1982 again ?? Or worse !!

machine1medic · Nov 7, 2007

Well in the early 80s , many around here lost their "real" jobs ....what with the recesion /
down-sizing all the investor/corp buy-ups.
WhatEver.

We had a woman "a temp" who moved out of her house ....lived with ?who-ever?. Not important.
And rented her Home until the recovery.
I remember {we had just bought our first home}
closing off part of the basement , and above that the living-room , and above that
the master-bedroom.So as to reduce the Heat-bills.
They were f****ing with energy costs then too.

Well the greater Milwaukee area is in the top three now acording to the stats in the news...
as far as impoverished / depressed , etc. etc.

I can tell Ya this much.
Since Labor day....
I have never in my 51 years seen so many For-Rent signs , suddenly infront of homes ....
even nice homes ....1953 Brick on the right side of the tracks. /and the like.

My hatred of the politicians , and the gimmy lemmings who keep them in office ,
and the mega-rich corporate hoars , who sell our country intencifies monthly .

Phil

Guest · Nov 7, 2007

Not many for rent signs around here, but lots of
for sale ones, I believe people are trying to cash
out home equity and move to cheaper pastures, but
the real estate bust from the last 1 1/2 years has
ate that equity, I believe the average home price
has dropped $100,000 in the last 18 months. Lots of
people took ARMs thinking the market would keep rising and interest rates would stay low, that strategy backfired and many homes are now for sale by the bank. Many people here re-financed and spent
the found money and that gave the local economy a
false boast for years, that's gone now.
I sell to the limousine industry and I think that is a good indicator of the state of the economy, because when things aren't well people
cut back on entertainment first, well my business
is less than half of what it was a year ago and I
have even gained some market share, so I say 1982
or worse, but I would not consider myself optimistic by nature.

Bob-O · Nov 7, 2007

I don't remember much from 1982 as I was working 66+ hours a week in the defense industry (thanks, Reagan.

Lots more for sale signs around, a mere 35 miles from Wall Street. Few visitors to the weekly open houses on my block - a flipper at $889K and $12-15K in taxes, and an original cape from 1953 like mine at $515K with $8500/yr taxes. The contractors I know are scrambling to finish everything before the bottom drops out. I'm glad we only paid $42k in 1981, and never tapped the equity.

Doesn't look good from where I sit.

morsetaper2 · Nov 7, 2007

If you can its a buyers market.

Thats what i'd like to do in the next yr or so. I bought in '86, house almost paid for. Sure its worth less than it was two yrs ago. But the larger (and more expensive) place i want to move into is worth less too.

A least interest rates are reasonable now!

SND · Nov 7, 2007

It's gonna be hitting soon here in Canada too. Dollar at around $1.10 is just nuts... and yet they say the unemployment got a little lower last month. When there's lay offs and lots of the wood industry just completely shutting the doors, I don't know where the new jobs are. Moving toward a service industry isn't gonna be any good. For many years the province I'm in, and a few others around really banked on " The tourism Industry " Government was putting a fair amount of cash in that, and call centers. Nobody's gonna come here with our dollar now, in the mean time real businesses were/are closing and government won't help that at all. Actually looking at cutting taxes some more.

Glad I'm very small, finished paying the last few tools for my new machine 2 weeks ago. Now if I can just finish off the house I'll be ok before it really starts to hit.

They haven't built a house for less than 250-300K for quite a while around here. In a region where the average wage is something like $14-18.00/hr. No clue how they afford it, but I'm sure many won't for very long. There was a lot of houses being bought and sold. Not I see more for sale signs that stay up for a much longer time.

Oh... I was Negative 2years old in 1982, so I didn't get to see it. My mom did say around 1980 within like 1 day everything went upside down.

morsetaper2 · Nov 7, 2007

In 1986 when I bought my house I was happy to get a 10% mortgage rate. I put about 10% down, excellent credit history, and well paying job. A few years earlier mortgage rates were even higher, like maybe as high as 12-14% IIRC? I was in my mid 20's so I didn't pay a whole lot of attention to those sort of things.

