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Ron,
On the light side, I'm waiting for the Feds to lower rates so much that they start to pay us an interest rate to borrow money.
Now I know that a lot of foolish Americans have run their credit cards up to the hilt and can't possibly (reasonably?) borrow any more money ...but it just so happens that I wouldn't owe anything if my lovely wife hadn't recently bought a new car ...so I have a lot of credit to go. I think I can help.
You've heard the expression that "the rich get richer"? Well, I'm thinking it's time for the thrifty to get richer. I'm planning on soon borrowing as much as I can and then using the interest profits paid me to continuously loan myself even more, through an appropriate Federal agency of course. That should kick-start the economy while it's down. After a bit, I'll be able to return the principle and help keep consumer spending up with just the interest profits.
On the down side, during the last nasty '90's Bush Sr. recession, it slowed down so much that our coal hauling business dropped off about 25%. I didn't see how the public could choose to use less power, but part of it was that Ford quit taking coal for their foundry and I'm sure many other industrial power users slowed also. That was the most notable economic sector failure last time, where people quit buying cars for a while, especially American made.
The '80's recession before that, during Carter/Reagan, was mostly a major housing downturn. A friend of mine recently bought a large pre-manufactured house from Canada. After completion of the north-south NAFTA highway, we'll be able to get our houses cheaper yet from Mexico. First foreign cars, now this.
That's the scary part ...that both major sectors are falling together now along with general retail sales and stocks. Might get ugly alright.
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