A blue ribbon investigative panel (the National Bureau of Economic Research) has determined that we’ve been in a recession since March!?! Wow! Maybe they’ll invent the wheel or, fire would be nice. Hrmmm… what else could they do? Oh, they could tell us when this could end:
“It has been evident for months that jobs were disappearing and that business was less than robust, but it took the panel’s announcement to make it official that the economy is in a recession. But at least one of the six committee members suggested a recovery was possible by mid-2002.”
But is that really possible? I don’t think so:
“Based upon how effective interest-rate cuts prove to be and keyed to the fact that there is not another terrorist event that would dent consumer confidence, by the end of the second quarter next year we will be in recovery,”
Uh….. is that not what the Fed has been doing repeatedly since March? Is it my mistake or, is it simply not working. Or, are we talking about commercial and business interest rates and not consumer interest rates. I’d imagine that it is rather important to make that distinction. Because if it is not. Then will we suffer yet another method of corporate welfare in the face of a grim economy? Horse shit. Oh and by the way, we have not begun to feel the effects that the war and the terrorist attacks will have on the economy. How on gods green earth do they expect this to run it’s course, expose and solve it’s own problems, and lead us into recovery? All in what? 7 months? Tops? More horse shit.
Why then? Why is all of this so important?
The economy is not collapsing because “that’s just the way the economy cookie crumbles.” The economy is collapsing because too many businesses exploited investment capital on crappy, gee whiz boomer internet ideas… forever souring NASDAQ and technology investment in general. Then, big traditional businesses seized upon this construct to explain to shareholders why fiscal 00 losses were so high. Even if it wasn’t true. As in the case of Chrysler.
They then used that “economic crisis” to expliot employees and generate more profits from their layoffs. They blamed technology investments, particularly Y2K remediation, for even more losses. Finally, they get the National Bureau of Economic Research to say we are in a recession. Now they don’t have to pay the heavy intrest rates on their borrowed money in the face of lost profits.
Money to keep them in gleaming offices, seven figure salaries, and most importantly, to keep the stock prices down. Therefore when they took salary cuts in… oh say… June, they may use personal sacrifice to merit huge bonuses in corporate stock. Therefore, when this “upturn” happens next spring…. they have a golden parachute for when this much anticipated “upturn” does not happen as predicted. I can hear the executive towers at G.M., Ford, and Chrysler (with 500+ lesser businesses to follow) literally vibrating with anticipation. Nice, real nice. I hate boomers. You thought that the 80’s “me-ism” mentality was dead? Please.