Thread: The strongest economy in the world

Here are some very good videos on the credit crisis. These are the best yet. Brief & succinct, and to the point. Good details, presented quickly and adeptly:

Part I:


Part II:

^ Seen those before, pretty scary stuff when its all laid out in understandable terms.
Thats mess took a 3 or 4 years build and it will take a few years to unwind. Folks expecting a sharp recovery from this need to adjust their thinking.

Many Pension funds are using funny accounting to hide the degree that they are underfunded.

I believe that this year and the next couple of years, there will be lots of sob stories about underfunded pensions. Translation: You paid into it for 30 years. Sorry.

Hidden Pension Fiasco May Foment Another $1 Trillion Bailout

By David Evans
March 3 (Bloomberg) -- The Chicago Transit Authority retirement plan had a $1.5 billion hole in its stash of assets in 2007. At the height of a four-year bull market, it didn’t have enough cash on hand to pay its retirees through 2013, meaning it was underfunded to the tune of 62 percent.

The CTA, which manages the second-largest public transit system in the U.S., had to hope for a huge contribution from the Illinois state legislature. That wasn’t going to happen.
Then the authority found an answer.

“We’ve identified the problem and a solution,” said CTA Chairman Carole Brown on April 16, 2007. The agency decided to raise money from a bond sale.

A year later, it asked Illinois Auditor General William Holland to research its plan. The state hired an actuary, did a study and, on July 17, concluded that the sale of bonds would most likely result in a loss of taxpayers’ money.

Thirteen days after that, the CTA ignored the warning and issued $1.9 billion in bonds. Before the year ended, the pension fund was paying out more to bondholders than it was earning on its new influx of money. Instead of closing its funding gap, the CTA was falling further behind.

Public pension funds across the U.S. are hiding the size of a crisis that’s been looming for years. Retirement plans play accounting games with numbers, giving the illusion that the funds are healthy.

The paper alchemy gives governors and legislators the easy choice to contribute too little or nothing to the funds, year after year. 30 Percent Shortfall.

The misleading numbers posted by retirement fund administrators help mask this reality: Public pensions in the U.S. had total liabilities of $2.9 trillion as of Dec. 16, according to the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College. Their total assets are about 30 percent less than that, at $2 trillion.

With stock market losses this year, public pensions in the U.S. are now underfunded by more than $1 trillion.

Link & Entire: Bloomberg.com: Exclusive

^
Well, Wall Street does not have any confidence in BO what with the tax hikes and massive spending, eh? Tell us you're not one of those Obamunists jumping into the O-Hole too, Spin?

Despite the situation, the American economy may come back faster than others.

Originally Posted by Boon Mee

Wall Street does not have any confidence in BO

Wall Street got themselves into this shit, why they even so much as glance in the direction of the government is beyond me. Most of them should be in prison by now, which leads me nicely to.......

Frank Seeking Prosecutions for Financial Wrongdoing

March 5 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank said he wants to see people prosecuted for wrongdoing related to the financial crisis as lawmakers overhaul regulation of Wall Street.

Frank will call on attorneys general, bank regulators and officials from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to outline plans for prosecuting and recovering funds from those responsible for the crisis, he said today at a news conference in Washington.

“What are your plans to prosecute those people whose irresponsible and, in some cases, criminal actions helped bring about this crisis?” said Frank, a Massachusetts Democrat.

Congress is planning the biggest overhaul of U.S. financial- industry regulation since the 1930s after companies reported almost $1.2 trillion in writedowns and credit losses since the subprime mortgage market collapsed in 2007. Frank said his committee will examine whether law enforcement agencies have sufficient tools to fight fraud, and will advance legislation aimed at curbing abuses in credit-card and mortgage lending.

“I do want all these people with enforcement powers, state and federal, in that room outlining what their plans are to do these recoveries,” Frank said about the March 20 hearing.

full story

Now Barney Frank isnt blameless in all of this and I feel sorry for any inmate that he shares a cell with, getting covered in spittle and all that.

Jobs losses: as the last paragraph is in bold.

Worst is yet to come for job market

This is the most brutal downturn in decades, but the unemployment numbers only show part of the pain.

By Chris Isidore, CNNMoney.com senior writer
Last Updated: March 5, 2009: 6:10 PM ET



Quick Vote

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- It's no secret that the job market is bad.

The Labor Department will release its latest jobs report Friday. Economists surveyed by Briefing.com forecast that the unemployment rate rose to 7.9% in February and that 650,000 jobs were lost.

Still, as bad as those numbers are, some have argued that this jobs downturn is not as bad as the early 1980s. The unemployment rate peaked at 10.8% in late 1982.

