To anyone noticing, something feels off. A lively nation once filled with friends, laughter, great music, Hollywood's sparkle, and affordable shopping has faded into memory. An unsettling shift has occurred, leaving many of us questioning the very fabric of our daily lives. Why does everything feel gone or empty? Why do the vibrant scenes of community and abundance seem overshadowed by an eerie stillness? To uncover this mystery, we need to explore the idea of a "zombie economy", where the economy is struggling and unable to achieve robust growth, yet continues to function at a very low level, often propped up by external support. A term that conjures images of a lifeless entity hovering over a once vibrant society and examines its relationship with the declining purchasing power of the dollar. This investigation will shed light on the economic shifts that have brought us to this point and identify those responsible for it.
Vanguard is the largest provider of mutual funds and the second-largest provider of exchange-traded funds (ETFs) in the world. It has $9.3 trillion in global assets under management as of May 2024. Vanguard was created by John C. Bogle in 1974. Bogle broke how the traditional stock market functioned by investing solely on risky or low performing investments, and then flooded the market with false gains. His strategy was to buy everything and then hold it. Bogle argued that Vanguard funds were independent of advisors and operated solely out of the interests of shareholders and if CEOs were not willing to do so, they would be replaced. (It is easy to dangle the carrot of greed to the average salary for a CEO of an S&P 500 company. In 2023, $17.7 million a year was the annual salary to the corporate CEO, which is more than 268 times the median worker's income at those companies.)
Enter Paul Volcker, former president and chairman of the Federal Reserve. Volcker’s influence on economic policy and financial markets indirectly affects all investment firms, including Vanguard and Blackrock, that operate within that wider economic context. Famous for his money management rule, “The Volcker Rule”, which restricts banks from engaging in proprietary trading (banks use their own money for profit instead of earning commissions by trading for benefits of clients) and from owning, sponsoring or having certain relationships with hedge funds or private equity funds. The perfect rule for private equity firms to use our own systems against us.
Volcker was selected by President Richard Nixon in 1971 for Secretary of Treasury. Together they created OPIC (Overseas Private Investment Corp.) and Fannie Mae (federal national mortgage association). Nixon and Volcker worked together to help collapse the Bretton Woods system (fully negotiated monetary order to govern independent states) and officially took the US dollar off the gold standard. The stock market would crash in 1973 as a result. Volcker was quoted “this was single most important event of his career”
By the 80’s “Volcker Shock” had kicked in, people started to take notice of the losing power of the dollar and protested but were quickly silenced. Once the removal of gold backed currency was implemented, the federal government could now tighten money policies, increase military spending, produce large federal budget deficits and create major macroeconomic imbalances to the US economy without previous restrictions. These were the early stages to the high inflation and the “Zombie Economy” that we see today.
By 1987 Paul Volcker was hired by the Rockefeller Group and left the federal reserve to get into investment banking working with the president of the World Bank. The US current account would be in permanent deficit by the 1990s. He chaired the Economic Recovery Advisory Board under Obama (09-11), during the subprime mortgage crisis and was the first pick for US Secretary of Treasury. Obama made the famous speech announcing that he assisted with “the direct transfer of mortgages and mortgage-backed security from investment banks to the Federal Reserve”. Obama was a massive supporter of and promoted Volcker rule.
By 2018 World Bank developed the “Environmental and Social Framework” known as ESG scores we see in corporate today. In 2015 Obama appointed Ajaypal Banga (Indian national) to serve on “President's Advisory Committee for Trade Policy and Negotiations” and now sits as current World Bank president. He is the chair of “Partnership for Central America” with Kamala Harris and is her outside advisor.
In perhaps his greatest achievement towards global governance through shareholder demands, Volcker created the World Justice Project. An international civil organization with the mission of “working to advance rule of law around the world” WJP Rule of Law Index is a quantitative assessment tool (AI) that shows data on which countries adhere to the rule of law in practice. Companies that adhere to the ESG scores laid out by shareholders, score higher. (More on this later but to understand the current invasions, look no further than their own map)
To begin the takeover of the stock market and private home ownership, and to install the classic fascist business model (when government and corporations merge), they needed to change how profit margins work. All private ownership is then transferred to the investment company/bank/government that I will call “THE DEEP STATE”, since they have all merged. “The Deep State” will then purchase properties to rent or lease back ownership, collectively removing private ownership altogether. Pleasing the shareholders ESG scores was going to reign supreme over profits. When profits are down, that is an investment opportunity for “The Deep State” to purchase anything for a lower cost after they themselves drove down profits based on their scores. If a company has too many “white men in a management position”, they will receive a lower score. When “people of color” or women or LGBT++ are put into a management position, they will score higher, placing the higher value on social governance rather than strictly profits.
