our big story today comcast is gobbling up its main competitor time warner cable now the forty five billion dollars deal gives comcast the potential to completely reinvent the media landscape by wiping out its major rival comcast would have thirty three million cable subscribers and almost more importantly just as many broadband users giving it. away when it comes to setting market prices negotiating licensing fees and deciding what shows you can watch now the major implications will surely invite public scrutiny by regulators but with comcast huge lobbying presence in washington many experts believe it's unlikely that the merger will be judged anti-competitive remember the comcast and n.b.c. universal merge back in two thousand and eleven well major protest pretty much they pretty much went unnoticed following that deal so it might happen again this deal

will give comcast such a dominant position in the internet and television broadcast worlds that some are crying monopoly the deal is expected to close at the end of the year that is unless we see apple t.v. but that. our next guest is a very popular one and it's no secret investor and financial commentator peter schiff thinks that the u.s. dollar is going to fall off a cliff and he also thinks interest rates are going to skyrocket peter schiff joins us now via skype from west port connecticut peter first in front of us thanks for joining us and now the last time we spoke you saw bond yields going higher especially in view of the fed's tapering but since that time there's been data out

of the u.s. that's been well weak do you still feel of bearish about the u.s. government right now how do you feel to talk to well absolutely and you know when i talk about interest rates skyrocketing that's what's going to happen after the dollar collapses but before the dollar collapses the fed is going to print dollars to buy bonds to prevent interest rates from rising now the reason that interest rates have fallen somewhat on the long bond over the past few months is because a lot of bad economic data has now come to the surface i was expecting all of this bad data because i was saying for months and months as the fed first started talking about tapering that if they ever actually did it they would have to undo it because the minute they tapered the markets would start to go down stock market real estate market the economy would start slipping back into recession and the fed would be forced to have to embarrass tingly reverse their position which is what

they're going to do but i think the bond market is now getting ready for the fed to at least take a climb out on the taper and ultimately i think they're going to ramp it back up again and be doing more than eighty five billion a month now since. if it's been poor during this recovery what can be done to get wages up in your opinion well first we need a real recession that is the problem that in till we clear out the damage that has been caused by all the mal investment all the misallocations of resources that have happened as a result of our monetary policy until that happens we're never going to have a real recovery that's going to produce real wealth and higher wages so as long as the fed is blowing bubbles real wages are going to keep falling and the average american is going to keep seeing his standard of living diminished as a few people benefit from all the cheap money flowing from the fed well i guess the follow up to that would then be is wage growth something that public policy makers should concern themselves with at all well wages will grow as

a natural drive pop byproduct of a free market when you have capitalism and you have businesses investing their profits and you become more efficient you have greater economies of scale real wages are going to go off as consumer prices come down and your standard of living rises the government interferes with that process by creating inflation and by undermining productivity with regulations and taxes so if you want a vibrant economy if you want to see we real wages growing the government to get out of the way ok but you know the households they pay down debt but without wage growth do you think that household debt is going to become a problem again. well i don't think households have pay down debt i think they're drowning in debt the mortgage debt is still there the credit card debt is still there the student loan debt is still there the auto loans are still there we have record amounts of debt and it's not only individuals it's corporations people like to talk about the cash the corporations have yeah but they didn't earn most of it

they borrowed it the corporations have a lot of debt and of course the government has more debt than ever so we're drowning in debt there hasn't been any d. leverage and we let we have levered up to the max that's why interest rates are still exist because that's the most expensive rate we can afford now obviously you've already told us what you think of the u.s. economy but where do you see the u.s. economy heading from here over the course of twenty fourteen well if the fed continues with its taper timetable will be back in recession now i don't believe they're going to continue i think they're going to come back with more stimulus which might technically and statistically keep the market out of recession or keep the economy out of recession but in reality i think we're in a depression i don't think the u.s. economy is growing at all i think whatever g.d.p. growth they've been able to manufacture i get two thousand and thirteen according to the government the economy grew by one point nine percent i think it actually contract it i think the only reason it looks like it grew is because the government

is under reporting inflation i think actually the economy could track and meanwhile the only reason that the number got bigger was because we spent more borrowed money but that didn't make us richer that made us poorer because the debt grew a lot faster then the economy so when when the average american doesn't feel the recovery that's because it doesn't exist when they talk about a jobless recovery the reason it's jobless is because it's not a recovery if we had a legitimate recovery we have plenty of jobs for people but the reason we don't is because it's a fiction it is a mirage of recovery created by the fed it's a bubble masquerading as a recovery but the people who are living in the. economy don't benefit from these bubbles anymore you know that the average american doesn't own stocks the way he did in the late one nine hundred ninety s. a lot of americans don't own houses anymore homeownership is now at at a generational low most people are renting their houses are a lot of people from hedge funds so all they're doing is paying higher rent the

