Dow Falls Below 10,000

[TrailerParkJawa]

Sweet.

No, it's not. I don't think you have any idea how deadly serious this is. Read up on Iceland. Gas stations ran dry. Grocery store shelves were emptied. No food, no fuel, and no prospects of restocking either. Endgame.

^ That's why I have a couple weeks of food in my home at this very moment. That, and there's the possibility of a blizzard shutting things down for a few days to a week during any given winter around here.

Living in earthquake country I have 2-3 weeks worth of water/gatorade/soda. But mabye only a week of food. Hopefully things wont get that bad. If it they do, well none of us will come thru this without knowing someone who was swept away.

[The Romulan Republic]

No, it's not. I don't think you have any idea how deadly serious this is. Read up on Iceland. Gas stations ran dry. Grocery store shelves were emptied. No food, no fuel, and no prospects of restocking either. Endgame.

Are you seriously saying that the nation of Iceland is going to die? And their's been nothing on CNN, no fundraising aid, no international relief... Frankly I find that hard to believe. But I guess however pessimistic you are, it can get worse.

[Broomstick]

If you want to keep up with news in Iceland, this site was recommend to me by an Icelander I ran into on another board.

[J]

So what's happening with Iceland? Are they all going to just starve to death?

The price of everything went up several times, shelves were emptied and gas ran dry. They would be well on the way to Mad Max right now were it not for the loans & aid which have been extended by several parties.

As it is they're limping along, they've effectively had their wealth cut down to a small fraction of what it was since their currency is now worth very little, making imports very expensive. Unfortunately Iceland has to import nearly everything so the effective cost of living has gone up several times.

[Darth Wong]

Almost all first-world countries have thrown away the concept of national self-sufficiency in favour of economic efficiency at all costs. I guess Iceland had to learn about the problem with this philosophy the hard way.

The worship of efficiency is one of those dangerous trends in national policy. Efficiency is great, but no engineer in his right mind would eliminate all redundancy in a mission-critical system in pursuit of efficiency, nor would he pare down the safety margin to almost nothing. That's just madness.

[Surlethe]

The worship of efficiency is one of those dangerous trends in national policy. Efficiency is great, but no engineer in his right mind would eliminate all redundancy in a mission-critical system in pursuit of efficiency, nor would he pare down the safety margin to almost nothing. That's just madness.

Now, I don't want to sound like I'm sucking engineer cock, but in a sense policy-making, especially economic policy-making, is a form of social engineering. You have to take the facts of how the economy will respond to any given change and use those to design your ideal economy. Your description is not just an analogy; it's actually what's going on.

[Big Orange]

Britain is stil in the shit and it may get worse before it gets better, thank you Thatcherite revolution:

Britain on brink of recession as economy shrinks 0.5%
Friday October 24 2008 09.53 BST

UK GDP shrank by 0.5% in the last three months in a clear sign that the British economy is in much worse state than feared.

The shock fall in GDP in the third quarter of the year fuelled expectations of further cuts in interest rates, possibly by as much as a full percentage point. Analysts had expected the economy to shrink by 0.2% in the quarter.

It also sent sterling falling further against the dollar to as low as $1.5646, having already hit its lowest level in five years. Shares in London continued their sharp falls, with the FTSE 100 down by almost 250 points at 3848, or 5.8%.

Economist James Knightley at ING said: "So much for Gordon Brown's 'no more boom and bust'. This is the first decline for sixteen years and largest fall since Q4 1990, but unfortunately we think this could be the first in a series of around four negative quarters of growth."

Philip Shaw at Investec said the figures were "truly dire". He added: "The fact that GDP contracted is not a surprise but it's a big shock that the decline is as large as 0.5%.

"News since the end of September has hardly been encouraging and the UK may well experience a recession that is significantly deeper than we had expected before.

Link

[Tribun]

Britain is stil in the shit and it may get worse before it gets better, thank you Thatcherite revolution:

Britain on brink of recession as economy shrinks 0.5%
Friday October 24 2008 09.53 BST

UK GDP shrank by 0.5% in the last three months in a clear sign that the British economy is in much worse state than feared.

