US Economy Fucked?

stevejames

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What are the yanks' views on the US economy?

Here in the UK we keep being informed of how messed up the financial and housing markets are.

Is it really that bad?

Bear Stearns news seem to have focused everyones view somehwhat.
 

vindicator

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From $170 dollars a share to $2 a share today?!

Ya, that has got people going. A lot of people lost a LOT of money last week.
 

snevets

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This is the worse it has been since the depression of the 30's. Very similar characteristics in terms of where we were then and compare them to now. No one can say how stable the financial institutions are because no one knows what their assets are worth.
 

Mr Stiffy

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Thanks to Bush, the US Economy will be messed up for many years to come. 12 billion dollars every month to keep a war against Iraq going....what a waste and what's the real purpose of going to war anyways.....

The rest of the world knows America went to Iraq for their oil...nothing more, nothing less.
 

stevejames

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You tell us - any arbitrary European newspaper will have more on it than any of our own. The lack of raw coverage and abundance of economic sugarcoating here is pathetic.

No one really knows, the banks and financial institutions arent transparent enough.

We're just watching with interest as it will no doubt ripple on to us!
 

ballsaplenty2156

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After 8 years of the Bush administration, we'll be lucky to still be the United States in a year or two. He has driven the economy into the ground with his financial "wisdom". It's not the war in Iraq that's killing us, it's all the underhanded wheeling and dealing. The uber-rich keep getting richer at the expense of everyone else.
It feels like the Roman Empire, we're not necessarily being defeated by outside powers, but being slowly strangled by those within.
We've lost so much in the last 40-50 years, it is truly pathetic.
 

Mr Stiffy

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After 8 years of the Bush administration, we'll be lucky to still be the United States in a year or two. He has driven the economy into the ground with his financial "wisdom". It's not the war in Iraq that's killing us, it's all the underhanded wheeling and dealing. The uber-rich keep getting richer at the expense of everyone else.
It feels like the Roman Empire, we're not necessarily being defeated by outside powers, but being slowly strangled by those within.
We've lost so much in the last 40-50 years, it is truly pathetic.


It is gonna take a very, very long time to recover from this. I have to wonder how bad will the situation become for americans in the near future.
 

Jason

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We have as much news coverage on the US economy in the UK as is available in the US, if you care to read it or listen to it.

One sort of answer is that it is all so complicated that no short answer can be right.

Another is that the US economy if seen in isolation is sailing into a storm, but is not holed below the waterline. But the worry comes from elsewhere. The Eurozone economies are not getting a great deal of column inches at the moment, but there are enormous strains as individual Eurozone countries fail to meet their targets to keep the Euro in good health. In the UK we have an economy which is heading for problems. Plus strains in Asia. Any one of these problems could be solved, but all together is a different matter.

It's not the US economy that is fucked, it's all the world's economies.
 
D

deleted213967

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You guys go ahead with your discussion.

1. I still need a moment digesting the USD 7.7bn price tag of the lone Société Générale trader's 15 minutes of fame.

2. Then, I'll need another moment to comprehend the value proposition of a 5-diamond e-whore of the Spitzer kind.

Hopefully the updated edition of "Freakonomics" will include the answers.

P.S.: The US economy probably self-fucked, just like some lucky LPSG members.
 

vindicator

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I don't think people really realize the gravity of the current situation. This in many ways is a perfect storm and i'm not sure how the WORLD economy is going to deal with it. I'm beginning to worry about a worldwide economic collapse, similar to 1929 but on a larger scale.

Look at what has been happening. Since 2001 the US dollar has been dropping, and oil prices have gone up by like x4. At the same time, the trade deficit has ballooned and the country has been bleeding $$$. Not to mention a war now running in the trillions of dollars and a 9 trillion dollar debt. Mix in the sub prime mortgage fiasco with the scores of people having to leave there homes, and the devaluation of the people that do get to keep their homes, it is a recipe for total disaster.

