Overview

So a lot has happened in the past couple of years, foremost is the financial meltdown, resulting in the "Great Recession." It will have been two years this coming fall when the crisis hit full force. As a few writers have pointed out, the roots of this crisis go back further than 2008. I got a sense of foreboding in the summer of 2006 when Mary-Anne and I start readying the Columbus home for sale. From the time we decided to put it on the market to the time we actually sold it, the value of the house dropped substantially. To be sure, I thought that it was a localized phenomenon. In hindsight, it probably was not.

In any case, we are still feeling the effects of the global financial meltdown. They range from the unprecedented bailout of Wall Street, the emergence of the Tea Party movement, the worst unemployment statistics since the Great Depression, a hung Parliament in UK, the crisis among Portugal, Spain, Ireland, Italy and Greece, the threat to the euro, wild fluctuations on the stock market and many other things. It is pretty clear that the effects of the Great Recession will linger for many many years.

The recession has not been as severe here in Canada, largely due to a sound banking system. It was recently ranked as one of the soundest in the world. However, there are troubling signs. There are worries up here about the debt load taken on by the average Canadian household. One would think that, during these tough economic times, folks would retrench, cut down on spending and reduce their debt load. Instead, Canadians have assumed more debt than ever before. The irony is that the low interest rates have made it easy for people to justify racking up debt. So Canadian economists are voicing some worries about the effect of a rate hike on the debt load of Canadians. Who knows where this might be going?

More to come as I get back into the swing of this particular blog!