Monday October 12, 2009, 12:42 pm
It's pretty clear now that all or nearly all this is either still going on or has resumed full force. No one is going to get in the way of the ones with the power and money except for us. If we want this changed, we are the ones who are going to change it. If we don't, we'll not like the consequences but we will deserve them.

If you are interested, a good source of info is Elizabeth Warren; you can Google her and read her insights and recommendations. She's very good and has no real evident bias but does have a strong focus on doing her job well.

Monday October 12, 2009, 11:51 pm
Thanks Tinkie! That was a good vid in simple terms. Passed it on!

Tuesday October 13, 2009, 12:40 pm
Thannxx Tienkie.. at the end of the day we are the ones with the power... it is us that actually hold the purse strings... to what, how and when we will spend it.. perhaps it is now the time to be our own business, and choose to support smaller business industries, so that the bigger business can come back on their knees bringing in their offerings....???

Tuesday October 13, 2009, 6:25 pm
The reason this crisis is possible is because salaries have fallen in comparison to the cost of living more than ever. Therefore, borrowing enourmous sums of money makes sense to people whose salaries are completely insufficient to allow them to access basic things like housing, cars, even food. No one unless they are desparate borrows so much credit, unless they really have to. And so the real problem is not the banks and the lenders, but the disparity between salaries and cost of living, and the reason salaries are so low is because there are plenty of people willing to work for low pay and that is because there are too many people ie the population is too high.

Wednesday October 14, 2009, 2:52 pm
Thanks Tinkie!

This article is one of the best I've seen. The problem is that those who most need to understand its contents are unlikely to read them.

Wednesday October 14, 2009, 4:02 pm
I had computer problems mid paragraph!

Julia A

The kind of revolving credit to which you refer was not the main cause of this financial crisis because many people use that type of credit all the time. Muhammad Yunus and his Grameen Bank received the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize for sorting out some of those problems from below.

Somehow in the last 30 years many peoples', nations', and governments' debts grew too fast, and the sub prime mortgage debacle triggered a bust based on those debts. Until or unless those debts are reduced in a responsible way, the recovery from them will probably be slow, painful, and have a few spikes in it.

Many governments tried to sort things out with 'cash splashes', 'cash for clunkers', 'financial bailouts', infrastructure spending, etc. That is they started from the top.

Financiers need to be reminded constantly that lending money to customers who are unable or unwilling to repay it cretaes more problems than it solves. When financiers forget that golden rule, shortly thereafter they make no loans at all!

Keeping in mind the many things people wish to do at the moment e.g. relieve unemployment, deal with climate change, develop infrastructure, fight terrorism, alleviate poverty, and so on, there is not enough money on the planet to do all that at once while paying off debt at the same time.

No wonder the US Congress is having a few problems at the moment!

Wednesday October 14, 2009, 7:49 pm
Thank you Tinkie, this is very interesting! Hugs ♥