People are bewildered by the chaos building in all corners of the world today however there is a reason stitching all such phenomena together. The seeds of today’s sorrows was sown in the collective mindset of the last 35 years of hyper-bull market mentality. How?

Mass moods swing between positive and negative periods on scales of decades just like daily, weekly, and monthly mood swings (see the http://www.socionomics.net for more details).

What most don’t realize is that during positive mood era, inequalities grow larger-and-larger; as people bury there head in the sands as the increasingly self-congratulatory feedback system takes hold (“hey my 401k account and housing price keep rising, I must be the master of the universe. What do I have to worry about?”) and destructive behaviors begin to become commonplace. We sweep everything under the rug without a care but as we sleep, kindling keeps building on the forest floor until one day, a spark ignites a wildfire. 

And because the last several decades have seen increasingly destructive behavior (entrenched greediness,  extreme overbuilding and expansion, blind consumption of the planet, banks irresponsibly using depositors money to enrich themselves, the rich getting richer, people being blind to fairness and justice as long as there mutual fund accounts keep growing, etc.); the inequalities have mushroomed, expectations have become ridiculous, and everything (including our vanity) is in oversupply.

In this condition there is only one way to go–down. What goes up must come down–and in this event likely crashing down. Commodity markets are declining, housing prices are softening, employment is rising, radicalism is rising in all corners of the world (including in government leaders). It is the 1970’s and 1930’s all over again.

We hope for the best but are preparing for the worse as the next 1-2 decades could prove to be a wild roller coaster ride of financial, social, and political chaos. The good news–the seeds of its reversal will be sown during its reign as people once again get rooted in reality and begin planning to make the world truly a better place.