Economics and Investing:

Peter S. was the first of several readers to send this item: Over 100 Million Now Receiving Federal Welfare. Peter’s comment: “If true, then this is worse than I previously thought and feared in the US.  It is going to be ugly when the U.S. Dollar collapses…”

American Expatriate (“AmEx”) suggested this: Fed’s Fisher: Just Stop With the Easing

Reader B.B. sent this: US Dollar already went off a fiscal cliff – what does a falling dollar mean to US families? Masking de-leveraging via debt markets.

Coffematt forwarded this: Real recovery in home prices not expected until spring. JWR’s Comments: This is yet another bit of “Sunny Skies Ahead” Pollyanna nonsense. Even if there is a housing “recovery” it will be short-lived and artificial because it will spring from huge taxpayer-funded bailouts, monetization (“Quantitative Easing”) of the debt, and the wholly unrealistic Zero Interest Rate Policy (ZIRP) — none of which can go on indefinitely.

Items from The Economatrix:

Italian PM Warns of the Break-up of the Eurozone and the European Union

Eric Sprott:  Silver is Suppressed or it Would Be $150/oz

Greece Rating Outlook Cut to Negative By S&P as Economy Weakens

Gas Prices Set to Rise for Rest of 2012?