Beneath the radar screens however, there were a number of developments that could foreshadow important changes in our way of life, much sooner than we would like to think.


Starting with the credit crunch. Should a recession or worse be close at hand, the demand for oil, perhaps even from China, would likely slow and prices would drop – for a while. Despite much optimism that the world’s central banks will soon liquefy the credit markets to the point that “sub-prime” would become a distant memory, many concerns are being raised.

We are beginning to learn that in recent years, some parts of the mortgage industry turned itself into a giant “ponzi” scheme in which highly profitable sub-prime loans that were likely to default, earned large fees for their issuers. As long as the real estate market grew enough to cover the defaults, all was well. When the growing stopped, however, something bad was sure to happen. We are now arguing about just how bad the “bad” might be.