by k_semler » Tue 30 Nov 2004, 17:40:54
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Madpaddy', 'K')_semler,
Funny how everyones experience everywhere is of higher prices and less disposable income but the business pages keep telling us we are booming like never before.
As a slogan in postwar Britain went "you've never had it so good" and I think that was shortly before the botched Suez crisis. Correct me if I'm wrong any Brits out there.
Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity are also emitting this corporate line too. Seems like doublethink to me. Even though you see the profit margin falling, and hiring grinding to a halt, which makes it very obvious that at least a recession is at hand. We are also producing more goods than the year before with more efficiency, we also recently had the busiest travel season since 9/11, which signifies a good economy. Since -1+1=0, does this mean that there has been no change in the economy? This would equate to stagnation, and with rising costs of consumer goods due to rising fuel costs, inflation is also occurring.
Hmm, it seems that we have a situation of both a stagnant economy, as well as inflating prices. As you know, when these two items are combined, it forms a unique economic situation known as "stagflation". It appears that the 70's are repeating themselves again. Unfortunately, this is no artificially created shortage caused by OPEC, it is a shortage created by man's greed, as well as the limits of nature. We are now presented with two choices: we can adjust our economy to compensate for the energy that is now at least at a plateau, (if not declining), or we can continue on as we were with reckless disregard to the future of our race.
At the least, we are experiencing stagflation which will soon devolve into a full blown recession. After a recession a depression is imminent, and after depression a collapse follows. It appears that we have started on this slide. There is very little time to prepare, any further delay will only lessen your personal chance for survival. Before, the worry was about the survival of industrial society, now it has become more personal. I really did not expect the recession to take hold so fast. I am not even close to ready to deal with it. Maybe 08/04/04 really was the peak, when Saudi Arabia announced that it had "no excess capacity" to extract crude oil?
Here Lies the United States Of America.
July 04, 1776 - June 23 2005
Epitaph: "The Experiment Is Over."
Rest In Peace.
Eminent Domain Was The Murderer.