At least now rates for a 30 yr are in the 6-7 % range.

machine1medic · Nov 7, 2007

Perhaps we are just one stage further into the quagmire.
S.E. Cheeseheads are notoriously the "it will never happen to me types" and the "not in my backyard" types ,
we sell each other out for state funding in our own areas ie. the new Brewers stadium etc.

Folks hoping it will get better , our gov. just signed one of the biggest across the board tax increases in state history.

No-one in my niehborhood can sell for anywhere near what we owe , either due to value drop , our fools like me that threw my debt all on the house when the credit-cards , waterbills , and gass all doubled.
There's no-one to buy it any-way.

So renting , instead of loosing is the end of the teather. Even if ya have to double-dwell with a friend or relative.

art_deco_machine · Nov 7, 2007

I was doing better in 1982. I wouldn't mind going back.

But I think it is already worse than 1930's. The government is fudging the numbers.

AlleyCat · Nov 7, 2007

The NAFTA and GATT treaties crippled my business and 9-11 finished it off. I sold off the big equipment and kept the smaller stuff in my attempt to go another direction. Some of the money I put into gold and silver. For me that was a smart move and even today with gold around $830 per ounce it's a good buy. Some experts are saying that gold could go to $2000 per ounce or higher and silver could possibly have even higher percentage gains.

What most people don't understand is that gold isn't going up, it's the dollar being devalued. My plan was to protect the principal and you can't do that in dollars or at the bank. Check out the gold prices. Take physical delivery of the metal.

http://www.kitco.com/

The up side of holding gold is that you hang on to your principal amount. The down side is that when the currency devalues the chaos begins. Our society isn't as civil as it was in past years. So fasten your financial seat belt and get ready for one hell of a ride this go around. Buy silver, gold,.... and lead.

jim rozen · Nov 7, 2007

Not worse than the 30s. Yet. Banks simply
failed then, there was no FDIC. At this point
the sub-prime mess has snared a bunch of
brokerage houses but things are being propped
up for now. Citigroup, Morgan Stanly.

When they stop doing that, and you see runs
on banks in the US (already happening in the
UK) you will see the ride get bumpy.

No lines in front of banks yet.

Jim

dvideo · Nov 7, 2007

ADM....

Walmart economist have a much better handle on the "real economy" - at least at my level - than the Feds do... at least through thier "unemployment forecasts...".

The real "STUNNER" to me was the indicator (via a PBS news report) that housing starts were down 1 million units - earlier this year. there was no EQUIVALENT huge increase in unemployment filings though.... I would guess that this is due in large part to the number of "illegals" that can not file for unempolyment...

Walmart cares about spending... the Feds care about "posture" - that is the message of 1 million housing starts less (at about $200K per house). VERY DRAMATIC difference....

I am not being negative - just observing that the Government numbers are about HOW MUCH MONEY THEY HAVE TO PAY OUT - not the same as Walmart's "HOW MUCH ARE WE GOING TO SELL?".

--jr

dvideo · Nov 7, 2007

We have it a lot better than folks in the '30s. Family stories from my wife's side of the family told of banks in Memphis coated with blood on the outside walls where people had just beat their hands against it....

FWIW - my wife's family owned a small bank in north-west Tennessee. It was the ONLY bank west of Nashiville that survived the '20s bank collapse. They had a LOT of stories about who made it and who didn't - and why. They still own the bank and are doing well.

*************************

we have a LOT to be thankful for -

--jerry

jim rozen · Nov 7, 2007

And one of the reasons we have it better has to
do with the new deal policies.

Social security: old folks are less likely to
starve.

FDIC: folks are less likely to lose their money
in bank failures.

What would we all do if the newspapers in the
morning said, "you better come downtown and pull
your money out, your bank is going under" and you
get there and the line is blocks long.

Yep, all the money you thought you had - gone.

Please play that scenario out in your mind
when you are tempted to say "we need LESS
government regulation of the financial markets."

