How do you feel about a potential 2 Trillion deficit for 2009? For my own country, Canada, we're looking at something like 40 Billion, which equates to about 400 billion if we were as big as the US. Lots of money to have on the credit card.
Keltoi
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rid of Nixon but set the stage for more crap to happen...then there was Reagen (sp) when we were getting ready to move...then Clinton got us back in the Black but got caught..not anything to do with money...just a freaking B J and I hear Hillery cleaned his clock for that.
Then a fucking WAR with an idiot at the helm for two bloody terms...How do I Feel? I feel sad and PISSED OFF!!! I hope my grand kids great great Grand Children have good jobs and can do something to fix this after they learn English and forget Chinese.
I wanna be just like Barbie....that Bitch has everything!
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prepared to live primitively in the woods when those who hold the debt come to cash in on it, lol.... Aren't they China and Russia? What's the collateral, anyways? Just potential incomes as tracked by SS #'s or did the dorks put up actual territory, etc?
Phhhlbt.......
Maybe I'll head to South America......lol
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All deficits mean that not enough money is coming in to pay for all the spending in a given time period, usually one year.
..... All surpluses mean that more income has been coming in than was paid out in that time period, usually one year. They may be used to reduce the debt.
..... The debt is increased by each deficit, and so do the penalty payments, called interest.
..... Obviously this is a matter of politics - to not tax enough, or even to give tax breaks, in order to get many more votes in the next election.
..... Large deficits mean large interest payments, again and again and again, each year. Inflation and loss of the value of the currency may not be noticed by most people at the time, but they are very important.
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We are spending money we borrow from China that
they got off our huge corporations who decided
factories in China would make them big bucks and
then forced us to have only Chinese made crap to
buy, none of which lasts or works properly. Now I
wonder where they expect us to come up with the
money to buy their products from. No middle class
no market, no economy to speak of.
Meanwhile the big bucks pays to have a government
that makes laws to make all of this legal. Meanwhile
no one can show what was done with the first $350
billion dollars, beyond resort trip, bonuses for the
people who destroyed the financial institutions and
paying for the Inaugural balls.
Blessed Be,
Christopher
Wisdom is what is left after you have done all the dumb stuff.
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The recession hurts China too, and maybe soon China, and other countries in Asia, will no longer lend as much money to the USA. Then what? Interest rates will go up, and up and up? The value of your money will deteriorate, causing prices of all imported goods to rise and rise? YOUR standard of living will have to be adjusted too! Good luck, you'll need it! LET FREEDOM REIGN! Even if it keeps hurting many? LET MISERY REIGN TOO?
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I have been preparing for this for several years now.
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January 28 2009, 8:50 PM
QUITTNER,
I have watched this for several years and
acted where I could to protect myself from
sudden inflation. I am buying a few things
that i will need in the future now before they
go up in price. Those things will go up in price
should I have need to resell them some day.
I have no debts, never got into the credit and
avoid bills. What I have I own free and clear.
Not much one can do about government, though
I do what I can. mainly it is a matter of taking
steps to protect oneself as best as possible. meanwhile
I don't expect any major improvement in the economy for
several years if we are lucky.
Anyone working job should be considering how long
they could survive if their job came to an end. There is
no real job security, no matter what company one works
for our how high up one is short of the top few that have
golden parachutes.
They should work to get rid of any debt and get rid of credit
cards. It would be wise the cut expenses and need as
far as possible since all those things are likely to go up
in price.
I already produce most of my own electricity through
solar panels as utilities will go through the roof.
Blessed Be,
Christopher
Wisdom is what is left after you have done all the dumb stuff.
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I hope you realize how very lucky you and yours are! But there are very many out there who are in misery now, and many more will be, as more and more people will lose their jobs or other income. Then what will they do?
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I hear that from some of my friends with small businesses
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January 31 2009, 4:53 PM
QUITTNER,
Of course we are only into our second year of this
recession and there is no way to determine how bad
and how long it may get.
As for what others will do. I would imagine they will
have to figure that out for themselves, as my grand
parents did for the Great Depression. After all giving
up is not really a good survival plan.
A lot may depend on if they have family, friends, or neighbors
that can help or share what they have. A lot are going
to have to unlaod a lot of their possesions that they
no longer can afford to pay payments on. There is going
to be a lot of pain and frustration, anger and depression.
But as depressions and recessions happen fairly often. It
should always be in the back of people's mind what they
can do if their job or business disappears. Remember that
recession is just a nicer sounding word we made up so we
would not have to say depression. And we held off saying
recesion. calling it a ecconimic downturn to keep from
saying the R word. If we were honest we would still call it a
depression and stop the game playing.
But without exception every boom ends in a bust, so we should
not be so surpised when the boom collapses as it always does.
In fact it is the free and easy spending of a boom period that
creates the situation for the bust.
