Staring Down the Precipice

I remember the depression. Or, as they say, the Great Depression . No, I didn’t physically live through it. It was experienced by listening to the stories and memories of the women closest to me when I was growing up.

That would be my mother and my paternal grandmother.

My mother was a child during the Great Depression. She didn’t suffer as many did, as her father was a professional (a dentist) who bartered his services throughout the ‘30s.  Money was tight, of course. And her stories about the less fortunate were vivid and real. 

My grandmother was raising four children while married to a house painter during the same decade. Work was scarce. Times were hard.  It took creativity and fortitude to feed and clothe the family on the resources available.  They were lucky to live in southern California, where food could be grown year-round. Her stories were vivid and real, too.  I especially remember the tale of feeding “the poor, lonely souls” who would knock on the door looking for work, and her packing them up a parcel of whatever food she had to spare as she sent them on their way.

These stories were repeated often enough that my mind could envision that era to the extent that books or movies merely corroborated what I’d been told.

Of course, I was living in the optimistic splendor of the after-the-war years, exacerbated by the influence of the hipster SoCal lifestyle within orbit of The Industry. Nevertheless, I've always viewed the stock market as a place you put money that you didn't mind losing. Kinda like Vegas.

So here we are right now.

Look, when I was crying the bailout blues a couple posts back, it was in objection to the way the original sucker was written. Even though I abhor the necessity of it I knew it had to go forward, albeit with regulations and not a carte blanche check to the Treasurer. I watched Bush's bailout speech (text here).  Important shit was going down, and when the MBA Pres - who's treated the government like a corporation  (and hasn't that gone well... as an aside I recommend the documentary The Corporation)  - looks like green cheese while he explains that the economy runs on credit and will grind to a screeching halt without the bailout... well, I didn't think he was bullshitting. Not this time. This was no grandstanding about weapons of mass destruction. Laissez-faire was dead, and in ironies-of-ironies its champion had killed it in a spectacular failure.

And what happens? His own party kills the rescue. I suppose a lot of them are up for re-election. Not to mention the probability that the majority of the constituents they're hearing from know diddley-squat about economics. I'm certainly no genius, but I was harping about unrealistically inflated real estate prices and fairytale loans more than three years ago. Earlier this evening Suze Orman was practically frothing at the  mouth about how the market lost over ONE TRILLION DOLLARS today  -  which is more than $700 BILLION,  in case  we're doing any math.  Couple this with the fact that with the bill's failure (assuming it won't be salvaged) the banks  - those same nice entities that now can up your credit card interest to outrageous rates if the payment is one day late while the billing cycle keeps shrinking, plus they have to mail the bill only 14 days ahead of time (don't you love deregulation?) - will FREEZE CREDIT.

That means no matter what the current limit is on any credit card they will decrease it to the size of the balance it currently has. And it will be very difficult - if not impossible - to obtain further credit.  While it is true that it is better not to have credit the fact is that most people - and businesses - do. That's how businesses run. And how payroll gets paid. And how cities pay for their necessities. And on and on and on and on...

The world markets are already starting to fall.

Soooo... if you think it's not a good idea to play with fire contact the dissenters. (Hey, I can't do everything... get the name and look it up w/their email on the government site.)

Comments

[phhhst]

I wouldn't have wanted the bailout bill to pass the way it was written.

[shaunna]

they'd better hobble a rescue soon... or everything will grind to a halt. period. not too many people - or businesses - are equipped to live off cash only.