Euro collapse and possible outcomes

Originally Posted by Niamh_Chinn_Oir

I think that people who apply for things like "Job Seekers Allowance" should be means tested and people should ensure that Job Seekers are actually looking for work. There are so many people on benefits who just don't want to work, but there are many people who genuinely cannot find work and need support.

I have 2 examples that will show exactly how screwed the benefits system is right now:

Example 1 - The family that previously lived in the house I'm currently in.

I honestly felt sorry for my LL and seeing how the house was left, I don't have a lot of doubts. Family of benefits moochers (the bad kind), with 5 kids and 20 DOGS. They were getting benefits for everything from kids to the damn dogs (benefits for dogs?!?!). According to the LL (who investigated and reported them), they were making some 4k a month from benefits after tax. That's insane.

Even so, they stopped paying the rent and when the LL threw them out, they "occupied" the house for 6 months and this ended up with court and police to get them out. They destroyed the house in rage (broken windows, unbolted the fireplace mantle, broke the fireplace hearth, broke the dishwasher and dryer, ripped out pieces of floor, left the fireplace packed with trash and used up baby towels... etc, etc, etc...) and stole the heating boiler (and since the LL doesn't have 3 or 4k to suddenly toss on a new one, he had to install an older one that is too weak to heat this house...).

Example 2 - My hairdresser

Husband has MS but they can't even get child benefits because her wage is a few € above a certain limit. He can't get health benefits for his MS because of her wage. In the meantime, morons like the ones above mooch off 40k a year...


So, morons get at least 40k a year to do nothing and be assholes; a honest and working person with a husband that can't work anymore due to MS can't get much needed benefits... what's wrong with the picture here?

Originally Posted by ilphithra

So, morons get at least 40k a year to do nothing and be assholes; a honest and working person with a husband that can't work anymore due to MS can't get much needed benefits... what's wrong with the picture here?

We got here because those with severe disabilities much less able to effectively advocate for themselves. Our democratic systems do not consider the idea of hidden/repressed voices.

I have made such a comparison between decades more than once... seems I'm not alone after all.

Originally Posted by Snow Leopard

We got here because those with severe disabilities much less able to effectively advocate for themselves. Our democratic systems do not consider the idea of hidden/repressed voices.

The political do-gooders who perform favors to constituents(often upper middle class and the rich class) nearly always do so under the cover of helping the poor, whether this takes the form of higher ed subsidies, day-care subsidies(here we have 7$/day public daycare system, whether you earn 16 k a year, or 350 k a year), they always like to give the goodies that serve the public in a top-down fashion, which increase the aristocratic middle class's wealth, while decreasing everybody else's standards, and this in turn is justified under the name of 'public good' and 'social justice'.

Originally Posted by Snow Leopard

We got here because those with severe disabilities much less able to effectively advocate for themselves. Our democratic systems do not consider the idea of hidden/repressed voices.

I think you missed something...

Example 1 - Perfectly healthy people mooching off the state even though they should be working. They get over 40k/month by cheating on their benefits requests.

Example 2 - Person with MS that should be getting help and does not because his wife's wage is a few € above the limit to get it. They can't even get child support.
If they cheated like the people on the first example or if his wife stopped working, they'd get all the help he needs and then some.

See what's wrong with the picture now?

Originally Posted by Agile

Hyperinflation to me is the total breakdown of confidence in the currency, so really anything is fair game so long as assets in question hold long term value. For whatever reason gold has managed to maintain the perception, perhaps maintained by central banks recognition of gold as a reserve asset, however governments are also known to outlaw gold trading during these times of crisis. I believe your figures are close to correct and probably a little higher, I once estimated 0.7oz for every one on earth. Due to these low figures, and the Zimbabwe video demonstrates, hyperinflation is hyperinflation only from the perspective of the currency, but can also be seen as hyperdeflation when everything is being measured from a real asset perspective.

The Average Life Expectancy For A Fiat Currency Is 27 Years ... Every 30 To 40 Years The Reigning Monetary System Fails And Has To Be Retooled → Washingtons Blog

If successive governments were to spend responsibly, then these financial problems wouldn't happen. Unfortunately, fiat currencies give politicians the opportunity to spend beyond their means, thereby ensuring the destruction of the currency within a relatively short period of time.