In regards to the war... even if everything Bush said WAS true (which it wasn't), the government cannot continue financially to continue on this scale. I think there are real parallels to the Roman Empire who's downfall was overexerting itself.

I think it is only a mater of time until other countries are pulled into the wake since the world is now integrated more then ever.

They need to get some economists who REALLY know what they are doing to get out of this mess.
 

yhtang

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After 8 years of the Bush administration, we'll be lucky to still be the United States in a year or two. He has driven the economy into the ground with his financial "wisdom". It's not the war in Iraq that's killing us, it's all the underhanded wheeling and dealing. The uber-rich keep getting richer at the expense of everyone else.
It feels like the Roman Empire, we're not necessarily being defeated by outside powers, but being slowly strangled by those within.
We've lost so much in the last 40-50 years, it is truly pathetic.


To be fair, I do not believe Bush "thought up" all the financial policies that led to the state of US finances today. The policies did not help improve the country's circumstances, that was certain.

To quote, "After 8 years of Bush administration...," it is only fair to blame the people for voting him in again after the first 4 years - or, putting it another way, I have great respect for his publicity team for managing to get him the second 4 years.
 

B_Nick4444

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not as bad as it looks ... about 18 months ago, I was predicting a recession, because of the inverted yield curve we were seeing ... that it didn't happen, made me wonder why, and I speculated that it might have had something to do with the artificial liquidity afforded by the debt derivatives, and further made me wonder what would happen, should something happen there ... now we know ... the other thing that had me concerned was whether the Fed would keep interest rates high, to prop up the dollar, to keep the price of oil down, when what the economy needed was a lowering of interest rates ... fortunately, that is not happening ... what will result, is that the dollar will rise, as other central banks lower their rates ... so the US economy will recover ... along the way you will rising US corporate profits, etc, etc ... In short, I'm not losing sleep, especially since my favorite UK tie and suit manufacturers and merchants are lowering their prices to keep their American customers buying ... makes me proud to be an American ... think I'm gonna cry , right after I order this new 7-fold tie ...
 

transformer_99

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Like it always has been for jobs, plenty of problems and work to be done, everyone saying they have no money to fix it, that is until it's really critical to produce something that saves the day.

This mentality shows too, economically they lower interest rates, stock market jumps up & down a few hundred points during any given day, oil prices and gas going up. Same story there, people making money doing nothing of value except trading on good and bad news. They just don't realize that home prices haven't dropped enough to get the housing market back to normal. Incomes would have to double, maybe even triple to offset the inflation from 2000 to today. So the wealthy simply raise the price to sell what we already need/use. They don't have to do anything more than sell what your base needs are and they've got inflation covered, even the next record profit announcement we see ?
 

faceking

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This is the worse it has been since the depression of the 30's. Very similar characteristics in terms of where we were then and compare them to now. No one can say how stable the financial institutions are because no one knows what their assets are worth.


Sweet jesus... you couldn't be more wrong.


"No one can say how stable the financial institutions are because no one knows what their assets are worth."

Yer a hoot.
 

faceking

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not as bad as it looks ... about 18 months ago, I was predicting a recession, because of the inverted yield curve we were seeing ... that it didn't happen, made me wonder why, and I speculated that it might have had something to do with the artificial liquidity afforded by the debt derivatives, and further made me wonder what would happen, should something happen there ... now we know ... the other thing that had me concerned was whether the Fed would keep interest rates high, to prop up the dollar, to keep the price of oil down, when what the economy needed was a lowering of interest rates ... fortunately, that is not happening ... what will result, is that the dollar will rise, as other central banks lower their rates ... so the US economy will recover ... along the way you will rising US corporate profits, etc, etc ... In short, I'm not losing sleep, especially since my favorite UK tie and suit manufacturers and merchants are lowering their prices to keep their American customers buying ... makes me proud to be an American ... think I'm gonna cry , right after I order this new 7-fold tie ...

My lord, ... is there actually a few ppl here on LPSG that understand economics... and just don't throw out adjectives and terminology that they hurt themselves with...

Kudos.