Originally Posted by tisonlyi

The reason I see collapse, eventually, is EXACTLY why you see loss of hegemony.

If the rest of the world no longer see an unipolar, American-centric world, why on earth would they continue to fund the US national debt? Why would Saudi Arabia continue to support its reputed, massive holding in DJI stocks - particularly in the US when some of those corps could easily switch base. Why will central banks around the world continue to prop up the US dollar - and make no mistake, they are in a big way - when Pax Americana is over, done, dusted, volumised and demoted from the NYT best-seller list?

Will the US happily slash its military complex down to a size that's reasonable for an independent, but not dominant nation?
Will the US be easily able to tolerate not denominating the primary currency for the global economy?
Is the US well placed to restructure it's energy supply away from oil?
Will the US be able to restructure quickly enough to tolerate the shock of it's credit lines being reduced/removed?

These things tend to go slowly, slowly, then hit a point and go for a vertical trajectory.

I've obviously some lefty leanings in this, but it's capitalist reasoning that's forcing the logic. I don't expect everything to go overnight... It'll be over a decade or so, maybe less.

For one reason why the US is no place to put financial confidence, look at the DJI.

14k to almost 10k within a year. Factor in inflation, REAL inflation, and the index looks like it's been spectacularly stagnating for the past 20 years at least. The dollar has had a bounce, only because the FED has miraculously, but no less finally maxed out its abilities to raise interest in dollar purchases while the money supply has gone through the roof.

At some point, the loonies in charge of the system have to realise the madmen are in charge of the keys.