All those complaining about being "wiped out" and the end of the world...

Too bad...

Consider MY side of this story...

1) Housing

While you were busy getting rich quick in the stock market gambling on these investments that have no real ties to the real economy of making goods and selling them or rendering real services and selling them the rest of us were being screwed to provide for your quick profits...

Because of the deregulation of the housing market, sellers were able to disassociate themselves from all the risk of selling the home by reselling the mortgages as securities, this allowed them to make loans to anybody with a pulse thereby driving up the prices year over year 10 to 20% for the last 10 years effectively pricing many middle class people out of the market.

In my best year ever I made around $99k (back in 2001), more recently in the 70-80k range. According to what I was taught in school, I should be trying to buy a house in the $210-$240k range and should be putting $42k down. Here in Florida that is a fairly small ranch style house in a bad neighborhood with about 1500 square foot and 1/10th of an acre lot if you are lucky.

Even then, this is not even realistic for me as a single man without dependents. How does an average family of 4 do it on $45k/yr (median income)? Answer: They can't. They are screwed out of the chance to own their own home, I am too.

2) Health insurance:

By turning health insurance into a for profit corporate business, prices there have ALSO risen 10 to 20% a year with more and more citizens being driven off the insurance rolls as unable to afford it. The insurance companies like this - they make more by providing less to fewer richer healthier customers. Meanwhile 47 million Americans are left out in the cold.

3) Gas prices:

The oil companies have been making a killing by totally disconnecting the price of gas from any rational explanation of supply and demand. There are too few refineries and too little excess capacity or supply in the pipeline in case of an emergency. Whenever anything happens, prices go into orbit. Who could imagine $4/gallon gas?

4) College education:

College was affordable in the 60's and 70's through the government but Reaganomics dictated that banks had to make loans and be able to make money on the deal. These loans and gov't tax cuts to the wealthy have shifted the cost burden to the students who cannot afford the price on minimum wage jobs.

5) Jobs:

The corporations have been shipping our jobs offshore for years to countries with slave labor without regard to the consequences to the American economy or stock market.

While my prices on important things to me have been going up 10-20% a year for a decade, my salary has been stuck for 7 years and is down from its peak in 2001 by 25%. My college education in engineering seems to count for less and less all the time.

Their objective of cutting out the middle class and not paying a living wage has come back to bite the investor in the ass as it turns out if you don't pay a living wage then people borrow to maintain their standard of living and ultimately they can't pay it back and the system collapses.

Conclusion:

I really don't feel bad for you if you thought you could get rich quick in the stock market at my expense.

Today is the day of reckoning for those stock market investors who like the fictional "Gordon Gecko" believe that greed is good. They are paying the price for their hubris and their belief that they can get rich quick while screwing the rest of us.

I have only a small amount of money in the stock market in Wachovia stock so I am going to lose a little but I didn't put that money in there in the first place, my parents did.

I've been too busy just trying to keep even the last 20 years since college to be able to invest my money in Wall Street's house of cards.

Personally, I was hoping to be able to afford to buy a house if I could ever get ahead before I considered investing on Wall Street.

Maybe this will work out for me when housing prices plunge, provided I get to keep my job.

Doug D.
Ft. Lauderdale, FL

Thank you for bringing sanity to DU today.

IYKWIM = If You Know What I Mean

when Wall Street crashed in 1929, it wasn't just or mainly the rich who suffered!

Economic disaster will ruin everyone - and the rich probably less than the rest, as they have more margins.

We shouldn't allow that to happen - we need to re-regulate and break up the companies that are "too big too fail" and force a lot of little companies as we had between the 1930's to the 1970's.

It would really change the balance of power between Wall Street and Main Street back in our favor.

Doug D.

I don't think it's exactly extortion though - when banks play so much part in the economy, they *cannot* go down without bringing the rest of us with them, whether they choose to or not. There needs to be a restructuring, so that industry and public services become more important again, and Big Money less so - but that may take time.

So you start at the bottom and protect the average person. Problem solved. You don't gamble on Wall Street. That doesn't take a long time - we could start tomorrow. It will take tome to repair the damage, but we could stop more damage from being done immediately. The more time we wait, the greater the risk and the harder the fall.

It is like an addict looking for one more fix and promising to go cold turkey tomorrow.

This is the oddest reverse logic argument.

Of course Wall Street shenanigans put us all at risk, and everyone could be hurt. That is the problem, Why then advocate giving them a license to play more shenanigans? And why say that those opposing more power and freedom being given Wall Street are somehow the cause of a crash? That doesn't make the least bit of sense.

did not cause the great depression.

The upside down economy -- where the 1% predator class stole 80% or so of the wealth -- is what caused the great depression. Not unlike what we have going on today.

We've had bigger stock market crashes by percentage than what just happened and recovered from them. But that was BEFORE things were this badly upside down.

