No. of Recommendations: 1
Unemployment's on the rise, Banksy. Had a brief discussion with my brother who started to say, "we've been in a recession since..."
I told him I used the classical definition of recession - two quarters of reduced GDP. A recession is deep and can seem to be relatively prolonged. Though it's implied that some are only a few months long. I would assume a certain % of GDP decline defines those. But you don't really know your in a recession until it's declared and you get to look back. Economists may vary, but there's an old saying that Economists have predicted 10 of the last 6 recessions.
The length of the recession is from the peak of the GDP to the trough. I'm not sure if that's a good picture. It doesn't really tell me how the people are faring at the bottom of the trough. I've been on unemployment. I have helped people fill out tax returns, but I'd nee some brush ups to do it now.
Nothing was scarier than the GFC. This was caused by greed and Greenspan's ideology, which came in part from Ayn Rand. Dumbfounded, I listened to a friend tell another friend that they had a friend in a specific bank and that they were letting anyone buy a house. She stopped short of saying the qualifications were fraudulent, but that anyone could buy a house.
I examined two people who sold mortgages at the tail end, just before the GFC, and they were making BIG Money for what they did. They had people setting up appointments so they could process the mortgage application in a few hours. By the time they arrived it was a done deal, no deal ever fell through or at least very few. One fellow made $30k a month, the other (a newbie) was making $21k a month. Still, the 30k a month fellow tried not reporting all the income - go figure. They were just processing loans as quickly as they could because they knew the gravy train wasn't going to last.
Anything like that happening now? No. If we have a recession, it'll likely be shallow and then we resume. Crossing my fingers though. :)
