No. of Recommendations: 6
I'm not sure if it could play out the same way today. For a few reasons. Let's say there is union agitation that hikes worker pay in the USA. That has an instant effect of increasing the prices of products made in the USA. And what almost immediately follows is that those same things made outside the USA are cheaper. So, in a globalized world, the consumers of "stuff" shift their purchases from USA-made stuff to foreign-made stuff. Now they may (they will!) also agitate for government to step in and inhibit the foreign stuff. But government will be reticent to do so because that increases inflation. And increased inflation means higher interest rates. And because government constantly (multiple times a week) refinances ALL their debt, and ALL the interest on their debt, and some of their current spending, that would mean higher and higher interest payments. Which means less money for the current government to spend (because it's going to interest).
How do you take a pitchfork to a treasury bond?
One might argue that all of this and more has been happening in France for a while. A tentative lesson: just because it's not in the long term best interests of the population OR of the politicians doesn't mean it won't become the law of the land.
As for the pitchfork question, the question is more whether the bond market can take a pitchfork to you. The answer is "yup!"
Jim
