The bailout - how will it effect YOU?

bromius · Heavy Crude Joined: May 26, 2008 Posts: 143

Its hard to say how the bailout will impact me directly, since it hasn't even happened yet. Very generally, I think the short term impact will be positive, say for about six months since it will forestall hardcore panic for a time. Longer term I think it will be negative due to the measures cost and questionable efficacy.

Ludi

Fishman

Bailout or not, this crisis is going to hell for the nanny state. No wonder the Dems are leading the charge for the bailout while the Republicans in the House hesitate. The Dems know that after this big hurrah all their big plans are for naught. Even obama has said his big plans would be put on the backburner while this gets worked out. Hard to institute universal health care if there's NO MONEY. There will be some serious pissed off people when obama has to sign a reduced spending budget next year.

coyote

How will it affect me. Personally.

My taxes will go up. The money needed for proposed projects like public transit and renewable energy in my community won't be there, and they will remain unbuilt. My feelings of allegiance to the Union will suffer with the understanding that my tax dollars go into the pockets of people much richer than I - and that my elected representatives forced it on me. I will be a little less proud and happy to be an American.

If the bailout actually succeeds in its objectives, then the natural business cycle will be delayed, and housing prices will remain higher than they should be for some time longer. The correction I've been waiting for and saving for since learning about peak oil years ago will not continue on schedule. This will prevent me from buying my own property and having the time to make appropriate preps before the oil crash comes. I was getting there, slowly, and with the mortgage crisis was beginning to feel that I would succeed - but if housing prices don't keep coming down, I will be unable to make the jump. I will be stuck in an apartment in suburbia, instead of building the life I wanted on my own land. My own taxes - the money I've saved to buy property - will instead go to ensuring my own failure to transition. Five years of planning and responsible behavior have apparently done me no good at all. Nada. Zippo. Because of this.

If the government is allowed power such as this, then all the preps that any of us have tried to do, with foreknowledge, planning and sacrifice, can be undone in an instant. This isn't necessarily going to be the last time something like this happens. Look to your plans, and notice what can be taken from you, from a direction you didn't expect.

I'm a lot more afraid for my personal future than I was a month ago.
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TheDude

There are plenty of good articles out there on how this will impact citizens personally, such as How the bailout plan could affect your pocketbook

StuckInPhilly · Heavy Crude Joined: Jul 24, 2008 Posts: 120

I can't forsee that it will affect me one iota for at least a few months.
I'm not buying anything big in future so my interest in credit is nil.

It's just a postponement of the big batta-boom to come later.

I think Killjoy kinda tells it like it is.
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“In the Soviet Union, capitalism triumphed over communism. In this country, capitalism triumphed over democracy.”
[Fran Lebowitz

Loki · Expert Joined: Apr 08, 2006 Posts: 1298 Location: Cascadia

jbrovont · Intermediate Crude Joined: Jun 16, 2006 Posts: 701

If the bailout fails, the poor are going to blame Bush and Congress both. If it fails, it probably means credit lines will freeze. If it passes, credit lines *may* not lock up, and the middle class will blame Bush and Congress anyway, which means eventually the poor will blame them too. Maybe it means more spin control time, though it looks to be already too late.

Pass = higher taxes + financial collapse anyway
Fail = financial collapse

Either way, the blame is on BushCo. If congress sticks their neck out for him with this, they need not worry that there might not be enough blame to go around. There appears to be plenty. They ought to stay out of it - they're in deep enough for letting it happen as it is.

Mechler

How will it effect me?

If it goes through then maybe the guy buying my house will be able to secure his mortgage and we can close on time. Also, maybe I'll be able to secure the financing on the house I'll be buying (I call it the PO mothership, because it's a contemporary solar house on a fair amount of land close to where I'll be working at my job in renewable energy).

If the bailout doesn't go through (or doesn't forestall the crash long enough) then, sh!t, I don't even want to think about it...
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"It is certain that free societies would have no easy time in a future dark age. The rapid return to universal penury will be accomplished by violence and cruelties of a kind now forgotten." - Roberto Vacca, The Coming Dark Age

Kristen

I'm just a poor college student so I guess the worst that could happen is that when I'm done there are no jobs available. Prices could go up, so that gallon of milk will cost me 20 instead of 5. Guess I'll have to stick to canned soup. I don't own a car, and live downtown so I'm within walking distance for all my needs. If I lose my job, I could move back in with my parents. My mom is a instructor at the college I am attending and if there is a depression, usually more people go to school, so she should be ok. I'm just not old enough to have any assets and I don't come from a rich heritage. Sure I have my computer, and an Ipod but that's about it. Who wants those if we lose electricity right?

I don't even grasp what this bailout is exactly. Are they just going to write the banks a check for 700 bil and call it even? Where is this money going to come from? I keep hearing the tax payers, but I doubt the IRS makes that much in taxes a year. If it is taxpayer money, does that mean I technically own a very small slice of one of these banks their rescuing? Should I expect a certificate in the mail of shares owned?

Also if the fed is a privately owned institution, and they're doing the bailouts, how does that equal government ownership? It seems to me that they should just let it crash and pick up the wreckage later. Why fix something that is broken, when you can create something new and better instead.

mystiek

One of the things being tossed around is raising payroll taxes. If that happens, I know we will have to cut back on staff in our business. I'm sure there will be other small business that will do the same. As far as Russia's predictions about the US, they better watch themselves because Gog-Magog doesn't look like they have a great ending either.
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Rev 21:4 and He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there will no longer be death, there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have passed away.

ORCA

Askiing how we individually will be affected as a result of the bailout certainly causes one to think. Personally, I'm not sure how I'll be affected.
Unlike most of you who seem younger than me, I'm retired already. I have a home located on a few acreas that I worked and paid for over the years, so I'm mostly debt free. My retirement income appears more secure than many because its through the state I live in, not a private entity.
I am already frugal (but not "cheap"), and my wife and I live within our means. If required to, we could rachet down even further.
My opinion is that the bailout will be a failure in the end. At most, it will only delay the final result while making the "sheeple" feel better until the real hammer drops.
I actually feel fortunate that I'm not young and finishing college with a load of student debt as I search frantically for a means to earn a living while building a life for myself. Good luck to those of you in this position.
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Roy · Last edited by Roy on Sun Oct 12, 2008 8:06 am; edited 1 time in total

gw

1) Inflation without a corresponding increase in income.
2) Higher interest rates
3) Higher taxes

I think this is just a plan to help out some rich people and to buy a little more time before the inevitable economic crash. Most people will be worse off as a result of the bailout, and the rich will become richer and the poor poorer.

I don't think the banks are going to continue to lend to people with no money.
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March 7, 2007 Remarks by the President to Political Appointees

allenwrench · Intermediate Crude Joined: Apr 23, 2008 Posts: 893

Don't know. I have high grade investments and some precious metals. wife has retirement fund. Owe about $50K on house, but we could pay house off unless we would loose all investments 100%. We have a large pantry and stock many staples.

This month is the 1 year anniversary of my PO enlightenment. Accomplished a lot of change this year. Still need to do more but am light years ahead of my oblivious life I used to live.

My thanks to all the participants at our forum.