If we were to pinpoint the key to America’s success through the two World Wars and the standoff with the Soviet unx, it would be its vibrant economy and impressive manufacturing capabilities.
This self-evident economic prowess has been reduced to that of an enigma. A substantial portion of the American empire’s value today is imaginary.
If we relied solely on the academic discipline of economics for interpretation, it would be difficult to reason how a heavily financialized nation can convince other countries to continue producing real, physical products for a heavily indebted nation’s citizens to sell to one another and consume at rates not balanced out by net exports.

如果我们要找出美国在两次世界大战和与苏联对峙中取得成功的关键，那就是其充满活力的经济和令人印象深刻的制造业能力。这种不言而喻的经济实力已沦为一个谜。今天，美帝国价值的很大一部分都是虚构的。
如果我们仅仅依靠经济学的学术学科来解释，就很难理解一个严重金融化的国家如何能够说服其他国家继续生产真实的实物产品，供一个负债累累的国家的公民相互销售，并以不被净出口平衡的速度消费。

It is a struggle to rationalize — though economists, through repetition and assertion, try — how the New York Stock Exchange can be worth $32.7 trillion dollars when there are only $2.3 trillion dollars in circulation if it isn’t a glorified Ponzi scheme riddled with securities and accounting fraud.
There are maybe plausible, albeit farfetched, explications for how WeWork’s stock value rose from $4.4 billion to $47 billion in a three-month time span, but we are left at a loss for words when investigating how 50% of this company’s reported wealth vanished from the national economy in one day.
All roads lead back to the US dollar, the world’s reserve currency, and another enigma to unravel. From 2008 to 2011, it was discovered that the Federal Reserve wired $16 trillion dollars of cheap credit they imagined into existence to prop up several banks and corporations around the world — a story the private, runaway cash-printing entity fought to keep secret from the public.

尽管经济学家们通过重复和断言，试图使纽约证券交易所的市值达到32.7万亿美元，但如果它不是一个充斥着证券和会计欺诈的美化的庞氏骗局，那么它是如何在只有2.3万亿美元流通的情况下实现合理化的？这是一场斗争。
WeWork的股价在三个月内从44亿美元涨到470亿美元，或许有一些看似合理但牵强的解释，但当我们调查这家公司报告的财富有50%是如何在一天内从国民经济中消失时，我们就无话可说了。
所有的道路都指向美元，世界储备货币，以及另一个有待解开的谜团。从2008年到2011年，人们发现，美联储虚构了16万亿美元的廉价信贷，以支持世界各地的几家银行和公司。这是一个私人的，失控的印钞实体竭力不让公众知道的故事。

For years, the dollar flourished under a regime of 0% percent interest rates, massive trade deficits, and record levels of federal borrowing and spending. The US dollar remains a juggernaut, and inflation — while being felt more so today — is not causing the apocalyptic balance of payments crises seen in recent years in Argentina or Greece.
The reasons for this go beyond conventional economics, which generally lack an examination of power and politics. The real force behind the omnipotent dollar derives from imperial conquest and the establishment of economic rules and institutions that the victors created after World War II. Some call this system post-industrialism, globalism, or neo-liberalism, but it all describes the same program: the world must trade in US dollars, denominate their debts in US dollars, liberalize its markets and continue borrowing under often usurious conditions from US bankers.

多年来，美元在0%的利率、巨额贸易赤字和创纪录的联邦借贷和支出水平下蓬勃发展。美元仍然是一个巨大的力量，而通货膨胀——尽管今天的感觉更加强烈——并没有导致近年来阿根廷或希腊出现的灾难性的国际收支危机。
造成这种情况的原因超越了传统经济学，后者通常缺乏对权力和政治的考察。无所不能的美元背后的真正力量来自于帝国主义的征服，以及二战后战胜国建立的经济规则和制度。有人把这种体系称为后工业主义、全球主义或新自由主义，但它们都描述了同样的事情：世界必须用美元进行贸易，以美元计价债务，开放市场，并继续在通常是高利贷的条件下从美国银行家那里借款。

