The Greater Depression is here.

[Versed0101]

Guys, none of that is going to happen. President Obama told me that we're going to fix this mess (you know, the one that started by people spending ridiculous amounts of money they didn't have on unnecessary crap) by having the government spend ridiculous amounts of money it doesn't have on unnecessary crap. I'm no economist, but that sure sounds like a foolproof solution to me.

Excellent point. I am in total agreement with your sentiments. I think it's going be important for each citizen to take personal responsibility for his or her own finances and not buy crap they don't need and think in terms of what is best for their families and our country.

We need to get the Greatest Generation out of their wheelchairs and nursing homes to save us again. They won the war, rebuilt the country and set us up for many years of prosperity. Unfortunately, looking at Gen Y, I don't see the sense of purpose the older generation had. If I had to go to war, I'd want the 88 y.o. WWII veteran watching my back rather than some of the folks coming out of high school now.

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[DrGregoryHouse]

"This city is headed for a disaster of biblical proportions."
"What do you mean, "biblical"?"
"What he means is Old Testament, Mr. Mayor, real wrath of God type stuff."
"Exactly."
"Fire and brimstone coming down from the skies! Rivers and seas boiling!"
"Forty years of darkness! Earthquakes, volcanoes..."
"The dead rising from the grave!"
"Human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together... mass hysteria! "

 

[Josh L.Ac.]

We totally need a Ghostbusters III.

 

[coprolalia]

We totally need a Ghostbusters III.

Imagine how good a Ghostbusters III movie would be. You know how far the movie special effects have come since the originals came out? The special effects would be amazing. And, you could get Dan Akroyd, Rick Moranis, Bill Murray, and the whole rest of the old crew and resurrect some dying (dead) movie careers too boot.

I'm all for it, Josh. They can take on the Cloverfield monster. There's your plot.

-copro

 

[lisichka]

my question is whether anaesthesiologists will earn less with Greater Depression, and obama's healthcare plan proposal?

what do ya guys think?

 

[aphistis]

my question is whether anaesthesiologists will earn less with Greater Depression, and obama's healthcare plan proposal?

what do ya guys think?

Well, the nice thing about inventing fictional scenarios is that you can make them play out however you want. What do you want to happen?

 

[lisichka]

why fictional??? Obama is here ( his healthcare proposal may soon be implemented). the country is in recession. how will it affect anesthesiologists' pay? clear and simple.

 

[aphistis]

why fictional??? Obama is here ( his healthcare proposal may soon be implemented). the country is in recession. how will it affect anesthesiologists' pay? clear and simple.

Recession? Yes. "Greater Depression"? Sorry, bub, ain't no way at this point.

 

[urge]

Recession? Yes. "Greater Depression"? Sorry, bub, ain't no way at this point.

We were in a recession for the whole 2008 year and it was denied, denied, and redenied by the "all knowing", slick economists, until this January. Same thing will happen with the depression. In 2012 they'll say we went into depression in 2009.

Seriously.

 

[danzman]

Imagine how good a Ghostbusters III movie would be. You know how far the movie special effects have come since the originals came out? The special effects would be amazing. And, you could get Dan Akroyd, Rick Moranis, Bill Murray, and the whole rest of the old crew and resurrect some dying (dead) movie careers too boot.

I'm all for it, Josh. They can take on the Cloverfield monster. There's your plot.

-copro

I was reading about this just the other day! Apparently, the writers had a sequel in the works back in the mid 90s that involved some parallel universe and would star all the original Ghostbusters and Chris Farley. When Farley kicked the bucket they shelved the project until just a couple of years ago. They got everyone signed on to do the third, but couldn’t convince Rick Moranis who claimed that he had made so much money doing the “Honey I Shrunk the Kids” crap that he was no longer interested in making movies. In the end they made a video game that uses all the original characters voices instead, minis Rick Moranis.

 

[Josh L.Ac.]

