Where is the US economy headed?

georgeob, You must've missed my primary thesis; that the wealth favored the already rich during the past three decades. It's never been about equality - which I never favored nor advocated for. I understand a bit about Econ 101.

SCREW THE ECONOMY!
FLASH!
1:52 pm ET
Earthquake in Virginia!

phew! I was 'looking' for you once I heard that it was centred in Virginia, south of Washington

This morning, there was a radio piece by an economist about the value of those gold coins - with inflation, we're just about where we were in the 1980's in regard to the value of gold.

Damn. I knew I should have been holding dollars for the paper content.

It's only an itsy-bitsy wobble Beth (5.9 is like a loaded truck going by). But trust you Yanks to get dramatic.

I bet it gave all those who have been impatiently waiting to apply Emergency Procedures a real good buzz as they round you all up and usher you to safety.

Has Obama blamed Bush for the quake yet?

H2O, no Obama hasn't blamed Bush for the quake, but we all know you've blamed Obama for it, haven't you? Admit it.

Interesting day on Wall Street.

Perhaps Obama should stay in Martha's Vineyard.

I'd credit some very wishful thinking about what Bernanke might say on Friday re QE3.

Bernanke has been issuing "wishful thinking" since he became chairman of the feds.

Could be. I believe that part of today's rally is attributable to investors believing (wrongly, I think) that Bernanke will announce a QE3 in his speech on Friday. I can't see that happening.

He ought to - and ought to go a step farther, and announce Quantitative easing, not Qualitative.

Cycloptichorn

given that I have not heard a single person claim that QE3 would work I would normally not expect QE3, but this government seems to know how to do little other than corporate class welfare.

What do you think about this?

I shared the wrong video at first but I corrected it!

I notice that someone is ignorant and has thumbed down my video without watching it! Are you man or woman enough to come forward and explain to everyone the logic in doing so or was this an act of emotion?

That's unsurprising. Being a much-less-than-avid reader of Keynes, on what basis would you be persuaded? But no matter. Even if Keynes wouldn't advocate the amount of stimulus spending that pops out of the textbook models we now call "Keynesian", so what? Keynes wasn't a Biblical prophet, he was a scientist. Consequently, we should judge "Keynesian" models, not by how faithfully they reflect Keynes's every word, but on their merits as scientific theory. Can they make refutable predictions? And how do these predictions hold up against empirical data? On these terms, Keynes-via-Krugman thrives, whereas Hoover/Mellon/Hayek-via-the-Wall-Street-Journal-Editorial-page falls short.

George, I do agree with you regarding public debt, and I'm personally in a situation of having negative net worth, despite a mid-six figure household income.

I was hurt tremendously by the housing market and still are getting hurt. J don't think consumers at my level are entirely to blame for the bubble....there was quite a lot of banks who lent quite a lot of money which allowed the bubble to develop and quite a few people made quite a few millions and quite a lot of them were bailed out by quite a lot of our tax dollars.

Sorry for that. But I really do agree that the wealth disparity is indeed impacted by the loss of billions of paper-assets by the middle classes. I just think it stinks that the people who allowed this mess to happen and should have known better (and they should....who lends a 27 year old over $600,000 in mortgages when their house hold income is only $75,000 at the time?) I know I should have known better....but here we are..