ECONOMICS

German conservative leader Friedrich Merz has reportedly reached a tentative agreement with the Green party on the giant debt-funded spending package for defense and infrastructure.

As a reminder, Merz’s Christian Democratic-led bloc and the SPD are rushing to secure a supermajority in parliament to approve sweeping constitutional amendments that would release defense spending from debt restrictions and set up a €500 billion ($542 billion) fund for infrastructure investment.

The (more…)

Authored by Brandon Smith via Alt-Market.us

Ever since the days of Herbert Hoover and the official start of the Great Depression the concept of trade tariffs has been readily demonized across most of academia and among the majority of modern economic ideologies. It is actually one area where globalists and free market economists tend to align (though each group has very different reasons).

Proponents of Adam Smith’s free market philosophy or Ludwig Von Mises and his Austrian school (more…)

Today just after midnight, US tariffs on steel and aluminum have come into force, and in response the European Commission announced its plans to retaliate to a similar degree (albeit on a different range of imports from the US).

While the impact on certain sectors and product lines could be large, the aggregate macroeconomic effect on Europe is likely to be small. Of more concern, according to Nomura's George Buckley, is that this is only the opening gambit – Europe is now firmly (more…)