What remains of the American Dream is the domain of mass deception and mass delusion.
Ten years since the 2009 nadir, what have we learned? Some people like to learn the hard way:
The net effect of Trump's policies have been to turbo charge a late cycle boom, which will lead to a vastly more painful bust. His policies are the exact opposite of responsible economics, which prescribes counter-cyclical fiscal policy (surplus) at this point in the cycle. Somehow the vast majority of economists have bought into this ludicrously irresponsible CasinoNomic gambit. Meanwhile gamblers have been bailed out so many times they are are totally desensitived to risk. In other words the current economic "model" is predicated upon abject irresponsibility. Case in point, this latest stage rally is compliments of the Fed admitting that the cycle is over:
Jan. 31st, 2019
“This is one of the most dovish turnarounds by a Fed chair that I have ever seen in my 30-year career...“Talk about a Fed put"...referring to the idea that central bank policy makers have grown increasingly sensitive over the years to stock-market declines and stand ready to intervene in an effort to provide calm"
Today the rally continued on this "even better" news:
Gamblers are using the last cycle as an analog for why Fed neutrality is bullish, because the market continued to rally for a full year longer. However, this time around interest rate sensitive sectors are more closely aligned with the overall market unlike 2008 when they led the market:
At this stage, it should be abundantly clear to everyone that today's economists from academia, private sector, to government, are 99% proven idiots who can't be trusted. After 2008 they couldn't bring themselves to admit that their macroeconomic policies are a grand failure. Therefore, all are now merely extrapolating the recent past into the indefinite future. Meanwhile, today's CEOs are fixated on quarterly profit hence they are myopic at best and salesmen at worst. Which means that the de facto Idiocracy is flying totally blind. Into the ground.
From a political standpoint, the obligatory delusion since 2008 has been to assiduously ignore how we got here. That way we can all pretend that the usual rules of U.S. capitalism still apply: tax cuts good. "Socialism" bad. Again, leaving aside the socialism for the rich - bailouts, money printing, and Ponzi borrowing that would have final shit canned this failed economic model ten years ago. We're learning how bad socialism is from people who don't even understand capitalism.
Therefore, the parlour game of the day on both the right and left is to determine where feckless voters will stand on economic issues ahead of the 2020 election. Will voters swing to the left, the right or center. Of course it all totally depends on the economy, which means the stock market. The way it works is that if by some miracle stocks are up two years from now, voters will want small government and de-regulated corruption as usual. Of course on the reverse side when the crash comes, voters will want government to step in and bail them out again. In other words, the U.S. has neither capitalism nor socialism, it has a turbo-charged casino model with a make-believe safety net. A model that encourages risk taking over responsibility.
All of which speaks to American mythology and the enduring fantasy of the American dream which at best is a dystopian delusion. At worst it's a massive con job that is using people up at an astronomical rate. About to go full Third World revelation. The lesson that should have been learned ten years ago when there was still a stimulus buffer between gamblers and the pavement.
Some people like to learn the hard way. There's no such thing as a "Fed put" when $200 trillion of global risk assets reach 100% correlation to the downside.
"Broadcasting lies on the television screen
Trying to get us hooked on your American dream
Up on your games if you know when you'll win
When you cheated on your wife with your moneys and your scheme"
