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Dec. 14, 2025 - Ron Paul Liberty Report
28:02
Unemployment Crisis 2025 Philip Patrick s Warning Signs to Watch

The unemployment crisis of 2025 is unfolding faster than most people realize. In this video, Philip Patrick breaks down the key warning signs you need to watch—from sudden layoffs and hiring freezes to automation, AI disruption, and tightening credit conditions.

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Global Reserve Shift? 00:05:19
We have the economist from the Birch Gold Group, Philip Patrick.
He's an expert on precious metals, and we will once again pick his brain and get him to answer all the questions that we have.
Philip, it's good to have you on the program again.
It's an honor.
Thank you for having me, Dr. Paul.
Very good.
You know, there's been a lot of gyrations going on, you know, in the markets.
Stocks are way up.
You know, I keep thinking about Mises' prediction of a crackup boom.
And some of that stuff is cracking up, but not quite what Mises predicts.
He says everything goes and everybody rushes out of money and they buy stuff no matter what.
But there are days, I imagine you've recognized them, where gold, boy, just look at what gold's doing.
You say, it can't be rational.
And yet I say to myself, but we predicted this.
People do about it.
Austrian economics taught this.
So it is believable.
It's still shocking.
And same way with silver.
Who would have ever thought?
Well, a lot of people have.
They thought about it.
They knew it could happen.
But then they still were shocked that it happened.
$60 for silver.
So there are a lot of gyrations.
But the big thing is, is we always talk about price of silver and precious metals and gold.
But we should always be talking about the value of the currency.
And the dollar is under siege and it's the reserve currency of the world and it makes a big difference.
And it's under an attack.
And this to me is very, very serious as far as things go because people work with the dollar and they have a unit of account.
And we have essentially a unit of account that's universal because we have the reserve currency of the world.
But the whole thing is the unit of account should be something you could define and be relatively stable, but not.
So we end up with statistics and telling us what's happening.
So I'm not surprised that it's difficult to figure out exactly what is the employment doing.
Sometimes we see it, oh, it looks like employment's fine.
And then you look at another spot, businesses are closing down and they don't coincide.
Do you have a thought on that, on why we might be getting these different statistics?
They don't seem to be conventional.
But one thing for sure, in my mind, we don't have a unit of account that we can depend on.
And that probably is at least a contribution to these discrepancies.
Yeah, I mean, I would agree with that vehemently.
First of all, when it comes to the dollar and global reserve currency status, I think it is long-term, not short-term, certainly under threat.
Dedollarization is happening actively around the globe.
And you can see why.
There was a belief in the 19, you know, as you know well, Dr. Paul, in the 1980s, gold was essentially the standard for global reserve.
It constituted 70% of global reserve currency status.
I think a belief was born then that government debt in general, and specifically U.S. government debt, was now risk-free.
And we saw this transition away from gold for central bank reserves towards debt and more specifically U.S. government debt.
That illusion has been shattered.
Forget the United States, debt to GDP amongst the West now averages about 110%.
So I think there has been a realization globally, and we're seeing a transition now away from dollars back to gold.
Gold became the number two global reserve asset last year.
It overtook the Euro.
I suspect over the next half decade to a decade, it could become the number one global reserve asset again.
When it comes to employment or unemployment, I should say, it's really confusing because we have a two-track job story.
On the surface, jobless claims today are very low.
It's about 191,000 people filed for unemployment at the end of November.
That's the lowest it's been since 2022.
So it tells us we don't have mass layoffs yet.
But underneath, hiring is starting to stall.
ADP say private sector payrolls fell by 32,000 in November.
It was the biggest drop in two years.
And small businesses are getting hit the hardest.
They shed about 120,000 jobs in a single month.
Unemployment overall is creeping up to about 4.4%.
So it's still historically low, but it's a four-year high and it's trending in the wrong direction.
So all in all, we're in a low-hire, low-fire economy.
Companies are afraid to hire, but also trying not to fire.
