Slope of Hope Blog Posts

Slope initially began as a blog, so this is where most of the website’s content resides. Here we have tens of thousands of posts dating back over a decade. These are listed in reverse chronological order. Click on any category icon below to see posts tagged with that particular subject, or click on a word in the category cloud on the right side of the screen for more specific choices.

The Pied Piper of Tokyo

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The big news over the weekend is that Japan has moved back into recession. The country is a cautionary tale of what can happen when complacent central bankers/planners ignore dangerous asset bubbles and then assume that they can fix everything with stimulus spending, ultra-low rates and wallpapering the country with newly printed money. With GDP over 7% under the level in 1997, a debt at over 250% of GDP, and huge entrenched budged deficits the situation there looks hopeless without a major default to try to rescue an economy that arrogant and incompetent politicians and central planners/bankers have driven to ruin.

Fortunately nothing like that could ever happen in the developed economies of the west. 🙂 (more…)