Easy solution - drop Rick Moranis and just focus on the core characters. That's one of the problems with sequels that are done a decade or so later - they try to pretend that everyone is still around kicking it with each other, or even worse, that everyone went their separate ways and somehow fate is brining them all back together.


Make it realistic. All the main characters are on their 2nd or 3rd wives, have kids that hate them, and are desperate to relive the glory years. When the opportunity comes around to indulge in their past pursuits, it goes south quick and they suddenly over their heads.

Of course at this point, Hollywood would write in that they make up with their estranged kids to develop new technology and save the day, which is uber lame.

 

[sestamibi]

I'd load up on GM stock. They're doing awesome.

 

[pgg]

why fictional??? Obama is here ( his healthcare proposal may soon be implemented). the country is in recession. how will it affect anesthesiologists' pay? clear and simple.

I'd worry less about the economy and more about your own pathologic aversion to work.

 

[lisichka]

I'd worry less about the economy and more about your own pathologic aversion to work.

creepy *****ic answer.

 

[pgg]

creepy *****ic answer.

Well, you think 60 hours/week is a lot, you somehow didn't realize that passing one's boards required studying, you think cardiologists have to go to school way too long ... and here you're seeking reassurance that your lifestyle-specialty-choice-of-the-moment will still pay you oodles of cash in the future.

What makes you think you can compete in a world that Urge assures is is just a couple years away from a real-life renactment of Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome?

Maybe there's some language or cultural barrier here, but it appears you've got all the character traits of the classic lifestyler. Anesthesiology has enough of them already. If it's vapid blind encouragement you seek, try another forum.

 

[lisichka]

Well, you think 60 hours/week is a lot, you somehow didn't realize that passing one's boards required studying, you think cardiologists have to go to school way too long ... and here you're seeking reassurance that your lifestyle-specialty-choice-of-the-moment will still pay you oodles of cash in the future.

What makes you think you can compete in a world that Urge assures is is just a couple years away from a real-life renactment of Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome?

Maybe there's some language or cultural barrier here, but it appears you've got all the character traits of the classic lifestyler. Anesthesiology has enough of them already. If it's vapid blind encouragement you seek, try another forum.

please stop stalking me. go away, creep shooo

 

[aphistis]

Well, you think 60 hours/week is a lot, you somehow didn't realize that passing one's boards required studying, you think cardiologists have to go to school way too long ... and here you're seeking reassurance that your lifestyle-specialty-choice-of-the-moment will still pay you oodles of cash in the future.

What makes you think you can compete in a world that Urge assures is is just a couple years away from a real-life renactment of Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome?

Maybe there's some language or cultural barrier here, but it appears you've got all the character traits of the classic lifestyler. Anesthesiology has enough of them already. If it's vapid blind encouragement you seek, try another forum.

lisichka = pwnd.

 

[Narcotized]

Recession? Yes. "Greater Depression"? Sorry, bub, ain't no way at this point.

I knew a guy that was so broke he used to use one credit card to make the minimal payments on other credit cards. Any sane person would laugh at this idea as being a cure for his debt problems. Yet when Obama and the Congressional clowns do this exact same smoke and mirrors, the public gets bought into thinking "They averted the next depression!!" It amazes me the gullibility of the masses.

 

[Narcotized]

President Obama told me that we're going to fix this mess (you know, the one that started by people spending ridiculous amounts of money they didn't have on unnecessary crap) by having the government spend ridiculous amounts of money it doesn't have on unnecessary crap. I'm no economist, but that sure sounds like a foolproof solution to me.

You're no economist, but you just explained Obamanomics better than any economist can. Jack Krugman was given a Nobel prize in Economics, and not only does he feel it was a good idea for the this current government to spend ridiculous amounts of money it doesn't have on unnecessary crap, Krugman feels we need to up the ante and have government spend even more ridiculous amounts of money it doesn't have on unnecessary crap.

I guess it's true; they really do give Nobel prizes to just about anybody these days.

 

[urge]

My thread still lives!