This new order was established at the 1944 Bretton Woods conference. At that meeting of 44 nations, two Jews — Harry Dexter White and Henry Morgenthau — established the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which would act as a predatory, Dollar-centered loan structure for all of humanity.
Not everyone was keen on this radical transfer of power, including members of the Grand Alliance. At Bretton Woods, White and Morgenthau encountered resistance from British economist John Maynard Keynes, who suggested the establishment of a global central bank that would issue a neutral currency, the Bancor, to avoid the predictable abuse of the power of currency monopoly that Washington and New York would go on to enjoy under the IMF system. Though Keynes was far better known, more internationally respected and more persuasive in the debate against White and Morgenthau, his idea was discarded due to the fact that, through the Lend-Lease Act, America became the British empire’s creditor. The Soviet unx adamantly refused to sign this agreement, but its economy was devastated by the war so it also lacked leverage. With the German Mark and French Franc destroyed or in the gutter, the exhausted and broken European superpowers had no choice but to agree to dollar dictatorship.

这一新秩序是在1944年布雷顿森林会议上确立的。在那次有44个国家参加的会议上，两个犹太人——哈利·德克斯特·怀特和亨利·摩根索——建立了国际货币基金组织，它将成为一个掠夺性的、以美元为中心的全人类贷款结构。
并不是每个人都热衷于这种激进的权力转移，包括大联盟的成员。在布雷顿森林会议上，怀特和摩根索遇到了来自英国经济学家约翰·梅纳德·凯恩斯的阻力，凯恩斯建议建立一个全球中央银行，发行一种中性货币，即Bancor，以避免华盛顿和纽约在国际货币基金组织体系下滥用货币垄断权力的情况。尽管凯恩斯的知名度要高得多，在国际上更受尊重，在与怀特和摩根索的辩论中也更有说服力，但由于《租借法案》使美国成为大英帝国的债权人，他的观点被抛弃了。
苏联坚决拒绝签署这一协议，但它的经济受到战争的破坏，因此它也缺乏影响力。随着德国马克和法国法郎被摧毁或陷入困境，筋疲力尽、支离破碎的欧洲超级大国别无选择，只能同意实行美元独裁。

It was here that White and Morgenthau, strongly motivated by their Jewish ethnic identity, forged a skeleton key that would enable the Jewish-dominated world of high finance to crowned king of the world.
Keynes’ worst fears came true as soon as the war ended. The United States suddenly cut off all of Britain’s credit lines after VJ Day and demanded re-negotiations in exchange for continuing to aid the militarily sapped and bankrupt supposed ally. The extortionary terms of the new loan included muscling the British empire’s vast protected markets open for US corporations to take over, neutralizing the Pound Sterling through attacks on its convertibility, and various reforms aimed at dismantling the UK’s empire and the living standards of British workers. The Anglo-American loan, as it came to be known, now required interest to be paid as well as an agreement that would allow US military bases to be housed on British territories. The House of Lords protested this takeover by US-based money and military power, but the ailing and demoralized Keynes was forced by the fragile Labour government of Clement Atlee to eventually capitulate. It took 50 years for the UK to pay off these debts.

正是在这里，怀特和摩根索受到犹太民族身份的强烈激励，锻造了一把万能钥匙，使犹太人主导的高级金融世界成为世界之王。
战争一结束，凯恩斯最担心的事情就成真了。在对日作战胜利日之后，美国突然切断了英国的所有信贷额度，并要求重新谈判，以换取继续援助这个军事上受到削弱和破产的所谓盟友。新贷款的敲诈条款包括强行将大英帝国受保护的巨大市场开放给美国公司接管，通过攻击英镑的可兑换性来削弱英镑，以及旨在瓦解大英帝国和英国工人生活水平的各种改革。这种后来被称为“英美贷款”的贷款，现在不仅需要支付利息，还需要达成一项协议，允许美国在英国领土上设立军事基地。英国上议院抗议美国的金钱和军事力量对英国的收购，但孱弱的克莱门特·阿特利领导的工党政府最终迫使体弱多病、士气低落的凯恩斯投降。英国花了50年才还清这些债务。

