DeLong is wrong.
It's a depression, or under by anyone's prediction will soon be. We should be able to distinguish this event from lightweights like 1992.
1973 & 1982, the last two worst recessions, lasted 16 months each. We are already at 13 months and it will keep getting worse for a while. IIRC, there was only two events in the 20th century that lasted 20 months.
With the collapse of housing & finance, the wide sector declines, the int'l declines, the very unusual deflation...its's a depression.
Does it matter?
"George W Bush, like the previous Republican Herbert Hoover, with his Neo-Classicist Economics, like Herbert Hoover, is responsible for the 2nd Depression in the last century"
It matters a lot.
Like it's a beautiful building right in your neighborhood.
And more documentation of health care fiascoes. Racing to have an emergency C-section in the three days before your insurance runs out (no COBRA available when the employer is shutting down), and then having them not cover it? Major league fucked-upness of our system on display there.
Maybe it's the season and the weather, but it's hard to imagine things getting better.
#3, Just imagine all the murders that are going to happen just before the estate tax gets reinstated.
My dad's company went broke in June, and the best he's found is substitute bus driving for the mentally disabled. He's worked 40 hours exactly one week since losing his job.
In other news, I'm going to be so fucking fucked if I don't find a job for next year.
My boyfriend, who graduated with honors from one of the country's top law schools, interviews exceedingly well, and generally looks very good on paper, has been looking for a permanent job for over a year now.
A friend from law school got a job at a firm in New York making big bucks doing real estate law, and got laid off over the summer. Two other friends are working their asses off because people keep getting laid off at their firms and they don't want to be among them. One in particular is terrified because she has a work visa, so if she loses her job she has to leave the country within a month.
If GM goes bankrupt and can't pay its pensions, the most likely immediate result will be my in laws moving in with us.
Our jobs are as secure as we have a right to hope, but we are counting on the IRS refund to pay for the Chapter 7.
What a cheery Christmas thread, and the Greater Depression has barely begun.
OT and a week old: I found it interesting that Rip Hamilton takes a Bob McManus approach to conditioning.
LeBlanc, that's pretty tough but all too typical these days. People might think about signing up for bankruptcy CLEs.
I had a similar experience, Heebie. Went to a party and discovered three friends had been laid off that week. So, so terrible.
2009 is going to be uglier still. These stories will seem quaint by June.
I was in court in Rockville last week, and had some down time to chat with the judge. He signs foreclosure orders, and sits on arson cases: both at alarming levels.
So when do we start burning shit down?
If this is a depression, the timing's better than that other one. We get a new liberal president just a few months after it starts. It's just a question of whether he has a new deal.
You don't start burning shit down. You do this. And if you're still in work and you know people who are doing it, you send them money for food and lawyers, organise meetings, collections. Just like before.
14: See 12, people have already started.
Is it 'burning shit down' if you're doing it to collect the insurance money?
But little do you know that the insurance company is on the verge of bankruptcy too.
Which, when you think about it, is the perfect Rube Goldberg stimulus: desperate owner torches building, makes claim against desperate insurance company, which gets government bailout, allowing government funds to flow through insurance company and owner to contractor, who hires people to rebuild building. Possibly slightly less efficient than spending the money on Atrios' SUPERTRAINs, but what the hell.
I don't like the locution, "lost their job." It sounds as though it's behind the sofa. When you lose something, it's your fault. You were neglectful, absent-minded, forgetful. They didn't lose their job. Someone took it away. Someone laid them off. Someone fired them.
The word lost can be used when something is taken away from you. For instance, it's sometimes used as a euphemism for death.
The boss doesn't lay them off, though -- market forces do.
Actually, recessions and job losses are caused by surges in boss cruelty.
#3, Just imagine all the murders that are going to happen just before the estate tax gets reinstated.
In my less charitable moments I hope for exactly this. The people getting wacked will be crony corporatist aristocrats who raised shitty children. Not exactly a great loss to society. In my ideal world the kids then get sent to prison, removing them from society. The estate, proceeds of a criminal enterprise at this point, goes to the state which uses it to build SUPERTRAINS! Hooray!