Doug, I feel for you. But at least you still have a job and a decent income. The high-tech crash followed by 9/11 took my career with it. My former 6 figure income boss now sells clothes at a department store. I am part of the "trap door" economy. Post-9/11, there was zero work in my field for at least 2 years. After that, nobody would touch me with a 10-foot pole anyway. My last job interview was for scrubbing toilets at a gas station convenience store...I never heard from them again either.

I didn't "invest in" (gamble on) the stock market. I've been forced to live off my seed money (retirement fund) for most of the last 6 1/2 years while I heard and read about the great economy on the news. Now I'm taking on debt to "retrain" in my mid-50s for a new career. No effing help from the gov for me. It's all been highway robbery.

Now for me time is running out. At least I do own my home and can hopefully sell it at a huge loss to someone like you, and free up a few dollars to survive on till that runs out. My eldest sister, an alcholic, remembers as a toddler being picked up by her hair and slammed into walls. The abusive rethuglican bitch of our mommie dearest, and her enabling rethug jerkoff pedophile daddie dearest get to live on the taxpayers dime through their mid-80s. Their abused and robbed children will probably die before they do. And they'll say it's our fault because we're "bad."

to save those rich skins??

Us poor folk, of course.

While the rest of you breathe a sigh of relief and go on about your lives.

And we suffer and die.

Yeah, that's sooooo morally right. Need I add :sarcasm:

feeling sorry for their slavemasters, not able to imagine any other way of life than slavery.

GO LIBERTY!

My story is worse than that, but in the ball park. I don't see anyone talking about bailing out us renters who've been paying the landlord's mortgages for the last 8 years.

I've paid roughly $25,000 in rent over the past 3 years, with absolutely NOTHING to show for that investment.

The real estate investor's sense of entitlement is king on DU. Most of the time we are ignored on here, and if one manages to get someone's attention, they attack you for a perceived slight on the real estate investor.

for being against the little guy, for wishing pain and suffering on others, and being accused of not "running my business properly" since I'm an artist living paycheck to paycheck.

Fact is, folks tried to get rich off of shoddy investing, and now it is biting them in the ass.

And to all the middle class folks a rung above me on the social ladder, the loses you are seeing in your home value and 401k is a direct result of those above YOU using predatory lending and money backed by nothing to get rich quick.

The super-rich have fucked us all, and the "recession" is already real for lower class America, and now that the middle and upper-middle class are going to be affected, we just HAVE to do somethign RIGHT NOW!

and now it was only worth $250,000, then you would be at least $50,000 in the hole (not counting incidental expenses such as mortgage insurance, interest, property taxes and upkeep), so your $25,000 investment in rents would have actually put you ahead of the game :hi:

In the past 3 years I've paid about $130k toward my mortgage and still really have nothing to show for it. But hey, only 26 years left to go! ;(

Wall Street has been screwing 90% of us for decades. No sympathy though, for anyone. Dog eat dog. Survival of the fittest.

Wages going down, real estate going up. What the Hell did people think was going to happen to the whole mortgage mess? Corporations reduce wages, eliminate jobs, wreck our industrial base, outsource everything, corrupt our government, and each time that yet more people are made miserable by those actions, the stock goes up, up up!

90% of the people have been suffering to one degree or another. But we were all told to take "personal responsibility" and are called losers. Hmph. If we were more clever, we would be sharks. Too bad minnows! It is the free market! Human nature! We all want to be rich!

But now, that smug 10% is scared. Now they are feeling a little bit of the pain. Suddenly the tune changes, and God forbid we would let them fall or lose out. So what do they say? "Sorry, I can see now that a system that supports 10% of the people at the expense of making things so miserable for the other 90% is just wrong, and that we need to rethink this?"

No. They want us to prop them back up, patch back together the same old game, and we get the same old promise that it will trickle down, and now we have a new twist - prop back up the game that has been destroying your life, or you will be even more miserable. You will cause a depression, and it will be all your fault.

Just one more time. Trust them just once more. One more fix. One more go around at the gaming table. Once they are back on their feet, this time - they promise - they won't forget you.

I'm nervous about what's going to happen. I'll probably lose my job and then my home and then everything else. I'm not being stoic about that; I'm just resigned to it. I have been beat almost literally to death by almost 30 years of this fucked-up economic system. I'm like the exhausted mouse that the cat's been playing with before it finally bites its head off.

as long as we can pay the rent. I have no mortgage so I am no in any danger of losing my home at least. I am just hoping the rent stays reasonably low.

We rented for many years. Depending on where you rent and who owns the building, it can be a nightmare or a very pleasant way to live.

Don't assume that owning a home would necessarily mean you'd have much other than bills to show for it. I'm not just talking about people who overbought or bought foolishly, either.

The mortgage payment on our farm is roughly the same amount you're paying in rent. But we also have a lot of expenses most renters don't have. Right now, the old farmhouse needs about $30,000 in repairs. We're likely to need a new well soon enough. Since we are our own landlords, we have to pony up all of it.

