Recession? No, Depression: Deja Vu All Over Again

I’ve already addressed this subject before: two financial analysts, using different methods, have already forecast a recession that will last until mid-2024. It does not matter who is in the White House, trying to run things.

It will not matter one teensy weensy bit who sits in the Oval Office: it is already underway and will continue.  Throwing money at it is not the answer. Work programs? There’s plenty of work if the current nasty virus (which is picking up speed in cold weather, as viruses do) would just go away and stay in a cave somewhere. That isn’t happening, but the vaxxes that have been tested are nearly ready for public use, as of this morning.

Economist John Wells puts his view of the current financial mess, and what to expect down the road, into the perspective of how it will affect an already-struggling economy: https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/john-williams-warns-hyperinflationary-great-depression-coming

From the article:  Williams explains, “Put all the political turmoil aside for the moment.  The markets respond that this (CV19 vaccines) is going to turn the economy.  My point is it is not going to turn the economy…”  

“…at least not soon because of what has happened to the economy and the severe structural damage.  We have had a lot of companies go out of business, in particular, small companies.  A lot of people have suffered, and we are going to have more of that going ahead.”

Because there has been so much damage done to the economy, Williams says there will have to be stimulus no matter who eventually makes it into the White House. – article

As I said above, we’re already in an economic recession and it will continue, regardless of who is in the Oval Office. Wells tells us to regard it as a potentially drawn out economic depression, similar to the 1930s.

The economic depression that followed Hoover’s carelessness, including the financial crash of 1929 and bank closures, could have been prevented by a little foresight. Coupled with bad weather in the Southwest that went on for years, causing crop failures, deaths and economic poverty, there were few options available at the time to bring the USA back to its normal working order.

That was the reasoning behind FDR’s decision to start those work programs. The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) is what started the implementation of conservation programs that have given us the national parks we like so much. The Works Progress Administration (WPA) was an American New Deal agency, employing millions of job-seekers (mostly unskilled men) to carry out public works projects, including the construction of public buildings and roads. The PWA (Public Works Administration) built large-scale public works such as dams, bridges, hospitals, and schools. Its goals were to spend $3.3 billion in the first year, and $6 billion in all, to provide employment, stabilize purchasing power, and help revive the economy. Most of the spending came in two waves in 1933–35, and again in 1938.

By the time World War II became a real threat to the USA, these programs were coming to an end. When we became involved, Henry Ford converted some of his assembly plants in Detroit to meet military production needs. An additional set up near Dearborn was put together to build airplanes for the war.

This current economic crisis was partly caused by carelessness and a certain amount of general public denial about a frequently fatal disease. There’s plenty of blame to go around over it, but according to the last news report, the vaccines being developed to stop its progress are nearing the distribution point.

A smarter and more conservative Democrat like FDR could handle our current crisis, and likely make things work, and get the USA back in working order. The current crop of nutballs patting themselves on the back about “winning!” will, as Mr. Williams indicates in his video, run the USA right into the ground financially. They have no idea how to make things work, but they do know how to spend Other People’s Money.

What Williams is saying, bluntly put, is that we are facing another economic depression very similar to the Great Depression. This coincides with the forecasts by those other analysts, so that brings the total to three, whos opinions are more valid than that of any politician on the planet. The fiscal incompetence of the current crop of Democrats in Congress is already well-known. It is valid to be concerned that they will only make things worse.

What I’d really like to see is the current younger generation being told that they have to participate in work programs if they want to get monthly or twice-monthly checks from Uncle Sugar.  If a WPA work program was good enough for my mother, who did have job skills, it should certainly not be demeaning to those kids, should it?

Your tax dollars are at work here, people. Doesn’t mean that they’re necessarily being used for your benefit, either.

Frankly, it does not matter one bit who sits in the Oval Office. This is going to happen, period. Whoever has that job over the next four years will get blamed for the mistakes, the excesses and any and all failures, massive or not.

I would not want that on my record.

Category: "Your Tax Dollars At Work", 2020 Election, COVID-19