Often you see elderly folks who keep large
amounts of cash in the house, and stockpile food.

Sounds crazy until you realize they were poor
and hungry during the depression. They are one
reason the present administrations idiotic,
misguided attempt to privatize social security
failed miserably.

Jim

dvideo · Nov 7, 2007

You are sure on target Jim..... I heard many of those "bank" stories from people who experienced it FIRST HAND...

I also think the Mormons have the right of things to be prepared in case of adverse times... "Just in Time" for family food and necessitites is not a good idea.. Like "gas" - from one day to the next - things can change a LOT.

This isn't a political question at all, either. I heard stories about the flood of 1927 (It started raining one day... and did not stop....) and other events.... We saw Katirna and ill preparedness on the part of many......

1982 was not bad... It's the epidemic of 1918-22 and similiar that gets my attention...

--jr

--jr

dvideo · Nov 7, 2007

Just to add.... Many of the customers I have are having problems... some decided to just "not pay".... it's radically increased over several years.. - a lot like the Dot.Com bubble... That's in technology, too.

--jerry

jim rozen · Nov 7, 2007

Nobody's *really* sure how many died during that
influenza pandemic. They just don't know.

"The Great Influenza" is a book that discusses
this in detail. There is strong reason to believe
that disease emerged at an army base in the
midwest and spread to the rest of the world. It
is pretty clear WW1 was stopped because if it.

There is a camp near where I grew up (camp shanks
which is blauvelt NY and the story was that they
would march the troops from the camp, over the
mountain, to the docks were the troop ships would
take them overseas.

One shipload began the march (perhaps ten miles)
and the ship never sailed. 90 percent of the
soldiers died before they got to the docks.
That's how rapidly the disease came on.

Jim

motion guru · Nov 8, 2007

I was in HS during the early 80's and didn't know times were tough . . . I had a job building hydraulic hose assemblies and pulling orders of hydraulic and brass fittings. $4/hour wooowhooo! Enough for gas money and McDonalds, I thought things were pretty good.

We have posted ads for hiring people for months and get very few resumes . . . doesn't seem to be an over abundance of people looking for work around here.

Posted ads for engineers in Detroit, Chicago, Atlanta, Rochester, Phoenix, Seattle, Portland, Boston, (even here on the Practical Machinist) . . . mostly Indian and Chinese engineers looking for H1B sponsorship. . . we have one interview scheduled after a month of ads. Comparing this to the 30's cheapens the hardship experienced by my grand parents.

dvideo · Nov 8, 2007

A friend in SoCal says that "all the Real Estate Agents" he knew were dropping out of that business and going to do something else... He did not exactly where they were "going"..... Some were back to semiconductor sales....

There are a lot of good folks looking for work.. Your grand parents in the '30s might well be the equivalent of immigrants today... good, serious workers earn that shot...

--jr

gmatov · Nov 8, 2007

MG,

4 bucks in the early 80's was not too bad.

You can't get replies for what you need now, either the job description tells them they are unqualified, or they think it has already been jumped at.

Post for six of them, vet them out, hell, you might decide to hire all six.

Yeah, the situation today is not nearly what my parents went through. Frugal was not the thing, they simply could NOT AFFORD anything.

A nickle loaf of bread don't seem like much, unless you don't have a nickle to your name.

We are one hell of a spoiled society. We NEED our I-Pods and our PS3s for our kids.

Far as the Engineers, mebbe the salary is a bit on the low side.

Cheers,

George

Douglas Martins · Nov 9, 2007

"Far as the Engineers, mebbe the salary is a bit on the low side"

Engineering wages are on the decline yet they demand is really high.
I just won't go across the country and work for someone in a location I hate away from the family for low wages.
Since most of these companies already use Indian engineers and now have major problems with their work and need American engineers they still aren't smart enough to realize we won;t work for Indian wages.
I constantly get calls for the same rates I was getting 10 years ago.
When I can buy things at 10 year ago costs I'll consider it.

regards

1982 again ?? Or worse !!

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