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Odds 'n Sods:
Eric S. suggested this Washington Post piece: We're
Borrowing Like Mad. Can the U.S. Pay It Back? And if that weren't bad
enough news, here is the daily glut o' gloom from The Economatrix: Leading
Economist Fears Decade of Economic Weakness -- Oil
Traders Demand Ships to Store Crude at Sea Before Prices Rebound -- Crude
Below $40 as Demand Drops Faster than Supply -- The
Bond Bubble is an Accident Waiting to Happen -- UK
Auto Workers: Pay Cut or Lose Jobs -- Japan
Suicide Hotlines Overburdened in Economic Crisis -- Merkel
Makes 44-Billion U-Turn to Save German Economy -- UK
Plans $200 Billion Gamble to Restart Mortgage Market -- Money
is Dead, Long Live Barter -- UK
Government: Recession Will Fuel Race Tensions -- Arizona
Treasurer Warns State Running Out of Money
o o o
SF in Hawaii mentioned this article from Australia: The jobs most at risk
in 2009
o o o
Kenya: 10 million risk hunger
after harvests fail. (Thanks to Danny B. for
the link.)
o o o
Scott N. spotted this Wall Street Journal commentary: 'Atlas
Shrugged': From Fiction to Fact in 52 Years. Scott also suggested reviewing
CBO
Acting Director Robert Sunshine's recent Senate testimony. Scott's
comment: "I'm watching this on C-SPAN. Sunshine is testifying on the
state of the current recession before a congressional committee, on Thursday,
1/8/09.
He states
that if
this were
a typical recession,
we'd already be pulling out of it by this time. In the current recession,
however, we haven't even hit the worst yet (e.g., here come the Alt-A and
Option ARM mortgage defaults in 2009, credit cards after that, collapse of
Baltic Dry index, etc.). He's estimating 2014 before we're
back to full economic potential. It's a damning report. 'It's not a
terribly optimistic forecast,' Sunshine
says. Quite the master of understatement. We could use a little bit more
sunshine on what going on in Washington, DC. The rest of the CBO Macroeconomic
analysis team is not much more optimistic either." JWR Adds: Don't
miss the chart early in the video clip that shows the Federal debt ballooning
to 400
times the GDP by 2058. For those that would prefer to study the
text of Sunshine's report, see this
PDF.