I haven't changed my mind. It will look like it's getting better for some time(6 mo or 1 yr, due to stimulus + census) and then hell will break loose.

Thunderdome!!

 

[usnavdoc]

My thread still lives!

I haven't changed my mind. It will look like it's getting better for some time(6 mo or 1 yr, due to stimulus + census) and then hell will break loose.

Thunderdome!!

Thunderdome!!2 men enter 1 man leaves!

So the only question is are you gonna be strolling around in pig ****e with MasterBlaster or up on high with Aunty(aka tina turner).

I too have big worries about inflation and what will happen when the next round of ARM mortgages come due.(2nd round of housing market bust.)

Not too mention we are gonna be hit double hard with the health care reform. Less reimbursement as well as higher taxes and higher health insurance costs.

Im with Corpro on this one. Time to find a good comprehensive tax plan(financial advisor, accountant, lawyer etc..). Hard to justify as a new attending but probably better now than later.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n3horf9QVbQ

 

[lord_jeebus]

I'm concerned by the return of government money by the banks - how could they go from massive insolvency to profitability so quickly? I think that they're continuing to overvalue their mortgage-backed securities on paper - we're back to the 2007 mindset, yet there has been no fundamental change to justify that outlook.

I found out that for every house on sale in my city (San Diego), there are two in foreclosure that have not been put up for sale. There are massive efforts by both the government and the banks to keep the housing market inflated for as long as possible - or at least until the banksters extract the remaining money as bonuses before the real collapse.

Geithner is a crook and Obama needs to clean house. I think it is too late for any meaningful reform, however.

I think the consequences of health care reform are small potatoes compared to what the Wall St parasites are doing to our country. At least we have real skills - you can't say the same for the majority of Americans.

 

[cfdavid]

If you don't spend, the economy won't grow because money doesn't change hands. What else can anyone do; Print money? Economies are cyclical, it's simply a fact of life, and we are in a lull now. It's only bad because the media makes it look so bad. The media is driven by a new generation of entitled brats who can't take the good times with the bad. The economy will improve when people shift their investments into new technologies and infrastructure (maybe not houses this time). The alternative to not spending is to hold all our cards to our chest and not spend a dime. Seriously, how does that help?[//

Generally, this is a balancing act. What may be good for the overall economy may not be so great for the individual (who may be deep in debt already).

The problem in the U.S. is that we simply can NOT continue with such a high percentage of GDP being "consumption". So, in order to right the ship, we're all gonna feel some pain, one way or another.

My concern is that our government (dems and republicans alike) won't do the right thing due to lack of political will. So, we're likely to see the continuation of skyrocketing debt, increased taxes (the only non-popular thing politicians seem to have no problem with), decreased purchasing power, and a general lowering of our living standards.

 

[dienekes88]

If you don't spend, the economy won't grow because money doesn't change hands. What else can anyone do; Print money? Economies are cyclical, it's simply a fact of life, and we are in a lull now. It's only bad because the media makes it look so bad. The media is driven by a new generation of entitled brats who can't take the good times with the bad. The economy will improve when people shift their investments into new technologies and infrastructure (maybe not houses this time). The alternative to not spending is to hold all our cards to our chest and not spend a dime. Seriously, how does that help?

Generally, this is a balancing act. What may be good for the overall economy may not be so great for the individual (who may be deep in debt already).

I was under the impression that victoriah was just talking about the mass flow rate of money as it were. Analogy: you can have the same blood volume, but if your cardiac output increases (money changes hands faster), you have a greater mass flow rate, which is vessel diameter x velocity.

This can either employ personal consumption or the "Keynesian multiplier" in the form of greater government spending, which most people here oppose (for good reason... look at the poor use of money in the schools and healthcare).

The problem in the U.S. is that we simply can NOT continue with such a high percentage of GDP being "consumption". So, in order to right the ship, we're all gonna feel some pain, one way or another.

