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So are we in a recession or not?
Recession highway sign
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About the author
Tess Vigeland is the host of Marketplace Money, where she takes a deep dive into why we do what we do with our money. Follow Tess on Twitter @radiotessPages
By F P
From Boston, MA, 11/13/2008
Go back to England, Ireland, or wherever else you came from. History tells us that only Native Americans were found on this soil!
in response to this comment:
I came from another country but I have degree and I work in the lab and pay taxes. maybe you do not have a job,lazy or you defend on gov. aid....
Who's to blame? Highly paid, high position of authority, trusted by others to make the right decision, High profile job, plenty of assets, many influential friends, can make lousy decisions and still be highly compensated while their area responsibility goes broke. Only those who are high on the corporate ladder and politicians do it over and over and get away with it.
It is sad to see the lack of oversight, in these government endorsed businesses; encouraged by skewed policy; preyed upon by get-rich-quickers, and neglected, in favor of watery-eyed hopes that the bull would never stop: the false promise of equity.
Indeed, this is a systemic failure, propagated by underhanded deals; a flighty and depressed public, with more speculation than anyone could ever shake a stick at
"It is recession when your neighbor loses their job, and depression when you lose yours."
Mr. Litwin has quite a point
First of all lets look at who got us into this mess to begin with. Our Government and their greed. Did you know that the President makes $400k a year with benefits for a lifetime, and our Representative and Senators make approx $188k a year with benefitsfor a lifetime. They get their annual cost of living increase automatically every year unless they decline it. Now stop and think. If the country goes into a recession or depression do you think they have to worry about losing their job, their home, their savings. Think again.And the funny thing is that they got all this by voting it for themselves. The american people had no say so.Our founding fathers would roll over in their graves if they saw what America has become today. We are right back in the same saddle that we ran from when we came to America to begin with. We are over taxed, people can make a living off the welfare system and never lift a finger towards the effort, Welfare has become a lifestyle, Employers don't value their employees, Employees inturn have poor work ethics because they are viewed as disposable, If you want to get rich quick - sue somebody, and if you don't feel like paying your bills just file bankruptcy, let everyone else cover it.
What needs to happen is that the American people need to take their country back. Government officials should not have life time benefits if the job ends then so does the paycheck just like everyone else. No rules or laws should be allowed to pass without the voice of the people. Send illegals home period. Force Big corporations to bring the jobs back home where they belong. Stop rewarding those too lazy to work.
America needs to wake up, get educated and put forth the hard work necessary to turn "Our country and future around"
Absolutely. I completely agree with your comments. It's time we clean house and commit to returning to the basics: live simple, eat to live (not the reverse) and the Gucci bags,ferrari and hollywood money can go towards investing in crop shortage, cleaning our air and water supply. Too drastic - no way - look where we are today!
We are in a recession because recession is a natural part of the economic life cycle our species has implemented for this planet. At some point, we have to pay to bill.
Nothing is free in life, but most people in the west still think that they are entitled to get more from the universe than they give; hence, the stock market phenomenon. Every Joe plays the market, now, with some high hopes of cashing in early and putting the struggle of life behind him forever. It's a lovely dream, but impractical as the backbone of a world economy. Somewhere, somehow, someone has to pay, someone has to actually do the work.
It's similar to those pyramid scams that swept through the Americans in the 1980s. If you got in and out early, you scored. The late comers ended up footing the bill for the few early winners.
The stock market is a glorified pyramid scam, as is the industry of credit.
Solution: Stop expecting to stop working. You're going to work until you can no longer get out of bed. Save money when you can, real money, stop buying needless crap, stop feeding an excess-consumption-based economy that relies on your over consumption simply to exist. You fat and unnecessary toys keep the current dysfunctional economy alive.
Instead, eat less, walk more, be grateful for whatever possessions you have, stop feeding the illusion with your compulsions for more and more and more. It's sickening, and we're all to blame.
I understand the importance of living within your means. I am a 28 year old woman, with a college degree, and a "corporate" job, at a respectable company. I drive a compact sedan, am married to a hard-working mechanic, with no children. I still am STRUGGLING to pay for my mortgage, and additional bills. To look at me, I own nothing. All I have is my husband, my dog and a food on the table at the end of the day. I did not run myself into debt in credit I couldn't afford back, BUT I am feeling the crunch! Minimum wage is CATCHING UP to my wage, and my husbands wages....and we were told when we were younger if we went and got "an education" we would be "better off", I'm on the low end of middle class. We ARE in a recession. You have high rollers (upper class), hard workers just getting by (middle class) and freeloaders on welfare that don't work and surprisingly have MORE than I do in the way of possessions, nicer cars, free brand name food, free housing, free transportation.....I believe that this is part of the reason our country is in such bad shape, some people just refuse to work, and live off of hard working peoples wages in tax monies and welfare. It's not fair, and it doesn't appear that it will EVER change. And, I will continue to work as hard as I can, because I know that millions of illegal aliens and welfare recipients are counting on me!!!
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