Washington found itself in possession of infinite opportunities after the military subjugation of industrial powerhouses Germany and Japan, the safe and sound American manufacturing base, and the transformation of Britain into a vassal state. The “rules-based liberal order” — where Washington makes the rules and breaks them whenever it sees fit — was born.
Under the initial Bretton Woods agreement, Washington promised that the new economic order would peg the dollar’s value to gold to prevent its exploitative use. This would not last.
The gold-backed dollar was a source of consternation for New York and Washington throughout its run, but things came to a head by the 1960s.

在军事征服工业强国德国和日本之后，华盛顿发现自己拥有无限的机会，安全健全的美国制造业基地，英国变成附属国。“基于规则的自由秩序”——华盛顿制定规则，并在其认为合适的时候打破规则——就此诞生。
根据最初的布雷顿森林协议，华盛顿承诺新的经济秩序将把美元的价值与黄金挂钩，以防止黄金被剥削。
这种情况没能持续太久。黄金支持的美元在整个运行过程中一直令纽约和华盛顿感到恐慌，但到了20世纪60年代，事情达到了顶峰。

In the lead up to his overthrow during the infamous Jewish-led color revolution of 1968, General Charles De Gaulle sought to re-assert French sovereignty against the “exorbitant privilege” of the US dollar by dumping his nation’s dollar supply for its value in gold. Though De Gaulle was brought down in 1969, his rebellion against the dollar successfully depleted the US Treasury’s gold reserves. This culminated in a run on the US dollar — the “Nixon Shock” — which forced the desperate White House to arbitrarily end the Bretton Woods gold standard in 1971 to avoid economic collapse.
Since then, the dollar has counter-intuitively grown in prominence. America’s post-industrial, finance-driven economy has led to grave economic suffering for the working and middle class at home, but it simultaneously provides a tempting “get rich quick” incentive for the oligarchs of the world. Foreigners now possess 40% of equity in the US, which makes acquiescing to Washington and New York’s political and imperial whims a price many are willing to pay.

在1968年犹太人领导的臭名昭著的颜色革命中，夏尔·戴高乐将军被推翻。在此之前，他曾试图通过抛售法国的美元供应，以换取黄金价值，来重新维护法国的主权，反对美元的“过分特权”。尽管戴高乐在1969年被赶下台，但他对美元的反抗成功地耗尽了美国财政部的黄金储备。这在“尼克松冲击”，美元挤兑中达到顶峰，这次迫使绝望的白宫在1971年武断地结束了布雷顿森林金本位制，以避免经济崩溃。
自那以后，美元的地位反而出人头地。美国的后工业化、金融驱动型经济给国内的工人阶级和中产阶级带来了严重的经济痛苦，但同时也为世界上的寡头们提供了一个诱人的“快速致富”的动力。外国人现在拥有美国40%的股权，这使得默许华盛顿和纽约的政治和帝国主义奇思怪想成为许多人愿意付出的代价。

For risk-averse foreign governments and elites, it is also profitable and safe to purchase American debt. When a debtor owns the machine that can print the money he owes, it’s a sound bet to assume creditors will be paid back, at interest. In China’s case, keeping the US dollar strong while duing the Yuan by purchasing Washington’s debt has traditionally served as a win-win keeping American consumer demand for Chinese goods high.
As plutocratic forces in Washington grow more aggressive and misanthropic, multiple nations are beginning to reexamine their entente with the American empire. The politicization and weaponization of the US dollar and American power over financial institutions, as seen in recent years with total sanctions regiments and asset freezes aimed at countries such as Iran and Russia, is leading many to question their relationship with the US economy.

