I blame democrats and republicans for this mess 100%!!!!

demos and repubs refuse to invest in american workers thus undermining the security of this once great nation.

If one cheats to get rich then we all cheat to get rich.

Look where it got us. M nowhere fast as the nation is breaking apart all because of greed. Greed is not benefitting the nation at all.

Newsflash: This is already a global depression. Blaming just the U.S. is ignoring the mess that Europe is in -- which is related to our banking problem but compounded by Europe's own fucked up situation.

Hopefully it won't take another world war to get out of this one.

OP, you are correct. The banks are no more greedy than the slobs who took out loans they couldn't afford. The rich are no more greedy trying to hold onto their wealth than the poor who seek to take it. Greed, sloth, envy, and lust are driving this country straight into the ground. Both sides spend money that we don't have to buy votes.

Ito, you're a dumbass and no further comment to you is necessary.

If we do go into another great depression, can I order my soup online so I dont have to wait in line for hours in the rain with my fedora and long coat on?

We were closer in 2009 but not even close then. This is nowhere close to the Great Depression unless you live in Greece and Spain. Remember they started counting the unemployment rate for only the nonfarm payrolls during the Great Depression when half the country was previously working om farms. The real unemployment rate was probably closer to 40% during the depths of the Great Depression in the early 30s.

I always thought a fedora and long coat was stylin'...especially when you're not wearing pants!

It might not be close to the "Great Depression" but it certainly isn't like your average cyclical recession either. The length of this downturn, slowdown (since 2007) is one part and the REALLY slow recovery is the other.

http://www.conference-board.org/data/globaloutlook.cfm

If you leave off China and other developing countries, the total growth in GDP for the U.S., European Union (15) and other "advanced countries" is a measly 1.7% over a 6 year period. Europe and Japan last year and this year either had negative or negligible growth.

For a better summary of global financial problems, including the looming massive Chinese property bubble and over-leveraged European debt:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/greatspeculations/2012/05/30/watching-a-global-depression-develop-in-slow-motion/

The problems of 2007-2009 in the U.S. were just the tip of the iceberg, there are a lot of other global economic problems that linger.

Ito Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> It might not be close to the "Great Depression"
> but it certainly isn't like your average cyclical
> recession either. The length of this downturn,
> slowdown (since 2007) is one part and the REALLY
> slow recovery is the other.

We need to shed 30 years of over-leverage and debt financing by everyone concerned. That's not going to happen quickly. Regardless what side of things you fall on there's no quick and easy fix for this. Just plain going to take some time.

GDP declined by 25% in the Great Depression.

http://dmarron.com/2009/05/27/not-the-great-depression-2/

There are more economic depressions in the history of the United States besides the "Great" one:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_recessions_in_the_United_States

Economic slowdowns can have lots of names. One widely used definition of a recession is two consecutive quarters of negative growth in GDP.

There was also the Long Depression which started in 1873. Some have tried to compare the current period to LD because of the two bubbles that became synonymous with the expansions that preceded the two recessions. They both occurred after the expansions that followed the end of wars, the Civil War and the Cold War.

A depression does not have to have continuous periods of negative growth.