I think even if we had been enjoying the best of the Clinton economy when this hurricane age started last year, another few years of increasing storm activity could still knock us into a recession.
Hurricane age? Again we are simply shifting back toward norms. We were in a passive age which deluded a lot of people.
I do not feel confident to predict whether another few years will or will not knock us into a recession for a time, but if we cannot recover to a point where we can weather future years of storms with minimal impact on the economy as a whole then that would be a manmade one.
If nothing else, the price of gas will rise to the point that many more millions of people will have effectively no discretionary income for some years.
Well that is true but tied back again to wholly manmade issues. If we were not in the situation we are with oil, then storms hitting regional oil supplies would not be a major factor.
I think the biggest single threat to our way of life at this precise moment is the weather.
It is humbling to see that nature will always be a player in human life, but I just can't agree with "threat to our way of life". Regionally perhaps, especially if the way people live physically does not adjust (that is people do not adapt), but not wholesale.
Maybe I am just not understanding what way of life means to you. In fact now that I think of it recessions and depressions do not really change our way of life as they are a part of life. Way of life to me means a change in social order, such that we lose freedoms we once had, or are incapable of living together as we once had.
The last great depression caused suffering, but life includes periods of suffering and our "way of life" handles it or it cannot and ends. In this case our way of life most certainly did handle the depression, and we came out with some extra securities.
It was actually during the periods of good economy and weather that our greatest changes away from our "way of life" have generally occured.
Maybe it just seems that way to me though, since natural disasters force everyone to be practical with solutions, while manmade disasters means that any and all solutions can be invoked, usually the most drastic to how we live.
AbE: It just occured to me that perhaps our disconnect is that when you say "way of life" you are actually meaning "standard of living". To me those are very different things, recessions and depressions marking reduced standards of living even if they do not change our way of life. I would agree that multiple and continuous natural disasters could very well effect the standard of living. Though I still believe that should eventually work itself out over time.
This message has been edited by holmes, 10-18-2005 05:59 AM
holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)