Crisis may claim 50 million jobs in 2009 According to the International Labour Organization, in its annual Global Employment Trends report (GET) global unemployment in 2009 could increase over 2007 by a range of 18 million to 30 million workers, and more than 50 million if the situation continues to deteriorate. [Read... [Read more...] Is this insane or what?
The simplistic perspective offered by libertarianism is IMHO way off base. Hard data shows dramatically different information. I've seen this reported in the past, there were warnings on this through the past decade...and here is a link to a latest set of comments that reveal what went wrong....http://seekingalpha.com/article/116929-u-s-domestic-debt-what-can-be-expanded-what-must-be-reduced Over the last decade personal debt and financial institution debt grew at rates dramatically faster...crazy faster than did government debt. It resulted in a typical business cycle bubble....only dramatically worse than any we have experienced in decades. The effect is spreading world wide. Its amazing....business productivity is crumbling around the world. People can argue where the liquidity came from that allowed this debt crisis to occur. Did the US govt cause it with low interest rates and tremendous borrowing? Did it come because China primarily and other nations buy up US debt like it was going out of style. Frankly I've been involved in some elements of US finance markets for a long time. Going back to the 1980's there are and have been enormous amounts of capital from around the world that flow into the US economy. One reason is.....take a look at all the other economies around the world, measure risk, measure the relative thinness of those opportunities....and frankly the US economy has looked great for decades to world wide capital. High interest rates or low....the US economy always looked good relative to the rest of the world. The bubble was caused by enormous surges in financial institution debt and personal debt. The size is historically unprecedented. The crash is ugly beyond belief. Asset values are tumbling and going to tumble at unprecedented rates and amounts. None of it looks good, and certainly world wide job losses will be huge. But the primary reason for this bubble occurring and the resultant collapse isn't even remotely tied to a US central banking system. It might have a slight correlation...but the core problem was debt growth in two areas that frankly never would have been allowed or occurred in previous times.