Predictions of the Future from Doug Casey

One of my sister's passed an article on to me where Doug Casey, a highly respected author, publisher and professional investor, predicts three possible futures. These futures are of what the world will look like 20 years from today (2031). Casey bases his projections on facts, research, and sound analysis, and while all three are possible and I encourage you to read the entire article, the second one to me is the most plausible and likely and so it is only that one which I will excerpt below:

MIDDLE CASE – FACTS ARE IGNORED
The world’s governments continue under the delusion that printing massive quantities of paper money will solve problems when, in fact, printing lies at the base of the problems. Most currencies lose most of their value. Some lose it all. This destroys the most productive people in society, the middle class, who produce more than they consume and save the difference... in currency.

And it injures successful corporations that have billions, or even tens of billions, in cash. Few of their managers know what to do with such sums other than to hold currency; at best they’ll buy their own and other companies' stock. The result is a stock market boom in the midst of a grim depression. But only one person in a hundred will be in a position to benefit from it, because most will be living too close to the edge, and the stock market will be the last thing on their minds. The destruction of capital sets technology back quite a bit in the U.S., Japan and Europe. Chindia increases its relative strength.

The U.S. government, believing it has both the obligation and the ability to “do something,” redoubles its control of the economy. Price controls and capital controls are the order of the day. Petroleum products are rationed. Enforcement of new regulations is assigned to a new agency, the “Economic Recovery Administration,” which resembles the TSA in most regards – except it has many plain-clothes employees, to better ferret out violators.

People think increasingly of politics as the way to get what they want. More and more Americans move abroad – although things are deteriorating in most places in the world. Poor, backwater countries offer the best opportunities because their governments are either weak, or corrupt, enough to allow new economic activity.

Again, I highly encourage you to read the entire article, which lays out the methodology and background and reasoning behind the predictions and also lays out the other possible futures.

Doug Casey has written The International Man: The Complete Guidebook to the World's Last Frontiers. For Freedom Seekers, Investors, Adventurers, Speculators, and Expatriates and Lies, damn lies & dirty lies: How to get rich by understanding big government & the media.