Welcome To The Greater Recession
At Naked Capitalism Edward Harrison looks at the revised numbers that just came out: GDP numbers make double dip threat real.
Those of us who actually live in the real economy, as opposed to inside the Bubble, have been watching this happen. When two-thirds of the GDP is consumer spending and 20% of the workforce is un- or under-employed, spending goes down. People are trying to hang on until things get better, but there is no ‘tunnel’, much less a ‘light at the end.’ The Village can stop worrying about the ‘confidence fairy’, the ‘unemployment ogre’ had it for lunch some time ago.
Paul Mason, the Economics editor of BBC’s Newsnight decided to travel In Steinbeck’s footsteps: America’s middle-class underclass.
The new generation of Joads is living in tents, because they have run out of options. The Village refuses to do what is necessary, what we know from history works, because they don’t ‘believe in it.’
2 comments
You can count me.
I don’t even have a tent anymore.
Most people have no idea how bad it is in states without job growth already.
And they are about to pull the plug on any more.
Florida has higher unemployment than the national average, and the state government is making it worse.
We have a barrier island full of empty condos that will end up in foreclosure, as people fail to make mortgage or fee payments. There are a lot of them available below the owner’s cost in an attempt to reduce some of the burden, and they still don’t rent.
People go to the beach, but they are staying like they once did.
The politicians just don’t understand the problem, and how bad it really is.