TOO CRAZY TO BELIEVE
– In most cases, we simply condense articles from others, but the
article that follows has addressed much of what is reported in
different publications appearing around the country, so we are
presenting it in its entirety.
"Most Americans know that the U.S. economy is in bad shape, but what
most Americans don't know is how truly desperate the financial
situation of the United States really is. The truth is that what
we are experiencing is not simply a "downturn" or a "recession".
What we are witnessing is the beginning of the end for the greatest
economic machine that the world has ever seen. Our greed and our
debt are literally eating our economy alive. Total government,
corporate and personal debt has now reached 360% of GDP, which is far
higher than it ever reached during the Great Depression era. We
have nearly totally dismantled our once colossal manufacturing base, we
have shipped millions upon millions of middle class jobs overseas, we
have lived far beyond our means for decades and we have created the
biggest debt bubble in the history of the world. A great day of
financial reckoning is fast approaching, and the vast majority of
Americans are totally oblivious.
"But the truth is that you cannot defy the financial laws of the
universe forever. What goes up must come down. The borrower
is the servant of the lender. Cutting corners always catches up
with you in the end.
"Sometimes it takes cold, hard numbers for many of us to fully realize the situation that we are facing.
"So, the following are 50 very revealing statistics about the U.S. economy that are almost too crazy to believe..."
#50)
In 2010 the U.S. government is projected to issue almost as much new debt as
the rest of the governments of the world combined.
#49)
It is being projected that the U.S. government will have a budget deficit of
approximately 1.6 trillion dollars in 2010.
#48)
If you went out and spent one dollar every single second, it would take
you more than 31,000 years to
spend a trillion dollars.
#47)
In fact, if you spent one million dollars every single day since
the birth of Christ, you still would
not have spent one trillion dollars by now.
#46)
Total U.S. government debt is now up to 90% of
gross domestic product.
#45)
Total credit market debt in the United States, including government, corporate
and personal debt, has
reached 360% of GDP.
#44)
U.S. corporate income tax receipts were
down 55% (to $138 billion) for the year ending September 30th, 2009.
#43)
There are now 8 counties in the state of California that have
unemployment rates of
over 20%.
#42)
In the area around Sacramento, California there is one
closed business for every six that are still open.
#41)
In February, there were 5.5
unemployed Americans for every job opening.
#40)
According
to a Pew Research Center study, approximately 37% of all Americans
between the ages of 18 and 29 have either been unemployed or
underemployed at some point during the recession.
#39)
More
than 40% of those employed in the United States are now working in low-wage
service jobs.
#38)
According to one new survey, 24% of American workers say that they
have postponed their planned retirement age in the past year.
#37)
Over 1.4 million Americans filed for personal bankruptcy in 2009, which
represented a
32% increase over 2008. Not only that, more
Americans filed for bankruptcy in March 2010 than during any
month since U.S. bankruptcy law was tightened in October 2005.
#36)
Mortgage purchase applications in the United States are down nearly 40% from a month ago
to their lowest level since April of 1997.
#35)
RealtyTrac has announced that foreclosure filings in the U.S. established
an all time record for the second consecutive year in 2009.
#34)
According to RealtyTrac, foreclosure filings were
reported on 367,056 properties in March 2010, an increase of nearly 19%
from February, an increase of nearly 8% from March 2009 and the highest monthly
total since RealtyTrac began issuing its report in January 2005.
#33)
In Pinellas and Pasco counties, which include St. Petersburg, Florida and
the suburbs to the north, there
are 34,000 open foreclosure cases. Ten years ago, there were
only about 4,000.
#32)
In California's Central Valley, 1 out of every 16 homes is
in some phase of foreclosure.
#31)
The Mortgage Bankers Association recently announced that more than 10%
of all U.S. homeowners with a mortgage had missed at least one
payment during the January to March time period. That was a record high and up from 9.1% a year ago.
#30)
U.S. banks repossessed
nearly 258,000 homes nationwide in the first quarter of 2010, a 35%
jump from the first quarter of 2009.
#29)
For the first time in U.S. history, banks
own a greater share of residential housing net worth in the United States
than all individual Americans put together.
#28)
More than 24% of all homes with mortgages in the United States were underwater as of the end of 2009.
