Global Economy, recession, depression, or...

[fraggle092]

I'm not sure why they are so grossly overstaffed. But the fact stands that they are overstaffed. Maybe they are trying to compensate for the fact that the average Chilean isn't too productive...?

Haven't you ever seen a grossly overstaffed Chilean store? It's such a common sight that it's most likely not due to chance.

The big stores are (were?) open 7 days a week, 10am to 10 pm.

That doesn't fit too well into the fixed labour law employment contracts, so you end up needing at least three shifts, or more, to cover the hours, weekends, and absenteeism, so probably the shifts have to overlap sometimes.

No business spends more than it absolutely has to, especially as personnel is one of the biggest outgoings, but they have to do it to comply with the Labour Laws.

[Ripsigg]

The local Walmart here in a rural midwest town is grossly understaffed and is actively looking for workers. The help wanted signs are up all around. My son works at the local McDonalds and he temporarily stopped in mid March because I didn't like the way things looked and they were ok with it. They lost his phone number in early May they sent a letter asking him to come back to work. It would appear that the labor market here is even tighter than it was before this all started. Hotels are busy, stores are busy, you name it. Economically things are back to normal here. Even the movie theater is now open and showing 1980's movies. Didn't get the chance to see Goonies in the theater? Now's your chance.

Very little here was actually affected by the shutdown. Yes main street was shutdown but it all came back open in May just as the stimulus was hitting.

But it doesn't tell the whole story. The other shoe hasn't dropped meaning that the impacts in the broader economy haven't trickled down yet. Manufacturers haven't started laying people off locally. Easy credit (PPP) and stimulus has kept them open. People who were laid off and haven't gone back to work are making more from unemployment so they are keep stores and restaurants going well. They have no desire to go back to work.

The hammer will drop in August and September unless they keep the emergency unemployment and PPP going. And if they do keep it going, I can't see how all of this stimulus in the trillions of dollars won't affect the stability of the dollar.

[admin]

so, I don't know if I would support this argument about the demise of the dollar (well, not any time soon, but my definition of soon, is still pretty soon), but I am definitely positioning for a drop in the dollar.

about a 35% weakening in the dollar feels about right, from here over the next three years.

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/artic ... f=fIqbqIlF

I think that also about fits the pattern seen after the 2008 crisis, relative to the peso.

For those that need a refresher, the dollar weekend with the flow of stimulus money out of the U.S. and other developed countries. Chilean peso hit 450 to 500 to the dollar. Copper took a bull run.

I am betting on something similar happening this time. I do not think we will get that strong peso, as Chile's deficit spending has been gaining speed for a few years. That should off-set tendency of the peso to get overly strong, as those debts are dealt with and the other economic damage in recent years.

I have become fairly comfortable with copper as a stash of cash (speaking mining stocks here, not physical copper); and, of course real estate.

still can not get excited about gold, and as was pointed out in that article bitcoin and gold will never be sufficiently large markets to soak up a that liquidity. But if it makes the gold bugs happy, I did buy a gold pan for sport.

anyway, a commodity bull run will be critical for Chile to start getting its head above the budget high water mark, and reactivate the economy when this is all over. low oil prices are their own global economic stimulus package.

Lithium was beat-up bad, and will be for some time, but with imminent implosion in Argentina, all those junior miners over the mountain will disappear for a long time to come. Bolivia will never produce. The small guys can not afford to compete with the likes of SQM.

other commodities should do good (chile does mine and produce other things than copper).

Real estate in the south of Chile should be a fairly hot item too, once these boarders open a bit. There is going to be a whole lot of people, looking to get way, way, way away from the rest of the human species; and there are not many other places on the planet with the combo of things southern chile and the Patagonia have in large volumes.

I definitely believe anyone with two pesos, pounds, euros, dollar RMB, are going to want to take a plan B seriously; because this shit is no longer a conspiracy theory / Black Swan. That black swan just smashed through their windshield, and it is obviously dangerous to live in a densely crowed urban environment (always has been, now it just obvious).

[nikotromus]

You really think just a 35% weakness in 3 years? It took Murica 243 years to rack up 24 trillion in debt and now they're stacking on a trillion a month. 26 trillion now and it will be 27 trillion in weeks. I'm not a math wizard but I just don't see this beat down van driving that far. And that goes for every other fiat currency which will all burn to the ground together.

