The future ain't what it used to be

This marks our our 10th year of doing this. And by “this", we mean using data, logic and reason to support the very basic conclusion that infinite growth on a finite planet is impossible.

Surprisingly, this simple, rational idea -- despite its huge and fast-growing pile of corroborating evidence -- still encounters tremendous pushback from society. Why? Because it runs afoul of most people's deep-seated belief systems.

Our decade of experience delivering this message has hammered home what behavioral scientists have been telling us for years -- that, with rare exceptions, we humans are not rational. We're rationalizers. We try to force our perception of reality to fit our beliefs; rather than the other way around.

Which is why the vast amount of grief, angst and encroaching dread that most people feel in western cultures today is likely due to the fact that, deep down, whether we're willing to admit it to ourselves or not, everybody already knows the truth: Our way of life is unsustainable.

In our hearts, we fear that someday, possibly soon, our comfy way of life will be ripped away; like a warm blanket snatched off of our sleeping bodies on a cold night.

The simple reality is that society's hopes for a "modern consumer-class lifestyle for all" are incompatible with the accelerating imbalance between the (still growing) human population and the (increasingly depleting) planet's natural resources. Basic math and physics tell us that the Earth's ecosystems can't handle the load for much longer.

The only remaining question concerns how fast the adjustment happens. Will the future be defined by a "slow burn", one that steadily degrades our living standards over generations? Or will we experience a sudden series of sharp shocks that plunge the world into chaos and conflict?

It's hard to say. As Yogi Berra famously quipped, “It's tough to make predictions, especially about the future." So, it's left to us to remain open-minded and flexible as we draw up our plans for how we'll personally persevere through the coming years of change.

But even while the specifics about the future elude us today, “predicting" the macro trends most likely to influence the coming decades is very doable:

Rising trends:

  • Populism in politics
  • Federal debt levels
  • Geopolitical tensions
  • Interest rates

Falling trends:

  • Funding levels for pensions
  • The numbers of insects world wide
  • Confidence in the future among the younger generations
  • Wealth and income equality

Trends can be expected to continue until they change. Therefore making "predictions" on trends is like making a "prediction" about which way an already tossed ball will travel. It's not really a prediction at all, but a statement of observed data.

These two lists bring to mind another great Yogi Berra quote:

No, the future certainly isn't what it used to be.

Once it was a place in which you could invest towards your hopes and dreams, confident that conditions would be better for your children than they were for you.

That's no longer the case. The defining trends in play are all working to degrade, rather than enhance, our future prospects.

Which is why it's little surprise that millennials aren't saving for retirement. Here's the dim view many of them hold:

“In general, I regard the future as a multitude of possibilities, but most of them don't look good," Elias Schwartzman, 29, a musician, told me. “When I'm at retirement age, around 2050, I think it's possible we'll have seen a breakdown of modern society." Schwartzman said that he saw the future as encompassing one of two possibilities: an apocalyptic “total breakdown of industrial society," or “capitalism morphing into a complete plutocracy." “I think the argument can be made that we're well on the way to that reality," he added.
Wood, 32, a political consultant, told me via Twitter that she felt similarly. “I don't think the world can sustain capitalism for another decade," she explained. “It's socialism or bust. We will literally start having resource wars that will kill us all if we don't accept that the free market will absolutely destroy us within our lifetime [if] we don't start fighting its hegemony," she added.
(Source – Salon)

As someone who tracks economic, environmental and energy data closely, these views are neither surprising nor really debatable. They are merely trend extrapolations, which are difficult to dismiss.

What the older generations don't yet understand is that the economic and social models that rewarded them so richly are not doing the same for younger folks. In fact, those old models are visibly breaking down. And confidence in them is failing, too.

Younger people are increasingly seeing that the model of extractive, exponential growth (which is often errantly termed “capitalism" when, as practiced, it should be termed “corporate socialism") has no future. And of course, they are right.

But regardless of age, anyone with an open mind should be able to identify that something is wrong with the story of "endless growth". The evidence is pretty much everywhere we look:

(Source)

If we're willing to entertain the possibility that infinite exponential growth is impossible, and we extrapolate from there, what sort of economic trajectory would we expect to see as growth peters out? Exactly the sort we see in the above chart. Lower and slower growth that finally peters out and then slips into reverse for the rest of the story.