#27)
U.S. commercial property values are
down approximately 40% since 2007 and currently 18% of all office
space in the United States is sitting vacant.
#26)
Defaults on apartment building mortgages held by U.S. banks climbed to
a record 4.6% in the first quarter of 2010. That was almost
twice the level of a year earlier.
#25)
In 2009, U.S. banks posted their sharpest decline in private lending since 1942.
#24)
New York state has delayed paying
bills totaling $2.5 billion as a short-term way of staying solvent but
officials are warning that its cash crunch could soon get even worse.
#23)
To make up for a projected 2010 budget shortfall of $280 million, Detroit
issued $250 million of 20-year municipal notes in March. The bond issuance
followed on the heels of a warning from Detroit officials that if its
financial state didn't improve, it
could be forced to declare bankruptcy.
#22)
The National League of Cities says that municipal governments will probably
come up between
$56 billion and $83 billion short between now and 2012.
#21)
Half a dozen cash-poor U.S. states have announced that
they are delaying their tax refund checks.
#20)
Two university professors recently calculated that the combined unfunded
pension liability for all 50 U.S. states is
3.2 trillion dollars.
#19)
According to EconomicPolicyJournal.com, 32
U.S. states have already run out of funds to make unemployment benefit payments
and so the federal government has been supplying these states with funds
so that they can make their payments to the unemployed.
#18)
This most recent recession has erased 8
million private sector jobs in the United States.
#17)
Paychecks from private business shrank to
their smallest share of personal income in U.S. history during the first
quarter of 2010.
#16)
U.S. government-provided benefits (including Social Security, unemployment
insurance, food stamps and other programs) rose
to a record high during the first three months of 2010.
#15)
39.68 million
Americans are now on food stamps, which represents a new all-time
record. But things look like they are going to get even worse. The
U.S. Department of Agriculture is forecasting that enrollment in the
food stamp program will exceed 43 million Americans in 2011.
#14)
Phoenix, Arizona features an
astounding annual car theft rate of 57,000 vehicles and
has become the new "Car Theft Capital of the World".
#13)
U.S. law enforcement authorities claim that there are now over 1 million
members of criminal gangs inside the country. These 1 million gang members are
responsible for
up to 80% of the crimes committed in the United States each year.
#12)
The U.S. health care system was already facing a shortage of approximately 150,000
doctors in the next decade or so, but thanks to the health care "reform"
bill passed by Congress, that number could swell by
several hundred thousand more.
#11)
According
to an analysis by the Congressional Joint Committee on Taxation the health
care "reform" bill will generate $409.2 billion in additional
taxes on the American people by 2019.
#10)
The Dow Jones Industrial Average just experienced the
worst May it has seen since 1940.
#9)
In 1950, the ratio of the average executive's paycheck to the average worker's paycheck
was about 30 to 1. Since the year 2000, that ratio has exploded
to between 300 to 500 to one.
#8)
Approximately 40%
of all retail spending currently comes from the 20% of American
households that have the highest incomes.
#7)
According to economists Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez, two-thirds of income
increases in the U.S. between 2002 and 2007 went to the
wealthiest 1% of all Americans.
#6)
The bottom 40% of income earners in the United States now
collectively own less than 1% of the nation's wealth.
#5)
If you only make the minimum payment each and every time, a $6,000 credit card
bill can
end up costing you over $30,000 (depending on the interest rate).
#4)
According to a new report based on U.S. Census Bureau data, only 26% of
American teens between the ages of 16 and 19 had jobs in late
2009 which represents a record low since statistics began to be
kept back in 1948.
#3)
According to a National Foundation for Credit Counseling survey, only 58%
of those in "Generation Y" pay
their monthly bills on time.
#2)
During the first quarter of 2010, the total number of loans that are at least
three months past due in the United States increased for
the 16th consecutive quarter.
#1)
According
to the Tax Foundation's Microsimulation Model, to erase the 2010 U.S.
budget deficit, the U.S. Congress would have to multiply each tax rate by
2.4. Thus, the 10% rate would be 24%, the 15% rate would be 36%, and
the 35% rate would have to be 85%.
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June 15, 2010
Edition