So I think this is the beginnings.
The engine is spluttering, if you will, especially for Main Street and working families.
So I think there's some potential bad news on the horizon, but just spluttering at the moment.
Very good.
The Currency Crisis 00:14:12
You know, one of the reasons why we have to be considering and seriously looking at the unit of account, the currency that is generally the most popular and being used as a reserve currency of the world.
And when you think about a unit of account, whether it's a unit of gold or silver or whatever, if it's not understandable and you can't define it, that leads to problems.
Because if you think about it, one half of our transaction is the monetary unit.
Most people just think of supply and demand of the product, and that is very important.
But it's also the supply and demand of the money.
And if you can't define the money, you have too many variables.
And then you get political power and control.
And it's been notoriously known that over the centuries, governments, kings, and whatever would want control of the money.
And then what did that lead to all the way back to Roma times?
They spend more because they're not held to a precise quality of the currency.
And then they go and they run up deficits.
And that I think is what's happening right now as we do it.
But the other thing that I think happens, Philip, is the fact that, you know, when it gets out of whack, when there's too much debt, and the other thing that happens during these times is what they call malinvestment.
You know, the people think, oh, there's savings out there.
There's money available.
Interest rates aren't 5%.
Now they're 3%.
It's a time to invest.
That information.
So that is lost.
So you have the malinvestment and the debt.
And we suffer from this.
And I'm convinced after looking at this for a year or two, is that the market is demanding that those discrepancies are solved.
They have to solve the problem.
To have good economic growth, you have to take the burden of debt off.
And already, I think we hear this, Philip, about how heavy this weight is on our debt of the $38 trillion plus the part that they don't count, readily count, because that takes it up to $100 trillion.
But that is a big, big burden.
But the market demands liquidation of debt to get growth again.
Even the changes that were falsely made, the malinvestment, which is part of the bubble system, I think that's what the challenge is.
And they always try to fix it without admitting that monetary issue is so important.
They say, oh, all we need is a new Fed chairman or something like that.
So I think they're not looking in the right place to solve our problems.
I mean, obviously, I couldn't agree more with that.
I mean, anybody who understands the history of currency understands very well that the history of currency is a history of destruction and devaluation.
There are no currencies that have thrived over very long periods of time.
They just don't work.
As you rightly point out, we've headed down a path over the last, well, really since the turn of the century, that every empire in history at some point will get to.
And that's when you run out of real money and you start creating money out of thin air and creating massive issues.
It happened to the Romans, the Habsburgs, the Ottomans, the British.
It happens every single time in history.
Talk about the crisis today.
It is the most predictable crisis ever.
You've had guys like Jim Rickards for 15 years saying gold will hit $10,000 an ounce.
His rationale was money printing, debt burden, and inflation or hyperinflation.
Everything he said was correct.
He was maybe 10 years early, but we're seeing it play out in front of us.
And the problem, as you mentioned, is, first of all, when you create money out of thin air, it encourages malinvestment.
It drives bubbles everywhere, which we're seeing all over the economy.
But the problem today is it's gotten to an almost unsolvable position, right?
We've got $38 trillion of debt that we've been able to amass because we've been viewed by such a low-risk borrower by the world for three quarters of a century.
We could borrow very cheaply.
The problem now is twofold.
One, the debt burden is too big.
Two, the world is realizing we're in an unsolvable position.
What I was saying is the problem today is the debt burden has gotten so big.
Debt service payments are now the second biggest item in the federal budget.
Second biggest expense after Social Security.
Debt service is now 1.13 trillion.
At least in the context of history, that is the death knell.
Ferguson's law, which has been true of every empire, is very simple.
When any great nation spends more on debt service than defense, the empires have collapsed historically.
So at least in the context of history, we're already at break point today.
You know, a lot of people say, well, inflation wouldn't be that bad.
And I'm talking about the increase in the supply of money and credit by the Federal Reserve or another central bank.
And that is artificial.
