Here's my favorite quote from the Inaugural Speech today:
"We remain the most prosperous, powerful nation on Earth. Our workers are no less productive than when this crisis began. Our minds are no less inventive, our goods and services no less needed than they were last week or last month or last year. Our capacity remains undiminished."
Exactly.
I recall years ago a work of fiction about the Stock Market, where an expert pointed out exactly that about the Depression. The day after Black Friday, all the wealth and resources and industrial capacity, all the work ethic and talent and imagination were still there. Only one thing changed; faith in the economy. The numbers we used to measure wealth changed drastically. A whole structure based on borrowing money to lend money collapsed. But the real wealth was still there.
As Franklin Roosevelt said, "The only thing we have to fear is, fear itself -- nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror..." It is not entirely unreasonable to be fearful about what one has in the way of income at the moment. I know the feeling well, since I am currently unemployed. But the economy overall is stopped up because of unwillingness to spend money, out fear. I sometimes wish I'd been more fearful before the recent troubles, and stashed away something for this Rainy Day.
But I expect in a handful of months we will see far more recovery in the economy than has been predicted so far. I expect to be employed again by sometime in June at least. In what, I don't know; there isn't much going on up here in the Great White North lately. But there will be something.
That's my forecast for the economy. Bets, anyone?
"We remain the most prosperous, powerful nation on Earth. Our workers are no less productive than when this crisis began. Our minds are no less inventive, our goods and services no less needed than they were last week or last month or last year. Our capacity remains undiminished."
Exactly.
I recall years ago a work of fiction about the Stock Market, where an expert pointed out exactly that about the Depression. The day after Black Friday, all the wealth and resources and industrial capacity, all the work ethic and talent and imagination were still there. Only one thing changed; faith in the economy. The numbers we used to measure wealth changed drastically. A whole structure based on borrowing money to lend money collapsed. But the real wealth was still there.
As Franklin Roosevelt said, "The only thing we have to fear is, fear itself -- nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror..." It is not entirely unreasonable to be fearful about what one has in the way of income at the moment. I know the feeling well, since I am currently unemployed. But the economy overall is stopped up because of unwillingness to spend money, out fear. I sometimes wish I'd been more fearful before the recent troubles, and stashed away something for this Rainy Day.
But I expect in a handful of months we will see far more recovery in the economy than has been predicted so far. I expect to be employed again by sometime in June at least. In what, I don't know; there isn't much going on up here in the Great White North lately. But there will be something.
That's my forecast for the economy. Bets, anyone?
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