What crisis? Billionaires’ fortunes double since 2009

Amidst a sea of lost jobs, slashed wages and austerity measures, the super-rich seem super-resistant, with their wealth doubling since the financial crisis, adding $226 billion to their wealth in the last year alone.

The Wealth X and UBS Billionaire Census 2013 makes for sobering reading, in that it seems to confirm many peoples’ suspicions that the financial crisis, while a nightmare for so many, has actually been a windfall for the world’s richest.

To better grasp the vast wealth of the ultra-high net-worth individuals (UHNW), their combined fortunes are now greater than the GDP of any country aside from the United States and China, and could fund the entire US budget deficit until 2024, according to the report.

Food stamp recipients panic as federal EBT system crashes; government IT systems rapidly unraveling

I've often said that 72 hours after EBT cards stop working, every U.S. city will collapse into chaos. 

In case you're not familiar with the term, EBT cards are "digital food stamps." Nearly 50 million Americans are right now using EBT cards which are automatically refilled each month with welfare money the government doesn't have, increasing the national debt.

Under Obama, food stamp enrollees have exploded. The annual usage statistics for food stamps are found here, but you can't see them because under the Obama administration's contrived "shutdown theater," the USDA.gov website has been taken offline. Note, of course, that the food stamp program itself is still online (most of the time), thereby proving there really isn't a "government shutdown" as claimed by Obama.

Iceland President: Let the Banks Fail

Iceland President: We Decided to Let the Banks Fail

  Iceland President Olafur Ragnar Grimsson on the recovery of the country's economy speaking at the annual World Economic Forum in Davos, Grimsson also held his country as a model of economic recovery after its near-collapse four years ago. "We didn't follow the traditional prevailing orthodoxies. And the end result four years later is that Iceland is enjoying progress and recovery."

 

interesting:

Goldman Sachs made 400 million betting on food prices in 2012 while hundreds of millions starved

Financial Intel

Americans buy nearly half a Billion dollars of gold and silver in January