“Always be nice to bankers. Always be nice to pension fund managers. Always be nice to the media. In that order.” ~John Gotti, American gangster and head of the Gambino family
By Catherine Austin Fitts
This week on The Solari Report, I present the theme for the 2017 Annual Wrap Up – “Does Your Pension Fund Have a Deep State Drain?”
It’s time to change the narrative on pension funds. From 2009-2012, we funded over $20 trillion for the bank bailouts. There is $21 trillion missing from DOD and HUD since fiscal 1998. Trillions more dollars have gone for quantitative easing. And more dollars are lent to big banks at the Fed window at interest rates lower than 1% interest. And we can afford lower tax rates and bigger military budgets.
At the same time, pension funds are underfunded and there is – or so we hear – a crisis. Despite the laws and regulations to keep pension fund properly funded, we are told they are not fully funded. And, depending on what estimates you read, we are told we can not possibly find a few trillion to address shortfalls in the pension and retirement systems. And indeed, retirees are beginning to experience cuts in their benefits.
I struggle to find the logic in here. We can gift or lend $20 trillion to private banks to which we have no legal or contractual obligation to do so and to which approximately 80% of the population is opposed, but we cannot fund legal and contractual obligations to our own citizens. Why?
There are other riddles in the official pension funds narrative.
Countries such as Norway, Denmark and the Netherlands can manage changing societies and financial markets, can make reforms, and can take actions that deliver solvent retirement systems. Why the government which runs the worlds reserve currency do the same?
Some corporations, hedge funds and private equity investors are promoting products, services and activities that seriously harm our environment, general population and economy. Why are pension funds financing them? For example, why are pension funds financing companies that create expensive addictions because they make money for that company? Surely large pension funds have the strategic breadth to understand that creating an addicted population will detract from long-term performance.
Finally, circumstantial evidence suggests that boards and trustees do not fully control pension fund policies, which are heavily influenced by powerful outside forces. The governance of pension funds has been compromised. If the integrity of pension fund governance is compromised, are investments and returns also compromised? Do pension funds, like so many other institutions, have a deep state drain?
My goal is to ask questions about pension funds that can help us bring real insight into what is happening to us.
This section is the last of our 2017 Annual Wrap Up. Check out News Trends & Stories, Part I and Part II as well as Equity Overview, Precious Metals & Rambus Chartology. As we complete our web presentation, you can look forward to our pdf and flipbook which will be published in February.
This week is the last week of the month, so no Money & Markets. Email or post your questions for Ask Catherine and I will answer the following week.
If you want an inspiring movie recommendation, check out Breathe which tells the story of Robin and Diana Cavendish and is produced by their son Jonathan, now a London movie producer. At the age of 28, Robin Cavendish was diagnosed with polio and given 3 months to live. Defying all odds, Cavendish lived another 38 years, becoming a worldwide advocate for the severely disabled and introducing numerous innovations to improve the mobility of people who needed ventilators to breathe. Breathe is first and foremost a love story about the miracles that happen when love makes all things possible.
Talk to you Thursday!