When the economy is this screwed up, we worry a lot. We have a flat rate mortgage, so we don't have a balloon payment looming over the horizon, but jobs have been disappearing in this area and even those that remain have little security with so many people lined up to take them. We can't turn on a dime to move the way we could when we were renting. Sure, we have some equity in this property, but equity is only worth something if someone wants to buy it. Tight credit + job losses = no sale.

and now my home is worth 25% less than I owe on the remaining mortgage.

You renters have it easy, most of us have less than NOTHING ot show for our investment in the American dream.

a state legislator could help turn things around a little. I know that in the state of MN renters get a form at federal income tax time to report their rent. In relationship of their rent paid to their income they are given relief, I think it's in the form of a tax credit. I'd have to ask my daughter specifically but it was done to equalize the tax deduction home owners have for their mortgage interest.

Many of us are scraping by, watching our homes drop in value and our retirement funds lose value. Glad you're full of bitter schadenfreude at watching ordinary folks suffer.

potential home buyers, not only will my home value drop (our only big investment besides our 401K) but I may have difficulty selling it in the event I have to move--which may be sooner than I expect.

I'm truly sorry you're going to suffer. That's about as far as my sympathy goes.

You most likely bought a house at MASSIVELY inflated value-- the rise in real estate value during the last several decades, and especially the last, has been fueled by market manipulations such as the resale of mortages as securities. There was NO valid reason for your house to have been worth so much that you're now going to lose your shirt when the bubble bursts and its value seeks something closer to its real worth. YOU accepted that risk, and my friend, it was a fool's game from the beginning. YOU participated in your own fleecing. That sucks, and it's likely going to hurt, but what should the rest of us do about it?

The same people we are complaining about screwing us have screwed you.

it is their LIFE SAVINGS... they may even make LESS than you per year

IDIOT

and they expect ME to pay for their losses after they've screwed ME?

Too bad..not my problem.

Doug D.

now you are PISSED ANGRY and it does not matter how many facts are presented, you are PISSED OFF and wish ILL on others... so you can get even.

I hope you will be happy when millions starve and more millions go from place to place in this country looking for work.


I highly suggest you invest in a shotgun and some buck

They assumed they could get high returns on investments that simply were supported by the overall macroeconomic picture. You can't screw the middle class for decades and have a growing economy simultaneously. It's pure fiction.

Doug D.

Have you put aside any savings? (With no dependants, I'd imagine you could do that, right?)

That's what people are seeing disappear right now. Real people, making less than you, and raising families on it.

People who've simply played by the rules, worked hard, saved harder and done what they thought they were supposed to do to eke out a little security in an insecure world.

This whole situation has tentacles that reach far, far beyond Wall St. No one is crying for the hedge fund managers and high-priced investment bankers, trust me.

But if you work for or run a small business, you may soon find yourself unable to make payroll - no more in that line of credit you need to manage cash flow. If it's your boss in that spot, what goes may soon be you.

Or try getting your kid to college - those loans you were counting on? Dried up.

This really isn't about class warfare, as satisfying as I'm sure that is.

There's blame all around, and more for sure laid at the feet of the greedy on Wall St.

But the results now will impact nearly everyone.

JG. This is all very true.

Sadly, this isn't about those "fat cats" getting their comeuppance. It's about regular middle class americans who will be hurt the most.

either the politicians or those in the media - at least not very well.

Like I said - blame aplenty. And I'd like to know that the abuses that put us all here will no longer be tolerated, personally. (On the news this morning - mortgages now requiring more down, lower credit limits on credit cards... well, I think those are good things, in general. There really isn't such thing as free money, though our society has been behaving a bit like there is).

But in the meantime, in the short-term, there's potential here for regular people - who did nothing wrong - to be badly hurt by this problem. So let's take care of the immediate first and then dig in to the bigger picture problem and make sure we take care of it.

Just my 2 cents.

He/she sounds calm and rational.

YOU sound pissed and irrational.

Which is fine.

The stock market is always a gamble. When people were winning, they had no problem with the social cost that entailed. They thought it was their cleverness that was being rewarded. But if you are clever enough to see it going up, you ought to be honest about the possibility of it going down. And ot was certain to go down when the prosperity was being created by pricing homes and health care out of people's reach, and eliminating jobs and benefits and reducing wages. Don't now blame the poor human "collateral damage" for the game failing.

Why is to that we are so quick to blame people who are losing their homes and jobs or their health, tell them they made bad choices and should take personal responsibility, but those depending upon the market are not to be seen as gamblers and their security must be guaranteed?

People losing their jobs and homes is the problem. The actions by corporations that have caused people to lose their jobs and homes are the same actions that have inflated stock prices. Why should we give guarantees and protections to those corporations, but not to the workers and home owners?

How about we trust the people, rather than the speculators, give them relief, and Wall Street can wait while it trickles up?

No free lunch. People are changing their "principles" according to whose ox is getting gored here.

I hate the wall street rat-crooks, but all of us are going to suffer.

Some much too naive here.

Oh well, I've learned a lot here lately.