And the people suffer differently.
They claim that, well, if prices go up and grocery prices go up and their salaries go up, everybody's happy.
But it doesn't work that way.
Some people go, it goes down.
I think that ends up in statistics showing that why does one group benefit the other?
Because things aren't even.
They don't work with the same set of standards.
And it is something that.
But I think under the conditions we have today, when we have this artificialness in the monetary system, that the middle class suffers a lot in this and maybe the biggest losers.
But also, I think people don't realize that statistics are coming from the government.
And every once in a while you hear, oh, that statistic was delayed.
This catch, you know, it catches up.
So I put, I really carefully look at statistics and the arguments, politicians, or even especially maybe the central bank.
One time I was arguing with a chairman of the Federal Reserve, and I said, gold is money.
And they said, oh, no, that's not money anymore and that sort of thing.
And I said, but why do you keep it?
Why do you have so much gold?
Why do we hang on to the gold?
And they said, well, that's just tradition.
We do that.
I said, why don't you hold on to diamonds or something?
But anyway, right now I see gold coming back.
And I think a lot of people agree with us.
Even though gold was pretty well squelched on, people gave up on it.
We weren't even allowed to own it for 42 years.
And we didn't even revolt against that.
But those things are reversing right now.
And we are, and guess what?
Of interest.
So the liquidation of debt and cleansing all the mistakes made by low interest rates.
That's where they, and they're doing everything to prevent that.
That's why it isn't an argument of whether the Fed should control the interest rates and keep them low.
How much lower should it be?
It's always somebody wants a half a point and somebody else wants a whole point.
It's as if they can correct that by that method.
And that actually makes things worse.
And therefore, I see people suffering more than so than another group.
I think the middle class suffers.
Inflation of the money system is a tax.
And I think that we should give credit or understanding, at least, to the people who are saying the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.
And this type of system lends itself to that type of a problem.
I'm constantly agreeing with you, but it's because I am constantly agreeing with you.
So you're absolutely correct.
First of all, I was one of those people.
If you'd asked me about the turn of the century about gold, I was a banker at the time.
I was starting to believe it had become a relic.
It is very clear today that that is not the case.
The historical aberration was the climate from the 1970s up until today.
This is a reversion back to what has always been the historical norm, and that is sound money for global reserves.
In terms of wealth inequality, it's been fueled largely by money printing.
Scott Besson, our current Treasury Secretary, wrote a very interesting op-ed in the Wall Street Journal a couple of months ago, and he described very well how the Fed had fueled bubbles, essentially by keeping interest rates low and pumping massive amounts of money through the markets.
What that has the effect to do is inflate asset prices, right?
The first place huge stimulus goes is through financial markets.
So the first place to see inflation is in asset prices.
Well, the problem in the United States is 90% of assets, stocks, are owned by the top 10% of the population.
So what happens in reality is the top 10%, they get much, much, much richer.
And then as that money bleeds through into the broader economy, they have to pay a bit more for eggs, bread, and milk.
Well, the problem is the bottom 90% get no benefit from asset inflation.
They just have to bear the cost of higher prices for eggs, bread, and milk.
Since the 1970s, essentially since we've come off a gold standard, $50 trillion have disappeared from the bottom 50%, gone up to the top 10 and heavily weighted in the top one.
So they have, through policy, fueled massive wealth inequality in the United States.
The final thing you said, we are certainly seeing a reversion back now to sound money.
People are suffering.
It's a very tough position.
Yes, inflation's rising.
Yes, wages are rising.
Nowhere near as close to inflation.
So wages are just not keeping up.
And that's why people are feeling it.
That's why this economy is confusing.
Even the job numbers we discussed earlier, confusing, because a section of America is doing great, but most are not.
So yes, I welcome.
a move back to gold, but I do think that we're going to have to weather some very tough storms.
At the end of the day, the government cannot pay this debt traditionally.
The only way out of it is keep interest rates low, keep printing money and inflate the value of that debt away.
