Quote from Scataphagos:
(Excerpt)
"... Next year state budgets will have depleted their initial rescue dollars. Absent another rescue plan, they will have no choice but to slash spending, raise taxes, or both. State and local governments, representing about 15% of the economy, are beginning the worst contraction in postwar history amid a deficit of $166 billion for fiscal 2010, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, and a gap of $350 billion in fiscal 2011.
Households overburdened with historic levels of debt will also be saving more. The savings rate has already jumped to almost 7% of after-tax income from 0% in 2007, and it is still going up. Every dollar of saving comes out of consumption. Since consumer spending is the economy's main driver, we are going to have a weak consumer sector and many businesses simply won't have the means or the need to hire employees. After the 1990-91 recessions, consumers went out and bought houses, cars and other expensive goods. This time, the combination of a weak job picture and a severe credit crunch means that people won't be able to get the financing for big expenditures, and those who can borrow will be reluctant to do so. The paycheck has returned as the primary source of spending.
This process is nowhere near complete and, until it is, the economy will barely grow if it does at all, and it may well oscillate between sluggish growth and modest decline for the next several years until the rebalancing of excessive debt has been completed. Until then, the economy will be deprived of adequate profits and cash flow, and businesses will not start to hire nor race to make capital expenditures when they have vast idle capacity...."
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I believe it's "worse than Zukerman thinks"...
The middle-class wage jobs we've lost to low labor cost countries will never, NEVER have the chance of returning to America until either (2) US implements strong protectionist policies... which will piss-off our trading partners... the ones we're dependent upon to buy our bloated debt, or (2) the $USD is devalued ENOUGH so that US workers are competitive with low-labor cost countries... BUT THAT WOULD MEAN BANKRUPTCY FOR NEARLY ALL AMERICANS...
No genuine relief in sight AT LEAST until the Boomers die off... 30-40 years?
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Robert Rodriguez has it together....
http://zerohedge.blogspot.com/2009/07/robert-rodriguez-there-is-no-god-given.html
This is worth listening to.....
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The major point being that although one can think of solutions that will work....it does not mean in any way that they will actually be utilized....particularly by a flawed political/corp. system....
One must become very very independent....