Dems with the capital initial are all about ME ME ME. Fuck the poor, fuck the Planet.

So who cares.

that will recover too... we are talking years here... perhaps even decades

So the question is whether the individual person has time for that to happen

But in the meantime it will stop the bleeding

There is more

It will also make sure your employer has a line of credit and can pay you... but that is kind of immaterial

Does not matter how many times we try to explain that this is far more than just fat cats... does not matter

there are just too many dollars in the world

currency valuations are relative- and this is a global problem, which is why you've seen the dollar make significant gains recently.

That's because your "explanations" are nothing but assertions.

NOBODY here has explained - or even tried to explain - the exact mechanism of disaster, including the answers to such inconvenient questions as why would the politicians let the plutocrats crash the system. Do you remember October 1987? What happened then? Why didn't THAT turn into "Great Depression Part Deux" as all the fearmongers were screaming?

No one is saying that the goal is to hurt fat cats - or hurt anyone.

This is about not letting fat cats continue to hurt all of us.

Could you please stop accusing the people who have been warning for years about the risk of a depression from the free market idiocy and Wall Street insanity, and who are now saying that we need to get going with a New Deal relief and regulatory program NOW of causing or wanting a depression, or of hoping for one or of being ignorant or in denial about it?

In some respects- they're every bit as bad as any freeper- and have certainly reinforced the perception of DU as a nuroots site.

Not in my family.

today's payday - and i have a bunch more. my pay went into my account at a bank that was recently sold. i will be able to pay my rent, put gas in my car, and get groceries.

in percentages the drop on wall street yesterday was not the worst ever. i think we should all take a deep breath, and think about where we go from here. life is still going on, it did not stop, and it is not going to stop.

What the Hell are their life savings doing in an overheated, unstable, unregulated and unsupervised stock market?

It is not as though we have not been warning people about this for decades. We were dismissed out of hand. The market, and real estate was all good, all smart. Are we now to believe that people put their money into the market thinking it was not a risk? Not hoping that it would make them money? Not knowing the price the rest of us were and would be eventually paying for that? They knew it was a risk. They didn't tell us that they were going to gamble for bigger returns, and that if it didn't work out we would all have to make good on their losses.

The society has paid an enormous price for this orgy of greed. All sorts of people have been seriously hurt, not just those who are now vulnerable to a market downturn.

I understand that many people were bamboozled into the stock market. But many people were bamboozled into taking on mortgages, too. Bamboozled into supporting pro-corporate and pro-market political policies. Why are only the stock holders to now be seen as innocent victims of all of this?

Investments should be INVESTMENTS, not glorified gambling. They should result in some meaningful benefit to the economy on whole, not a zero sum gain where somebody screws me so that they can get rich and then call it "investing".

Doug D.

because if we continue down the road we're going, many companies won't have the credit to float their payroll for the X amount of days they need to and then their employees suffer.

You don't have to work on Wall Street to be hurt by what is going on right now.

allowed them for a reasonable retirement...and they are/were close. It was nothing fancy...just a simple retirement where all the bills are taken care of.

If the market crashes due to this catastrophuck then these are the truly innocent who may get harmed.

These folks were not interested in get rich quick. They just wanted to retire on something more than the pithy SS money that keeps them from the street but not from poverty.

That being said, I am not too sure if a bailout would have helped them even if it came. This was inevitable with how things were set up and handled...especially over the last 8 years.

You can't get 10% returns year after year unless Wall Street games the rules and screws somebody. Sorry but few industries have that much room for improvement.

Your only excuse is that you were duped if you bought into it.

Doug D.

nothing gives back 10% and is safe... somewhat

TBills don't have those returns

For example

Gov'ment bonds don't either

Another example

Now very risky investments do... most of the people you are railing against are NOT putting money into those

You are just angry

You don't get this

This is not JUST about Wall Street

And facts don't matter

and I do get this more than MOST people because I'm smart enough to not stick my money into a scam and try to screw other people so that I could get rich quick.

Doug D.

a year actually MANAGE their 401K

As I said, no facts matter to you

You are just PISSED OFF

SO I will say this again, INVEST in a 12 gauge remington, and some ammo, and a cleaning kit

and making sure that my standard of living is less than my parents when I studied hard and worked hard when they didn't really have to.

Doug D.

and your response is to applaud this?

There are days

:banghead:

At least you admit that you are angry

I learned many years ago that unrepressed anger does not lead to clear thinking

Take a walk, clear your head...

Connect some dots

Learn some history

Realize we are in the midst of a revolution... yes it is here... but it will take more than just anger and keyboard commandos

or for that matter hate for others who are like you

People do what they are told to do by financial advisors. These people did.

Pointing out the "personal accountability" thing when people generally follow what is publicly seen as "good financial advice" is what the Republican's do. Despite the fact that it was not good advice at all those folks in that situation are going to feel the shaft and hard. It also helps no one in the end and the schadenfrade here is obvious.

