novapsyche | (no subject)

I was just telling one of the psychologists in our building today that economic conditions are incredibly similar to those right before the 1929 stock market crash. "There are safeguards in place today to keep the market from such a catastrophe, but still it's a volatile situation."

The economy is already feeling a surge in Katrina's wake. Coffee, sugar prices up. Meanwhile, the prices of our exports (like that bumper crop of corn up in the Heartland) will drop because it will cost so much get to ports other than the Gulf.

Some places in the U.S. are already seeing $6 for gas.

This dwarfs 9/11. And we can't blame anyone. As they say in the insurance business, it's an act of God.

The diaspora will mirror the vast exodus out of the South during Reconstruction. Mirror, not parallel.

Three days. It takes just three days for civilization to descend into anarchy. Can we mark this for the future? If not, it will happen again.

It is criminal that Bush has refused help from other countries. The incompetence of this administration is staggering, truly. I'm not cynical enough, I guess; such callousness in the face of human misery still gives me pause.

It's 2005, not 1905, not 1865. I can't help but be angry.

New Orleans, the melting pot, is boiling over. It's the American psyche that's being scalded.

Scores of people are going to die today.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

And for quite some time.

Off-topic, that's one awesome and funny userpic!

Thank you!

We can blame people. The army core of engineers asked for money years ago to shore up those levies. The administration didn't give it to them.

Somewhere in there, I blame our failure as a society to develope an information infrastructure that allows us to truly monitor our own government, instead of being stuck bemoaning its failures later.

Well the stock market crash in the 80's was worse than the 29 crash in terms of percentage lost of the market. The real problem in 29 was people's rush on the banks. So hold out on that apocalyptic rhetoric just yet.

The problem with the economy in the 1920s was the rampant speculation. That is still going on. You have, I presume, seen the price of gas?

The banks failed. That money just disappeared. Sure, our economy is not the same as it was back then, but more people are living on fumes: using credit, not saving. It's still a volatile situation.

I'm aware that I've probably said something similar recently somewhere 'round these parts, so I'll keep it short and sweet as possible: not content with bottoming out several overseas economies in '85 and '87, the neocons are now for some reason diligently striving to do the same thing right here at home. Bush's proposed deregulation of the investment industry will indeed, if successful, push us straight into another Depression- and we may not even need that to destabilize sufficiently.

'K, I'll shut up now.