[alokin]

This is may be a bit far fetched, at least for the folks living in suburbs. They will eat potatoes and lettuce and the like and maybe some eggs if they can afford the feed, Sundays maybe meat.

I think that there will be a downturn but not from one day to the other. Even not in the US.

Try to start a community garden now!

[patience]

The FED has chosen to fuel the system with fiat, and throw the little folks under the oncoming train. So, we get inflation first, then contraction, the severity and timing of each yet to be determined.

Since the FED and the govt are bedfellows, TPTB will pull out all the stops to 1) keep it afloat until after 2008 elections, and 2) save the power structure.

So, I'm guessing (like everybody else) that except for a black swan, we get inflation this year, maybe 15% to 50%? The bigger the real number, the faster it falls apart. Once inflation goes to a point that other countries won't buy our debt, it's over for the US, unless other countries did it faster and further. To quote a Ticker Forum poster, "It's a race to the bottom, and the LAST one wins!"

I see 2008 as the unwinding, 25% inflation, and credit defaults going parabolic, as wages don't keep up. Toward the year's end, we had better have all our ducklings in a row and headed for shelter. Several analysts I've read are saying that finance can't keep the wheels on past Sept, 2008, probably based on the need to roll over commercial paper every 3 months, which brings business to a screeching halt. If so, then it will be a bleak New Year for most, as deflation hits with a vengenace.

When inflation has decimated the population, and credit is gone, we are at 1932, but without the huge % of self-reliant farmers we had then. Unemployment at 10% to 25% sometime in 2009, or sooner, if the FED can't hold it together.

SOMEBODY CONVINCE ME THAT I'M WRONG! Please.

[sciencegirl]

I say that by summer wheat will double in price from what it is now. Maybe some rolling black outs when too many people crank the AC. Also a stock market crash either 2008 or early 2009. Good times indeed, it's a good thing I have extra supplies.

[shortonoil]

patience said:

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')he FED has chosen to fuel the system with fiat, and throw the little folks under the oncoming train. So, we get inflation first, then contraction, the severity and timing of each yet to be determined.

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('shortonoil', '[')
Expect a complete economic/social collapse to be in full progress as early as the third quarter of ‘08.

[patience]

shorhonoil,
Yeah, I can see that . I was being conservative. Worst case, hell on earth. Best case, not much better. Crap. I really was hoping for a cornucopian to change my mind. This is gonna suck big time.

[Troyboy1208]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('alokin', 'T')his is may be a bit far fetched, at least for the folks living in suburbs. They will eat potatoes and lettuce and the like and maybe some eggs if they can afford the feed, Sundays maybe meat.

I think that there will be a downturn but not from one day to the other. Even not in the US.

Try to start a community garden now!

[patience]

Troyboy,
Yeah, c'mon over and sample my garden. I won't have to buy so much dog food after they eat you.

[gnm]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('shortonoil', 'T')he municipal bond market is now DOA. These bonds were meant to be rolled over, they were never meant to be paid off. As these $trillions come to maturity and the issuers begin defaulting, there will be a nation wide tsunami of bankruptcies develop. This will immediately bleed into the other multi $trillion arena, pension funds.

Expect a complete economic/social collapse to be in full progress as early as the third quarter of ‘08.

[lionstone]

http://ammunitiontogo.com/catalog1/inde ... rifle-ammo

I bought some super quiet ammo for the neighbors dog, or for troyboy. (Which ever comes first)

[aflurry]

OK,

This thread gave me an idea. Anyone know how we could do this? Maybe using Google Apps or something?

The board needs a predictions calendar that would allow people to post all their predictions, signed of course, and then be held accountable to them. You could schedule your prediction as close or far out as you want: a day, a month, a year, five years. But you wouldn't be able to edit or delete it once you had posted it. That way anytime someone starts mouthing off about market collapse, societal collapse, cannibalism, etc. We can say "Put it on the board. Put a date on it." There should be a daily headline showing each expiring prediction with the predictor's name visibly attached.

I would love to check in each morning and see each day's predictions held up to scrutiny. Some additional features would be a poll attached to each prediction that would open on it's expiry date, allowing people to vote on whether it came true or not (some predictions will be more complicated than a simple yes or no.) anyone who's predictions expire will generate a published Prediction Success Ratio (PSR) based on the results of this poll. That way, you can refer to anyone's PSR and get a bead on the predictor's relationship to sanity.

