Courtesy of Pam Martens.
Janet Yellen, Federal Reserve Chair
According to the U.S. central bank, the Federal Reserve, in its December 17, 2014 policy statement delivered by the Federal Open Market Committee, America has become a veritable oasis in a sea of economic turmoil. Economic activity is “expanding,” labor conditions have “improved further,” housing spending is “rising moderately,” business fixed investment is “advancing.” And that plunge in oil prices? Well, that’s going to be “transitory” and “dissipate.”
The Fed’s position that the United States can wave a magic wand and delink itself from the vicious deflationary forces besetting our trading partners is the stuff of fairy tales.
As of November 2014, annual rates of inflation as measured by the Consumer Price Index (CPI), showed that ten of our trading partners, mostly in the Eurozone, were experiencing deflation:
Belgium: -0.110 percent
Estonia: -0.614 percent
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