from In Search of Fixes for a Fossilized Economy by Victor Davis Hansen at National Review

Historically, 2016 is one of the least expensive years in memory to finance a house, car, or major appliance. Or, put another way, regular savings accounts are earning almost no interest. Hundreds of billions of dollars usually paid to savers have in a sense been transferred to borrowers in the form of lower interest rates.

Given annual U.S. gas consumption of about 140 billion gallons, American consumers are enjoying a collective fuel savings windfall of well over $200 billion per year — in addition to reductions in home heating expenses.

All the new technology and innovations, the near-zero interest rates, the printed new money, the record number of college-educated youth, the massive government borrowing and the cheap energy have not brought millions back into the labor force or increased annual family income and purchasing power.

In sum, the U.S. has been stimulated to death with cheap fuel, near-zero interest rates, massive borrowing, and cheap money. Yet its economy is ossifying.

HKO

The regulatory state has accumulated friction costs for decades, and the Fed is no longer able to bail them out. Rather than acknowledge this a new realm of books and explanations are coming forth about structural changes in the economy that avoids any accountability of the government and its never ending pursuit of the welfare state and regulatory state.  You can not raise taxes high enough to fix this and it will likely only make it worse.  Much worse.

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