12 Signs The United States Is Headed For Financial Collapse

Is the United States headed for total financial collapse?  Most Americans seem to think that we are now recovering from the recent economic crisis and that we will be back to "normal" very soon.  But what do the numbers say?  Do the economic signs point toward a recovery or a major financial disaster?  The truth is that if you take a close look at the numbers, they are very troubling.  Just consider the following signs.... 

#1) The FDIC plans to open a huge satellite office near Chicago that will house up to 500 temporary staffers and contractors to manage receiverships and liquidate assets from what they are expecting will be a gigantic wave of failed Midwest banks.

#2) So is there are reason for the FDIC to expect so many banks to fail?  Well, the FDIC recently announced that the number of banks on its "problem" list climbed to 702 at the end of 2009. This is compared to only 552 banks that were on the problem list at the end of September and only 252 banks that were on the problem list at the end of 2008.

#3) The U.S. Treasury Department has announced that foreign holdings of U.S. Treasury securities fell by 53 billion dollars in December, which was the biggest one month decline in history. China alone reduced its holdings of U.S. Treasuries by 34.2 billion dollars.  If other nations quit buying up U.S. government debt, what happens then?

#4) A massive "second wave" of adjustable rate mortgages is scheduled to reset beginning in 2010. The first wave of adjustable rate mortgage resets absolutely devastated the U.S. housing market in 2007 and 2008. So what is this second wave of mortgage resets going to do to the U.S. economy?

#5) In fact, one shocking new study predicts that 5 million houses and condos will go through foreclosure over the next couple of years.  If that actually happens, the impact on the U.S. economy would be enormous.

#6) A number of financial analysts are forecasting that the next "shoe to fall" in the ongoing financial crisis will be commercial real estate. U.S. commercial property values are down about 40 percent since 2007 and currently 18 percent of all office space in the United States is now sitting vacant.

#7) The number of Americans who are declaring personal bankruptcy continues to shoot into the stratosphere. 1.41 million Americans filed for bankruptcy in 2009, which represented a 32 percent increase over 2008.

#8) But how can average Americans possibly pay their bills without jobs? In some areas of the United States, unemployment is now at depression-era levels.  For example, the mayor of Detroit estimates that the real unemployment rate in his city is now somewhere around 45 to 50 percent.

#9) Meanwhile, soaring unemployment insurance taxes are actually discouraging small and mid-size companies from hiring more workers. According to the National Association of State Workforce Agencies, companies in at least 35 states will have to fork over even more in unemployment insurance taxes in 2010.

#10) In addition, the U.S. is facing a pension crisis of unprecedented magnitude. The reality is that the vast majority of all pension funds in the United States, both public and private, are massively underfunded. With millions of Baby Boomers now at or nearing retirement age, there is simply no way that all of these unfunded pension obligations are going to be met. Robert Novy-Marx of the University of Chicago and Joshua D. Rauh of Northwestern's Kellogg School of Management recently calculated the collective unfunded pension liability for all 50 U.S. states for Forbes magazine. So what was the total that they came up with? 3.2 trillion dollars.

#11) Not only that, but Social Security and Medicare also threaten to decimate U.S. government finances. In fact, some economic analysts are now predicting that the coming wave of retiring Baby Boomers is going to bankrupt the entire Social Security system.

#12) All of these financial problems come at a time when the U.S. national debt is experiencing exponential growth. The U.S. national debt is now over 12 trillion dollars and it is rising at a rate of about 3.8 billion dollars per day. So just how much is one trillion dollars? Well, if you spent one dollar every single second of every single day, it would take you over 31,000 years just to spend one trillion dollars.

So is the U.S. headed for a massive financial collapse? 

Unfortunately, the answer appears to be yes.

Very hard economic times are coming.

Now is the time to make sure that you and your family are prepared for what is ahead.