Sociologically, we'd expect people to be nervous, anxious, and scared as their dominant cultural narrative is increasingly revealed to be no longer viable. Ask yourself: is the world becoming calmer or more volatile? The rash of mass shootings, anti-establishment election victories, prescription drug epidemics, and returning nuclear war fears make the answer sadly obvious.

Biophysically, we'd expect to see key resources and species populations depleting at alarming rates -- which we are. This is due to diminishing returns: nearly every planetary resource is getting harder and more expensive to obtain. Mars anyone?

In a desperate attempt to mask the costs of of slower and lower growth, the world's central banking cartel has deployed its “one weird trick": lowering interest rates to historic rock-bottom levels. This has allowed for more debt to be crammed into the system for a few more years, to keep the mirage of the party continuing for just a little bit longer.

Because of that hail Mary, we have ended up in this very bizarre situation where our debt has been growing at twice the rate of our income -- which clearly will end up in a solvency crisis:

Perversely, the central banks are doing everything in their power to defend and propagate this unsustainable status quo, even though fourth grade math tells us it will surely end in ruin. How is it possible that this very simple observation eludes so many of those in positions of power? You'd have to be an intellectual yet idiot to hold the view that debts can forever compound at faster rate than income.

Further, we find that when the US government's deficit spending is stripped out from GDP growth, there actually hasn't been any economic growth at all for years:

(Source)

The US has been going deeper and deeper in debt simply to maintain the appearance of "economic growth". This whole illusion is being limped along for just a little while longer.

For what purpose? And why? Both excellent questions without a good answer. You should be asking yourself what "success" looks like here. What's the eng game? More growth? Okay, then what? More growth? Keep going along that line of thinking. Take as much time as you need.

Clearly there's an end to that story somewhere. Growth ceases. Presumably smart people in power get this, too, although they'll never admit it publicly so as not to spook the herd. Looking at the number of very well-connected and wealthy elites busily arranging bolt-hole properties to retreat to 'just in case', they're already well ahead of the general public in preparing for the tribulations to come.

All of which brings us to the very real prospect of war, as that has long been the favored path of politicians seeking to deflect public ire from their own policy failures. I worry that a major military conflict is dangerously close at hand. The ridiculous UK government narrative around the Skripal poisonings (which remains utterly illogical from start to finish) used to seriously degrade relationships between Russia and NATO has all the hallmarks of contrived political operation.

Added to the brewing geopolitical risk is the very likely prospect of the bursting of The Mother Of All Bubbles. When (not if, sadly) that happens, it will be truly catastrophic to every financial market in the world, and especially damaging to the western economies.

So the race is on. Will the bubble burst first? Or can the political class engineer a massive military distraction beforehand?

Regardless of who “wins" that race, you need to be physically, emotionally and financially prepared for these outcomes. PeakProsperity.com's (free) What Should I Do? guide is an essential resource for those not yet fully prepped, as well as is our Self-Assessment.

Yes. Things are that serious.

If you're not yet an enrolled subscriber to PeakProsperity.com, please consider becoming one now. 2018 is looking to be the shoo-in candidate for "The Year Everything Changed". Interest rates are finally rising. Volatility is finally returning to the financial markets. Oil prices are threatening to finally return to the critical $70/bbl range. The populace is finally waking up to the extent of the abuse perpetrated on their safety, personal data, and civil liberties. The crypto bubble has finally burst.

So many long-term trends that have defined the (false) sense of 'prosperity' over the past eight years are ending now. What ensues will be fast-paced disruption.

By enrolling, you'll stay abreast of developments and be able to position yourself (and your wealth) accordingly, benefiting from our daily work to harvest and synthesize all the complex information so you don't have to. You'll support will also help our ongoing efforts to bring Peak Prosperity's alternative message and insights to a greater percentage of the general public, who desperately need this information to counter the "Don't worry, everything is awesome!" narrative prevalent in our captive mass media.

