Recession or depression?

Supernova wrote:Which would you say we are currently in and have been in for quite some time?

A lot of people say depression, and I'd be inclined to agree, except I'd hate to think THIS is as bad as it could get and then the bottom really falls out from under us.

Shale wrote:While not as fast and as devastating as the Black Thursday of 1929 that launched the Great Depression, this so called 'Great Recession' is on the brink of becoming another worldwide depression.

We never learned our lesson from the last one. We allowed the monied-interests and banks to play havoc in the stock market and housing market during a great boom and regulation did not keep up with the computerized age - then the inevitable paper fantasy came crashing down.

Now, just like the last Depression, everything is slowing, which causes greater slowing until eventually it will stop as it did before. Look around you. It is depressing to see the empty storefronts in my city. Even the big national chains are cutting back and hardly staying solvent for lack of business - because all those little guys have quit buying. There are many ppl who have been unemployed for over a year or two years now and the prospect of finding a job as even more ppl are losing theirs gets ever harder.

So, I think the commentators and gov't officials are afraid to call it what it is, or at least fast becoming but it may soon be called the Second Great Depression.

Shale wrote:While not as fast and as devastating as the Black Thursday of 1929 that launched the Great Depression, this so called 'Great Recession' is on the brink of becoming another worldwide depression.

We never learned our lesson from the last one. We allowed the monied-interests and banks to play havoc in the stock market and housing market during a great boom and regulation did not keep up with the computerized age - then the inevitable paper fantasy came crashing down.

Now, just like the last Depression, everything is slowing, which causes greater slowing until eventually it will stop as it did before. Look around you. It is depressing to see the empty storefronts in my city. Even the big national chains are cutting back and hardly staying solvent for lack of business - because all those little guys have quit buying. There are many ppl who have been unemployed for over a year or two years now and the prospect of finding a job as even more ppl are losing theirs gets ever harder.

So, I think the commentators and gov't officials are afraid to call it what it is, or at least what it is fast becoming but it may soon be called the Second Great Depression.