instagram.com/reel/DOK9DmVAFxC/?igsh=MTliNGVuOHB6NWV6Yg%3D%3D. As I said in my September 2025 monthly blog, the so-called “Big Beautiful Bill” is a terrible mistake.  Many people who voted for both of the two major American political parties feel this way – this is not strictly a political issue.  Ideally the entire bill should be overturned, the tax cuts especially for corporations rescinded and the cuts in social programs restored to their previous levels.  The majority of the population depends upon the major entitlement programs for their basis sustenance and here I refer to the likes of Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, the Affordable Healthcare Act (“Obamacare”) and SNAP (“Food Stamps”).  We are still at a point where the cost of living is rising and purchasing power is falling, so we are not yet at a point where these programs can be cut.  Furthermore it is a huge mistake to increase the military budget to USD $1 TRILLION – this should be cut by at least 90 percent.  We simply cannot afford this madness. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is no longer a fantasy.  It is real and it is already in the process of permanently displacing millions, tens of millions, hundreds of millions and eventually billions of workers all over the planet.  It is also helping to make the centi-billionaire, the deca-billionaire, the billionaire, centi-millionaire and deca-millionaire class ever wealthier and more powerful.  These are the…