[dissimulo]

There has been quite a bit of discussion about how the various economic problems we face will contribute to the debasement of the dollar and eventual economic collapse. I must admit that this is my biggest concern for the future - I see little possibility that we can avoid slipping into a depression.

However, while I may be among a large number of people on this site who believe this, it is still far from a mainstream point of view. That means the majority of people think the economy is going to chug right along without major problems for the foreseeable future.

So, I'm interested to see if I have really overlooked reasons to be more hopeful about the economy. Setting the consequences of peak oil aside, if you believe we will find a way to avoid a major depression in the US, how will we do that? How will we deal with inflation, the housing bubble, excess foreign holdings of our debt, and decreasing value of the dollar?

[Revi]

The whole economy may tank, but you don't necessarily have to go down with the ship. Pay off your debts asap. Shrink your car or move closer to work. Get a bicycle. Make you life so simple that the bigger economy doesn't matter to you. Gardens aren't going to stop growing. Sun keeps shining on the earth. 1000 watts per square meter. Capture it. Use it. Kick the fossil fuel habit and it doesn't matter so much what the bigger economy does. You are living in a different economy.

[MattSavinar]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Revi', 'T')he whole economy may tank, but you don't necessarily have to go down with the ship. Pay off your debts asap. Shrink your car or move closer to work. Get a bicycle. Make you life so simple that the bigger economy doesn't matter to you. Gardens aren't going to stop growing. Sun keeps shining on the earth. 1000 watts per square meter. Capture it. Use it. Kick the fossil fuel habit and it doesn't matter so much what the bigger economy does. You are living in a different economy.

[dissimulo]

I appreciate the responses, but these don't really answer the question I am trying to ask. I rank among the doomers and have been preparing for a major economic downturn. I am a prepper by nature and have arranged my finances conservatively, which should give me an edge in bad times. But, I am not asking how to prepare for bad times.

My question is: If the US economy is to survive just the non-PO problems we currently face (such as the consumer debt bubble, inflation, and the national debt) what will it take? What do all the people who believe that the US economy will survive in its current form think will happen? After all, most people who are not aware of peak oil are, at least to some degree, aware of our economic woes. Yet, most people don't see a crash coming. Therefore, there must at least be common arguments for how the US economy will survive these problems. What are they?

[grabby]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dissimulo', ' ')Setting the consequences of peak oil aside, if you believe we will find a way to avoid a major depression in the US, how will we do that? How will we deal with inflation, the housing bubble, excess foreign holdings of our debt, and decreasing value of the dollar?

[grabby]

We won't know how inflation is coming along now.

M3 is not reported anymore.

[grabby]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Revi', 'T')he whole economy may tank, but you don't necessarily have to go down with the ship. Pay off your debts asap. Shrink your car or move closer to work. Get a bicycle. Make you life so simple that the bigger economy doesn't matter to you. Gardens aren't going to stop growing. Sun keeps shining on the earth. 1000 watts per square meter. Capture it. Use it. Kick the fossil fuel habit and it doesn't matter so much what the bigger economy does. You are living in a different economy.

[jaws]

Slash government spending, raise interest rates.

[cube]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('grabby', '.')...
this is life, they need you little guys to buy their investments when they sell,
.....

[Dukat_Reloaded]

Don't forget the brokerage firms, financial instutions, the bank fees, taxes & stamp duty, they all take a cut of any of your profits your lucky to make, if you lose out, they still take their cut. Read over fancy leaflets selling financial seminars, buy the stocks they recommend after they have brought them themselves and they sell before telling you to sell, or they sell when they tell you to buy. You need to buy before a trend begins, because thats often when mum&dad investors jump in after the stock has gone up, and the savy bankers offload again and find new investments. "Pay off your debts asap", no have as much debt as possible on a variable fixed rate. Say you want to buy a property or some assets, find a cheap property which hasn't boubled up as much as all the others and get a loan afew months after the fed stops reporting m3 data (in about 9-12months time). Try and keep yourself employed as much as possible and wait for your pay to magically increase due to pricing pressures such as rents going up, food price going up, your employer will have to increase your pay to keep you and this is the time you almost get your house and your assets for free. You'll be paying off your house loan of 500,000 with a 10k weekly paypacket.

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dukat', ' ')Try and keep yourself employed as much as possible and wait for your pay to magically increase due to pricing pressures such as rents going up, food price going up, your employer will have to increase your pay to keep you .

[Revi]

The best investments you can make in my humble opinion are woodlots and solar panels. Both harvest sun and give you energy and warmth. What can go wrong with either of these? If you leave the woodlot alone, It'll grow and make more wood. If the value of it tanks from some real estate bubble, you let it grow some more, and cut firewood in the meantime. The solar panels are going to come in handy at some time. You can use them for any number of applications. They will even charge your transportation. We need to steer the US economy towards solar, but the people in power seem to be too dumb to get it. The Chinese will happily take our money for evacuated tube collectors, however.

[Daculling]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dukat', 'Y')ou'll be paying off your house loan of 500,000 with a 10k weekly paypacket.

[GoIllini]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dissimulo', 'T')here has been quite a bit of discussion about how the various economic problems we face will contribute to the debasement of the dollar and eventual economic collapse. I must admit that this is my biggest concern for the future - I see little possibility that we can avoid slipping into a depression.

However, while I may be among a large number of people on this site who believe this, it is still far from a mainstream point of view. That means the majority of people think the economy is going to chug right along without major problems for the foreseeable future.

So, I'm interested to see if I have really overlooked reasons to be more hopeful about the economy. Setting the consequences of peak oil aside, if you believe we will find a way to avoid a major depression in the US, how will we do that? How will we deal with inflation, the housing bubble, excess foreign holdings of our debt, and decreasing value of the dollar?

[GoIllini]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Daculling', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dukat', 'Y')ou'll be paying off your house loan of 500,000 with a 10k weekly paypacket.

[GoIllini]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('grabby', 'O')h by the way, many things have changed so we won't see the inflation effects.

the CPI (Consumer price index) has been changed several times so you don't see the effects of inflation, they took a whole slew of goods such as AVERAGED HOUSEING AVERAGED RENT etc (Notice the AVERAGE IN THERE?
it will be years before an average changes

[Revi]

There's a lot of opportunity out there for the individual investor, particularly if you know about Peak Oil. Things are going to change. Change could be to our favor if we move to the right place. Solar panels, wind, hydro all will be in better and better shape as the rest of the economy goes down. It's clear to me. Anything non fossil fueled good, fossil fuel bad. You can ride the oil companies or play the futures game, but in the medium to long term, even they are dead. Get with the new energy now, it'll be a better ride. The answer comes up every morning.

[DesertBear2]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('GoIllini', '
')It's very simple: hike interest rates up now

[MonteQuest]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dissimulo', ' ')Setting the consequences of peak oil aside, if you believe we will find a way to avoid a major depression in the US, how will we do that? How will we deal with inflation, the housing bubble, excess foreign holdings of our debt, and decreasing value of the dollar?

[DantesPeak]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MonteQuest', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dissimulo', ' ')Setting the consequences of peak oil aside, if you believe we will find a way to avoid a major depression in the US, how will we do that? How will we deal with inflation, the housing bubble, excess foreign holdings of our debt, and decreasing value of the dollar?