Reality Check continued

Forecaster Richard Russell says the secret of getting rich is to avoid losing money. I argue that the best way to get rich is to identify a niche market and start a business to fill it. Sometimes these goals clash.... keep reading

Economist Wynne Godley was convinced that savings would make the 2001 recession worse: the same old Keynesian bugaboo. I was worried about Greenspan's policy of inflating the money supply to reduce short-term interest rates: the same old Austrian School bugaboo.... keep reading

This remains the oddest oddity of the entire balance of payments question. Warren Brooks pointed it out in 1991. It still was unexplained in 2001. It remains unexplained today. How is this possible?... keep reading

In mid-July, 2001, the Dow moved up 238 points in one day based on a single economically peripheral news story. The lemmings were still hopeful, despite the recession that was not yet official.... keep reading

The experts tell us to buy and hold. This is the key to investment success. But this theory has risks and flaws, as every investment strategy does. You need to be aware of them.... keep reading

In 2001, the Federal Reserve pumped in fiat money to keep prices rising. In 2004, the FED began stabilizing money. If it sticks to this policy, price deflation and recession lie ahead.... keep reading

Here is a way to short-circuit the effects of the Financial Modernization Act of 2001. If you don't take action, you are vulnerable.... keep reading

What would the American revolutionaries say of our taxes today? Would they think that their battles to bring liberty from oppressive taxation were worth it?... keep reading

Like a drug, fiat money is addictive. When the FED adopted an easy-money strategy in 2001 to reduce interest rates, it created a false boom to counteract a real recession. In late 2004, the FED reversed this policy.... keep reading

Any business that is not actively adding to its email list is digging a deep hole for itself -- maybe a burial plot. It is handing over market share to its competitors.... keep reading

In the middle of the 2001 Recession, I recommended job security as the #1 defensive strategy. Officially, the NBER had not yet announced this recession, which had started in March.... keep reading

When recessions hit, wise investors take evasive action. That's because the U.S. government will run a massive deficit to stimulate the economy. This is what happened. I had been saying that it would for months. By this time, the recession was in its first week.... keep reading

I knew it was coming. I knew the stock market would take another hit. It did.... keep reading

Some people take politics too seriously. There were murder threats against Kstherine Harris, Florida's Secretary of State.... keep reading

A recession was guaranteed, no matter who won the Presidency. That was what I was writing in November of 2000. Political paralysis was looming, and it arrived. Bush's Administration foundered until 9/11.... keep reading

I have called only two recessions in the last 15 years: the 1990 recession (in 1989) and the 2001 recession (in 2000). In both cases, they took place within a year. If you know what to look for, you too can do this.... keep reading