If a company does not comply towards better ESG scores, the company will be tanked, purchased back by the “Deep State”, then leased back at a higher cost. Red Lobster’s bankruptcy is a direct result of this business model after they were purchased by Blackrock. Shareholders pushed that it would be beneficial to the “environment” to sell the land on where each location sat and made them sell the land, to become renters to their own business. They could no longer afford their once successful business model and offer their signature endless shrimp, if they now had the added cost of rent on top of standard operating costs. This goes back to homeownership. A house that once cost $100,000 sold to your neighbor, is now purchased for $200,000 cash and turned into a rental property, asking for $3000 a month in rent over a $1000 a month in mortgage. They continue to make profits off regular commerce and citizens, killing the middle class and the American Dream.
The combination of growing debt and high interest rates led to the high rise in federal net interest costs. This would pave the pathway to their next wave of their attack on the US dollar, with the housing crisis of 2008 and then the Covid lockdowns of 2020. The US and global economy had been changed forever and the final nail on the coffin would be set.
Now let’s tie in Blackrock, the largest private asset manager in the world. Blackrock is an American multinational investment company and is the world’s largest asset manager with over $10 trillion in assets. Blackrock, following policy laid out by the World Bank and Volcker Rule, has sought to position itself as an industry leader in environmental, social, and governance (ESG) considerations in investments and make the pleasing of shareholders reign supreme. Larry Fink is the CEO.
In 2003 Fink helped negotiate the resignation of then CEO of the NY Stock Exchange, Richard Grasso. After gaining control of our money and S&P they would start to change the tax codes for capital gains to reward holdings (longer ownership and lower taxes). In 2006 Blackrock merged with banking giant Merrill Lynch and together purchased 5.4 billion of Manhattan debt that was in defaults. In 2008 Obama contracted Blackrock after the financial and housing crisis, giving them government contracts without any other competitive bidding. Blackrock hired many executive branch members, becoming fully entrenched within our own government. Privately owned houses and companies that could no longer afford their mortgages, were purchased by Blackrock. In 2009 Blackrock purchased Barclays Global Investors adding trillions more to their purchasing power. Now merged with the largest banks and governments and full control of the stock market, these private equity financiers had the unbridled freedom and the purchasing power to make large profits from tanking the economy and stealing private ownership.
In 2015 Fink sent out a letter to all CFO’s telling them to “ignore activist shareholders” and keyed the term “short-termism” to change the narrative. “We see companies reduce capital and research and development as a result of short-term focus over the long cycle, which is devastating for a company and if it’s an American company, probably for the US as well.” Short term gains were made priority over long term goals and gains, forcing companies to halt financial forecasting or prioritize long term profits over that happy get it “now” feeling.
In 2016 Blackrock received the ABANA Award (Banking and Finance award) for strengthening ties of the US, Middle East to North Africa, and Trump put Fink on the business forum for economic issues. In January 2020 the Federal Reserve rolled back rules that would previously limit bank investments into Venture Capital (private equity financing firms) and securitize loans (interest and principal payments from assets). Contracting debt such as mortgages, both commercial and residential, automobile loans and credit cards that went into default, were automatically purchased, removed private ownership and would directly transfer the money from paying customers to the banks. Often never giving the option to pay back debt, even if it means a resident losing a home or vehicle.
During the 2020 pandemic shutdowns, the federal government turned to Blackrock once again to purchase “all distressed securities”, just like after the subprime mortgage crisis of 2008. This time, Blackrock purchased not only homes but businesses that couldn’t survive the economic shut down, they started to invest and move money to Ukraine. They could never let a great financial crisis (that they caused) go to waste of course.
The combination of growing debt and high interest rates has led to the exaggerated rise in federal net interest costs and the collective buying of anything they can afford. This would carve the path to their varying waves of economic attacks on the US economy and the planned massacre of the purchasing strength of the US dollar. Working with governments, controlling money supply through the banks, and controlling the market profit guidelines, “The Deep State” has successfully crashed the US housing and business markets and then purchased it all to rent back to the native-born citizen all the while, handing out free federal money to anyone “foreign” born. Let’s not forget the funneling of upwards of $250 BILLION to Ukraine while FEMA is out of money to rebuild American communities in dire need. It is the complete inversion of the American dream and everything we work so hard for.
When will it be enough for people to start seeing what is going on? When will people stop selling their homes and businesses to investment firms instead of to their neighbors? When will the people stand up and demand the laws that were once in place to be put back, to stop the monopolies that are quite literally profiting off the complete economic destruction from local neighborhoods to complete countries? When will people see that we no longer have a country, but a complicated money laundering machine run by globalists who want everything no matter who or what is in their way?
