During the 1980s, while Ronald Reagan was president, government began tampering with the financial markets. In the spring of 2003 government started working aggressively with Wall Street to elevate asset prices. In spring of 2006, when asset prices were showing signs of weakness, Henry Paulson was named Treasury Secretary for the purpose building a larger and more active consortium to keep housing and stocks on an upward path. When this effort failed, TARP was passed partly as a face saving effort and partly to save the remaining assets of the politically privileged upper class.
Quantitative easing first under Ben Bernanke and now Janet Yellen provided unlimited funds for stock purchases. Laws prohibiting manipulation were not enforced. Friends of the Federal Reserve have traded risk free for three years. The U.S. Government has been reduced to an income redistribution engine. All laws that come before congress are for the purpose of rigging one market or another.
The poor and middle class have been robbed blind. Most are still clueless as to how the process has worked.
One by one the pillars of our free market system have been discarded. Central economic planning has allocated the nation’s resources so inefficiently that genuine growth is no longer possible. Government at all levels requires a high rate of growth in order to produce enough tax revenue to continue operating.
The bull market that began in 2009 has been politically engineered without much regard for the consequences. A hand full of billionaires has benefited and will never have any regrets. For all others, their financial futures have been destroyed. Most who haven’t already are going to lose everything they have.
But, it does look as if all efforts by all of the governments in the world are no longer enough to keep the market from falling. I do believe the bull market is now over.