I hope this one does not last too much longer because I am
afraid we have forgotten how to rely on ourselves. Long
enough and it might well affect me as well.
Blessed Be,
Christopher
Wisdom is what is left after you have done all the dumb stuff.
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It will get worse for a time, but eventually (when?) the bottom will be reached, and from then on things will get better, and better.
..... It seems that the economic/money system we have includes structural instability, with good times followed by bad times and vice versa. I am reminded of the biblical story of Joseph in Egypt who during the GOOD years saved up a lot of food that later on, during years of famine in other countries, helped him not only to provide enough food for his own country's population, but even to sell some food to others (at very high prices?).See
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_cycle
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kondratieff_Waves
..... also see some of the many references, further reading suggestions, and the external links listed.
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Interesting to hear Economists suggesting that we might have
no real recovery until 2012 at the earliest. So this may be one
for the record books. No sign of credit loosening up, no sign of
the housing market stabilizing and some states have as much as
10% unemployment and several have 7 to 8, to 9% unemployment
and still climbing.
Not to mention the number of states that are nearing bankruptcy.
For that matter our federal government would be considered
bankrupt if we were a third world country. China is making noises
about not buying any more of our government bonds.
So it becomes a matter of what is a good plan to keep oneself
afloat until this economy begins to turn around.
Blessed Be,
Christopher
Wisdom is what is left after you have done all the dumb stuff.
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Every time I hear economists talk on TV (besides that wonderful breath of fresh air Peter Schiff, who predicted ALL of this years ago), they talk about how positive actions (like saving) taken on an individual level can have a negative effect on a national level. "if everyone saves, then the economy will collapse"
How can such a system even exist? It's inherently unstable on the most basic moral and philosophical level. Individual vice for common good is a fallacy.
Unless of course we don't actually live in a "free" market system at all and haven't ever. When you look at the big picture, not as a capitalist system, but as a feudalist system, then it all makes perfect sense. We have a large number of consumers (serfs) who sacrifice on an individual level (spending beyond their means and suffering longterm consequences) so that the parasites on top (lords) reap the benefits.
The real tragedy is that people mistake this joke for capitalism.
Keltoi
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Considering the mess we are in, obviously it does
not work and it has not worked for a long time,
Look at the reoccurring depressions, now called
recessions and who knows what we will call it next.
Poor as I have been I have only rarely been in debt.
I cannot believe that paying more than something
costs is a good thing, which is what credit is. half of our
American Gross National Product is the credit cost that
supports this system.
I just cannot but wonder is how people get sold this idea
lock, stock, and barrow for so long.
Blessed Be,
Christopher
Wisdom is what is left after you have done all the dumb stuff.
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The system has been developed over centuries, and if most people "play" by the rules, then it works, even works well.
.... But recently things went wrong.
1) In order to lower their prices, firms relocated operations to Asia where employees accepted (much?) lower pay, so that the prices of the products are (much?) lower than those of competing firms here. Then they sell them here.
2) People buy goods of similar quality that are less expensive, so that mainly goods made in Asia will be bought, rather than goods produced here.
3) That means that local factories will have to lay off employees, more and more until, hopefully, people will again buy mainly locally-produced goods, if ever.
4) People who have lost their jobs will buy less, making things even worse locally.
5) The various governments provide a lot of (borrowed plus taxpayers') money in an attempt to keep firms afload (read: keeping their employees employed), and to get more local people to buy more. Buy what? More goods made in Asia?
6) That Band-Aid help isn't enough. The basic reason of people NOT buying local stuff is not being addressed.
7) That problem with credit is caused by debtors not being able to pay on time every time what they agreed to pay. Probably because they lost their jobs. Why? See above.
8) Credit is more difficult to get because lenders do want their money back as agreed, and many borrowers may be still employed now, but for how much longer? Then they too will not be able to pay what they owe on time every time.
9) Governments buying bad debts must expect no repayments, ever - This is equivalent to having the taxpayers pay the debts instead of those who at one time had agreed to pay them.
10) Borrowing by governments is expensive, and the interest on the much too high national debt, and other debts, payable is already much too high. If and when interest rates will get higher, the debt charges will get even higher still. Maybe all lenders soon will require higher interest rates! Beware of the coming inflation! Inflation is equivalent to a tax on savings.
11) Printing money, too much money, is very dangerous - Read up what happened in Europe financially during the early 1920 when interest rates went up, and up, and up! Compare with the finances in modern Zimbabwe, in Africa, too!
12) As people lose their jobs, they need money to live on nevertheless. So they pull out money from their reserves, such as the stock market. It is quite normal for prices to get lower and lower if more people want to sell than want to buy.
Then their savings get lower and lower. If they want to sell their homes, then, similarly, the prices of homes will get lower and lower.
13) The market does what is quite normal, the system will work if most people would obey the rules.
14) Out of work? Move to Asia!
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