Plot, the economic situation is unlike anything we've experienced firsthand. My parents talked of the hard times of the Great Depression, but, even then, they were not as pessimistic as many are today. We can find parallels between the fall of the Roman Empire, and the US, and discuss other economic catastrophic world events. Fear of the unknown, and panic likely to result should matters get much worse are major concerns, but I'd like to believe we will survive this mess and be a stronger people and nation.
Ron
Back in the 1930's, we had several things in this nation the we no longer possess today.
First, over 25% of all Americans in that era lived or worked on a family farm. That means almost all Americans had a "country cousin" whose house they could flee to, and where they could sleep in the barn if need be. But today less than 3% of Americans live or work on any kind of a farm, and most farms of today are the monster corporate factory farms--no "family" there at all.
Second, we (once, back then) had the greatest railroad in the world, meticulously maintained and in top flgith condition. That railroad is a mere shell of its former self now. (And the rest of the world scratches their heads over why we would be so foolish as to dismantle it.) Using rails to ship freight is far cheaper than road or air travel, and it uses loads less energy. And using rails to transport people is not only cheaper and less energy intensive than cars or air travel, but it's also usually equal in time-efficiency for almost all instances of inter-city transit of less than 500 miles.
Third, we had an awesome canal and levee system. It's been halved since then.
Fourth, our domestic reserves of raw nautral resources, still sitting utterly untouched within the ground, were more than double back then than what they are today: coal, oil, iron ore, gold ore, copper ore--even uranium. We have very little left now of any of those (and other) important resouces within our soveriegn borders. And what scant amounts still remain under the ground here on American soil are only the sub-standard dregs that the miners and oilmen of yesteryear snubbed their noses at.
Fifth, we did NOT have a staggering debt of ... trillions of dollars, owed mostly to (of all nations!) Communist China. Our treasury was full of actual cash and gold back then, not a stack of IOU's.
Sixth, we had an economy heavilly centered upon the actual manufacturing of ... stuff! REAL stuff! Like clothes and toys and appliances and funiture and kitchenware, etc. Today our maufacturing base is almost nothing but cars, military contracts, soaps, and pharmaceuticals. But all the OTHER stuff gets manufactured almost everywhere else now.
What I'm saying is, we've got little left to play with, no additional cards up our sleeves. And our ability to be flexible as far as manufacturing and trade and transit --and especially the retooling of all of those toward any sort of a new economic target we might dream about-- simply isn't there anymore. And that's because you can't retool what either doesn't exist or is just hanging on by a thread.
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