Current anomaly: Five generations alive!

[Eric the Green]

(03-24-2019, 08:03 AM)Mikebert Wrote:

(03-22-2019, 04:36 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: Again, I think you are being too impatient. We should not have expected an FDR in the 2010s; only politicians like those in the 1850s. Pierce is even a Bush ancestor, if I remember correctly. It still feels like the 3T, just as the 1850s did. But the crisis is ongoing anyway, and will climax on schedule. 

Obama tried to shift away from the Reagan policies, but the nation is too divided for that to stick. The division continued and gave us the Tea Party and Trump. Our crisis is really not economic, primarily, but political polarization. That is the real nature of this 4T, in a double rhythm with the 1850-1865 crisis.

But you may be too optimistic.

I confess; sometimes I am

Quote:A 2008 start can only hold if things happen fast. In 2016 I had thought we would already be in recession by now, with a second financial panic happening in the first half of this year, with unemployment peaking in late 2020. In this case, whichever party won in 2016 would get slaughtered in 2018 and 2020. In this scenario, the 4T structural changes would be implemented during the 2020's and the 4T would finish up in the late 2020's or early 2030's, in line with a 2008 start.

Well the recession has been delayed. I don't think the business cycle has been repealed, we are still going to get a recession and it will almost certainly be serious because asset prices are so extreme. But now it looks like whichever party wins in 2020 will get slaughtered.

If this is the Dems (which I believe is what you forecasted years ago), then the GOP will probably gain control of the House, a filibuster-proof Senate and the presidency in 2024.  This means 8 years of GOP rule. We know what that looks like.  Tax cuts and conservative judges.  In other words 2020-2032 will look a lot like 2000-2020. In this scenario, if anything like 4T restructuring is to happen, it would have to be after 2032. This makes the 2008 start completely untenable.

If recession has not yet gotten underway and the GOP wins narrowly in 2020, then Dems stand to win big in 2022 and 2024. In this case, it is *possible* that 4T restructuring could be implemented over the next 8 years, in which case a 2008-2032 4T would make sense.

But for the GOP to win in 2020, it would mean the expansion is still ongoing. In July of this year the expansion will reach 121 months, and surpass the previous record of 120 months. The longer the expansion continues the greater the departure from the past. Already asset valuations have reached a new plane of existence. It is possible that our political and economic system is undergoing a phase transition to a new reality that is a complete break with the past. A world in which voodoo (economics) becomes real and "when we act...we create our own reality"[Karl Rove]. This is the world of neocon reality, Stephen Moore (Trump's Fed nomination) and Kevin Hassett (Trump econ advisor and Dow 36K author).

Maybe this phase transition would be the 4T structural change, which would support a 2001 date for the 4T start. In this case Republicans would win in 2020 and again in 2024 and again....it would be like the post- Civil War era. In 20 years we would be in the world of Ready Player One.

Did things happen fast in the 1850s? Not toward a solution. Of course now things are going along pretty much as I expected. I expected an economic recovery in the mid and later 2010s; it happened just as I said. I have expected a mild downturn at the end of the decade. We have seen some indications of this, but the slowdown has been very mild so far. But that's as much as I expect from the business cycle; not another great recession. I have predicted there will not be another great recession this century, though obviously climate change puts everything in peril. But I expect ongoing solutions to this crisis from today onward will help mitigate this.

It is very likely that "4T structural changes would be implemented during the 2020's." It is this that I have always predicted, and that the GOP does not have the ability to do this. Exactly how this plays out in the 2020 election is still up in the air though; which Democratic candidate is chosen will determine who wins. If they choose anyone but McAuliffe or Landrieu, the Dems may lose. If they pick Bernie or Joe, they might win, but they might lose too. IF they choose anyone besides these four, the Dems will lose to Trump.

But if things continue to go as I expect, this progressive period of change will happen in the 2020s, regardless of any second great recession or no recession; even if the Dems don't take the White House back until 2024, and even if they keep it only one term, great change will happen. If Trump wins in 2020, it won't be long before congress effectively runs the country. An economic collapse is not the only motivator of change, especially since the mid 2010s recovery still left many people still working paycheck to paycheck and under-employed, and inequality is still growing; and this motivates the left enough, along with the Trump crisis, the climate crisis, the gun crisis, and so on. Change in the 2020s will be swift and deep, even if there is no great recession beforehand.

You can't base predictions on one pre-conceived assumption, such as that change only comes after a big economic collapse. Events are more complicated than that.

Edit to Add: Recall that a pro-northern, anti-slavery administration also only lasted for four years during the civil war 4T. Lincoln's successor defended southern rights. In that time too, congress effectively ruled the country (but in the early 4T that time, as I see it). After Johnson, the country arrived at a compromise consensus during the 1T, first with a milder reconstruction era, and then with a still-cruel black/white aparteid without official slavery but in a tighter national union. So, we may get a Lincoln elected in 2024. McAuliffe already compares himself to Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry; why not Lincoln too? They are both Aquarius. This edit is just speculation, I admit.