In this vein, in Part 2: Everything Is Suddenly Deteriorating, Fast we analyze the recent whipsaw volatility that has broken out in the financial markets and explain why it, along with other markers we've been watching out for, indicates that the markets are poised to fall dramatically further from here -- whether war breaks out or not.

But even if this is as far as you're going to read, please get your preparations in place and get ready to hold fast. Things are only going to get bumpier from here.

Click here to read Part 2 of this report (free executive summary, enrollment required for full access)

Top FIVE takeaways from Trump's LEGENDARY Joe Rogan podcast

SYFY / Contributor, The Washington Post / Contributor | Getty Images

President Donald Trump sat down for a three-hour podcast with famous podcaster Joe Rogan for what was likely the longest interview of a presidential nominee in American political history.

The interview, which first aired Friday, October 25th, has amassed over 38 million views at the time of writing, making it one of the top-performing podcasts Rogan has ever done. Naturally, the mainstream media tried desperately to spin this interview against Trump by "fact-checking" claims he made about the 2020 election, cherry-picking individual sentences from the three-hour-long interview just to repeat them out of context. They've even gone so far as to tell people not to watch the podcast.

This is all just a coping strategy, as anyone who has seen the interview would tell you, Trump absolutely crushed it! He was sharp, witty, funny, intelligent, strong, positive, and perhaps most importantly, he had actual policy solutions to America's problems. If you haven't had a chance to check it out, here are the top five takeaways from the must-watch podcast:

Tariffs and Federal Income Tax

Win McNamee / Staff | Getty Images

Trump repeated a statement he had made at a rally earlier in the week, suggesting that he's considering repealing the Federal Income Tax. He suggested an alternate means of deriving income for our government tariffs. Trump praised the late 19th century, President William McKinley, for his use of tariffs to increase the wealth of the United States before income tax was introduced. Trump said that he wants to use tariffs to tax other countries for stealing American jobs, which would simultaneously protect American industry and lighten the burden of American taxpayers; two birds, one stone.

RFK Jr. and MAHA

Rebecca Noble / Stringer | Getty Images

Joe Rogan discussed RFK Jr. and his mission to Make America Healthy Again. He mentioned a startling statistic he had heard from RFK Jr.: that over 70 percent of young American men are not physically fit enough to serve in the military. Trump corroborated this claim with a graph he had brought that revealed the U.S. spends significantly more than most other countries on health care per capita yet has significantly lower life expectancy. This discrepancy is perpetuated by Big Pharma, which profits off our illness. Trump even claimed that he was warned against partnering with RFK Jr. lest he would anger people within the industry. President Trump assured Rogan that he is completely committed to working with RFK Jr. to make America healthy again.

The JFK Files

Bettmann / Contributor | Getty Images

In an especially thrilling moment of the interview, Trump claimed to have read a portion of the JFK files and decided to re-seal it after seeing what he read and consulting with trusted advisors. He claimed that well-intentioned, good people asked him not to open the files just yet, and after reading about half the files, he understood why. While he was reluctant to go into more detail, he claimed that there were people who were involved with the JFK assassination and the following investigation who are still alive, and whose names and addresses were in the files. But according to Trump, enough time had passed, and he was adamant that he would unseal the JFK files soon after taking office.

The Biggest Mistake in His First Term

Kevin Dietsch / Staff | Getty Images

President Trump discussed what he saw as the biggest mistake he made during his first term. He admited that he was still very new at politics when he was elected into the White House and relied on the advice of the swamp creatures he swore to destroy when building his cabinet. Trump admitted that he made several bad picks, which caused him problems throughout his first term, but he said he is determined to learn from his mistakes, and he's working on assembling a dream team for 2025.

Doubling Down on 2020 Election Fraud

Kevin Dietsch / Staff | Getty Images

Despite efforts by the mainstream media to "debunk" election fraud claims, Trump continued to assert that there was interference in the 2020 election. Trump pointed out the Hunter Biden laptop story, which was actively suppressed and denied by the media leading up to the election, despite being true. On top of this, Trump and Rogan discussed the opportunity for cheating and interference offered by Covid with the vast increase in the use of mail-in ballots. Considering how small of a margin Biden won by, Trump argued that between Covid and the fake news media, the notion that the scales were tipped in Biden's favor is not that far-fetched.