But several experts say it would be a mistake to come to that conclusion. They argue that unemployment rate only hints at why this jobs downturn is worse than any since the Great Depression.

Steep decline

If the job loss forecasts for February turn out to be accurate, it would be the worst monthly drop since 1949.

It would also bring total job losses over the last six months to 3.1 million, the largest six-month job loss since the end of World War II.

Even adjusting for the large growth in the nation's job base in recent decades, this would be the biggest six-month job loss since 1975.

Economists say the steepness of this decline will make it tougher for the job market to improve any time soon. The increasing job losses create a downward spiral in which businesses, faced with lower demand because people can't afford to buy their products, lay off even more people.

Link & Entire: Worst is yet to come for job market - Mar. 5, 2009

CNBC Gives Financial Advice | The Daily Show | Comedy Central

Tragically funny.

^I wish I could green you for this last one Spin, very funny and yes tragically so.

No surprise here for those of us following the news and economic reports. There will be higher unemployment most likely. I think the 10% figures is too lower and the unemployment will be higher. This will mean:

less consumer spending to slow the economy (The Paradox of thrift)

more foreclosures

more car repos

homelessness

Think job losses won't get worse? Think again

Some forecasters say jobless rate may rise through 2010 to 10 percent

Job losses could get even worse
Forecasters say even if the economy begins to slowly recover later this year, jobs losses may continue until well into 2010. By John W. Schoen.


By John W. Schoen
Senior producer
msnbc.com
March. 6, 2009

Bad as Friday's grim jobs report was — 8.1 percent unemployment rate, 651,000 jobs lost in February, 4.4 million shed since the recession began — the labor market's pain is likely to continue until well into 2010. Wall Street economists, who are not typically paid to see the glass half-empty, warn that more bad news is coming in the months ahead.

"The economy is in a tailspin. Businesses are jettisoning jobs at an unprecedented pace," said Richard Yamarone, economist at Argus Research.

“The labor market remains in free-fall," said Nigel Gault Chief US Economist IHS Global Insight. “The recession is deepening; there is no sign yet even that the rate of contraction is slowing."

Link & Entire: Job losses could get even worse - Eye on the Economy- msnbc.com

Part 1: Well worth a quick listen.


Part 2: Military Industrial complex, people losing everything, breakup of states, etc.




Comments? Opinions? Agree or disagree?

^
Strongly agree. I've been keeping my eye on this guy for some time now and he's always been accurate in his predicitons. Got the '87 market crash right as well as the Asian money debacle in '97 predicted right so...it all falls in line with what I'm hearing from my family back in the states. It's gonna get much, much worse...

^ Thanks for the comment, Boon. I suppose it's good that we are overseas, now.

Here is Jim Rogers. Again, this is recent: March 9, 2009.

Here is Dave Ramsey - a financial "guru" - calling Peter Schiff a "kook" and a "nutburger" in January, 2008.

Look who turned out right. Look at the companies Ramsey mentions: Ford, GM, General Electric.

One of the best showcases of how Democrats are wholly responsible for the economic MELTDOWN

Pay particular attention to This is a list of the attempts made by the Bush administration starting in 2001 to rein in the out-of-control spending frenzy by Fannie and Freddie.

Here is a brief info video. This is one person's opinion. Some hearsay, also. But woth a listen.

Comments? Opinion?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cHUepjsIxV4

Well, you gotta admire BO, eh? Not only is he 'saving' America, he's bailed out Europe too!

AIG 'Was Going to Bring Down Europe': Lawmaker

The U.S. government rescued giant insurer American International Group in part because its collapse would dramatically hurt European banks, a senior Democratic lawmaker said on Thursday.
...
"That's why we could not allow AIG to fail as we allowed Lehman (Brothers) to fail, because that would have precipitated the failure of the European banking system," Pennsylvania Rep. Paul Kanjorski said.
...
The identity of those being helped by the massive AIG assistance package remained a mystery on Thursday despite efforts by irritated members of the Senate Banking Committee to get answers from Fed Vice Chairman Donald Kohn.

currencies are seen as virility symbols the long view is China and the RMB aS THE REF CURRENCY BUT ITS STILL THE ALMIGHTYUS $

^To use a term from the Cold War days, "mutually assured destruction".

Originally Posted by larvidchr

My guess is that the Dollar will continue, but if not it will be the Euro because it is spread over many Country's so no single Country would be allowed to issue bonds not backed up by real value thus creating the horrible situation we are in today where most of the Dollars out there just exists on bonds (a promise of money) with no real Dollars notes behind.
Just printing Dollars to cash in the bonds would virtually render the Dollar worthless.

The only for USA to pay off their debt is to devalue their $. And the only real way to do that is to print and borrow more. Which is exactly what is happening.