U.S. stock markets are down more than 50% since they peaked in October 2007, but that figure really doesn’t indicate how rapidly the decline is accelerating.The markets are down 25% in the first two months of 2009, and down 10% in the last week. If the markets fall another 25% or so within the next two months, we’ll reach capitulation. Therefore, I’m revising my earlier forecast, which called for complete economic collapse by the end of this year.
I’m headed to the mud hut for a long weekend. Comments on this blog, the absolute cluelessness of the mainstream media, and my email in-box suggest I should issue a reminder or two before I leave.
I’m frequently told how easy life is for me. Always by people who think life is difficult for them, as they go on to explain.
According to these tortured souls, life is hard because they haven’t made the necessary psychological commitment to the notion of a world economic collapse. And I have, so I have it easy.
I wasn’t born a doomer, nor a social critic. The path was long and imperial, albeit dotted with few indulgences, as least by “civilized” standards.
Prophet of Doom is a tough sell, as it always has been. Nobody appreciates a prophet in his own time, I suppose. On the other hand, there’s no need for a prophet in these times: the newspapers are filled with far more economic doom than I can keep up with, much less write about. So this post will focus on my personal approach to an economy rigged to fail.
Over at Endless Emendation, I’ve been debating whether the industrial economy is near its end. Even without seriously raising the issue of the horrors of the industrial economy for the world’s cultures and species, and even for our own species, I’ve met a bit of resistance.
It’s not unlike the resistance I’ve met here. Or, during the last several years, everywhere else in the empire. I’ll avoid the issue of the horrors, just for simplicity. But I’m going to foray into the last of fast collapse. Readers, brace for impact.
Seems a life in the ivory tower is damned poor preparation for post-carbon living. But I’ve largely survived the blister phase, and calluses are forming on my soft, pink hands as I return to a life of labor at the mud hut. My fingers try to wrap around a shovel handle, even when there’s no shovel in sight.
The rewards are not evident yet, but I can feel them coming closer with each new dawn. Fortunately, I’m no longer addicted to academic success, as I once was, because I know there are greater rewards than meaningless paper in the bank and meaningless plaques on the wall.