Why This Recession Seems Worse Than '70s and '80s

YAHOOoooooooooo ^ | Friday February 13, 2009, 11:37 am EST

[BenLurkin]

"I don't remember a president talking down the economy as much as President Obama," says economist Chris Rupkey of Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi. "The economy is very psychological. There's a herd instinct."

[Onelifetogive]

Why This Recession Seems Worse Than '70s and '80s

Because most people's memories are a few weeks long...

[Skooz]

This is exactly what I have been trying to tell my liberal friends for months. They’ve bought the whole “worst economy since the Great Depression” idiocy.

[texmexis best]

Obama does not have the normal survival instinct. Which may be a problem for us in the future.

[BenLurkin]

It's intentional. He's been instructed to crush America's morale and he is going about the job as instructed.

[Skooz]

Yep.

If you get people worked into a panic, they are less likely to object when you deprive them of their liberties — to make it all better.

[Slapshot68]

“Obama does not have the normal survival instinct. “

Exactly. In 1982, Reagan challenged America to help itself, calling gov’t the problem.

In 2009, Obama says the gov’t needs to bail you out or we’ll never recover.

Which course of action inspires?

[brownsfan]

Takes a manufacturing base to pull an economy out of recession. Has anyone seen ours, it seems to be missing? Oh wait, there it is, in China.

Of course, we don’t like to talk about that on FR.

[scottinoc]

Because, as it turns out, Phil Gramm was absolutely 100% correct that we are a nation of whiners.

[subterfuge]

It's intentional. He's been instructed to crush America's morale and he is going about the job as instructed.

[Slapshot68]

We don’t manufacture anything?

http://investing.curiouscatblog.net/2008/09/23/top-manufacturing-countries-in-2007/

Not saying it couldn’t use a kick in the pants, but we still lead the world in manufacturing.

[ClearCase_guy]

I think this is the basic plan. Obama has now passed a massive Spending Bill (its not intended to be a stimulus package). He's moved the country very far down the road toward socialism, and he's set a tone for his adminsitration ("You need government to solve all your problems.")

It's now time for Obama to talk UP the economy. It's now time for the media to talk UP the economy.

They may have caused some real problems with their past down talk, and this may be a little bit of a struggle. But in general, if they can talk it up enough, they will seem like winners, and we will all we thrilled to live in a Workers Paradise.

And the problems are real and huge and insurmountable, and if we all crash and burn, Obama can just tell us that the Republicans reduced the size of his *ahem* Stimulus package too much and it's not his fault -- he tried.

[colorado tanker]

That brings us to my duct tape stimulus package. Tape over the pie-holes of Obama, Geithner and Bernanke. Could do wonders for the markets.

[Tarpon]

It’s not a recession, it’s a crisis of confidence. And no amount of jive talk is going to fix that.

[griswold3]

What’s the total job losses since the election?
Businesses know what’s coming and Obama is making it worse with this doom and gloom rhetoric.

[autumnraine]

While I won’t compare it to the Great Depression right now, I have to say in some regions of the country, unemployment is pretty dang rough.

And I don’t know if California was giving out IOU’s for tax refunds.

[KarlInOhio]

Hanke is not alone in dismissing what appears to be a potent cocktail of misinformation and doom and gloom, wherein the current recession-now in its 13th month-is already considered worse than the 16-month ones of 1973-1975 and 1980-1982.

13th month? So we were in a recession while still growing in the first half of last year?

I've heard that one of the primary reasons why this recession seems worse is because the economic damage hit the banks right away and spread very quickly from there. Most others are much more gradual as things slow down.

[Liberty1970]

We didn't have the debt load in 1982 that we have now. And that debt load is courtesy of decades of tax-and-spend (actually tax-and-spend-more-than-taxed) policies of the Democrats and their entitlement mentality. If we stuck to the Constitution government would be a small fraction of its current budget.

This is their mess, they own it, and it will be worse because they have all the wrong instincts. Individual Americans who got indebted over their heads precipitated this crisis but it has been building a long time. And responding by massively increasing the indebtedness of the whole nation to relieve the problems caused by indebtedness of a small portion of the population is sheer madness in the long run. It's like watching a drunk on a losing streak who keeps doubling down his lsoing bets. With our money... this is not going to end well.

[wombtotomb]

my take is, there are a WHOLE lot more entitlement mentality folks who went through schools that worried more about their self worth than actually teaching them anything, especially that they are owed a living. Add to this the guilty feeling 2 working parent families that gave them everything and they worked for nothing. Add to that, the greatest generation is dying off so fast and you have a huge majority of people running around like the oooohhh nooozzzz guys.

Hubby has been out of work for 4 months. FINALLY he is starting a new job next week. Been tough, but we cut back and survived. The Paris Hiltons, P Diddy crowd just can’t handle that mentality. ‘what, no coach bag this week?’ “no $700.00 shoes, no sweet 16 million dollar bash???? OOOHHHHH NOOOOZZZZZ!!! Good luck to them when the bond bubble bursts, the economy really does tank, and they are just like the rest of us little people after their now poor daddies jump......

[MeanWestTexan]

Obama is trying to create a crisis in our capitalist society so he can create a new one in his image.

He’s burning it down on purpose.