Personally, I have been one of the naysayers as to how the system is not long-term workable nor is it sustainable as a wholl all along but nobody hires the MBA who promises long-term steady returns when big cash in the short term is what gets the promotions...

and anyone who expects a 10% ROI on any investment is asking for a beehive of worries.

You can't get 10% returns year after year unless Wall Street games the rules and screws somebody. Sorry but few industries have that much room for improvement.

Your only excuse is that you were duped if you bought into it.



Doug D.

>>From 1926 to 1992, stocks returned an average of 10.3% in annual price appreciation and dividends combined, about twice as much as corporate bonds and nearly three times as much as Treasury bills.<< Page 63 ("The Long-term Case for Stocks").

'Who's that?' He was managing editor of Fortune and Money magazines.

For one thing, most stocks that were around in 1926 are not around anymore. Anyone want to "retire" with Fisk? Invest in the Reading Railroad? Buy shares in the Packard Motor Car Company?

Also, there's that little matter of the 1929 crash, and the fact that stocks in general did not recover to their pre-crash highs until the 1950s. So really, there was zero net gain for a quarter century.

As for the 10.3% increase each year from 1926-1992 claim, investments plus dividends (if any) would have to double every 8 years or so to achieve that-- so that a $100 investment in the same company in 1926, with reinvested dividends, would be worth $200 in 1934, $400 in 1942, $800 in 1950, $1600 in 1958, $3200 in 1966, $6400 in 1974, $12,800 in 1982, and $25,600 in 1990, assuming the company was still around.

was thrown around a lot back in 1994 and the mid-90's.

The point being that while it may have been wildly wrong, 1) Wall Street's hucksters knew that it was wrong and didn't care; and 2) suckered many of us into believing it.

So what we come back to is yet more evidence that Wall Street can't be trusted.

Could some of these people have taken a lot more risk than they should have been? And wasn't that out of greed?

Also - as I pointed out to someone else on DU tonight who was complaining about 401K loseses - at least they have a 401K. Do you know how many millions of people would be overjoyed to be in their shoes, even with a decrease in the total balance??

The same people who were saying that they had no sympathy for people who took on a mortgage that they couldn't afford - often because they lost their job or their health and couldn't afford medical bills (both of those are directly and indirectly connected to Wall Street gains) - now demand sympathy because their stocks went down and resist that being seen as a result of unwise decisions and foolish risk taking.

They say that if we don't prop back up Wall Street, make good on the investor's losses, and get the same game up and going again, that there will be a Great Depression. But it is Wall Street that caused the Great Depression, not the worker or the home owner. Then they say that it is ordinary people who own stocks, workers and home owners. Well, then they are at risk at the hands of the same people, aren't they? Then they say that businesses will go down and people will lose jobs. Wall Street prosperity has been fueled by throwing people out of work and reducing wages and benefits! Help the businesses and the workers, not Wall Street.

And we do exist, not that many people realize it.

There's a lot of those. :eyes:

Pretty soon the stock market will hit bottom and it will be a good time to buy an index fund. Ten years from now you will have made a good profit. The housing market has not hit bottom yet but again you will make money over a ten years period. No one has ever come up will a better idea than to buy low and sell high. It's the greedy people who buy high and end up selling low.

The investment model needs to be vastly simplified and individual investors need to assume actual risk and not keep shifting it off onto others. The market has little connection to the real economy in terms of people investing in actual companies that make widgets to sell to consumers, it has turned into a mathematical modelling convention.

The only way you really get rich is to invent something that everyone wants.

Doug D.

They are INDIRECT not DIRECT so it stands to reason that they represent a form of "derivative", perhaps simpler than some but nonetheless they are DERIVED from an index of selected stocks...

Q.E.D.

Doug D.

all of the talking heads on teevee are freaking out because the DOW might fall below 10,000. Many in Washington DC are doing everything they can to keep it elevated. I say, let it DIVE, then the world will begin to correct itself and common people may be interested in investing in the market once again, not just the ultrawealthy who have more money than they know what to do with.

and I feel no pity for the rich,or the stock brokers or Ceo's.
In fact I kinda HATE them for what they have done to this country.The ones seeing wrongdoing could have spoken up ,could have taken a risk to save this country but they didn't they went along because it lined their pockets.I hate the greed is good crowd.They're pigs And the market is one huge casino.

Something has to stop this.The fucking stock market gambling addicts ,over confident con man egomaniacs and stupid bullies have destroyed everything.And they tried to hide the theft but now they can't and I am supposed to pity these tapeworms.

Ddclue,I hope your dream of your own place can happen someday. I know alot of people here and everywhere suffer and struggle .They wish for the basics because they so need them to LIVE.I have very little food left I got enough to get 1 meal each day until my disability comes the last week of the month is always like this...It infuriates me how the "players" in the business sector have drove us crazy and robbed us blind.It disgusts me how their fortunate circumstances blind them to how much their lavish lifestyles cost all of US. This is wrong,unjust ethically perverse. The rich need a little poverty to control that arrogant hubris.