Kamala Harris dropped the ball at CNN's town hall

CHARLY TRIBALLEAU / Contributor | Getty Images

Vice President Kamala Harris held a town hall on CNN Wednesday night, asking voters questions about the swing state of Pennslyvania. It was a train wreck.

Harris could not give a single straight answer to any question, and would instead lapse into long, word-salad answers. At times even Anderson Cooper, who was hosting the event, seemed fed up with her answers and tried to steer her back on track. There were even a few times that felt like Cooper was practically spoon-feeding the answer to Harris, who still managed to drop the ball.

This town hall was a flop at a time when the polls revealed Harris really couldn't afford it.

She talked more about Trump than herself.

Anna Moneymaker / Staff | Getty Images

Throughout her campaign and the CNN town hall, Harris repeatedly promised that her administration would break away from the "hate" and "divisiveness" that supposedly characterize President Trump and his campaign. But despite these promises, it seemed like Harris's answer to every question was to bash Trump. From questions about how she would support or not support Israel to questions about potential Supreme Court reforms, the answer was the same: Orange Man Bad.

Even the CNN after-show panel complained that she spent far too much time talking about Trump. Her performance lacked substance and proved that her campaign isnot about anything she has to offer the American people, it's solely about hating Donald Trump.

She missed the opportunity to further define herself.

CHARLY TRIBALLEAU / Contributor | Getty Images

Harris spent so much time Trump-bashing that she never got into any detail about her policies. This was an event designed to give her the chance to lay out her platform and define who she is as a candidate and she utterly failed to do so. As mentioned before, all she really spoke about was Trump, a candidate who almost every voter is highly familiar with. This was a critical failure on Harris's part, she missed possibly one of, if not the last chance to make an impression on voters before the election and according to recent polls, this was a chance she could not afford to miss.

She gave several radical and dangerous remarks.

CHARLY TRIBALLEAU / Contributor | Getty Images

The few times Harris managed to reveal some of her policy ideas it became clear why she was being so coy: they are blatantly dangerous. In between her anti-Trump tirades where she makes Trump out to be the biggest threat to the Constitution the country has ever seen, Harris let slip that she is open to Supreme Court reforms, including adding more Justices to the bench. This is known as court-packing and is most certainly unconstitutional, as well as one of the hallmarks of an authoritarian takeover, as Glenn has pointed out.

Harris also spent the first several minutes of the event making dangerous accusations against Trump, calling him a fascist and comparing him to Adolf Hitler. She would echo this sentiment the following day in a surprise address. Glenn explained on his radio show just how dangerous and inciteful this kind of language is and the kind of damage it can do. This looks like a desperate, last-ditch attempt to sway people away from Trump during this critical time of the election cycle.

Meet Trump's dream team who will make America healthy again

Anna Moneymaker / Staff | Getty Images

Americans are sick of being sick. In a recent TV special, Glenn revealed one in three Americans suffer from a chronic disease, and it's only getting worse.

But there is hope! President Trump has taken notice of our dysfunctional and corrupt system and has assembled a Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) dream team who plan on making big changes once Trump gets back into office. This team plans on fighting back against federal regulatory agencies such as the FDA, which are bought out by Big Pharma and Big Food and allow toxic ingredients that most other countries have banned into our food.

So who is this dream team? Below, we've compiled a list of the most prominent figures who are working with Trump to make America healthy again:

RFK Jr.

The Washington Post / Contributor | Getty Images

Former Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. made the declining health of Americans a focal point in his campaign. After dropping out of the race, he combined forces with President Trump, promising to assist Trump in reinventing federal health agencies, such as the FDA and CDC, to purge them of corruption, and to reduce the dominance of ultra-processed foods full of toxic additives. RFK Jr. has adopted the slogan Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) in reference to Trump's Make America Great Again (MAGA) slogan.

