Just curious on what your opinion is on the recession in the US economy, and ideas on how to stop it.

What recession?

The economy is still growing, just at a slower rate than usual.

My opinion is that the economy is slowing due to speculation. "OMG we're gonna have a recession, let's sell all our stock"

I agree with the post above.
Speculation is what will kill the economy.

For example, over here, people speculated about Northern Rock, causing the first bank run for 100 years and the government to nationalise the bank

Whether we like to admit it or not, our economy steps on the back of the middle class and the poor. Both of these two groups buy a lot of $hit. When they are having trouble finding a job, or they have to take a job at minimum wage to feed their family, etc. This could ALSO slow the economy as well.

Business people are sometimes so short sided. What they really don't realize is that its in all of their best interests to pay workers as much as they can, because what you will have is a bunch of people with high salaries going out to eat more, buying more ipods, going on more trips, etc.

It also doesn't help the economy when the economic policies of recent years in the US have revolved around helping people who are already rich out the ass.

I think inflation is one of our largest worries in the US economy. Prices are rising and the value of the dollar went down extremely. This is not good!

Oh no. we are not in a recession. It doesn't exist!
War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is bliss.

It ain't rocket science morons.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7760821786905609611
http://goldprice.org/gold-price-history.html
http://silverprice.org/silver-price-history.html

I told all of you this a long time ago. But noooo. You don't want to listen.

Damned commies.
http://www.nationmakers.com/com_man.htm

From dictionary.com:

Recession - An extended decline in general business activity, typically two consecutive quarters of falling real gross national product.

We have not had ONE quarter of falling gross national product. By definition we are NOT in a recession.

You however, can define recession any way you choose and you can be completely convinced you are right. You would just be wrong.

I also find it interesting the the people calling names here don't even know what a recession is.

"The trouble with our liberal friends, is not that they are ignorant...it's just they know so much that isn't so" - Ronald Reagan

Oh - why do I bother - no one here listens to anyone. I'm avoiding the "real life" forum from now on. It's full of arrogant people who never consider other people's points of view with any respect. The name callers here are not worth the time to share opinions and discuss issues. See you in the other forums.

Get rid of bush and everything will fix itself...

Read the above communist manifesto. Since you didn't bother.
It's under the "Damned Commies" comment.

Someone needs to up their meds...

Most are worried about a prospect of a recession. The fact that you don't have one right now, doesn't mean that there will not be one.

Some parts of the country are a LOT worse than others. It's only a matter of time before the truth comes out and we learn just how bad it really is, regardless of how the republicans try to paint a rosy picture.

Go back to school, and get an education kid.



Explain what a Republican is, and what a Democrat is. Since you are sooooo much more knowledgable than the rest of us. Please inform us o glorious one, since you know what the difference is.

http://www.infowars.com/?p=696

Quit being so condescending. You're certainly not the smartest person on this forum so get off your high horse.


Nutjobs masquerading as Americans.

Democrats are just a necessary evil to babysit the republicans from outright destroying this country.

Maxintosh
When you here the stupid things people like JonTheSavage say on the web you really do wonder wether some people should be banned from the internet.

LOL I hear you loud and clear

I've always said that there really should be some sort of mandatory drug testing on the Internet

Without offering any speculation as to whether or not we are in a recession, I will offer my idea on how to get out of it:

Wait.

So when you get mad and loose an aguement you want to ban someone because you lost? Sounds childish.You resort to whining because you don't get your way. Did someone take your toy when you were little?So you can't explain either? ok. I will accept that as necesarry ignorance on your part.

Yeah, by the looks of it and the links that you've provided, it appears that you will accept almost anything that you read

Then prove me wrong instead of acting like the 16 year old that you are.

Prove you wrong? All you've said so far is a bunch of delusional psycho-babble

I'm glad we agree

perhaps.... stop spending so much on wars and weaponry?

just a thought.

Nope that won't work.... it makes too much sense

I third that!Haha totally. We can get much more done if we all work together, the only problem is that we dont WANT to work together.

A republican is a member of the Republican party and a democrat is a member of the Democratic party.

I think the real problem is the amount of people that are trying to equate whatever we're in right now to the Great Depression, because we're clearly nowhere near that situation. Speculation....

I don't quite know if the war is causing economic problems, but it certainly isn't helping our national debt. Not to say I approve of wasting money. And even if the large deficit spending might not be causing problems now, it will in the future.