Kondratiev Is Alive And Well!

The main reason why economic recovery won't arrive until 2020 at the earliest is due to demographics. There are just not enough gen Y's to replace the retiring baby boomers, hence a fall in investment and reduction in economic activity. In the meantime, the rich will get richer and the poor will get poorer, just like in every econom.ic downturn.

American history has it's periods of economic hardship and each time presidents expect their citizen's to do their patriotic duty, by sacrificing their own financial well being for the sake of the country. There have been precious metals confiscations/nationalisations in each century of US history, war of independence, american civil war and 1933. Many people expect IRS agents to break down doors to recover a few gold coins from each household, but that's unlikely to happen. A much easier and more cost effective approach would be for a future US president to seize gold etf holdings, as well as the precious metal holdings of retirement accounts, replacing what is valuable with virtually worthless treasury bonds.

Originally Posted by ilphithra

I have made such a comparison between decades more than once... seems I'm not alone after all.

In some ways, the current situation is worse than back then, in some ways it's better. If both the euro and the us dollar were to collapse, then one would envisage suffering on a global scale. There would be high demand for gold and silver and just not enough to go around. A practical solution to this would be to open foreign currency accounts. People could exchange their savings to safe haven currencies, such as the swiss franc or to commodity currencies such as the canadian and australian dollar. And when necessary, exchange their savings back into to the local currency, whether that be us dollars or euros.

I don't think Germany or any of the other european countries would be interested in initiating WW III. Germany is neither anti-west nor anti-america. There are various countries to the east of europe who would have their axe to grind, in the event of a us dollar collapse.

Originally Posted by aus2020

I don't think Germany or any of the other european countries would be interested in initiating WW III...

The point of the article isn't to say that a country is "anti-this or anti-that". This article is speaking in a very subtle way about what people are talking about for a while already: Merkel and her minions are trying to get through the EU, what they couldn't get through WW2. Why do you think she's being compared to Hitler all over Europe?

Do you know what happened at the summit? The Eurozone countries had to relent the "overseeing" of their banks to Frankfurt. And Merkel wants Germany to take over the financial control of the whole of Europe (and not just that...).

The way things are going, first we'll have some civil wars... then, if Germany insists on their little plan, a war will come because people are already fed up of Merkel and her shit as it is. One has to be living here to understand what's really going on.

NOK trough the roof! =D

Originally Posted by ilphithra

The point of the article isn't to say that a country is "anti-this or anti-that". This article is speaking in a very subtle way about what people are talking about for a while already: Merkel and her minions are trying to get through the EU, what they couldn't get through WW2. Why do you think she's being compared to Hitler all over Europe?

Do you know what happened at the summit? The Eurozone countries had to relent the "overseeing" of their banks to Frankfurt. And Merkel wants Germany to take over the financial control of the whole of Europe (and not just that...).

The way things are going, first we'll have some civil wars... then, if Germany insists on their little plan, a war will come because people are already fed up of Merkel and her shit as it is. One has to be living here to understand what's really going on.

Of course I can understand the anger and resentment that europeans have about the balance of power shifting towards germany. The media is portraying the situation as either Merkel winning or losing at each turn of events, at the expense of the rest of europe, but in the end everyone loses. From my perspective, all that the politicians are doing is delaying the inevitable and expecting us to believe that they can make work, what is essentially an unworkable system.

As the major countries are part of global community, nothing much remains purely localised. I can see the economic problems in america causing problems in europe, which in turn causes problems for asia. The aussie dollar is considered to be the proxy for the world economy. Major shifts in it’s value isn’t as highly correlated to the success of our major trading partners asia and china, as much as by the success or failure of the world’s largest economy, the EU and disproportionately so. With recent news from Europe,the aussie dollar has been outpacing the major currencies: norwegian kroner, euro, usd, cad, etc.

Europe has significant short terms problems, but in upcoming decades, the most significant problem that I can see is skilled immigration:

Europe's Stark Choice on Immigration - Newsweek and The Daily Beast