Many conspiracy theorists saw this coming years ago. The first step in the waking up process is to understand the fraud of the financial system. I wish I knew there would have been this much of an in your face warning. Nobody with gobs of fiat in their accounts can say with a straight face "I didn't see this coming" once they lose everything. Not after all of this predictive programming. These articles are all over the mainstream now.

[mem]

I tend to think the USD will keep getting stronger more or less with bumps in the road until the true end/replacement of the USD which will be when

-other countries start to refuse to take payment in USD

It's already getting tenuous with the parabolic debt increase, but countries still take the USD

The virus has accelerated this, but just imagine if Cascadia goes (already overdue) or New Madrid. Of course an opportunistic alliance of enemies of the US may use such a natural disaster as an impetus to move in while the US is reeling
The result is the same...other countries would stop accepting USD.

My point is I dont see a slow decline in USD...rather a blow off top.
Like an addict that keeps stealing more and bigger things to pawn to fund larger and larger doses of drugs until one day they OD and its over

[VHRA]

One thing is for sure, once the USD starts dropping there is nothing catching it.

I would say the same for the stock-market but given that Fed prints as much monopoly money as they want I guess it might not drop nominally. Surely there will be Hollywood-movies made on this fiscal madness sometime in the future.

[eeuunikkeiexpat]

Probably will be a black swan quickness and unexpectedness. Hyper-inflationary collapses happen real fast in a short amount of time like a month or so. You are either already prepared for it or won't have time or be able to get out once it begins.

Stocks as protection? Probably only personally held shares of viable companies that survive the disaster, that electronic stuff, one does not actually own it.

[hlf2888]

I tend to think the USD will keep getting stronger more or less with bumps in the road until the true end/replacement of the USD which will be when

-other countries start to refuse to take payment in USD

It's already getting tenuous with the parabolic debt increase, but countries still take the USD

The virus has accelerated this, but just imagine if Cascadia goes (already overdue) or New Madrid. Of course an opportunistic alliance of enemies of the US may use such a natural disaster as an impetus to move in while the US is reeling
The result is the same...other countries would stop accepting USD.

My point is I dont see a slow decline in USD...rather a blow off top.
Like an addict that keeps stealing more and bigger things to pawn to fund larger and larger doses of drugs until one day they OD and its over

WOW, great analogy mem ... but i don't get the reference to Cascadia or new madrid

[eeuunikkeiexpat]

Cascadia is the subduction zone fault Northern Cal to BC capable of generating a 9+ and overdue, the mid-plate New Madrid fault along the Mississippi River would directly affect Illinois, Indiana, Missouri, Arkansas, Kentucky, Tennessee, Oklahoma and Mississippi also is overdue, when it last moved in a series of large quakes 1811-1812 it was felt throught the East Coast and even changed the course of the Mississippi River.

[hlf2888]

thanks eeuu, I was thinking perhaps Cascadia was the part of the US that wanted to leave the union and New madrid was a movement to secede starting in Texas. lol

[admin]

I am not saying 35% is the absolute bottom, but a short term reasonable drop.

I personally have believed that much more is coming down the pipe, it just takes time for the expodential colapse to ramp-up.

The big one by the end of the year will be the combination of real job losses (they artificially on the books), and the end of the U.S. government payments. That will probably be obvious in the next 1 to 3 months.

The U.S. has,

massive record setting spike in cases going on

end of government payments

companies cutting loose all those employees they have been keeping around, just because the government was paying them to keep them on the books.

election in November

Now, the congress might put another band-aid on that, but they are running out of runway. They are just kicking that can down the road.

[Jamers41]

thanks eeuu, I was thinking perhaps Cascadia was the part of the US that wanted to leave the union and New madrid was a movement to secede starting in Texas. lol

I am originally from Missouri so I recognized the New Madrid reference. Midwest peoples are definitely not used to earthquakes or "tremors", so when they tell us in history class about the 1811 quake (just before Missouri was even a state) it is difficult to conceptualize. Anything over a 5.0 in that part of the US would probably be a big deal.