对于厌恶风险的外国政府和精英来说，购买美国国债也是有利可图且安全的。当一个债务人拥有一台可以印刷他所欠的钱的机器时，一个合理的赌注是债权人将得到偿还，包括利息。在中国的情况下，保持美元强势，同时通过购买华盛顿的债务使人民币贬值，传统上是一种双赢的做法，可以保持美国消费者对中国商品的高需求。
随着华盛顿的富豪势力变得更加咄咄逼人和厌恶人类，多个国家开始重新审视它们与美国帝国的协约。美元的政治化和武器化，以及美国对金融机构的影响力，正如近年来针对伊朗和俄罗斯等国的全面制裁和资产冻结所看到的那样，正导致许多人质疑这些国家与美国经济的关系。

It is a matter of time before America’s growing list of enemies decide to pull the rug out from underneath US economy. Such a maneuver could cause chaos in global finance and trade, but the gravest consequences will be reserved for America’s ruling class at home as living standards for ordinary people free fall.
Unprecedented interest rates have given the appearance of the dollar as being stronger than ever before, but this is an illusion built through the cannibalization of Europe and Japan. On its own merits, the deindustrialized American economy is neither competitive or sustainable.

美国越来越多的敌人决定把美国经济架空，这只是时间问题。这种策略可能会导致全球金融和贸易的混乱，但最严重的后果将留给美国国内的统治阶级，因为普通民众的生活水平将直线下降。
前所未有的利率让美元看起来比以往任何时候都更强势，但这是欧洲和日本相互蚕食造成的假象。就其自身的优点而言，去工业化的美国经济既没有竞争力，也不可持续。
原创翻译：龙腾网 https://www.ltaaa.cn 转载请注明出处


Declining Living Standards
It is well-established that one of the major sources of political instability (populism, hopelessness, revolution, etc) is wealth inequality. Today, the United States has the most lopsided wealth distribution in the developed world, with a Gini Coefficient of 41.5 (compared to the two “second world” rivals: 36 in Russia and 38.2 in China).
The true state of the US economy is hidden under piles of cooked books and over-the-top propaganda headlines like “America’s astonishing economic growth goes up another gear,” but this can barely hide the mounting anecdotes gaining 10s of millions of views, like women with popular TikTok channels declaring that the new “American dream” is to emigrate.

生活水平下降
众所周知，政治不稳定(民粹主义、绝望、革命等)的主要来源之一是财富不平等。如今，美国是发达国家中财富分配最不平衡的国家，其基尼系数为41.5(与两个“第二世界”对手相比:俄罗斯为36，中国为38.2)。
美国经济的真实状况隐藏在一堆伪造的书籍和夸张的宣传标题之下，比如“美国惊人的经济增长又上了一个档位”，但这几乎无法掩盖越来越多的轶事，这些轶事获得了数千万的浏览量，比如女性在流行的TikTok频道上宣称，新的“美国梦”是移民。

Part of the mass disillusionment with the US economy is rooted in how it is structured in 2024 compared to the middle-class golden age of the 1950s. The general perception is that living standards have gotten worse for the majority of people.
In the immediate aftermath of World War II, the US economy comprised 45% of the world’s GDP, largely propelled by the production of high quality physical goods. Today, this share of the world’s wealth has fallen to 25%, which is still impressive, but the distribution of this economic activity has changed.
The radical financialization of the economy spurred by the theories of Jewish economist Milton Friedman during the 1980s ushered in a new system that began centralizing economic and political power in the hands of non-productive forces in the Finance, Insurance, and Real Estate (FIRE).

