<p>kayf, As Atana has pointed out those subsidies go first toward basic necessities like rice and ramen noodles, before they go to education. As things get worse, this trend will increase. People are dropping health care insurance left and right. I may be one...it would be the equivalent of a 25% increase in income. Disease, etc will increase. We're at the precipice of a very steep spiral downwards.</p>
<p><<or are="" you="" saying="" the="" colleges="" shouldn't="" spend="" their="" own="" money="" to="" give="" out="" students="" whose="" parents="" can="" full="" pay="" (which="" is="" how="" my="" son="" afford="" go="" nyu).="">></or></p>
<p>Yes, I'm quoting myself because I made a mistake, 'can' should be 'can't'
I want to make it clear that we were not considered a full pay family who received scholarship, my EFC was 12K</p>
<p>It is almost impossible to draw any sort of parallels between the US and India. India has a lot of enormous cultural differences that make the environment the way it is. The major one being the caste system which makes it almost impossible for the lowest caste, the untouchables, to rise above the station into which they are born. Even when they have access to education the untouchables are regarded by the other castes as the lowest of the low, they are insulted,shunned and abused by the higher castes. There is enormous resistance to any attempts to improve their situation in life as they are regarded as less than human. It is very common for untouchables to be beaten, killed, raped for such infractions as drinking from the wrong water container. It is impossible to compare it to the US as it is not mere poverty we are talking about but an enormous cultural divide. </p>
<p>What an amazing movie though. We saw it yesterday as well. i was very clueless going in and was expecting more Bollywood and a lot less violence. But it goes down as one of the best films I have seen.</p>
<p>I think the larger the disconnect between the wealthiest top 20% and the 80% below, the larger the problem. And, that disconnect is accelerating. May not be a caste system, but we defintely have an underclass, and they are subject to much scorn, not pity, by the wealthy. That breeds some pretty angry young people, that if not given opportunities to rise above their stature in healthy ways like education and have basic human needs met, will find unhealthy ways to get ahead.</p>
<p>This is funny and fitting ...haha</p>
<p>Postmodern</a> Haircut</p>
<p>That's funny^^</p>
<p>I believe an "inflationary depression" is actually quite likely.</p>
<p>As pointed out by many on here, entire sectors of our economy have or are moving overseas. </p>
<p>To counter the jobs moving abroad, and to counter the housing and credit markets meltdown, the federal government (and state governments) have largely decided that they need to become the "employer of last resort" and the "financier of last resort"--plus, let's be honest, they don't know how to stay in budget anyway. So, they are pumping billions (and even trillions) into putting people to work, and in trying to get banks solvent enough to loan to any small business that might have a chance of survival.</p>
<p>All this money being spent is inflationary, since we are borrowing it and doing deficit spending--and there is not a tax base (currently) to support it. </p>
<p>The problem is that money given to banks does no good right now--since, because their recent lax credit got them into loads of trouble, the banks have tightened up all their lending rules with the result that companies now in trouble (and I'd say at least half of all small companies are in trouble from a liquidity point of view) will not get funding, and are therefore likely to fail--and take their jobs with them--and people who can't afford or are reluctant to pay for a house that is "underwater" equity-wise will not get any funding either.</p>
<p>In a nutshell, this housing/credit mortgage disaster has created our inflationary depression--which is one we are likely going to witness for awhile (at least another two years in my view). </p>
<p>What is sad is that the people most responsible (the people who run the former investment banking firms and unscrupulous mortgage lending firms) have largely walked away unscathed. The Jamie Dimon's (JP Morgan Chase), Ken Lewis' (Bank of America), Hank Paulson' (Goldman Sachs and the Treasury Department), Angelo Mozilo (formerly of Countrywide Home Loans), Richard Fuld (of Lehman Bros), John Thain (formerly of Merrill Lynch), and Stefan Eriksson (of Quick Equity Funding) all walked away with millions while this mess went down. And, of course, Congress, the SEC, and the Federal Reserve all did their part by doing nothing to regulate this industry while over $600 trillion in derivatives were sold .</p>
<p>It is really hard to say where she goes but we have a few clues.</p>
<p>As bad as things are here, they appear to be far worse in other places around the world. The European banks appear to be in far worse shape than the US banks. Economies in other areas are shaky. The result has been a very implausible flight-to-safety. Ironically, that safety is Treasuries, US Dollars and Gold (and silver). The rising dollar is deflationary but it allows our resident to buy foreign goods more cheaply. If anyone has money. It also exports jobs - those that remain. Sometimes I think that the rest of the world is propping up our currency to tell us to spend to get their economies going again.</p>
<p>What if we just create as much money (also known as debt) as we want to and everyone else allows us to spend it? Sound nuts but it would get certain things going again.</p>
<p>As I like to say, fiat currencies always return to their intrinsic value: 0.</p>
<p>I'll tell you who I'm tired of bailing out is corporate America.</p>