The shock fall in GDP in the third quarter of the year fuelled expectations of further cuts in interest rates, possibly by as much as a full percentage point. Analysts had expected the economy to shrink by 0.2% in the quarter.

It also sent sterling falling further against the dollar to as low as $1.5646, having already hit its lowest level in five years. Shares in London continued their sharp falls, with the FTSE 100 down by almost 250 points at 3848, or 5.8%.

Economist James Knightley at ING said: "So much for Gordon Brown's 'no more boom and bust'. This is the first decline for sixteen years and largest fall since Q4 1990, but unfortunately we think this could be the first in a series of around four negative quarters of growth."

Philip Shaw at Investec said the figures were "truly dire". He added: "The fact that GDP contracted is not a surprise but it's a big shock that the decline is as large as 0.5%.

"News since the end of September has hardly been encouraging and the UK may well experience a recession that is significantly deeper than we had expected before.

Link

Is that because it had be the shit for a long time to literally tear down all producing industry to embrace the almighty services-future? Man, makes me glad that I live in a country where the politicians simply had been too incompetent to pull it through big style.

[Broomstick]

I wish they'd stop saying things like "on the brink of a recession" or "possible recession". I don't care if it fits the official fucking definition or not, we're in a fucking recession. Or depression. Or... well, we're in economic shit. All of us. Some more than others, but a big pile of bullshit just hit the fan and we're ALL splattered. Just fucking deal with it you retarded asshat talking heads!

IF the economy collapses entirely it won't STAY collapsed - supply and demand will still exist and things will be rebuilt. Eventually. But the meanwhile will be MOST unpleasant.

I had nightmares last night about not being able to keep the house warm this winter. Never had that particular dream before.

[DaveJB]

Is that because it had be the shit for a long time to literally tear down all producing industry to embrace the almighty services-future?

Seems the UK can't win when it comes to depressions - at the last one we were too focused on produce and manufacturing, and so when the demand collapsed the UK went down harder than anyone except the US and the Weimar Republic. Although how much of that was down to the National Government's incompetence is up for debate, really.

[His Divine Shadow]

For all this damn recession-talk and whatnot, the dollar sure has surged up. It's now 1.26 dollars for a euro, it used to be 1.6 at most. I miss those days. I even got an order from the US that hasn't been charged yet because it's a custom order and is being built up. Since I ordered it in august the fluctuating exchange rate has equaled a price-increase of 200 euros.

[Colonel Olrik]

So what's happening with Iceland? Are they all going to just starve to death?

The price of everything went up several times, shelves were emptied and gas ran dry. They would be well on the way to Mad Max right now were it not for the loans & aid which have been extended by several parties.

As it is they're limping along, they've effectively had their wealth cut down to a small fraction of what it was since their currency is now worth very little, making imports very expensive. Unfortunately Iceland has to import nearly everything so the effective cost of living has gone up several times.

From what I've been hearing (German news..) and already knew it's not so dramatic. The fact is that Iceland is very peculiar for a First World nation. They were one of the poorest regions of Europe until the 90s and with a self-subsistence economy, when the government decided to start behaving like a edge funds manager and the country's wealth increased tenfold (until now). However, most of the adult population still remembers what it is like to live with much less and to be satisfied with it, and the fact is that they have huge natural resources in comparison to the small population size and it's easy to distribute help to everybody. If the necessity arises, they can probably feed the whole 300.000 people with tasty fish.

[Ekiqa]

From what I've been hearing (German news..) and already knew it's not so dramatic. The fact is that Iceland is very peculiar for a First World nation. They were one of the poorest regions of Europe until the 90s and with a self-subsistence economy, when the government decided to start behaving like a edge funds manager and the country's wealth increased tenfold (until now). However, most of the adult population still remembers what it is like to live with much less and to be satisfied with it, and the fact is that they have huge natural resources in comparison to the small population size and it's easy to distribute help to everybody. If the necessity arises, they can probably feed the whole 300.000 people with tasty fish.

I take you haven't heard that the fish stocks are collapsing?

Iceland was really lucky it has all the geothermal power, otherwise it would've been in an even worse state, having to import oil and gas for electricity.