人们对美国经济的普遍失望，部分源于2024年美国经济的结构与上世纪50年代中产阶级黄金时代的对比。人们普遍认为，大多数人的生活水平下降了。第二次世界大战刚结束时，美国经济占世界GDP的45%，主要是由高质量实物产品的生产推动的。今天，世界财富的这一份额已经下降到25%，这仍然令人印象深刻，但这种经济活动的分布已经发生了变化。
20世纪80年代，犹太经济学家Milton Friedman的理论推动了经济的激进金融化，开创了一个新的体系，开始将经济和政治权力集中在金融、保险和房地产领域（FIRE）的非生产力手中。

According to data collected by Greta Krippner, in 1954 nearly 40% of America’s working population was employed in the manufacturing sector versus roughly 5% participating in FIRE activity. The US had already surpassed the British Empire economically following World War I, and the global need for American products made the country an exporting superpower after World War II.
During this same period, this 40% of workers in the manufacturing sector created 35% of the US GDP, while the FIRE market added up to about 13% of the economy.
This influence on the economy allowed America’s workers to hold significant leverage over capital. In 1954, 35% of US wage and salary workers were in a labor unx.
Following the implementation of Friedmanism during the “Reagan Revolution,” this socio-economic synergy was flipped on its head.

根据格里塔·克里普纳收集的数据，1954年，近40%的美国劳动人口受雇于制造业，而参加FIRE活动的只有大约5%。第一次世界大战后，美国在经济上已经超过了大英帝国，而全球对美国产品的需求使美国在第二次世界大战后成为出口超级大国。
在同一时期，这40%的制造业工人创造了美国35%的GDP，而FIRE市场占经济总量的13%左右。这种对经济的影响使得美国工人对资本拥有了巨大的影响力。1954年，美国35%的领薪工人参加了工会。
在“里根革命”期间实施弗里德曼主义之后，这种社会经济协同作用被彻底颠覆。

In 2022, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that a mere 12.8% of American workers are employed in the goods-producing sector (construction, mining, and manufacturing). On the other hand, a whopping 70% of Americans now work in the service industry, compared to 15% in 1954.
Less than 10% of US workers (approximately 30 million) are employed in both the FIRE market and professional business services that serve it (accountants, lawyers, consultants, financial advisors, etc). Yet percentage of the GDP controlled by this sector has shot up dramatically from 13% to now 33%.

2022年，美国劳工统计局报告称，只有12.8%的美国工人受雇于商品生产部门(建筑业、采矿业和制造业)。另一方面，与1954年的15%相比，现在有高达70%的美国人在服务业工作。
不到10%的美国工人(约3000万)受雇于FIRE市场和为其提供服务的专业商业服务(会计师、律师、顾问、财务顾问等)。然而，该部门所控制的GDP百分比从13%急剧上升到现在的33%。

Government spending (11.6%) has now outgrown manufacturing (11%) in terms of contribution to the GDP. This is strongly correlated with the collapse in unxization rates, which have fallen to 10%, though even here, about half of organized labor is composed of public sector unxs siphoning taxpayer money. Other factors, such as mass immigration and outsourcing — staples of anti-democratic and unpatriotic neo-liberal policymaking — also play a substantial role in undercutting labor power.
This inequality is only compounded by the US ruling elite’s finance-first economic plan. Last month, it was reported that 10% of Americans own 93% of all stocks. When it comes to the balance sheets, the US tax code punishes productive work (income tax) while incentivizing speculative activities (low capital gains taxes), meaning that the rich get richer while the working class gets poorer.

就GDP的贡献率而言，政府支出(11.6%)现在已经超过了制造业(11%)。这与工会化率的下降密切相关，工会化率已降至10%，尽管在这里，大约一半的有组织劳工是由吸收纳税人资金的公共部门工会组成的。其他因素，如大规模移民和外包——反民主和不爱国的新自由主义政策制定的主要内容——也在削弱劳动力方面发挥了重要作用。
美国统治精英的金融优先经济计划加剧了这种不平等。上个月有报道称，10%的美国人持有93%的股票。在资产负债表方面，美国税法惩罚生产性工作(所得税)，同时鼓励投机活动(低资本利得税)，这意味着富人越来越富，而工人阶级越来越穷。
（未完待续）