The action in 16 was organized by a very dear friend of mine. I hope she wins in time to come to my wedding in 2 weeks, but if not, she'll definitely win the excuse wars.
The silver lining here is that for some of us, all that murder and arson will mean job security.
28: Indeed, I was starting to think it was time to get out of the arson-for-hire business, but it's really turned around!
28: yeah, but all the massive state budget deficits, not so much.
Still seeing hiring in the city police departments though.
Didn't you watch The Wire, Brock? All gswift has to do is rearrange some dead hobos to look like they've been whacked by a serial killer and it's unlimited overtime.
I've been out of work since December '07 and I have lots of skills. I did get a 'win' because I got severance and unemployment, my supervisor had been trying to make me go 'f-you, I f-king quit!" for over a year.
I've sent out over 200 resumes and have had six interviews. My best prospect right now is through a friend who has what amounts to a tech start-up who hired me as a freelance tech writer/editor/ad writer.
And because of severance, unemployment, the first extension and the possibility of a second extension, our household finances are staggering along. But my husband (who works for a four-person banner/display shop) and have no health insurance. Which is scary in itself.
But my husband (who works for a four-person banner/display shop) and have no health insurance. Which is scary in itself.
The idea of not having health insurance sort of freaks me out. My brother was in a motorcycle accident about a month and a half ago, and while he's going to be fine, we just started getting the insurance statements and their bill so far is close to a quarter of a million dollars. I realize the situations are probably different (I'm pretty young and cheap to insure), but I have one of those high deductible plans that doesn't kick in until I have several thousand in medical expenses and it's only about $60 a month. It's useless unless I get hit by a bus while crossing the street or something, but I at least won't go bankrupt. This might be unrealistic for people who aren't in their mid 20's or who have pre-existing conditions, though.
Re: 34
Yay Massachusetts!
Also, I think we might be able to push to get health care passed now. Does anyone know the best way that I, as an individual, can do this? I mean Kennedy is on board and all that.
Regarding 16: Barack Obama.
Did the president of the United States just express solidarity with an occupation strike? Has my cortex just furted?
36. He still has to survive 6 weeks after expressing solidarity with an occupation before he gets to be President. But yes, this is not the world as we knew it.
I think I live in the only part of the country where the economy doesn't suck - inside the Beltway. I feel kinda guilty for having a good job (boring, but not too hard, and the hours and benefits and pay are good) and not even being all that good at it. This thread certainly is a cautionary reminder to keep my nose to the grindstone, though.
38: Wait, what? I thought you were a journalist in Vermont or New Hampshire. Am I mixing you up with some other commenter?
Sure, OFE. When I read that I got coffee all over my keysphere.
My job is very secure at the moment but I have no idea what it will look like in six months or a year and honestly I want to be somewhere else by then. When I start to freak out anyway I remember that I have a financial adviser cracking the whip to get my finances more in line with being a grown-up and that if all else fails I have a standing offer to go back to an old job that is perpetually hiring. Otherwise, I don't even know enough about the economy to know what to fear.
an old job that is perpetually hiring
Does a perpetually hiring employer reverse recession like a perpetual motion machine reverses entropy? Perhaps we should all relax.
I'm sorry, OFE, but if we all go back to that old job for a few months then it's going to take too long to cycle all of us through it and I'll have to start pushing people in front of buses to advance the line.
39: You aren't mixed up, you're just a little out of date. (It's not like I've talked about it that much either.) I was a journalist in Vermont until July. In August I moved to Arlington.
Maybe I am unclear on the concept, but if the company one works for is bankrupt, what good does a sit in do? If it is a cash flow situation that the bank is refusing to fund, there may be hope, but if no one is buying the product, what is to be done? Force consumers to buy?
OK, folks, I need a ruling.
I got a holiday card in the mail today. Cover is a snow-covered monument in a nearby city, with "Seasons Greetings." Inside, printed on nice 4x6 card stock, an abbreviated resume. (3d year law student, middling GPA from middling law school, a couple of minor law jobs). Inside of card, after the printed " . . . and best Wishes for a Happy New Year" is handwritten the following: Please keep me in mind if a position opens. Signed.
a very motivated person, s/he'll succeed
and rightfully imo, coz it requires so much mental energy to do that, even just normal holiday greetings
That's a creative idea, but not likely to be effective, I think. But what do I know about hiring?
