A very scary calculator button – Push at your own risk

The new anti-austerity leader of France has good intentions, but so did Obama and he had about a six month “honeymoon” and Democratic majority in Congress at the time. Hence the passage of the stimulus and ultimately prevailing over the hysterical histrionics of the healthcare debate. After 2010, that whole success deck was reshuffled. Don’t forget this is now a congressional majority whose often stated purpose has been to make sure we have a one-term president. Anything they can do to thwart, block, discredit or disintegrate in the form of any initiative on the part of our current administration is their main mission. Damn the state of the current economy or even a couple of quarters from now. I greatly cringe at the thought of a new administration with nothing more than a magical thinking cure of  free-market, trickle (one drop at a time) down, job creation through tax cut mantra. I cringe less at a reelection of Obama and even a greater political polarization and constipation than we currently are suffering through.

Don’t get me wrong, I am fully in the loft of the choir your in here and singing from the same sheet music.

The Congressional equivalent the new leader of France faces in the European Union, is just as formidable, and that equal is known as Germany. They are the last country to have anything resembling a productive economy and even they are starting to slip. They have also been hardcore austerity proponents and show no signs of being concilatory. I think they are getting free consultation on how to be this way from Nordquist and his ilk. I love ridiculous conspiracy theories like that one.

Jason:

I have no way of knowing this, but I think we both follow the same financial journalist sources, or close enough for me to concur with your salient point here. I think by now, and others who are frequenters to this website, that I am on the other side of the world and the financial and economic perspective from here is worth comparing. When the most recent declining economic statistics came out in China,  a western perspective (mine) would have concluded an “end of the world” scenario. It borders on the sublimly ridiculous, but the response of this country to a decline of their annual GDP quarterly rate from 8.2 to around 7.6 caused convulsions and concern in every sector of the economy. The only bigger news has been the massacre in Colorado and the violent and lunatic aspects of our society. The difference between China’s violent and lunatic fringe is that they have no acesss to guns. Only the military, armored car guards and maybe the common police (I personally have never seen one carrying any kind of weapon) have guns, and they are serious looking weapons. I diverge.

My point is simply this, as underscored by the close to same economist and financial sages we probably both read:

If China goes down, the rest of the world will tank with it and that is absolutely irrefutable. Like it or not, this is the only viable and productive ( as in the black) national economy keeping the rest of the world afloat right now.

A parting perspective related to our profession and those related to it. The number of job listings for the design professions in China and greater Asia has dropped off SUBSTANTIALLY since most recent bad economic news hit a month ago. No surprise that major and next to major firms have now developed a “wait and see” attitude when it comes to hiring here.

If you have no recent heritage of China or Asia based projects and do not speak Madarin (I dont’ but powerful design talent and capability trumps that) you do not stand a chance of getting a job here. Those of you that read this, I am on the ground, so trust me on this.

MauiBob:

A shocking self-admission.  I like to argue about anything and everything. I will give you props for what the rest of us already know and come to expect whenever you show up here. I would just ask you add  this  “almost reliably incoherent when I do and generally without much factual basis”, That would then be a complete and spot on self- realization.