It’s A Depression Alright
1,262 ViewsHere is the Depression in pictures (graphs), proof positive that this isn’t a recession and that “green shoots” are more bullshit being spoonfed to gullible minds.
It’s a Depression alrightTo sum up, globally we are tracking or doing even worse than the Great Depression, whether the metric is industrial production, exports or equity valuations. Focusing on the US causes one to minimise this alarming fact. The “Great Recession” label may turn out to be too optimistic. This is a Depression-sized event.
Review (all) of the graphs on the link above. Then please reread “After Christmas Horrors” from 2008 for a reminder of what needs to be done on a personal level.
I predicted this depression years ago, from a blog entry in 2007 on “Collapse Science“:
The American economy is in shambles, despite the false forecasting and numbers being portrayed by the U.S. government. The growing deficit and excessive spending of fiat money has left millions of Americans very poor. More money is now spent on “defense” then all other countries in the world, while several million Americans are homeless each night and over two million are locked up. An accounting for this malfeasance is grossly overdue and will result in a severe depression as the money supply dries up and/or revolution when Americans finally declare “enough is enough” of reckless spending and irresponsible government. The American political landscape is a disgusting mess and is taking no action to address these problems, and proposes to worsen in the next (s)election.
More from 2007:
Our priorities must change, experts are predicting a major economic depression that will rival the 1930’s. Personally, I think it will be worse then this because there are many issues of convergence that are coming to a head all at the same time.
As they say, the proof is in the pudding, and the graphs charting the global collapse are factual evidence that we are still a long ways away from rock bottom, but importantly, that is exactly where we are headed.
The writing was on the wall (on this blog) in 2006 in fact, and now here we are, headed down the steep side of the cliff.
A caller the other day asked me where she should “put her money”. I am NOT a financial advisor and do not accept any responsibility for where or how you spend your money. But if you do have money to ‘invest’ or need to spend, then it is very important that you don’t hesitate on getting this done. I can just imagine how worthless “dollars” are going to be in the future.
June 20th, 2009 at 11:07 am
Most I’m sure are aware of the idiotic movies playing to Christian fears of the apocalypse. These movies (and books) are loosely categorized as the “Left Behind” series - and I hate to say it, but there are fanatics who believe all this garbage.
The point of this post is not to disparage those folks - they are foolish enough on their own. My point however is that the demographics of the worldwide depression should be characterized as the “Left Behind” depression.
Why? It is know to me and others that the corporations who run our lives are increasingly excluding the bottom half of Americans from their financial caluculations related to consumption and demand. Effectively, the global corporate hegemony has written off 50% of the American public. As I’ve written before, the bottom half will not recover. We are seeing the “Brazilianization” of the American economy. Brazil has an extremely properous top 2% while the bottom 50% live in squalor and filth.
This “Left Behind” phenomenon has been on-going since the early 80s when Reagan declared war on the Middle Class. Didn’t hear about that? Well it was not formalized, but the tax cuts and spending patterns of the Reagan years were directed at subsidizing the rich at the expense of the middle class (tax cuts for the rich and social safety nets cut for everyone else, deficit spending propping up the military, the middle class paying the interest on the national debt). These patterns remain today and are evident in the appropriations bill that recently passed Congress for Obomba’s “War on Terror” and the current debate on healthcare, which is to say, “we’re going to raise your taxes, mandate that each of you buy insurance from private insurance companies, and take the tax money and spend it, not on healthcare, but on wars and imperial adventures for mineral extraction.” In effect, this has created a growing and permanent underclass - and I would designate it as the “Left Behind” segment of our society.
There is nothing that will bring it back. We are going to continue to see this kind of downward spiral until demand is reduced to the upper half of our society. The bottom half will be dispossessed, homeless, hungry, and dangerous.
Large swatches of our cities will become wastelands and no-man lands. Think of Detroit, but on a national scale.
The “markets” will return once this shakeout bottoms out - could be by the middle of next year - possibly longer - five years or so. The next shakeout will be the result of oil depletion. This will take out another 20% or so, perhaps more.
Please note that the upper 5% and definitely the upper 1%, the ones the media worships in their daily coverage (see Fortune 500 richest Americans, ad nauseum), will be relatively unscathed by any of this. From this group will come the warlords of the future - the ones that will command mercenary armies that will war against each other (and any survivors such as us) in the post-collapse world.
Not a pretty picture.
June 20th, 2009 at 5:18 pm
Well stated, logrithmic.
Anyone else seeing friends, relatives, etc., being forced to take major pay cuts? I’m seeing it and it’s spreading fast. Probably better than losing the job, but it’s the future for every 9-to-5′er.