It is the transfer of wealth out of the country. Like butter spread over too much bread, it becomes weak, and tasteless.They move more money offshore, then print more. So the dollar is worth less.You think you are a devine scientist. Do what you do best. Prove it. That is what science is based on. Or are you falling from your religion?

Try again. Many sources have long felt that we are currently in a recession like this article and this one, and today federal reserve chairman Ben Bernanke acknowledged that we are currently in a recession. Many other financial advisers have already said that it's even worse than that, and that within a year we will be in a full depression. Sticking your head in the sand is not going to make it go away, it's just going to make you look even more foolish when everyone sees just how much in denial you've been in once things get worse.

Agreed! Now if McCain becomes President, we will not have an economy after 10 years.

You mean McBush

The Media Plays a HUGE part in what happens in america. If the Media would say everything is cool and there is no spign of crappy money days ahead and blow it all out of proportion then all would be ok. Watch every day the stocks drop a few % O CRAP we are #*$ed. but when it goes up do they say o no all is well? NO There are far to many people that get scared of what CNN says and that in turn makes them stop and they tell 2 friends , and they tell 2 friends and so on.


Which also has a part in who our future president is going to be.

So if you had thousands of dollars wrapped up in certain stocks, and you heard that they were losing tons of money in those same certain stocks, you wouldn't try to save your money and remove it?

best time to buy a stock is when the price is low. if everyone did that, the economy would correct overnight

More proof of recession:

I'm pretty positive that we're are in a recession. Its a big deal yes, but nothing to freak out about. As long as we don't go into a full scale depression we're fine, unless you've lost your job

Around 2-3 weeks ago some analyst were on CNN/MSNBC and they all said that unless something 'drastic' happens that a depression will be unavoidable within the next year. After it hits it will take at least 5 years to recover from, and some people say it will take longer A recession is not fun, but a full fledged depression is downright scary when you hear stories of what the last one was like

The biggest problem is that if the US hits a recession or a depression, it will drag the UK down with it...

Yeah, we can cut interest rates but that'll do nothing if things are dire over the pond

It's not a recession, it's a correction.

Correction, it's a recession.

Boy, that's a depression.

I mean depressing.

And to think. This is just the beginning.
There are already people loosing homes, and living in tent cities. There will be rioting, food shortages, famine, you name it.

I'm glad I don't live in the city.

Tent cities? I think they call those trailer parks


That's speculative at best.

If you want to make a lot of money you can start printing up bumper stickers saying "I voted for bush and all I got was this lousy depression"

At least one Tent City is for real:



http://features.us.reuters.com/cover/news/...7-616F0DA5.html

I would not be surprised to see more of these either, the banks are not going to let people stay in homes without paying.

Very True...I don't know if I'm incorrect, but I feel like this year is a replay of 1928, I think things are going to get a lot worse before they get better. One interesting thing to note, gas in my town costs 4.14 a gallon (regular unleaded), and we have two refineries 20 miles or less away. The government continues to subsidize oil companies while at the same time Exxon Mobil is reporting the highest profits of any oil company...ever this last quarter.

People really need to wake up, for fellow American's out there, the government in this country is no longer serving its people, it has done an amazing job at helping fortune 500 companies. The only thing that really should have been added to the constitution is separation of corporation and state, this would have prevented the federal reserve from being able to be established, as well reduce the number of lobbyists, etc.

What did our founding fathers tell us to do when our own government is no longer serving the interests of the people?

I hope it wont come to that, but this is looking like a downward spiral, and quite frankly its freaking me out.

Wow I knew they were bad, but not that bad

Why hasn't this been on the news?

It is not all gloom and doom. We might even need a real economic downturn for real health. Continued cheapening of the dollar is not any solution.

I thought those hawking gold 7 years ago were idiots, but I could have made more buying something simple like that than doing the well considered stock purchases that I did make.

What we really need is the general population to get some good economic sense, and, unfortunately, it may require a real economic downturn to do that. Maybe a few less economic professors interested in the legalization of illegal drugs might also help (my personal college experience).

An idea: the insurance fallacy--that one can fix anything by "insuring" it. The only thing "insurance" creates is a false sense of security. The sooner everyone embrasses a lack of security the better. Growth requires risk--not blind risk, real knowledgable, thought out risk (good faith).

We hear how western companies are exploiting third world workers, but those who can offer employment are at least doing some good. If we are those who can do this good, we should do it--we should do it right.