In history, it's been the only way to get out of a debt crunch like this.
I can't see another way out, which means a lot of people hurt short term or short to medium term to ultimately fix the problem.
So it's not a pretty situation, but I do welcome a reversion back to sound money because long term it's the only way to prevent these crises.
You know, too often, though, there's a bipartisan support for these efforts because take, for instance, you know, the foreign policy.
There's a lot of consumption of wealth and taking money out and sending it around the world.
And it doesn't seem to be much doing much good as far as I'm concerned.
When you think of how long was that war?
Oh, that was 10 years.
Oh, how long was it in Afghanistan?
Oh, that was 20 years.
On and on.
And both parties support that.
But I do think there's some awakening.
People are certain to wake up to this.
But this idea that you and I have just talked about is that some people benefit and the wealthy can benefit and middle class seems to pay this tax.
And that's going to generate hostilities.
And we already see it, the ugliness.
Even though they're supporting the same principle of monetary manipulation, they're arguing over my guy can run the Fed better than your guy can do it.
And we can manage this economy.
We just have to redistribute the wealth.
And they want more regulation.
But they're arguing the same system.
But it's understandable because that is what most of our universities have taught for decades.
And right now, though, it's available to a lot of people.
If they look around, if they want to know more about the Austrian School of Economics, there's an explanation about this.
And because I really worry about the violence that could come from it.
And we are seeing more violence in the streets.
And yet I think too often, even though they're fighting with each other, they're endorsing interventionism in foreign policy, interventionism in social policy, interventionism in spending and deficit.
And that has to change.
And it will eventually, unfortunately, by the market, because the market won't tolerate it.
The market will come down.
And some of those charts that I've looked at in the last couple of days, when you look at a gold chart, even though they can be predictable and anticipated, it's still amazing.
When you think about the gold up to $4,200 and every day going up.
But I do think that we're far better off than when we weren't even allowed to own gold.
And now they would be able to own gold and legalizing contracts.
And people have been able to protect themselves by owning gold.
Why Gold Will Rise 00:08:27
And that I think is helpful.
So the more people that understand this, if we really have a really bad, bad time from this and the correction, at least the more people who are protected, the better off we'll be.
Yes, without question.
So, you know, this is clearly not a Republican or Democrat issue.
It's on both sides of the aisle.
There is no desire at all to curb spending, right?
Listen, to get a handle on debt and deficit, we would have to cut 25% of spending across the board.
That means Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, defense spending.
There is no political will to do that.
And listen, I understand why.
It's not fair, right?
People have paid into Social Security for most of their adult lives.
It's a tough thing to do.
So, you know, my thought was this.
Of every president, at least in my lifetime, the one I would say who was not afraid to upset anybody was President Trump.
But even he won't make the very, very tough decisions for short-term pain, for long-term gain to get us out of this mess.
And my feeling is if he won't not willing to sort of frustrate people, I don't see any presidential candidate doing it.
So the concern that I have is we're going to continue down this path.
That being said, as you point out, gold's up 60% this year.
Silver's up almost 100% this year.
As you know very well, Dr. Paul, gold and silver don't really run like that typically.
But that in and itself should be very telling.
What we're seeing today is not a rally.
A rally is traders chasing momentum.
It's emotional.
It's profit-driven.
This is a structural shift.
Central banks are leading the way.
They are buying gold in record quantities.
They've set consecutive annual records since 22 for gold buying.
The biggest single fiscal quarter in world history for central banks was the last fiscal quarter.
It beat the previous record by 28%.
This is a structural shift happening.
And people have to understand something.
Gold is not like other assets.
If I invest in a company, that company is worth a multiple of its earnings.
Gold is not like that.
Gold has no top to its value because currency has no bottom.
Listen, in World War I, Germany, an ounce of gold was 142 German marks.
The Germans lose the war.
They print money to rebuild Europe under the Treaty of Versailles.
Hyperinflation takes a grip.
