Scary Reality. Great Depression II Is Here

If anyone here thinks things won't be many times worse next year, and the year after, for the foreseeable future, then they simply aren't grounded in reality, or are speaking from an individual standpoint AND personally have much wealth.

1) Jobs

2) Credit

3) Asset values

4) Interest rates


Just take these four important metrics, with jobs being the most important, by a wide margin.

1 is bad and getting much worse.

2 is bad and getting much worse.

3 " " " " " ".

4 - What is the government going to do? Lower interest rates? They're already effectively 0.

In the meantime, banks have assets they repossessed long ago, but don't want to value now, and don't want to list for sale (because it will add downward price pressure to similar assets), so they just hang on to it. How is that going to resolve anything? Thank Geithner, Bernanke and Paulson for that, because TARP & TALF and all the other bullshit just gave banks that luxury at the expense of the taxpayers and future taxpayers.

We are in Kafka-like times.
 
Maybe this will begin a better trend in familial living style like the Asians have.

Instead of spending money in Warehousing parents ( grand parents ) in Stalinist "retirement homes", families will have the retired parents at home.

Instead of warehousing children in expensive sub-optimal child care, the parents ( or grand parents ) can baby sit the kids.


The biggest cost in this type of family unit is the arbitrary and excessive cost of health care. It's time for drug companies, Hospitals, Insurance Companies and Doctors to take a pay cut.


The current form of health care is a corporate con job on the middle class.



Quote from ER9:

i couldn't agree more. I have been having this exact same conversation over and over with friends of mine that are in general labor/construction trades.

We have noticed amoung ourselves that our fathers and our fathers, fathers could at one time work and manage to raise a family, own a house and car and still have enough left over for the occasional vacation from the mans job.

Just from observation (cant back it with technical facts) it seems our generation (40 ish year olds) have become the first that can no longer do these things. My friend a union member and in general construction, another that works for a local small factory made it clear that neither of them could even come close to those goals. One can not even afford to make vehicle payments and is forced to commute to work. Its stated they can barely afford to financially take care of themselves.

It frustrates them both to no end as both are bright men that simply prefer and enjoy physical labor over academia. Hardly a fault. I get the feeling its especially frustrating for both because they both make it clear theres no where to turn for help and there are no jobs to look to that could better their situation. I think this is devastating for grown men especially in a country as wealthy as ours....

We hear all these financial numbers spun on tv news and in economic reports but none of it means a damn thing because at the end of the day not only are there more jobless americans...our standard of living continues to erode and i am scared the next generation of young men will suffer a worse fate.

i dont tend to be a doomsday personality but when i hear how poor our general education system is (i live in los angeles, its pretty bad) and how poorly we attend to the future needs of the younger generation, i have really dire feelings about the next 10 or twenty years. I just dont see anyone in any office that has a chance to make change happen, watching out or focused on the longer term picture (20+ years from now) and trying to implement a comprehensive strategy of any kind. i honestly dont think there is anyone that has even envisioned and mapped out in detail a strategy for our future.

i read an interesting article recently that brought up an interesting point that maybe this is a time of transition when america reinvents itself and begins a new future phase of growth as we embrace and build the foundation as a leader in technology jobs. i hope so. A country full of pissed off, unemployed and desperate grown men will not be an enjoyable place to live.
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Quote from Arnie:

Think about all that has transpired over the last 2 years or so. Now look around you. Do you things really look any different? I know this is anecdotal, but I am not seeing anything close to what our parents (in my case) and grandparents went through in the '30's.
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Detroit looks alot worse for wear & tear than it did in the 1930s.

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Quote from peilthetraveler:

Detroit looks alot worse for wear & tear than it did in the 1930s.

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Detroit is an isolated example. A dying industry and stupid black people who would rather "keep it real" with a corrupt black mayor/council than elect people who could fix the problems.
 
I read a few great books recently, one was "The End of Work". It's about the jobless recoveries... the author is no genius really, he talks about the Hydrogen Economy.. that was a pipe dream.. otherwise it's a good read.. another one talked about cultures failing when they became too complex.. our credit crisis bears that out.. maybe we want to go to a lower and more robust state of organization? Currently we eat factory farmed food and distribute it via roads and whatnot... These unemployed and underemployed folk, many of them at least, could be growing massive amounts of food... factory farming is nowhere near as efficient as what can be done by hand on a small plot believe it or not, and on a small plot a person can grow stuff that is massively more nutritious than this fake shit we get in our supermarkets.. I've eaten organic legacy plants, believe me, I could feel the difference right off and I'm not prone to "placebo"...

So I can see two avenues of going to a lower state of organization and more robust culture, grow our own food and eat it /distribute it locally and stop borrowing to buy stuff we don't need.. another avenue is home schooling, the education from home schooling or Christian schools is far superior to the "factory farmed" shit we get from the public sector, if people are staying home and growing food maybe a massive exodus from the failed public education system can follow that... kids can get a great education in a couple of hours a day at home and have the rest of the day to get some exercise and have an actual childhood without the factory farmed socialist agenda being rammed into every orifice nearly... we could be better off eventually... I laugh at my wife because she watches Walton's reruns all the time but she might be leading the way really...
 
Quote from fkbsuhites:

Maybe this will begin a better trend in familial living style like the Asians have.

Instead of spending money in Warehousing parents ( grand parents ) in Stalinist "retirement homes", families will have the retired parents at home.

Instead of warehousing children in expensive sub-optimal child care, the parents ( or grand parents ) can baby sit the kids.


The biggest cost in this type of family unit is the arbitrary and excessive cost of health care. It's time for drug companies, Hospitals, Insurance Companies and Doctors to take a pay cut.


The current form of health care is a corporate con job on the middle class.
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our lives will definately change in ways we probably still cant even imagine....and by your example i think in alot of cases for the better. we will have no choice. we were allowed to be unrully children the past couple decades and to some that grew up in it young it became a way of life. it wont be easy but people will adjust. thats not my underlying fear for our immediate future. the lack of a comprehensive roadmap through it and beyond is....
 
Quote from Clubber Lang:

Detroit is an isolated example. A dying industry and stupid black people who would rather "keep it real" with a corrupt black mayor/council than elect people who could fix the problems.
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I'm not going to personally insult you, but I will say there are a few people here who seem to be in denial of the problems all around the nation, and that you're one of the few.

Check out Palm Beach, the Hamptoms, and even La Jolla (I just checked on La Jolla again, as I've been actively seeking to score a place there for 7 years now - I am patient, and usually ultimately prevail).

Things are a hell of a lot worse than your comments consistently imply or expressly state.
 
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