Excellent piece on the global war on prudence and savers now in process, see: The monarchs of money and the war on savers.
The assertion that the Central Banks saved us all is a insipid euphemism designed to disguise the fact that we the taxpayers are the bank of last resort. It is ‘we the people’ who were co-signed, without consultation, to guarantee the staggering costs of bailing out investment bankers and reckless actors from their due demise. And now the latest revelation sweeping the world is that “austerity doesn’t work”. The fact is that paying trillions of dollars to prop up bad assets and bad businesses in order to preserve paper wealth in 1% of the population, and then expecting the remaining 99% of society to ‘suck it up’ and find a way to function on the remaining slim pickens, is what doesn’t work. Government downsizing and spending cuts are definitely part of the solution, we do all need to find ways to do more with less today; but the other necessary part of the cure it to finally admit the truth and fire bad managers, write off bad debts and let insolvent players fall with their own bad choices. And yes it is unpleasant, but some arrests still must be made…
The Current’s Anna Maria Tremonti also did a worthwhile segment on this topic this morning. You can listen to the audio clip here.