fact that the fed is reinflated the housing bubble doesn't help the renter but you necessarily think that everyone should be a homeowner you know i don't i i have i think there are too many people in homes and they're in over their heads because of government policy i think a lot of people who own homes would be better off renting but i think there are some people who are renting who probably could buy homes but the reason they can't is because the prices are still too high if the government got out of the way and let real estate prices come down real estate would be a lot more affordable so that people who should buy homes would and the people who should rent would would but right now the government is is is is screw it all up right now peter i want to switch gears a little bit here let's go over to europe what is your matter of view on europe. well that little bit got a lot of problems too the irony of it is the problems in america are worse you know for all the problems you have in europe and you certainly have pockets you know you have these certain economies that are in very bad shape but you have other

economies that are not nearly as bad a shape but i but if you look at it in totality if you look at all of the countries that share the euro zone euro currency collectively they're not in as bad shape as the united states and yes i think the e.c.b. has made mistakes but not as many as as the as the fed has i mean so. you know you've got to look at him on a relative basis and so you know between the two i don't think europe is as bad but i you know i think there's other parts of the world as an investor that a lot more compelling than either europe or the united states you know when i look at europe mainly investing in scandinavia and to the extent that i'm also in europe i mean i prefer switzerland which is not even part of the euro zone two currencies that share the currency always both statements for me that's why we like you but i want to ask you do you think the german economy will survive the eurozone debt crisis well or will germany face crisis to. well you know a lot of it is going to depend on how they react to what's about to happen i mean i

think if you look at the way the euro has been trading relative to the dollar despite all of the negativity about the eurozone and all of the misplaced optimism about the dollar the euro has been strengthening you know even the palette i think is at a four year high today against the dollar so it seems that the markets have more confidence in europe now than they do in the united states and i think that's going to continue and i believe that a strengthening euro and as more money flows into the euro currency and as the euro becomes more of a safe haven then the dollar that will that will certainly benefit europe now if this ends in a currency crisis why couldn't we retain the out money and just run with keynes as bank or idea to stop unsustainable imbalances when he and i mean why not even sure what you're referring to if we have a i think. if we have a currency crisis i mean you know you're going to throw keynes out the window if

you want to and if you want to solve it it's keynesian economics that is you know behind the crisis is following all this this nonsense i had a feeling you'd have that question is the name kansas not going to and i'm going to sell well for an event i had to throw it out there i'm moving right on now gold it seems to be breaking out here what do you think's going on. well i think people are slowly waking up to reality they're not completely awake but we have got a lot of bad economic data now a lot of people want to dismiss it and say it's all weather related i think that's just an excuse i think it to date is too bad there's too much of it to blame it on the cold weather but i think people are starting to wake up to the idea that it's not as good as people thought and so people are gradually moving back into gold but i think it's just getting started i think that you still have a lot of naysayers a lot of short sellers in the gold market in fact i think that main sellers are the

shorts who are selling gold they don't even have don't think there's a lot of legitimate gold for sale and i think wall street is very skeptical so this we're climbing a wall of worry here and i think that's very good for the market it's very healthy that the market is going up but nobody believes that gold is going a lot higher i really like and i agree with you about that whether com that's just still anywhere near enough and i want to ask you real quick we have thirty seconds i know you're a gold them but what do you think a big point. well as i've been saying all along i don't think big corn represents a legitimate alternative to gold because i don't think it's a store of value i don't even think it's going to be a legitimate alternative to feed currencies i call that a bubble i think a bubble is more likely popped there's still a lot of air to come out of it so you know if you're looking for an alternative to the dollar or to the euro just look at gold look at silver right i think that if you digital currencies are going to do it not until there's an act by gold or silver peter i'm sorry we ran out of time but thank you always insightful always

fun we love having you on the show that was american businessman investment broker author and financial commentator peter schiff. time now for a quick break but stay tuned because when we return we're bringing you the best of the best from this past week plus edward harrison and i are tackling your viewer feedback in today's in the margins where the most insightful things to say from this past week find out coming up. the transit route to vnukovo report you'll best way to the heart of mosco.

to what extent things will you adopt the success self the arab spring depends on the people in their region on the arabs and to what extent it still depends on the big power brokers fight to pursue that on the agenda the influence of the outside. powers he's getting stronger now because of the absence of a major country like egypt but i assure you. decided by. the or by a shot over by america. in the absence of that power in this region which is the out of world.

