BlSh This so called "depression" is no where near as bad as the '70's. I had friends living in their cars and going to soup lines back then. Its just different this time. Back then unemployment insurance was meager and short. Now, you have states like MA paying as high as $900/week. There is so much govmnt spending, even before the "stimulus". I know things are bad in places, but it's not like that everywhere. And that earlier post about DC and NOVA is true. That market has def bottomed out.
The so called "depression" has just begun. It's nowhere near as bad as it will be in a few years. Just give it time. In the 70s, higher education could at least set you apart from the crowd and land you a job that pays a living wage. Today, educated people are working at McDonalds and Walmart. Plenty of people are already living in their cars.
Go down to Florida or out to Nevada or California. There are tens of thousands living out of tents or their cars - in California, state workers are traveling to park and rides to tell people living out of their cars that their children still qualify for public schooling even though they are homeless. Have you seen the tent cities popping up in Stockton, Sacramento or in Florida? The real unemployment rate in the U.S., based on very credible data is 18.2% - even the government "official" stats puts the number of unemployed at an all time high. It's just begun. When you can tell me what companies will be hiring what workers and where, and in what industries, let alone how much they'll be paid and whether they'll have benefits, then you can credibly engage in the 'green shoot' parade. All these talking heads are full of shit. Show me a combination of even 0% mortgage rates, 75% off the price of a home or car, and a jobless person, and I'll show you no sale.
Your going to have to give it time, right now many are still using their credit cards and probably some of their HELOC if the banks didnt take that away from them, to continue to live comfortably or just about get by. Things will get worse and they know it, job creation is not going to happen, as I said a thousand times, the jobs created during the economic boom over the last 10-20 years will probably never be seen again. Do you have any idea the amount of jobs created between the dot com boom and housing boom alone. Since the start of this economic downturn the economy has lost over 6 MILLION jobs. Government spending can only push an economy so far. Seems the economy cant work its own way out of this recession so to prop up everything around us they have to pump trillions and trillions into the system.
have not posted here in a while.. but have to chime in on whole crisis thing.. in my opinion, this crisis is mostly wealthy people crisis, or upper middle class crisis. from my experience in NYC "buy side" and my current situation, i can confidently state that outside some obvious industries the people that are scared the most right now is south of NYC Greenwich, Westport etc. life as they knwo has ended. I have some anecdotal stories of people in my biz that are going through tough time having to live off $500k a year.. when they were used to 20 times that silly. overall, personally think the debacle we are going through right now is a great thing. my payroll has decreased significantly, i no longer have to deal with the cocky f***s that used to be a staple of my biz. on the competitor end, i get more leads for M&A business now that ever before and can cherry pick what i want. given the market that i operate in is currently considered one of the toughest in the world, yet it is not so bad here.. and YES you can easily get financing for car or a biz so long you are entering at the right price. anyway.. i think what is going on right now is great overall and definitely healthy. mk
I ultimately think it is healthy too....there was too much excess. I had a friend start a very simple business.....selling food in malls. he eventually ended up buying $4 million worth of houses, and two Bentleys....all to basically sell French Fries....granted they had a lot of stores, but they did not cure cancer.
Not everyone lived that way. In fact, most people didn't. It seems as though those who lived within their means are getting hit the hardest. They can't just declare bankruptcy and walk away like everybody else.
valuable opinion, but i would disagree.. i agree with the poster before this one. even though it is not the american way, but i feel one bit bad that some "real estate" entrepreneur got a few deals of and all of sudden he dons Trumps hairdo and feels he has to date a brazilian model true, most ops people that i knew in stamforf and NYC are laid off and it is tough for them, but they were doing a job that was not needed in the first place. they are hit hard, but i have a feeling that even those of them that have "smarts" will be fine. i.e. one such guy started shipping cars from US to europe and seems to be doing quite fine now. not bentley fine, but makes his fairfield, ct mortgage pmt easily. anyway, i think it is healthy, plenty of talent around to pick from and mostly it is free so long you got cash to put to work.
The point is more than a few people were grossly overpaid, for not really doing that much. Things are starting to arb back to normal, although things got a lot more expensive along the way. No chance in hell could I raise two kids on a $50k equivalent salary in Washington, DC.... like both sets of my grandparents did.