Why the West is unprepared for the next economic crash

[Soph0571]

After eight years of consistent, if often anaemic, global economic growth, the risk of a new recession is rising. The recent annual report by the United Nations Conference on Trade Development (UNCTAD) was testimony to this: rising debt, increasing inequality, the absence of necessary financial regulation and the emergence of global tech monopolies led the list of economic threats in 2019.

Growth is underpinned by a highly unstable debt mountain three times the size of global output. In the UK and the US, household debt is approaching pre-crisis levels and, in the absence of significant growth in real wages, this will further constrain consumer spending – the driving force of global growth for the last 40 years. Social security cuts in both countries are also intensifying the pressure on households. Indeed, the US’s broken education system now mirrors its pre-2007 housing market; student loans are being securitised – bundled-up – and sold on financial markets in the same way that mortgages have been.

[link:https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/economy/2018/10/why-west-unprepared-next-economic-crash|

Interesting read

[rampartc]

1. because we learned nothing from the last one

the banksters, on the other hand, learned how to rake in all the money in the world.

[Hortensis]

2. Did you need to learn that you had to vote for Democrats

to put things right after the last one, though? I certainly didn't. This is a very, very old pattern that started long, long before I was born.

Fwiw, people lived with decades of economic problems, just like now, before the Great Depression hurt the middle (voting) classes bad. Then they voted for Democrats overwhelmingly and big change happened.

Unfortunately, in this era, which followed the conservative Reagan era, a lot of political scientists are predicting that the current new pattern of wobbling erratically between parties is likely to continue. We really needed Hillary, and the Democratic congress that at one time looked likely to be swept in on her coattails, to follow Obama so we could build on what he'd started.

[AwakeAtLast]

3. We have been preparing for three years

It has taken us longer than we thought. We moved, renovated my parents' old house on our own, and hope to sell our other house soon. I have no credit card debt and all of our vehicles are paid for. We hope to be debt free before the crash. Vacations have been non-existent and we do not buy anything unless we have cash on hand.
It has not been easy.