It seems to me that the most important thing in trying to find a job as a lawyer is to pinpoint the people who are actually looking to hire someone, right at the moment when they start looking. This = very hard to do.
I've heard of 4-6 interviews friends have had recently that were like "we really liked your resume/cover letter/heard great things about you from X, but we're not hiring/we already hired someone/you're not actually qualified for the position."
46. Is your correspondent known to you? If so, pushing the envelope, but OK. If not, too "out of the box". But I am a traditionalist when it comes to holiday greetings. Perhaps if he had made it into an "amusing" holiday update letter, in verse.
45: It looks like the employees in the linked article are trying to get severance pay and their accumulated paid vacation. IANAL, but bankruptcies generally wind up with some of the debtor's obligations getting paid off, right? Presumably, then, the union is trying to get their workers on the top of that list.
Which makes sense to me. Labor costs are probably among the most predictable of obligations, and the consequences of not meeting them the most dire. It's impossible to legislate that the employees should get as good a golden parachute as the CEO is likely to, but you can't blame them for trying.
if the company one works for is bankrupt, what good does a sit in do?
IANAL or a union organizer but in my experience there is a lot of wiggle room in "bankruptcy." Companies can do well by their employees (such as paying them for vacation time accumulated, etc.) or poorly. Not all of this is legislated/regulated, and public shaming tactics can be an effective tool in pushing the company toward the "well" side
Earlier this week I saw a story about taking Bank of America employees on a helicopter tour to see firsthand the devastating effects of mountaintop removal, to pressure the bank not to make loans to coal companies. This is kind of the same principle. It's a small gesture, but the human factor does matter.
I thought money owed to employees pretty much *was* at the head of the list of obligations.
46 strikes me as somewhat industry-specific. Does your industry/firm value someone who's willing to do something mildly unusual like that? Is that kind of initiative valuable in your work, or is it a distraction, liability, or irrelevant? Are you hiring for the East Coast or the West?
I'm hiring for data entry right now. I'm indifferent to initiative in data-entry clerks; meticulousness is a much better predictor of whether they'll be a good fit for the job. Having said that, the leading candidate has show substantial initiative. Do as I say, not as I do!
46: Huh. You know, for some reason I'm not hating the guy. Not that I'd expect it to work, but he's not putting you to any additional trouble, and it seems harmless.
I thought money owed to employees pretty much *was* at the head of the list of obligations.
What does "owed" mean?
Sometimes it seems to me like the main reason a company declares bankruptcy is so it can wipe out all existing labor contracts. Airlines?
53: Again, I am not a lawyer, but we've had a Republican in the White House for the past eight years. Money owed to employees may once have been at the top of the list but that doesn't mean it still is.
My understanding is that money owed to employees is at the very top of the list if the Company wants to pay it (in order to keep the business operating as a going concern, etc.). Otherwise, not so much.
Unpaid salaries are a top priority for payout in bankruptcy. I'm not sure what the status is of accumulated paid vacation and contractually agreed-upon severance.
Oh sure, I thought we were talking about more executory-type obligations.
re: 46
It obviously was not effective, and for that reason, maybe was not a good idea. That said, it does not seem out of line.
I suppose I am sympathetic because my rather large holiday card mailing each year is a silent plea for old law school friends, colleagues at my former firm and people I have met aloing the way to think of me when they need a litigator. (but I guess I should not add Charley Carp to my mailing list)
62 -- Oh I like getting cards from people I know. And of course, it's nice to send them and be thought of, maybe, you know, at just the right moment. (Although if it isn't just the right moment, it's still worth it). But an unsolicited resume? From someone I don't know? From someone I'm very unlikely to hire on other grounds (but he ought to be able to figure that out)?
16, etc.: If I'm reading that right, priorities in bankruptcy have very little to do with whether the employees get paid or not, because the problem is that the bank cut off the company's access to cash.