My wife is reading about that fad of natural foods. One good point was about the conditions of farm animals. We perhaps thoughtless accept barbaric treatment of animals on factory farms, but one farmer decides to provide somewhat nicer accommodations for his dumb animals, and instead of his production decreasing, it increases.

I am really failing to find either "liberalism" or "conservativism" in today's world. I even think that to be truly liberal one must be conservative. There did seem to be a few truly liberal and conservative candidates--one who is part of an idiotic religion comes to mind. But maybe we deserve one of the three aliberal/unconservative idiots we are left with. 

Attacking corporations is as idiotic as attacking science. Our corporations are our people. Anyone in American can buy a vote in any of our public corporations. So, how in the world are you going to reduce lobbyists? I suppose you could start lobbying congress--oh no, that would actually increase them! Maybe you just want to get rid of certain lobbyist?

Restricting the freedom of speech is very probably a bad idea every time one wants to do it.

No it's not.


The poor can't.


Well for starters it should be law that politicians, or anyone associated with them cannot become lobbyist at any time.


No we want to get rid of ALL of them. There is no need for them.

Yes, they can. This poor person has.

What the hell dude, you are really filling words in my mouth. All I said was "separation of corporation and state" how is that restricting freedom of speech?Let me break down your statements:

1. Attacking corporations is as idiotic as attacking science:This is not true, corporations need to be controlled, because the end goal is pure profit, and whenever that is the end goal of any system, it needs to be kept in check, because often times personal profit comes at the expense of the overall well being of a society.Also, I was not even attacking corporations, I was merely suggesting that these corporations be separated from the government by making it extremely hard for corporate lobbyists, etc. to even exist. Many presidential candidates for example say things like "I want to be the CEO of the nation, run the US like a business" and that is a perfectly acceptable thing to say in our culture, but honestly its {censored}ed up, because what this means, is that the US will try to generate as much money as it can at any cost (even the well-being of its people), and especially in the last 8 years, what has happened? Somebody with huge business interests, used his position as the President of the united states, to help out his friends, and his previous ties to various corporations at the expense of the American people, this is a social injustice that must be corrected.

2. Our corporations are our people:

This statement is wrong in so many ways it makes me cringe. Corporations are NOT people, they are an organization of people. While legally they ARE a person, they are not IN REALITY a person. While I perfectly understand the motivation behind corporations, but they ARE NOT people, not by a long shot.

3. Anyone in America can buy a vote in any of our public corporations.:

This statement bleeds inequality when it comes to voting. That's like saying "when voting for president, any American can buy a vote toward any candidate they want". Do you know what the implication of this statement that you made is? It means that money is the ONLY thing that matters in making any kind of decision, this is not reality and I would be deeply saddened if it was. Even if one bought shares in a company, that does not translate to votes, it means you only vote one way, short term get rich quick cash. Many corporations are only thinking of next quarter's profits without any regard for the long term stability of the company, the well being of its employees (who are not an expense, but a resource), the well-being of the community at large, impact on other businesses (determining the job market for an entire region, etc.).

4. So, how in the world are you going to reduce lobbyists? I suppose you could start lobbying congress--oh no, that would actually increase them! Maybe you just want to get rid of certain lobbyist?

I don't actually know a perfect way to fix this problem, but a start would be conflict of interest laws, like "you cant lobby for corporations". The reason why I say this, is because the goal of corporations (specifically corporations) and government are different, but in recent years we are getting them confused.Government is supposed to be about increasing the well-being of all of its citizens, fixing social, structural problems with the society as a whole. To do this, this might actually involve making less money, which would be perfectly ok as long as everybody in the government is doing alright (being able to eat, pay the bills, work, rights, have fun etc.)Corporations are about making as much profit as possible at the expense of EVERYTHING ELSE. The implications for this way of thinking are troubling at best.

5. Restricting the freedom of speech is very probably a bad idea every time one wants to do it.

Don't try to say that this is what I advocate. I am an extreme advocate of freedom of speech. I feel like we don't have nearly enough. I also feel like the average citizen does not have an equal say in how our own society is run. It feels to me that in this country we have freedom of speech only if we have enough money to back ourselves up. Everybody needs an equal voice, thats all I am trying to say.

That would be a VERY good start

You are kidding yourself if you think you've influenced anything one way or the other.

Exxon Mobil is owned by Bush. If you buy gas from Exxon Mobil, you're funding terrorism.


That will never happen in a million years.