The only thing keeping us out of another GD is the fact that so many people are employed by the gov't or pseudo-gov't like teaching. When things get rough, the gov't just prints money, raises taxes, or both. If gov't was run like a private business, it would have had to shed hundreds of thousands of workers, abrogate ridiculous pensions, cut back on health insurance, and the unemployment rate would be 20%.
There is no free lunch though. The result of this time may not be grandpa selling apples on a street corner or The Grapes of Wrath, but it will be bad - probably some sort of run on gov't debt and a collapse in the currency.