I'm just getting a little tired of all of the insane freakouts about how this or that bank-run or anarchy is going to happen with absolutely no accountability. There needs to be some way to force people to put some skin in the game.

Peak oil is a pretty scary thing. One thing I recall from the months after 9/11 is how the fear conjured up bizarre and ludicrous fantasies everywhere about the next terrorist attack that would dwarf 9/11. It's understandable, because fear destroys your equilibrium, but not desirable. I think the Peak Oil Prediction Accountability Calendar (POPAC) would serve as a reminder of how often people are wrong, and how much of a grain of salt we should take with every prediction.

[TheDude]

Tyler's right, threads go cannibal!

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Revi', 'T')hat's just my estimation. 2009 is when we fall off the plateau and oil production starts to slip. That's when the average guy can't afford to heat his house or drive around at all.

Joe Sixpack will have to drive something way smaller, if he can drive at all. We'll have to heat just a few rooms, and let the rest be cold all winter.

We may have to cut back on electricity use or get smart and change things so that we are using a lot less.

[patience]

gnm,
Yeah, the infrastructure thing has been bugging me, too. There are some road projects nearby that affect us, which I have been hoping will get done before it all falls apart. We're gonna need those roads in good shape, and that's not something individuals can do at this time. Later, yeah, we'll be on our own. If I gotta ride a bike to get somewhere, I want decent roads! And those projects could die quickly.

Thankfully, the city water project is done, replacing a spillway on the dam, and the lake is refilled. I worry next about the poorest people who are depending on handouts, and what their reactions are going to be when that stops.

My uncle taught his family to grow a wide variety in their gardens. He said that during the Depression, he had to live for a couple months on turnips, because that's all he had. Quote, "You can get real tired of turnips, three times a day....."

[patience]

aflurry,
We all have our skin in the real game. Predictions are best guesses, at best. Not worth getting too het-up about, to me anyway. I sorta do my own credibility checks, comparing what I know about, for reference, to what people say. It's not too hard to sort 'em out in general categories for my own purposes, but what you say has merit, and could be a useful tool!

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('patience', ' ')We're gonna need those roads in good shape, and that's not something individuals can do at this time.

[gnm]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ludi', 'O')ur roads here go to hell over the course of one year. Once maintenance ends, I expect our one-lane county road to turn to gravel in only a few years. State highways might last a little longer as they are slightly better made.

[shortonoil]

gnm said:

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'S')hort, good point on the muni bonds. Thats going to hit budgets on the local level all over the place. I don't see this being good for local level infrastructure maintenance either.

-G

[patience]

When my Dad was a young man, circa 1915, landowners were allowed to satisfy property taxes by giving some number of hours of labor on road maintenance. Dad helped build concrete bridges on county roads, worked at a quarry, and hired himself and a team of horses to the county for grading roads. I can see something like that coming round again, especially in rural areas, and maybe suburbia.

[Zardoz]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('shortonoil', '.')..We will see a shutdown of many essential services provided by local governments...

[Ferretlover]

Federal Government Works Progress Administration (WPA) 1935-1943
The Works Progress Administration (WPA) was instituted by presidential executive order under the Emergency Relief Appropriation Act of April 1935, to generate public jobs for the unemployed. The WPA was restructured in 1939 when it was reassigned to the Federal Works Agency.
By 1936 over 3.4 million people were employed on various WPA programs. Administered by Harry Hopkins and furnished with an original congressional allocation of $4.8 billion, the WPA made work accessible to the unemployed on an unparalleled scale by disbursing funds for an extensive array of programs. Hopkins argued that although the work relief program was more costly than direct relief payments, it was worth it. He averred, "Give a man a dole, and you save his body and destroy his spirit. Give him a job and you save both body and spirit."
While responsibility for such unemployable people as children, the elderly, and the handicapped was remanded to the states, the WPA provided literally millions of jobs to employable people, enrolling on average about two million a year during its eight-year stint. Far fewer women were enrolled than men. Just 13.5 percent of WPA employees were women in 1938, its top enrollment year. …
Gonna need a job?