My concern is that our government (dems and republicans alike) won't do the right thing due to lack of political will. So, we're likely to see the continuation of skyrocketing debt, increased taxes (the only non-popular thing politicians seem to have no problem with), decreased purchasing power, and a general lowering of our living standards.

Looping it back to medicine, there's the biz with cutting reimbursements, which is actually quite popular with everyone but physicians. I imagine anesthesiology is going to be targeted for cutbacks given that it's a ROAD specialty, but radiology and cardiology will prob get hit hard too.

The "general lowering of living standards" will include changing concepts of what interventions are worth the cost. Activating the cathlab en route for every "crushing substernal chest pain"? You catch all the people who really are having an MI and get them cath'd within that 90 minute window, but you also have the high cost of bringing in a bunch of overtime staff, etc... with the potential of false positives. I don't know the FP rate, but this is just one example. With lowering reimbursements, there's no way that the hospitals can comply with these unfunded mandates for higher quality care. A lot of tests will probably have to become less sensitive in order to improve specificity given the relationship between sens and spec on an ROC curve. Improved specificity will lower the false positive rate and rein in costs, but there'll be patients missed. This is something that no physician wants to do.

 

[hoyden]

I'm scared. I honestly am. I wrote about the economy going down the crapper when Bear Sterns collapsed, but I'm still not prepared. I cannot find that thread but it is somewhere. The citizens are broke. The States are broke. The Federal Government is broke. We will borrow more money from poor foreign countries until we cannot borrow anymore. Then it will suddenly be Thunderdome(Mad Max). I'm sure people will kill each other for food. People might eat each other for all I know.

Latest news say that the States are asking for 1 trillion dollars to provide normal services such as education, welfare, and infrastructure. Makes me think twice whenever a non responsive bed ridden pt comes to the OR... Why waste millions of dollars in one person so they can have a crappy quality of life when you cannot provide essential services to the rest of the population? We are due for a rude awakening. We will have to re-examine our moral beliefs during this down turn. Is life really priceless? We clearly cannot provide everything for everyone. Should people starve while millions are spent in prisoners, for example? Should we kill the prisoners because people are starving? Same goes for the chronically ill, the traumas, prematures... Spending millions in a few so they can be eaten by a hungry mob does not seem to be the answer.

On a personal level, how are you preparing for what's coming?
I'm reading a lot. I have focused all my savings to pay down debt. I don't have any assets to protect, though.

Sorry, if this will sound rude - there is no intent to it.

You do not know what scary is...

I won't even mention Haiti...
There are much more scary scenarios going on around the world, than whatever you've pictured above.

Which doesn't mean I think we are in great shape.


p.s. just realized that your doom is a year old ))))))

 

[Narcotized]

The alternative to not spending is to hold all our cards to our chest and not spend a dime. Seriously, how does that help?

Every boom is followed by bust. The debt and consumption of a previous boom must always end. Infinity does not exist. Your idea that we just keep doing debt-financed spending that drove the boom so that we don't bust is completely unsustainable and an invalid suggestion. The euphoric bubbles are the problem, not their inevitable collapse. They always have and always will collapse regardless of how much ill-advised central planning you attempt.

 

[circulus vitios]

If you invested $10,000 is 1988 and it was worth $30,000 in 1998 and now only $20,000 (in 2009), you are still ahead! And at at 7.2% annual return over a 20 year period to boot.

And when you take inflation into account, you made almost nothing over 20 years.

[SIZE=+1]What cost $10000 in 1988 would cost $17974.68 in 2008.

http://www.westegg.com/inflation/
[/SIZE]

 

[Narcotized]

And when you take inflation into account, you made almost nothing over 20 years.

[SIZE=+1]What cost $10000 in 1988 would cost $17974.68 in 2008. [/SIZE]

Not only that, his math is off. $10,000 to $20,000 over TEN years would be a 7.2% annual return. 1988 to 2008 is 20 years which means it's only a 3.6% annual return, and again that's before inflation is considered.