And yes I hate the players and I despise the"alphas".

:kick:

with a high of $99K per year, you're single, with no dependents, no mortgage, and you've "been too busy just trying to keep even the last 20 years since college to be able to invest my money in Wall Street's house of cards."

What the heck have you been doing with your money? If you have medical bills, I apologize.

Guess what? My masters degree in computer science isn't worth the paper the diploma was printed on now. However, I'm not going to blame my fellow citizens for trying to improve their economic status and have income for retirement by investing in the stock market. It's not the small investors who are to blame for this.

You make a lot more than most people in this country. What are you so bitter about?

I'm bitter for my country which is busy screwing the little guy.

Even still it is harder than you think to make ends meet, even for me. It is IMPOSSIBLE for average people.

Doug D.

thanks for telling us what the problem is.

We, you read that right,, we make far less than you do... we still manage to save and do other things.

I wonder what you'd do with oh 35K, the mean in the country

if I'm lucky - have been unemployed for 10 weeks this year but recently started a new job.

I certainly agree that you can't make ends meet on 35k - you can barely do it for one person on 70k so it stands to reason.

Two kids in college, single-income household. We ain't starvin'.

You are doing something wrong.

You make almost three times what I do, live in an area with a cheaper cost of living, and you're crying about you? Jesus wept.

I have no dependents, and if I made $70k-$99k each year I'd have a bunch socked away for a home and/or retirement. I can't imagine dumping so much of that on other stuff, with the exception of medical expenses, that I didn't have much to show for it long term.

lol

Whatever.

It's insane that people use credit to pay for things they cannot afford. THAT is the core problem in all this. Granted, the blame falls on the government for failing to regulate and for the greedy profit mongers of big business and their predatory practices. But we are the Credit Junkies, and our demand is their product.

I wish people would eschew debt and find a way to be happy with what they CAN afford.

in many places not having a car means you can't live there, no job, no access to anything. This means cars, repairs, gas, etc.

A lot of people are so in the hole they can't get ahead. The problem is not that they are spending too much, it's that they aren't being paid enough to live a decent life.

Doug D.

People easily confuse wants and needs. They need a car. They want a new car.

Are you always given to hysteria?

Ease off the hostile insults. You'll feel better if you're less of a grouch.

Nice photo of Gabby Hayes in your avatar.

& set himself up as model for the benighted who he says can't control their spending, advises me to reduce my hostility.

half of workers make less than $15/hour: 31.2K full time, 52 weeks.

Nothing you say argues against unwise uses of credit. In fact, the opposite, but I suspect that's above your pay grade.

buh bye

stop digging.

My husband and I have a combined income of a little under the national mean. We've made it a point to stay as debt free as possible. I am back in college and he is in grad school and we both pay our tuitions outright, not taking any student loans. We only purchase vehicles that we can afford to purchase outright, or are at least able to put more than half down on. We don't own a home because we agreed that we could not afford one at their current inflated prices. Any debt we incur is paid off as quickly as possible. We live extremely comfortably and are still able to put a significant amount of money into savings each month. We are not anti-debt, I realize there are definitely times when it is necessary and we utilize credit when we need to.

I am no apologist for the greed-driven CEOs. I, too, blame the lack of regulation and the predatory lending practices for our current economic situation. However, I feel we can do our part by using credit responsibly and not letting ourselves fall victim to their traps. The best way to protest and fight these crooks (I do realize not all of them are) is to minimize our dependence on them.

Our economy is fueled by consumer debt. That MUST stop. It isn't sustainable. This is the wake-up call.

and I'm one of those about to be "wiped out".

My company services the transportation industry. If the commercial paper market grinds to a halt, the transportation industry will grind to a halt. And, frankly, so will every other business. it doesn't affect just those businesses that deal in comercial paper, but all the businesses that deal woth those businesses - all all those businesses that deal with THOSE businesses. Just like dominoes.

The only think I have invested is a modest 401k. I have less than $1500 in CC debt. I only owe $80k on my home and $10k on my car. Yet, because I will probably lose my job I will be wiped out. Just like you, btw.

So congratulations - YOU are probably wiped out just like the rest of us. Feel better now?

things still have to move. this world is not going to grind to a dead halt. if you are that concerned, begin looking around for other jobs. it sounds as if you have a sustainable life style, you haven't been crazy or greedy. i think you'll be okay, really.

You do realize that anyone who has a 401k or even a money mark fund is turning upside down on a daily basis. Bleh, I hate people who have this kind of a mindset. And your job? What do you think your employer is going to do when the bank won't float any credit anymore? Keep you around? LOL!!!

Of course if people's survival, savings, and retirement are dependent on the stock market they are in a risky position. The cause of that is an unregulated and unsupervised market.

I want to thank you for this post.

Some are berating you here based on your $90,000 income. I want to talk about that, and I am glad that it came up.

