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March 6, 2009
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I don't know about everybody else, but I'm sick of the media sensationalizing the economy. Yes we know it's bad, but the media is making it worse by inciting more fear!
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Comments
Oh that's really going to help. Did you notice in October when things were insanely bad all the print media were very sober and predicted the downturn would never spread globally? Well, that was just stupid.
Posted by: mopar at March 6, 2009 10:53 PM
I'll sign if The What does.
Posted by: denton at March 7, 2009 8:51 AM
I know that this is not the media's MO, but honestly they're not sensationalizing anything. The economy is legitimately scary right now.
I hate to sound like The What, but...
We really do have a big handful of banks that are insolvent because they lent money to risky people and turned these risky loans into AAA-rated bonds that were bound to turn into the shit-investments that they really were, and AIG really was stupid enough to insure against this whole House of Lies falling apart because "housing prices are never going to fall". Michigan's been turning into the Dust-Bowl of the 21st century for a long time now. We don't really make stuff--we make promises of the worth of things and we cut one another's hair and stuff like that. Our economy has been unreal for a long time.
We are foreclosing on mortgages that have been so sliced and diced that nobody can tell who owns the right to foreclose on the property. It's not an apocalypse--it'll get straightened out eventually. But it's going to take a long time, and there are going to be a lot of hyperbolic-sounding-but-real stories in the months to come.
Posted by: vanburenproud at March 7, 2009 1:50 PM
Bklyn born the media is actually doing a terrific job reporting the FACTS on this economy. Earlier in the crisis some media outlets were not as forthcoming with the projected job losses but now the DOW is @ 6500, unemployment will soon be in double digits, and RE has collapsed....that my friend is not sensationalizing.
Would you rather the media not report massive job losses and collapsing world markets? The economy is in serious trouble and not making that obvious would be irresponsible you know. We understand bad news is difficult to accept but sometimes the truth is not pleasant.
Sugar coating bad news is a serious form of denial!
Yep this is severe recession that we all need to be aware of and make life changes accordingly.
Posted by: pierre de taille at March 7, 2009 5:59 PM
If anything the media is still sugar coating this recession in it's attempt to justify the idiotic amount of debt Obama wants the US to strap on in order to pay for all kinds of crazy stuff like "green" jobs and "universal" healthcare. Not that I'm against the idea of either one in theory, but Obama's "recovery plan" reminds me of a high roller at a casino borrowing every last cent he can scrounge up to make one last big bet in hopes of climbing out of the hole.
How often does that last ditch big bet pay off?
The media is doing everything it possibly can to justify Obama's wild borrowing and spending spree at the worst possible time just like it did to get the man elected in the first place.
Posted by: IronBalls at March 8, 2009 10:51 AM
Everybody's entitled to his/her opinion. I know it's bad out there. My brother has been unemployed for over a year. But what I'm trying to say is the more people listen to the way things are reported, the more people are frightened, the more they stop spending, the more the economy goes down the toilet. It's almost becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy.
The media has a role in how quickly we recover from this recession. They can report the news, both sides without all the extreme "adjectives" of economic conditions or they can continue the type of reporting that’s adding fuel to the fire. As FDR stated, "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself."
Posted by: Bklyn born at March 8, 2009 7:43 PM
Iron Balls, your ignorance re: stimulus is profound.
Bklyn Born, be reasonable. It's not rational for consumers in general to keep spending when a) consumer debt is at record levels and b) job security is hard to come by. Real unemployment is around 15 percent and climbing, and the savings rate has been negative for quite some time. Unemployment numbers are going up more before they fall again. What are people supposed to live on when the axe falls? Pull your head out of your butt!
That said, I do think it's important to make decisions based on one's own economic situation and not panic. Knock wood, my job for the time being is as secure as a job gets and I have more than enough saved for an emergency, so I am not personally curtailing my spending.
But frankly, the reason I am in a fairly good financial situation is because I didn't spend much in 2007. I'm doing well because I am pathologically frugal.
Your argument reminds me of a young business school student that used to intern at an office I worked at last year. She would whine constantly about her financial woes, but always with a starbucks cup in hand. And when asked, she would point to the lagging economy and state that she was basically taking one for the team--that she had to spend, or the economy would collapse. It was so easy for her to think in terms of this large, conceptual economy of ideas, but it was so hard for her to just see the real economy in her own bank account.
Posted by: vanburenproud at March 8, 2009 10:35 PM
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