Friday, January 1, 2021

My analysis on the state of the US so far: socioeconomic, markets, geopolitical, and more

I believe that the US is in a pretty messed up state right now in all manners of sectors, this may not be a surprise to most here but let me explain why in a more thorough way:

First of all, there is massive division in the country. The urban/ rural divide, Democrat vs Republican, rich vs poor gap widening even deeper. If you take a look at who voted for Republicans in the elections almost all the rural counties voted for Republican, while the big cities voted for Democrat. This causes tension between the effectiveness of the Electoral Collage process in the first place.There is also a huge amount of division between the two major political parties as well: Biden has to somehow handle the interests of those within the Democrat party (including the "radicals" like Bernie and the corporate dems). Perhaps they were able to apply a shaky temporary unity due to their common hatred for Trump but now that he lost the election these issues will boil more in the future. As well as the Republican party (who are deeply divided as well between the GOP supports and others).

Biden and his administration will also have to deal with almost 50% of the population still believing that he is not even the legitimate leader of the country. His job will be much harder since he has to deal with the Republican Supreme Court, a large amount of Republicans in the house (I think 100 members of which are still trying to contest against the Electoral College results), and a possible Republican Senate (led by Mitch McConnell - who was known for giving the previous Obama admin a hard time). Getting the type of bills that his administration and the rest of the Democrats wants will be a lot more difficult, and if things start to get even worse, more tensions amongst the Democrat party may boil over.

He will have Trump and other MAGA supporters on his tail throughout his presidency, looking to gain support for Trump's possible second term.

The political situation in the US is completely INSANE. And the major media outlets continue to fire up division and fighting for the sake of views and profits. You can't even discuss political topics anymore least you get branded as a "Trump supporter" or a "Lib Commie", as well as subsequently getting cancelled out. The BLM riots served to further fan up these flames.

Even passing stimulus to help Americans during the pandemic seems to be so hotly contested amongst the politicians with a possible measly $600 USD (which is chump change) going out to Americans while the majority of the money goes off to big businesses.

It almost seems like the politicians regardless of side have NO clue or empathy over how the lives of the Middle or lower class are. It seems like they are living in their own secluded world.

Small businesses are continuing to die off during the pandemic, people are losing their jobs, incomes, livelihoods, and mental health and drug addiction is continuing to increase.

Automation, and offshoring to depress worker's wages also doesn't help. Colleges are extremely expensive and a degree seems to be almost a requirement for even low lvl jobs due to degree inflation. The entry level job market for college grads to get their foot in the doors for their careers is also incredibly saturated even for STEM, you may need a master's and 3 years experience minimum along with jumping through so many hoops along the hiring process to finally get hired. It's creating a catch 22 where you need xp to gain xp, but how can you gain xp when no one wants to hire you? LOL!

The millennial and gen z alone have gone through at least 3 or 4+ (off the top of my head) major crisises including economic. This puts them in a major disadvantage in achieving life goals like getting married, having kids, getting a car and house, putting money into retirement, etc.

Under the Biden administration legal and illegal immigration may increase and he may possibly move them towards traditionally red states in order to ensure they become blue in the future. This may cause even more social resentment amongst different factions. Along with people like Californians now mass moving into traditional red states to escape the very high taxes and mismanaged state governments they have.

Not to mention the fact that the US has racked up trillions of federal debt in a couple of years as well as still not getting the covid pandemic under control. (Vaccines will help but deploying those vaccines, making sure that enough of the population get it to achieve herd immunity, especially with a lot of anti vaxx and anti mask, will still take a while). The US's position in the global world has also drastically decreased and they have damaged their relations with a lot of their geopolitical allies including Canada and the EU. Regardless of what you believe about Trump, the view of a lot of these countries on the US has DRASTICALLY decreased, almost as bad as their views about China.

These are some probable reasons along with others why the US dollar continues to depreciate and why other currencies like the Chinese yuan are continuing to appreciate against the USD if you follow the markets. Furthermore the stock market right now seems to be a giant overvalued bubble to me, with PE ratios (Price to Earnings) of stocks being like 200+! (Tesla's PE ratio is around 1,417! Holy crap!) Alot of the share prices of companies seems to be inflated way outside of their fundamentals. These all seem to be signs of a possible bubble and incoming major correction. (don't take this as financial advice though, just stating what I think)

Commodities like gold, and other hedges against the USD like Bitcoin are contuining to increase. Bit coin has surpassed its previous all time high and seems to be getting more and more expensive. Bitcoin's goal is to replace fiat currencies and swift and provide a way for other nations to bypass economic sanctions. China is making its own Digital Yuan initiative to help nations bypass US sanctions.

The US now also has to deal with a much stronger China, Russia, as well as balance all their geopolitical interests which is everywhere around the globe. They are spread way too thin, and because of their economic, domestic, and socioeconomic situation they cannot afford to be everywhere at once. They now also have to focus on repairing relations with their allies giving their opponents even more time to be prepared and stay ahead. China is projected to be the world's largest economy by 2028 in terms of NOMINAL GDP (which is in absolute terms) which is outstanding since they are already ahead of the US in terms of PPP (more relative measure).

They will also have to deal with China making much stronger ties between Asian countries, and the Belt and Road, as well as economic movements such as ASEAN.

At the end of the day, this is just my opinion on current events. Don't take this as advice and please do your own research.


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