Will it be a recession or depression or recession or depression ....?

Factual Questions
1

It seems that we’re at an inflection point for our economy. With what seems to be the start of an economic downtrend I’m starting to get paranoid for what will be in store for us over the next 10 years or so. What do folks think will be the impact of:

  1. Quickly rising energy prices both for refined petrolem, electricity and natural gas. Obviously being that I’m in San Diego I’m concerned about the huge increases that we’ve seen over the past year and those that are certain to come from the debacle of utility deregulation. I’m concerned that such a large and swift change (doubling to quadrtrupaling of costs) can set off the same stagflation that we saw following the OPEC triggered increases of the '70s. It seems that few people realize the huge effect that this change in California (6th largest economy by GDP in the world) will have on the rest of the nation and world. Further will we decide to step back from our commitment to pollution abatement to buffer these changes?

  2. The largely unrealistic run-up of the stock market especially in the “dot coms”. Has this skewed our expectations of what will come over the next few years and will it deprive new and existing companies with rational and socially desirable products and services from raising needed captial?

  3. The productivity tha computers and, or the Internet supposedly made on our economy? Is this productivity an illusion or will it allow us to increase prosperity without digging a deaper ditch farther down the road?

  4. A George Bush admininstration. Will it act like a Calvin Coolidge administration adopting policies that ignore domestic and international problems in the name of “states rights” and free-market efficiency?

2

Did you ever see the National Geographic article from June of 1974 that depicted a graph which showed that the United States only got 4.7% of our oil from OPEC countries, 14.9% from Latin America, and 64.8 was from our own domestic supply (my dad keeps several copies). That was right around the time when the oil prices went crazy, and the oil magnates used OPEC as an excuse to gouge the American public.

This story is very well told in the movie The Formula, with George C. Scott, and (interestingly enough) that movie is very difficult to find nowadays.

Also, interstingly enough, according to the March/April 1991 issue of Common Cause magazine, “George W. Bush is the third largest insider, or employee, stockholder in … a Texas oil company with offshore drilling rights in the Persian Gulf.”

I don’t know much about the stock market, but you raise some interesting questions, which I am thinking will soon be transported to the Great Debates Forum.

3

Recession: When someone is out of work
Depression: When you are out of work

4

Well, that is a very good explanation for depression, take it from someone who is out of work currently.

5

I havn’t heard this anywhere before but have though about it. High energy cost from supply/demand or taxes can trash our ecomony - or at least that’s what we should’ve learned from the gas crisis.

6

Oh, Please! One-to-two-star movies are hard to find. Give the conspiracy spin a rest.

7

Probably isn’t a conspiracy. Have you ever seen that movie?

And what did you think about the statistics quoted from the National Geographic magazine? This was right around the time of the oil and gas crisis, suppposedly based on price increases from the Middle Eastern oil-producing nations.

8

I’m just wondering who benefits from these situations, since somebody does, and how can I make sure that my friends and family are protected from the outcome.