nato a deadly alliance without a clear mission decades after the end of the cold war this washington let alone and continues to exist and expand in a big us adventure in afghanistan and behind regime change in libya nato now looks somehow in someway to absorb ukraine which is a ghost gambit. she could leverage or to curb it was able to build the world's most sophisticated robot which all unfortunately doesn't give a darn about anything tim's mission to teach creation why it should care about humans in the world this is why you should care only on the. welcome back now new york city is drawing up new rules to regulate the virtual currency bit cohen and combat money laundering in the process this is all after

a large scale attack by cyber criminals brought down several online exchanges but despite the obstacles the digital currency is continuing to hold its ground artie's lucy coughing off sorry cough and often has a story here it is. they've come to speak to mingle and to promote their vision of an alternative financial system and investors businessmen and curious citizens of all gathered here in berlin for our conference on what they are. all the bit point at the revolution it's the first digital currency that's not owned or operated by any sort of bank it's guaranteed payments without a middleman you can buy it with the real currency and online exchanges and that's an extract of option for those who think that today's financial system is in fact mean of an overhaul as people see how big coin is used online and they see the advantages the use and transfer of funds the security not having to see your personal data to make these transactions i think

a lot of people see these advantages they tell their friends they tell their coworkers they want and they tell the merchants that they do business with it and they expand the sphere of decline and that's a view that seems to be growing more popular nowhere is that more evident than right here in berlin in fact this neighborhood boast the highest concentration of businesses assuption the currency in the world it's growing list of bitcoin establishment includes a record shop upline store a boutique and this bar. and here are getting your hands on some big points while the digitally speaking and busier than ever instead of buying them from an online exchange you can use this big coin a.t.m. to trade your euro's into bitcoins and use that to buy your happy hour drink and i have four of course bitcoin isn't without risk and the past few weeks haven't been too kind to the cryptocurrency apple remove the last native bitcoin wallet application from its apps door and the currency saw its third mega crash in the

past few months when the largest bitcoin exchange stopped customer withdrawals because of a glitch in the software of course that led the currency to lose value by a stunning twenty percent just for a day but it's a sign that bitcoin may have a long way to go before it's a safe bet reporting in berlin for r.t. and to seek out from. berlin's there is then i said new york my mistake now this traffic we have many outstanding guest so it was difficult for us to make a best given the wealth of information delivered by our guests but we've done it with a compass that and we have three amazing clips through from economist paul craig roberts professor and not of money and investment banker chris whelan take a look. i started off by asking roberts if he thought the us whatever default on the debt obligations here's what he had to say. bill that would have thought because it can print the money right there you see that. the u.s.

it's debt isn't dollars so we can always pay a spot know all that money printing may cause inflation and so the real value of the bottom rate fall dramatically but there's no chance of them defaulting all or all the bonds the danger that the country face it. will the dollars exchanged our new collapse. lose its role as world reserve currency you see being the reserve currency is extremely important it means you can pay your bills simply by pretty money i mean other countries can do that and i sense that happen for the u.s. . so and so the power of the united states and its financial good cinema over the world depends on the dollar having this role but if they keep printing a thousand billion dollars every year to bail out the banks it's going to undermine

that role of the dial in exchange for the dollar collapse and the power of the united states will decline sharply so that's why what i think as the fed changing about quantitative easing. if it's not a really. causing the barracks to get well it's merely keeping them afloat that it's dealing with should close as. it's threatening the game will then the policy didn't make sense to go all the. way i don't needed to you are but i've been calling this out to interest several years now and they even noticed that it may have entered there may be saying well this would be a very serious situation that really were to go through a leader would be worse than the braintree over five years away from the panic of two thousand and eight which ushered in

a crisis deeper than anything we've seen since the great depression banks are back to making record profits and big bonuses are being handed out and i want to ask you do you think the u.s. banking system is safe today given what we know. can it's not it's not the look back at two thousand and six two thousand and six was a record year who would have thought that starting in two thousand and seven everything would start slowly and then and then like implode you know go down like that so you know it's a very misleading to look at these profitability measures when you take a lot of risk you know and it works out for you just like if you speed at ninety miles an hour as long as you don't crash you know you reach fast and your profits are magnified and all of that because you have very little base and but you're taking a lot of risks so we're all these profits there's a lot of risk. just spent the past a few minutes talking about how the irish banking executives they're being held

accountable for their actions during the housing bubble now in the u.s. the f.b.i. warned of an epidemic an epidemic of fraud in the housing market but as far back that was two thousand and four that's when they started warning about it and nothing's happened and in ireland it's occurred. just this past week u.s. nothing the question is do you think any american banking executives are going to be held accountable for what they've done during the financial crisis well no i mean timothy geithner the former treasury secretary and larry summers and others have basically said that you can't prosecute the heads of the big banks because it would be damaging to confidence they are afraid of systemic risk and all these other nonsensical concepts so i would doubt it also so much time has gone by and you've had some other changes in the regulatory world that it would be difficult to prosecute officers and directors of these banks and let's not forget citi group bob rubin whole cast of characters from the new york business community all of whom