Casey and Calley Means

Over this last month, Dr. Casey Means and her entrepreneur brother Calley have taken the Conservative sphere by storm after testifying in front of the U.S. Senate. The siblings have been making the circuit, speaking alongside Jorden Peterson, appearing on Joe Rogan's podcast, getting a shoutout by RFK Jr., and even joining Glenn on his most recent TV special. Casey and Calley are trying to expose the corruption in the upper levels of industry and federal agencies and fight back against what Dr. Casey describes as a "genocidal health collapse."

Dr. Robert Redfield

Chip Somodevilla / Staff | Getty Images

Former CDC Director Dr. Redfield has recently rejoined Trump's Make America Healthy Again team. His experience as the director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control means he is familiar with the corruption that rots our federal agencies and has good reason to believe that the Trump administration can turn things around. Dr. Redfield has shown concern for the alarming rate of chronic disease that plagues Americans. He expressed special concern for children, given that over 40 percentof American children suffer from at least one chronic condition.

Can fear win the vote? Democrats have a dangerous strategy to demonize Trump.

Anna Moneymaker / Staff | Getty Images

The Democratic Party’s nominee is deliberately spreading false, fear-driven narratives to turn her base against Donald Trump, regardless of the consequences.

Have you noticed how Kamala Harris and her allies in the corporate left-wing media have become bolder in labeling Trump a “fascist”? A recent New York Times article revealed that Democrats have shed their reluctance to use the term. In fact, it has become their rallying cry as Election Day approaches.

What’s the real goal here? According to John Daniel Davidson at the Federalist, Harris and her supporters are using this rhetoric to energize their base — and more disturbingly, to prepare them for violence if Trump wins. The fearmongering isn’t just about driving people to the polls; it’s about creating an atmosphere of rage and chaos.

Let’s show the Democrats that our republic doesn’t bend to fear and certainly doesn’t bend to those who twist the truth for political gain.

Harris is deliberately spreading false, fear-driven narratives to turn her base against Trump, regardless of the consequences. This is the same Kamala Harris who, during the George Floyd riots in 2020, encouraged bailing out rioters and urged the violence to continue both before and after the election.

For example, Harris has claimed that Trump will use the Department of Justice as a weapon against his political enemies if he returns to office. But let’s pause for a second: Who is using the Justice Department as a political tool right now? Harris’ own administration, led by Joe Biden, has weaponized federal agencies against Trump and conservatives for years.

Harris also recently entertained the idea that Trump would round up people who “don’t look white” and throw them into camps. During an interview with Charlamagne tha God, a caller suggested this scenario. Instead of refuting the caller’s paranoia, Harris nodded and said, “You have hit on a really important point.

This kind of divisive rhetoric fuels fear and division in our country. Let’s not forget: Trump was president for four years, and there were no camps, roundups, or authoritarian crackdowns on dissenters. Leftists claim Trump and his supporters spread conspiracy theories, but they are the ones pushing baseless and dangerous claims.

While Democrats claim to defend democracy, they are increasingly aligning with authoritarianism. For example, the EPA funneled billions of dollars to left-wing organizations, including one tied to Stacey Abrams, for “voter mobilization” efforts. This funding came through the Inflation Reduction Act — a taxpayer-funded omnibus bill. Imagine the outrage if Republicans in Congress gave billions of taxpayer dollars to right-wing groups. The media would be in an uproar, and there would be protests at the White House gates. But because it’s Democrats doing it, the mainstream media turns a blind eye. These are the warning signs of an authoritarian regime.

This is why it’s more critical than ever for Americans to see through the left’s manipulation. Trump’s not the fascist here — he’s a threat to the left's power. The real danger lies in the left’s escalating rhetoric, which is designed to incite chaos if things don’t go its way. And let me be clear: That’s exactly what leftists are preparing for.

Don’t let them succeed.

The best way to counter their lies is by getting out to vote and encouraging others to do the same. If every single one of us does this, we won’t let the fearmongering and lies being peddled by Harris and the Democrats succeed. Let’s show them that our republic doesn’t bend to fear and certainly doesn’t bend to those who twist the truth for political gain.

Editor's Note: This article was originally published on TheBlaze.com.