I am convinced that the party and modern liberalism in general are controlled and dominated by a small minority. I am also convinced, from extensive off line work in the party, and private conversations I have had with members here, that the ones who are most dominant, most likely to attack the left, to berate the general public as stupid and to blame for their own problems, and to consistently argue for free market capitalism, are themselves in that $90,000 and up annual income bracket.

The needs, desires, sentiments and world view of those people, who are in the upper 10% income bracket - be they supposedly "liberal" or "conservative" - are very different and even oppositional to those of the other 90% of the people.

I believe that this is the cause of the confusion and antagonism within the party, as well as the cause of the weakness and failures of the party and of the inability by the party to form a solid and effective front against the right wingers and their wealthy and powerful clients.

They are also the people most likely to use bullying tactics here, and at local party meetings as well. Since it has become increasingly true - has it ever been so true throughout history as it is now? - that bullying and self-centeredness are the very qualities that are lavishly rewarded materially, this should not surprise us.

I applaud you for looking at this from outside of your position of relative privilege and status.

it's pretty obvious at du, in different ways.

especially in various kinds of shaming tactics.

i'm not sure if it's deliberate, to keep the rank & file in line, or just a manifestation of class position: identification with elites w/ a little noblesse oblige thrown in.

but it does stick in one's craw a bit.

thankful that I could contribute so much. I paid between $40K and $60K a year in Federal and state taxes, and gave a lot away in my own particular style, and was really happy to do so.

Imagine having an income that you can hand that kind of money out and still have more left for yourself. My only complaint was that I paid exactly the same amount into SS as Gates did even though he's paid hundreds of times more than I.

I also tried to talk my colleagues into forming or joining a Union because in my position I was hearing the rarefied executives bitching about our salaries every day and knew they would find some way to knock us back down. I was met with some of the astonishingly stupid arguments you can imagine as to why a Union was either not necessary or not possible.

I don't completely disagree with the OP, but this part:

"Here in Florida that is a fairly small ranch style house in a bad neighborhood with about 1500 square foot and 1/10th of an acre lot if you are lucky."

1500 square feet is huge, people. Unless you have more than three children, I'm shocked at anyone complaining about 1500 square feet.

and housed 4 people. If it had been double that size with the same number of people, we would have gotten lost in it :)

Come to think of it, I've never lived in any space larger than about 800-900 square feet.

I read your whole post, and I'm glad I took the time. Recommended :)

If Bush vetoes it, then McCain loses more points. We need a stimulus package to get the middle class back its buying power. The wealthy people can still purchase. They will just have to make do with a million instead of five million. Big fucking deal.

My hubby 401K retirement, from his job, is tied up in the market. He has worked for 30 yrs now and is ready - we thought - to retire in 2 yrs. It's something that we have counted on.

WE ARE NOT RICH. His 401K is something that he has contributed small amts. to from his paycheck.

He's 65 and will now be lucky to retire by 72 !!! We still have a mortgage, etc.

Of course, you must be young and don't give a fuck about a lot of people's retirement savings being wiped out.

x(

.. you are aware that ANY INVESTMENT ADVISOR or FINANCIAL PLANNER would tell you to be mostly OUT of stocks if you are that close to retirement.

You DID protect yourself from an almost guaranteed drop in the market by moving at least most of your money to a safer investment?

If you didn't look in the mirror, there's your problem.

I talked with hubby, but NO move was made.

That's our fault. I know. I know. <wailing about here>

If NOTHING is done to help this ecomony, I want to know HOW YOU'RE doing then !!

Some folks on DU are going to lose their jobs. Happy about that????!!!!

I've already BEEN unemployed this year for 2-1/2 months...

Doug D.

not good. And that a key message of right-wing parties and governments is 'fuck the poor' and it's been disastrous. Just today, I was listening to some teachers I know talking about kids who can't concentrate on learning because they come to school hungry. And this is in a relatively middle-class town in a country with a welfare state.

However, this economic crisis has implications way beyond 'get rich quick' stock market investors. It could lead to massive unemployment, with lots of people having no jobs at all. It could lead to lots more people doing without medical care and higher education, as they lose their jobs *and* government benefits are cut. The crash of 1929 didn't just harm the rich or the greedy or even just all stock market investors - it harmed huge numbers of people, worldwide.

I think that it's necessary to find some way of controlling the crisis so that it doesn't result in a cataclysm. Once that is sorted, the next step is to make the changes that should have been made long ago; increase taxation on the rich and on big businesses; move back to an economy based more on industry and on public services and less on Big Money. But I perceive an attitude at times that it would be perfectly OK to have a big enonomic cataclysm, because that would harm the rich and greedy - without recognizing that it would do much greater harm to the poor and the sick and the very young and the old.

Seriously dude, nice rant and all, but one has to wonder what you did with all of that scratch? Kind of makes the post lose it's edge when you seem to have had a pretty decent income for a number of years.

I wonder if I were in your income bracket, would I be so bold as to give a hearty FUCK YOU to the rest.

I wish I was rich; if I were, I may be able to afford the $650.00 hit my 401 retirement package has lost in the past six weeks.

