Well, this article got me to watch the whole Crash Course in one day. Ahhh...the benefits of being unemployed. ;-)

I have to take Martenson's word for it on the Energy and Environment aspects since my area of expertise is not in those areas. His information makes sense and other news sources seem to confirm what he's saying there.

When it comes to the Economics, I can say that everything he says seems right on target. Everything he covers was hit upon in my undergrad macroeconomics courses. The only difference was that some other, competing theories were also introduced.  These theories often were about how we could, hypothetically, continue borrowing and somehow manage to deal with the situation. They never seemed as convincing to me though.

Additionally, back when I was in school, our government appeared to be running surpluses for the first time in a long time and nobody conceived that we would end up starting two wars while reducing taxes. We thought the government/federal reserve would be able to get a handle on the situation before the baby boomers retired.

I guess life didn't happen that way...

Here's the link to a recent article from The Economist:  http://www.economist.com/finance/displayStory.cfm?story_id=12887385&sour...

I find it interesting because it does seem that economists get that the situation is pretty dire and worth trying massive fiscal stimulus to get us out of it.  I am disturbed though by the general lack of concern about the implications this plan would have on both our government and economy given our current enormous amount of debt.  It makes me rather sick to my stomach to see that these folks really have no clue how to deal with the situation.

I can't recommend this resource enough.

Ever since I found it, I have been showing it to as many people as I can find who are willing to sit down and watch it, and not one of them has been able to shrug it off. Most of them will tell me later how they can't get its message out of their heads...

So pass it on! Make it as viral as possible! Because this is as practical and down-to-earth as we're going to get on a subject matter that it is infinitely hard to introduce to someone.

My innate skepticism has again gotten the better of me. Although Martenson is correct about how our monetary system generally works (it is based on faith) and that constant deficits and sky-rocketing debt do spell doom for future generations, he doesn't present the whole picture.

For instance, he does not discuss the reasons why we switched from a gold standard to a fiat monetary system. There were some good reasons such as the role gold played in worsening the Depression and the increased probability of various runs on currencies. Furthermore, inflation is still a reality with the gold standard. After all, the more gold mined from the earth, the more is in circulation. Here's a link to a short paper about the gold standard written by an Econ professor in the mid-90s: http://www.j-bradford-delong.net/Politics/whynotthegoldstandard.html

Here's another article discussing the gold standard: http://useconomy.about.com/od/monetarypolicy/p/gold_standard.htm

The very real point it makes is that the US cannot switch back to the gold standard because we simply do not have enough gold to repay our debts.

Martenson also seems to infer that deficits and inflation are inherent and required in a fiat monetary system. That is not true. There is nothing about this system that forced our government to spend beyond its means, running deficits year after year. If our government had, for the most part, balanced its budget government bonds would not have needed to be issued and the dependency on unsustainable growth would not have occurred.

Something else about Martenson disturbs me even though I believe he is sincere in his concern about the economy and environment. His financial guidance heavily favors the purchase of gold and encourages speculation over investment. My concern about his advice around gold is that it is just moving the asset bubble to gold. This follows the pattern we've been going with for the past 10 years or so. We decided that the dotcom industry was the way to go. We created an asset bubble there. When it became clear that was unsustainable, the Fed encouraged us to move our assets to the real estate market. The bubble moved there. Now Martenson is telling us to move our assets to gold and repeat that pattern? I'd rather break the pattern and get back to common sense.

He also favors investing in US oil and gas producers. Huh? Yes, it will like make us money in the short run. However, I feel uncomfortable giving my money to a company whose profits depend on the continuing dependence on an energy source that encourages both unsustainable environmental degradation and economic growth.

I agree with Martenson's premise that the next 20 years will require a profound change in the way people live. Maybe it's my taurus nature or maybe it's because I'm a mother but I would rather focus my energy on building for the future. I would rather research and invest (long-term) in companies that have socially responsible business practices and/or are pursuing viable energy resources for the future (perhaps like solar or wind energy). Those are the folks who will create a world my kids can survive and thrive in.

Lastly, I don't know what will happen to our monetary system nor do I know what will happen to our government. I am fairly certain that civilization will not collapse though.