Is this what the early days of the Great Depression felt like? By now surely we can agree that recession has gripped the world’s great economies. The premier Asian market declined 5 percent Monday, to its lowest level in five years. The same day, the European Union was grappling with whether to respond as a unified body or whether to let individual countries sink or swim in shifting economic tides. Meanwhile, things got so bad in Brazil and Russia that officials in those countries suspended trading in their principal markets.
In the United States things weren’t going so well either. You might remember the House and Senate signing on to a corporate bailout package that would have been unthinkable even months earlier. Did a $700 billion relief plan ease fears? Not if a precipitous drop in the Dow the very next day is any indication of the level of angst in the country.
Whatever our financial future holds, one thing is clear: We are standing at the edge of something that even our greatest economic minds don’t understand. And the unknown is the essence of fear.
A little perspective may be in order. This week we sought out some of the Coastside’s elder statesmen to ask them whether current conditions felt like the beginning of the end. Coastsiders like Buzz Carlson and Jo Burns have lived through the Great Depression. Today they assure us that we have a long way to fall before we will be where they have been. That is comforting in its way.
It is easy to get carried away with what is happening now. Sometimes solace can be found in the words of those with a little perspective.
— Clay Lambert
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