presided over the world to believe the collapse of that bank and nothing was done so i wouldn't hold your breath. that was the best of the week for boom bust and now it's time for in the margin. the margins time with the one the only mr harrison now every friday at harrison and i put you the viewer in the driver's seat letting you steer the show with your comments questions and concerns all sent to us through out the week via twitter you tube and facebook whatever social media of them you know now our first comment is from her. i think that's a word i'm not sure. who wrote the response to thursday's episode with the honest vera fokus and mike shylock he writes any improvement in the greek economy is

a dead cat bounce recent lost their sovereignty and the euro has trapped their economy like a mouse in a cage this dead cat and mouse game is not amusing to the greek people please read the a.p. story greek seaside town highlights unemployment drama by nicholas fighting this fight is published this week greek labor costs in euro are much higher compared with turkey and what do you think about this comment i mean it's it's insightful it was thoughtful but i heard you on a saying the exact same thing basically he was saying that you know this is just wishful thinking on the part of the europeans that anything is going to happen and it makes a lot of sense to me because i look at it is a big enough fact it's like you know it's a lot easier to have your economy grow two percent when it's already declaw and twenty five percent. in fact that's exactly what we've seen. in two thousand and thirteen was the sixth consecutive year of depression for greece. their economy

maybe three percent this past year and it's going to grow zero point six percent next year so when you look at that in the grand scheme of things when twenty percent of the people are unemployed sixty one point four percent of youth unemployment pulled the show. number two i mean it's all relative relative to the exact so the real question i think this is what the comment i was getting into is what's going to happen over the long term especially when you look at greek cost compared to turkish cost or he's basically saying is the euro is a straight jacket for greece the only way out is through internal devaluation the so-called you know collapsing of wages and prices and that's really a depression how much longer can that go on with this sort of like almost no growth situation with people protesting getting riled up about what do you think. they're wrong i think the ripple i think eventually you're going to see some serious political action. or other parties are going to get in there and we're

going to see. something different something always exciting drama definitely if nothing else now our next comment comes via you tube from iron rod rod writes in response to last friday's show featuring chris whelan and jen rogers he says quote free trade benefits the already advantaged in the case of t.t.p. the multinationals at the expense of everyone else read the open veins of latin america by a board of galleon know and understand how these ideas been used by developed countries to exploit others the secret t.t.p. has been written by the corporations for the corporations simple as that edge you believe that free trade agreements by design are developed to exploit certain countries. i mean that is already there. quite frankly is yes because you know let's go back to paul craig roberts he wrote this book about the decline of laissez faire the failure of laissez faire as what it was called and basically would have boils down to is is is corporatism. really

as its design today is really about the vested interests of a larger organization does not like laissez faire in the sense of small little enterprises and competing and so forth it's really a fair. large corporations lobbying in washington d.c. getting what they want and getting that agenda both domestically and abroad and so abroad in terms of free trade the question is is how can we have some sort of arbitrage between the wages of american workers and the much lower wages of workers somewhere else maybe we should read out of the open veins of on american. goodness here's a thank you for your all the time we have for now but you can see all segments featured on today's show on youtube at youtube dot com slash boom bust we also love hearing from you so please check out our facebook page at facebook dot com slash boom bust r.t. you can also tweet us at erin aid at edward any of us from all of us here at boom bust thanks for watching see you next.

visit see you when you're in the arctic you have the entire world at your feet she looks like a fairly simple shit but really she's no symbol. and full of people able to have access to the nuclear icebreakers the real king here is that the polar bear and ice breakers come second not a single complex expedition to the arctic can be conducted with the russian nuclear

powered fleet of ice breakers we undertake a unique operation in. the northern sea route russia's arctic ice breakers. there is obviously more for the latest because it's pink. women wanted to avoid rape they really need to buy guns environ how to use them. this is the one that i want to go with them once again it's the feel of friends. women are definitely the target of the gun lobby and you don't kill them when the killing money but if somebody would you would piss with her. i'm noticing more and more if that's really scary marketing tactics which implies that women have some sort of moral obligation to own a gun to protect their family and young girls shoot out here too so we do have a pink or. more kids young kids choke on food than are killed by firearms if

being armed made us safer in america we should be the safest nation on earth were clearly not the safest. cholesterol is depression. these are three three words. and you prove you are lying. are you see. form those threats of. branding you only see.

denied care every minute counts for pilots in the u.s. jail as the prison refuses medical assistance to the critically ill and maids or is he talks to his wife and daughter. in. the red machine this time with team usa in one of the most eagerly anticipated hockey matches of the winter olympics as gold and silver in the men's one thousand meter short track events. and also dive into softies night life with r t as we go through a myriad of entertainments and playing music to satisfy even the most picky traveler. and the sliding scale of just this we find out how in the same crime can get some time behind.