@hamburgboy,
hbg, That's another truism about government's inability to control capitalism's greed. We've seen what's happened to the Enrons and Worldcom's, and what happened with cheap money during the past decade where leveraged buyouts and trading in derivatives created wealth and balloons that destroyed whole industries and the banking system.
We had obvious clues since the early 2000s when CEOs and officers were pulling in multi-million dollar salaries and benefits while the wages of the production workers stagnated - with many not even keeping up with inflation.
With that same easy money came consumer borrowing from the equity in their homes to spend money they really didn't have - which in turn created such a huge balloon, there wasn't anything to keep propping up consumer spending.
By the time we heard the BOOOM!~it was too late.
Look at consumer and national debt today; it's at an untenable level vs GDP when the economy of the world continues to shrink, and tax revenues can't possibly meet the demands government has allowed to spend on pork and unnecessary give-aways.
We're still in the job loss arena, and many more families are declaring bankruptcy - losing their homes and cars. More past middle class families are now going to food banks and charity kitchens to get some food and shelter.
Tax revenues have been on a down-trend for many years now, but all levels of government has never learned to live within their means.
The picture looks bleak, and situations for more families are going to look bleaker for many years to come.
The recovery from this great recession is going to take many years, and before it's over, many government safety nets are going to disappear.
Some will begin to disappear next month.