Well, maybe I *am* rich-- I gross 24k a year, and if the second, part-time job I applied for at the liquor store across the street from my palatial 750 sq/ft apartment comes through, I guess I'll be considered lavishly rich, extravagant, dare I say it? "exotic!", as I still do my best to invest into my retirement savings.

I'll never be able to afford a house in the market they created. Median house price in my area is in the range of $500k. I don't have health insurance. Paying for gas is painful. I can't afford to go back to college and get my degree. Tourism and home sales are down in my area, so jobs are drying up.

We can't win this way, and all the gov't wants to do is prop up companies that we can't afford to pay.

THIS ISN'T WORKING. BUSH AND PAULSON ARE NOT OUR SAVIORS.

That is all.

But this bailout was neither the best way nor the only way to rescue the economy.

The world is not coming to an end. What happened yesterday was that the market held its breath and turned blue out of pique at Congress' refusal to kowtow to it.

And we should help them get free from the absurd hope of the market supporting and protecting people's savings and retirement, and we should do whatever it takes to protect their retirement and savings. Step one - free them from depending upon the market.

What are people's savings and retirement doing in the stock market? What is people's wealth doing in real estate? When did we all get the idea that we, too, could be aristocratic landed gentry or that the sharks in the market would do us any favors or even play fair? Bad idea. I said that when this trend first started - that people would some day face the choice of losing their savings, or demanding that we all become slaves to the market.

Here we are.

You should never take money to Vegas or Wall Street that you cannot afford to lose. Why don't we give money to the casinos and everyone can go gamble there? The rest of us can then be free to get on with the real job - rebuilding our crumbling and disintegrating country.

The entire thing is built upon the premise that only those in the market and who are successful, selfish and greedy will be hit. But that's fools logic.

Your entire OP falls apart when exposed to the fact that this crisis can affect everybody, and may hit the middle class and lower class the hardest.

that:

a) This is a crisis... All we have to go on for that is BushCo.
b) That everybody will suffer.

Stop spreading the fear, you're part of the problem - not the solution.

Doug D.
Orlando, FL

For decades now, very poor people have been SCREWED OUT OF HAVING A PLACE TO LIVE.

Yet, where was/is the outrage about the lack of low-income housing????

WHY are we so invisible?

I would really appreciate it if you would answer this one.

What makes you think that?

I worked during college in Atlanta in a supermarket during the 1980's and made crappy money all in all until about 1995 so NO I do NOT see the poor as invisible having BEEN poor... perhaps you've confused me with a Republican??

Doug D.

You specifically mentioned the middle-class "housing crisis" and I pointed out that there's been a HOUSING CRISIS for DECADES for low-income people, yet you choose to ignore that and get into a personal defense.

That's one aspect of what I'm talking about.

It's been this way for many years. Coworkers turn their backs ans say "well, he deserved it for rocking the boat" as whistleblower is fired and black-balled.

It's ALWAYS easier for folks to hide, say "THEY deserved it; I'M smarter" and let folks get thrown under the bus.

It's been that way for a long time ... it's why the Nazis could get away with murdering 11,000,000 people.

I seriously doubt I'd have ANY sympathy if I were in a concentration camp and I saw one of the people who sat and watched me get hauled away was being dragged into the camp. I'd probably say "what goes around comes around."

It's a lesson I'm afraid we'll NEVER learn.

I oppose ANY political 'rescue' that doesn't deal with the PROBLEM. (The 'bailout' DIDN'T.)

Every time we do it, we make life much better for them.

I get attacked for pointing it out, but I'm going to continue to do it, because we need to LEARN TO SUPPORT AND UNDERSTAND EACH OTHER!

From one canary to another, thank you so much for understanding, and speaking up and saying so.

You have no idea how much that means to me.... we all only have so much ammunition, and when it's gone, it's gone. If we don't replenish each other, we all lose.

CHIRP!!!

:yourock: :pals:

edited to add a quotation sent to me today that says it poetically:

"Our societies are in danger of rejecting those who disturb them too much, and sometimes even wanting to get rid of them."
- Jean Vanier, Our Journey Home, pp. 147-148

I invested in the stock market out of desperation, because as a contract programmer - and with what you said about your earnings peaking when they did, you might be a programmer too (I'm not now) - I have no retirement, I'd had bad luck in the 80's with a condo in TX and was screwed on real estate for 7 years, and my wife (now ex) didn't make much. So to save for retirement, to buy a house, and to hopefully have money to travel a little, I put most of my money in the stock market, but not flippantly - I only did it after reading numerous investment books, and umpteen advisors who said that basically I 'had to' if I wanted to have any chance of retiring; i.e. earning small percentages on CDs/savings wouldn't cut it.

So I wasn't trying to 'get rich'; I was merely trying to do better than a savings account. That doesnt' make me a greedy bastard Wall Streeter any more than millions of others like me who had their money in there whether via individual stocks, mutuals, or their 401ks/IRAs!

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