12.3% how high will it go?

[Lancer]

I've been getting ready for hard times for as long as I could, since I could get ahead. Now we have a couple of rice fields and are working on buying 10 mango trees. I still hope to find and afford a third local rice field. We have another one but its not local and doesn't produce much. Then I have a 12 v hookah dive system which runs off a battery and a solar charger (could use another one) for off the grid. Last thing then is a small sailboat. When the project for Zkrib is done the family carpenters and I (also a carpenter) will build something we've never built before, a catamaran out of bamboo. I have the epoxy and biaxial fiberglass for it already.

Surviving the times to come won't be for me. If all this comes about as I believe it must I'd imagine my meds will stop coming down the line pretty quick. My wife and her family will do ok I hope, with all that I've prepared for her.

I still hope for a last economic gasp, maybe 2 to 5 years, maybe even 10 or more? where things get good again. That would allow me to put a finishing touch on things.

[KrazyHorse]

[Lancer]

I'm glad you're enjoying yourself KH, (if your laughs are on me) and I do hope I'm wrong. If I am, well all that rice gets eaten now or sold, the mangoes we might own ditto, the diving system will be a blast when we finally get a boat built, as will the boat, I hope.

Consider while you bust a gut in jocularity that 46 cents of every dollar the US government spends this year is borrowed, which is why I hope for a short lived delay in the inevitable.

Glad you had fun.

[Dinner]

And that leads to world wide social & economic collapse how?

[Lancer]

I'll just let it play out and then let you tell me.

[ZEE]

Fantastic answer, sir

[DanS]

The way many people survive is by collecting unemployment benefits throughout the recession -- unemployment benefits have been extended indefinitely. It's not a ton of money, but it will keep you fed.

[DaShi]

And there's always crime.

[Lancer]

Fantastic answer, sir

Thank you sir.

[chequita guevara]

The government keeps several indicies for unemployment. The figure used by the government as its "official" rate is U-3. Nationally, U-3 for June was 9.5%. U-6, however, was 16.5%. U-6 includes discouraged and underemployed workers, as well as those who've run out their benefits without being able to find a job. That's 1 in 6.

In Florida, U-6 is 20%, or 1 in 5.

We haven't hit bottom yet.

BTW, my understanding is that how unemployment was calculated in the Great Depression was U-6.

On the plus side, I've got some possible freelance work.

[KrazyHorse]

Che, modern sampling methods weren't in place during the 30s. The measures of unemployment available from those times are not strictly comparable. However, empirical work on the subject has indicated that peak U3 unemployment (if it had been measured) would have hit ~25% in the 30s

http://www.scribd.com/doc/13282170/Unemployment-1930s-vs-Today

I think that you'd be a lot better informed if you were willing to use more varied sources and applied a bit of critical thought.

[Jon Miller]

From what I have seen, this is just equivalent to the early 80s... maybe even better for some?

Remember all, we were at record low unemployment for years... the big fuss is because this was a financial problem (which mostly hit the wealthy/etc) and because we aren't use to it.

Now, I actually think that it could get worse because the financial problems have effects that reach long, and I am worried that the problems haven't been fixed really... but what we have seen so far isn't so bad (possibly because we have pushed off some of it to the future).

JM

[Zkribbler]

The government keeps several indicies for unemployment. The figure used by the government as its "official" rate is U-3. Nationally, U-3 for June was 9.5%. U-6, however, was 16.5%. U-6 includes discouraged and underemployed workers, as well as those who've run out their benefits without being able to find a job. That's 1 in 6.

Of course, even U-6 doesn't include prison inmates, who are necessarily unemployed. And imprisonment/capita has increased several times over since the Great Depression.

I'd guesstimate that 75% of American adults are employed; and 25% are unemployed.

[Lancer]

Great, now all we need is a dust bowl.

[HalfLotus]

Local newspaper say Georgia is at its highest unemployment rate ever. So much for the 'new economy'.