Impending Economic Collapse: a matter of History

[Herr Vogel]

Everyone in this thread needs to read Sir John Glubb's The Fate of Empires and Search for Survival. It's only a twenty six page pamphlet, but I'll summarize.
Empires have a finite life span that averages about two hundred and fifty years, or ten generations. This pattern holds true for almost every empire in recorded history. They all go through the same phases of Pioneering, Conquest, Commerce, Affluence, Intellect, Decadence, and Collapse. The age of Decadence is marked by defensiveness, pessimism, materialism, frivolity, civil dissension, a weakening of religion, an influx of foreigners, and the implementation of the welfare state.

Given the current state of affairs, it is unquestionable on which side of that particular bell curve we are sitting. And depending on whether you start counting at Independence or the beginning of westward expansion, we're rapidly approaching that 250 year average. The collapse of the American Empire is not a question of if, but how, how soon, and where will the pieces fall?. The end of an empire doesn't always mean barbarians at the gates and the downfall of civilization. We might crash the economy and bring the rest of the world down with us. Maybe we'll succumb to Chinese influence. Or we'll tear ourselves apart in civil war. We could even get ''really'' lucky and merely step down from the world stage, reverting to isolationism.

 

[BehindBlueI's]

I've been reading about our collapse since the 80's, and that was just because that's when I was old enough to read about our collapse. They all rely on a few fundamental errors.

1) We aren't an agrarian/early industrial society. We *literally* create wealth creating resources from nothing. What natural resources does a "Windows 10" require? While most of our economy is still driven by the same occupations that have driven mankind for most of civilization (farming, transportation, merchant, etc.) we create and maximize resources in ways that pre-Information Age societies couldn't hope to. We are also more globally interconnected then ever and can project our power and resource gathering any where in the world. We aren't interested in the Middle East just because we want to "spread democracy".

2) We have peaceful transfers of power. We don't behead the rulers when we're tired of their policies, we vote them out.

3) Our debt is held by people who can't do anything about it. Nobody is adding us to their empire, we can pay our military indefinitely without incoming silver from foreigners, etc. The only thing they can do is downgrade our credit and stop lending us more money. And most of our debt is owed internally, to our own citizens and/or the gov't itself.

 

[tsm]

Our navy alone could completely shut down their country's ability to operate. In fact, if China was allied with the entire rest of the world, our navy, by its self, could take them down.

You have an exaggerated idea of the navy’s ability to defend itself. Five or six hundred hypersonic missiles could sink every surface ship, leaving only the subs. There’s no way to stop or avoid those things and won’t be for years.

Sure, the subs could retaliate, but at that point the navy wouldn’t exist for all practical purposes.

 

[BugI02]

You have an exaggerated idea of the navy’s ability to defend itself. Five or six hundred hypersonic missiles could sink every surface ship, leaving only the subs. There’s no way to stop or avoid those things and won’t be for years.

Sure, the subs could retaliate, but at that point the navy wouldn’t exist for all practical purposes.

What you are describing is already past the threshold for WWIII, so a few Trident D5s can make sure there is no second wave

I am also not sure, given the turning radius of a missile traveling at that speed, that a well timed hard-over rudder might not complicate targeting for such a weapon (unless fitted with a nuke warhead). I also think a proximity/blast fragmentation form of intercept would be quite effective, as the vehicle's own speed will magnify the destructive potential of any damage. Range is also a problem given the rate of fuel burn

Not an insignificant threat, but equally not an insurmountable one

 

[BugI02]

I've been reading about our collapse since the 80's, and that was just because that's when I was old enough to read about our collapse. They all rely on a few fundamental errors.

1) We aren't an agrarian/early industrial society. We *literally* create wealth creating resources from nothing. What natural resources does a "Windows 10" require? While most of our economy is still driven by the same occupations that have driven mankind for most of civilization (farming, transportation, merchant, etc.) we create and maximize resources in ways that pre-Information Age societies couldn't hope to. We are also more globally interconnected then ever and can project our power and resource gathering any where in the world. We aren't interested in the Middle East just because we want to "spread democracy".

2) We have peaceful transfers of power. We don't behead the rulers when we're tired of their policies, we vote them out.

3) Our debt is held by people who can't do anything about it. Nobody is adding us to their empire, we can pay our military indefinitely without incoming silver from foreigners, etc. The only thing they can do is downgrade our credit and stop lending us more money. And most of our debt is owed internally, to our own citizens and/or the gov't itself.

