If you doubt it, then look at the below graphs and news for a sobering reality. In another year, families will be diluting their milk with water. The lucky ones will be sleeping in homes with no heat, electricity or water. While the unlucky ones will be sleeping in railroad boxcars or on the streets in Obamavilles. Welcome to the Great Depression II. http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&q=lay offs&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&tab=wn
I'm at a loss to understand your extrapolation. I see two charts where the bear markets bottomed about the same point where we're at now. How and why are you extrapolating that this bear will continue on down to the great depression percentage levels? Looking at trend lines for all three (as one example) doesn't seem to give any indication that this bear will continue or reverse. Maybe there's a fundamentals issue that this market and the 1929 market have in common that the others don't?
The current market is accelerating as quickly to the downside as the Great Depression era market. The national debt has skyrocketed on a scale never before seen, unemployment is skyrocketing as well quickly to the upside, foreclosures are at a record pace etc etc etc. It wasnt this bad in the 1970s or during the tech crash. If you think and believe that 50% is the absolute floor then that is pure hope. Everyday I keep seeing more annoucements that another umpteen thousand are being layed off. I wouldnt be shocked to see that the floor might be at 80-90% down.