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American Dream or Great Depression?

#61
Basshole said:
I don't live where a 2 bedroom costs 3/4 of a million, but I'm also not oblivious to the fact that some people do.

Where I live is not exactly your concern, and I wouldn't tell you where to live. However, in the NY metropolitan area, and in California, people need to earn a living congruent with their expenses...or should we, by your measure, just tell everyone to MOVE???

:rolleyes:
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I deleted my post after I realised that I had misread yours :D

I wouldn't tell them to move either. over time the housing will equalise in california and it won't be such an expensive place to live.

But yes if you don't make enough money to survive where you are living you NEED to move.

Personally before I would leach off society I would in fact move to a place I could afford to live before I would ever even think of trying to get food stamps or welfare. Those are meant as a last resort not something for people to live off so they can live in LA county
 
#62
jive1 said:
My theory is that since it's an election year, there will be alot of fear mongering going on. The economy is shambles, but our candidate can solve that.

Economy's go in cycles. In the 80s, there were double digit interest rates, yet the housing and lending market didn't completely collapse. I graduated from college into an economic recession and within 2-3 years I had more job offers than I knew what to do with. There were guys who went from rags to riches and back to rags from that tech-bubble era but there's alot of us that still have jobs and managed to buy houses in time for the housing boom. And who knows what will come next.

The US economy is very diversified, and because of that our average recession is 11 months long while periods of expansion are an average of 6 years. So looking at the last decade or so, there was a market boom led by tech that lasted about 5 years and then bursted into a recession that lasted about a year. Then there was a housing boom that lasted for about 5 years, and now we're seeing the bubble on that burst. So it's inevitable that the US will have a recession. It's how economic cycles work.

Don't let the fear mongerers make you stop working and investing during a down time, and don't get too caught up in the frenzy of a boom. It's those that keep a level head during either time that make it through.
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Well put.
 
#65
Well, one reason for the current state of affairs is that the Treasury is just keeping on to print more and more money. It started in '71 with the abolishment of the Bretton Woods agreement, when the dollar started to float and other countries started to use it as reserve currency. When the Eastern Bloc collapsed, huge mass of dollars flowed to the post-commie countries, again enabling to print dollars without any adverse effects. Now when the dollar has filled al available space in the world's economy, it starts to lose value. Well, China continues to buy dollars since it has huge dollar reserves and doesn't want them to lose value.
It's much more serious than the dot-com bubble, since it's a crisis of a global currency, not just a bunch of companies priced in a wrong way. Here in Israel the state bank interfered into the currency trade when the buck fell in price from 4 NIS down to 3.3-3.4 NIS - for the first time since the 80's. The interest rate is also extremely low. It all means that the forecasts could hardly get any more pessimistic.

I wouldn't say that the US economy's diversified. Come on, the automotive industry is crippled, the external debt is humongous and growing with each second. US clearly can't support themselves without the inflow of goods from outside. Sure thing, every country trades with others, but in the US' case the import/export ratio is close to ridiculous.
 
#66
69nites said:
first a quality butcher makes more than enough money to survive.

second of all he gets food cheap lowering his living cost.

now if a butcher were to apply for foodstamps something would be wrong in the world
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I want to disagree with you but I'm not 100% confident in my argument. I tend to think the gaint food chains have done away with classic butcher. I mean I have never seen a butcher before. Not to mention I have no idea where to get trained to be a butcher. Anyway, I was just playing a game and now want to continue.

Hair stylist
 
#68
there's a 3 butcher shops which I shop. I can't stand supermarket meat.

if you're a good hair stylist you make crazy good money.

for example I give a tip of 5 dollars for my haircut and it takes around 10 min.

just the tips that's 30 bucks an hour on me.
 
#69
The PBS news hour just reported that in their latest Consumer confidence survey, that 69% of those asked said they felt they had heard more negative reporting on the economy then at any time in their lives. Well I lived thru the late 70's and early 80's where we had 8% unemployment, 10% inflation, Gas rationing, and 15% interest rates.

If what where experiencing now is a recession (it's not, the economy is STILL growing just not as fast "as expected"), then the late 70's were the worst economic times in history. The only thing 28 million on food stamps means is that some politician just bought a lot of votes.:rolleyes:

As far as the "housing crisis", if the fed would get it's but out of everyones business. Housing prices, which have gotten absurd in some markets would come back down to needed earth. In the mean while if the housing prices in your neighborhood are too high, MOVE. I have turned down good paying jobs more then once because I knew the money wasn't really that much when you looked at the cost of living. That's just common sense.
 
#72
heroincredible said:
Yes, we are booming like crazy here, but I don't know anybody who gets paid $17-20/hour working at McDonalds. Most of my friends are making between $10-$15/hour working part-time jobs though and most of that is in sales. The problem is that finding a place to live is pretty expensive here, so most of the money is spent on rent.
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That was what a friend of mine that was working in Ft. McMurry told me, I am guessing that in towns like that it is really hard to find those people. I would not want to be buying a house in Calgary right now, I would rather pay for one in Toronto.

lowsound
 
#74
Brad Johnson said:
Does the stereotypical food stamp receipient even vote?
:rolleyes:
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Yes, but not near as much as the Stereotypical AARP member, the US government gives on the average, 27,000$ worth of benefits to every senior citizen. Or the average Farmer, The US Government just passed a 280 Billion dollars in farm subsidies. If anyone detects a pattern here please let me know. For the record the two segments of society that are currently seeing INCREASES in income are Farmers and Senior Citizens.
 
#75
burk48237 said:
Yes, but not near as much as the Stereotypical AARP member, the US government gives on the average, 27,000$ worth of benefits to every senior citizen. Or the average Farmer, The US Government just passed a 280 Billion dollars in farm subsidies. If anyone detects a pattern here please let me know. For the record the two segments of society that are currently seeing INCREASES in income are Farmers and Senior Citizens.
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Farmers income increasing? Well that is a laugh. I live in a farming community of 6000 and every single farmer that I know holds another job just so they can afford to farm. I don't know a single farmer that isn't hurting somehow. Might be different in the states, but it sucks for farmers here.

lowsound
 
#77
seventhson said:
Lou Dobbs has been talking about the erosion of the middle class for years now....and the bifurcation of America into an upper and lower class. Corporations have sold out our manufacturing capability and middle class for quick, short term profits.
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Here's a thought...If they keep dropping the prime rate down and continue to de-value the dollar, you may see more of those companies and their jobs coming back to the US as labor may be too expensive overseas to compete with what labor may wind up costing here with the dollar so weak. But they won't be paying the same wages as before they left, you can bet on that. )-(
 
#78
iamlowsound said:
Farmers income increasing? Well that is a laugh. I live in a farming community of 6000 and every single farmer that I know holds another job just so they can afford to farm. I don't know a single farmer that isn't hurting somehow. Might be different in the states, but it sucks for farmers here.

lowsound
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We have too many farmers in the U.S. Plain and simple. We need to somehow convince the rest of the world to use HFCS as the standard over sugar.
 
#80
ryco said:
Boy, around here the trades have really taken a tumble. Everyone's a little tense.

I work for a mason and this time of year we usually have five or six foundations getting ready to go. This spring they've all fallen through. Not very much work on the remodeling end of things either. After we finish these last two houses we're looking at a lull.

Maybe a good time to retire. Or maybe venture into the world of unemployment comp. Have never done it in my life, but am seriously considering it. Fortunately I have no big debts or payments.

One good benefit about the trades is you can always work on your own house when things get slow. YEAH RIGHT!
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Yeah, if you can afford to buy materials and keep eating and paying your utilities...)-(
 

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