As always, a concise and cogent distillation of the economic issues. Well said

My only quibble would be on Windows 10, which is burning the natural resource of user sanity at an unprecedented rate

 

[Leadeye]

Except for cheap steel, what do we get from China that we can't get from anywhere else?

Lots of stuff that manufacturers use right here in the US like screws and hinges. It's not that you can't get them at all, but you can't get enough of them to meet demand and manufacturing can't ramp up fast enough to meet that demand. You also you have to consider that big banks with global boards will have to make loans to build expanded facilities knowing that when the civil war is resolved those facilities they are loaning money on will not be very competitive as they were before. I expect the federal government will step in with regulation/allocation programs and pick the economic winners and losers in this mess.

 

[doddg]

China existing as it does today in another 25 years is nearly impossible.
You think our debt is bad? Go look at China's debt and their spending habits. If their economy ever slows down, even the tiniest amount, their entire country is going to fold up. And you better believe we have plans for helping that along, because we're not going to go silently into the night.
Our navy alone could completely shut down their country's ability to operate. In fact, if China was allied with the entire rest of the world, our navy, by its self, could take them down.

1. Good to know that all our tax dollars have not gone the way of the drain.

 

[doddg]

I've been reading about our collapse since the 80's, and that was just because that's when I was old enough to read about our collapse. They all rely on a few fundamental errors.

1) We aren't an agrarian/early industrial society. We *literally* create wealth creating resources from nothing. What natural resources does a "Windows 10" require? While most of our economy is still driven by the same occupations that have driven mankind for most of civilization (farming, transportation, merchant, etc.) we create and maximize resources in ways that pre-Information Age societies couldn't hope to. We are also more globally interconnected then ever and can project our power and resource gathering any where in the world. We aren't interested in the Middle East just because we want to "spread democracy".

2) We have peaceful transfers of power. We don't behead the rulers when we're tired of their policies, we vote them out.

3) Our debt is held by people who can't do anything about it. Nobody is adding us to their empire, we can pay our military indefinitely without incoming silver from foreigners, etc. The only thing they can do is downgrade our credit and stop lending us more money. And most of our debt is owed internally, to our own citizens and/or the gov't itself.

A. Very insightful and well said.
B. Due to my little bit of Economics training (never been able to specialize b/c of having to teach different subjects every few years), I am very aware that it would make no sense for the U.S. to be totally self-sufficient, since we can buy so many things cheaper around the world and sell our technologies and make the big money: it's called international trade.
C. This comment: "2) We have peaceful transfers of power. We don't behead the rulers when we're tired of their policies, we vote them out," I'm afraid I have been tainted by my conspiratorial anti-government upbringings to believe that both major political parties are controlled by the "unseen" money people behind the scenes, so it makes little difference who is in office: the economic manipulation of the economy to benefit themselves will prevail.
D. Therefore, we can't "vote them out" because their replacements are twiddle-dee twiddle-dee-dum.
3. I hope I'm wrong, and all wet. I know there have been exceptions. My favorite was Truman: he was real and how I admire the man for the same reasons many loathed him. I do believe he was the President of the working man.
4. For example, he was from Missouri, a slave state, and yet he ushered in the integration of blacks into the army: well done!
5. It was the right thing to do and long overdue, and didn't win him any popularity in his own state and probably his personal Missouri friends.

 

[miguel]

3) Our debt is held by people who can't do anything about it. Nobody is adding us to their empire, we can pay our military indefinitely without incoming silver from foreigners, etc. The only thing they can do is downgrade our credit and stop lending us more money. And most of our debt is owed internally, to our own citizens and/or the gov't itself.

Excellent point. It's is all funny money anyway. A giant spreadsheet of who owes who!

We need a debt jubilee to reset everyone's credit score to 800+ and zero out those student/home/auto/CC/medical balances. 90% of the people that would be saved by it would restart and have the economy humming again, within weeks.

 

[mmpsteve]

Continue conservative economic policies, and throttle the FED that wants to raise interest rates to shut down the explosion of economic activity, and American entreupenuers will pull the whole world out of it's own self-induced socialist demice; mark my words, and hold on to your hats. MAGA, and save the rest of the world in the process; we've done it at least twice already.

 

[doddg]

Continue conservative economic policies, and throttle the FED that wants to raise interest rates to shut down the explosion of economic activity, and American entreupenuers will pull the whole world out of it's own self-induced socialist demice; mark my words, and hold on to your hats. MAGA, and save the rest of the world in the process; we've done it at least twice already.

1. I like your attitude, perhaps you and Alan Greenspan could get together.