10 years after it's 142 German marks for an ounce of gold, it was 87 trillion German marks for an ounce of gold.
Now, obviously, that is an extreme example of hyperinflation, but it describes a point very clearly.
Gold is just a reflection of the value of currency.
As the value of currency goes down, gold will go up in that currency.
It's just how it works.
So you can see really aggressive moves from gold, and it's why I can expect it to continue to rise in this climate, because I expect those structural shifts will continue to happen.
Philip, you mentioned that you had a different type of job a couple of decades ago, which is fascinating because you have a different opinion.
Do you recall some economic happening that made you start thinking a little bit differently on this issue?
Because you seem to understand it very well right now.
And you're a key economist for a gold company.
So was there any one thing that prompted you to look at this a little differently?
Yeah, there absolutely was.
I was one of the few bankers.
I was at Citigroup at the time that survived the sort of culling after 2008.
I was in private banking at the time, and there wasn't huge layoffs there.
But it was really the global response to the crisis, right?
Stepping up, bailing out Lehman Brothers, massive stimulus.
Even as we pushed through, I started in precious metals in 2011.
Even as the economy was turning around, I was seeing a desire to keep rates low, to keep stimulating, and debt amassing at a massive pace.
For me, I felt like the problems would hit us sooner than they did.
But for me, it was inevitable that we would head in this direction.
It is ultimately what forced my hand.
I thought, look, what would be good for my clients and people moving forward?
And I started to believe, hey, we may see commodities, in particular precious metals, start to run quite aggressively.
Obviously, they did after 08.
So that was the catalyst to push me out of banking and into physical precious metals.
And I haven't looked back since.
You changed to honesty.
But, you know, you work with Birch Gold.
I'm a partner partnership and work with Birch Gold, trying to get as many people involved, you know, and protect it.
I think that's important.
Now, if you could take a minute or two and just tell our viewers what they can do or get some information, how they might be able to or want to make sure, because some people believe it's too complicated and gold is too high and this sort of thing.
But I think there's room for people to continue to think about trying to protect themselves with understanding gold better.
And I think you hit the nail on the head.
It's about understanding it better, because I think if everybody had our knowledge on precious metals, Dr. Paul, and your knowledge in particular, they would all own precious metals.
So that's why for us at Birch Birch, send me round the country.
I'm going to Arizona next week to a turning point event.
And my job and our job is to try and educate people on the why.
That being said, for your viewers, I'm encouraging them to text Ron to 989898.
Again, just text Ron to 989898.
All that is going to do is get them access to free information.
And we have a ton of it.
So we have a guide on how and why to invest in gold under a Trump administration.
So it looks at the current climate, the things that he's trying to do, and how gold will fit into that.
We have a series called The End of the Dollar Empire, not hoping for the end of the dollar empire, but suggesting how we can stop that.
But it goes back to the creation of the Federal Reserve.
I think there's seven or eight volumes.
Really educates people on sound money, how we got to the position we're in, because I think understanding history is really important.
We're also working on actually an educational course that customers can complete, learn a lot about precious metals.
There'll be tests involved and everything else.
Like I said, we have a belief at Birch that if everybody really understands what's going on, the solutions will present themselves.
So that's all we're asking.
Text Ron to 989898, get the information, read it, digest it.
And if from there they want to speak to us, we're here.
There's people like myself.
I can guide through, answer any questions, explain how it works in an IRA.
By the way, for those who think it's complicated, it is very simple.
We do all the heavy lifting.
And for those who think gold's too expensive today, I bring you back to the Weimar Republic.
There was a time where gold was 87 trillion German Reichmarks.
Once we understand the position that the dollar is in, we understand why gold can continue to go much, much higher.
So again, text Ron to 989898 and just get access to the information.
What you choose to do with it is down to you, but get the information, please.
Philip, great.
Appreciate that very much.
I want to thank you for being with us today, and I'm sure our viewers have benefited tremendously by turning in today.
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