Forget the Year of the Ox, according to Bruce Sterling of Seed Magazine, 2009 is the Year of the Panic. He lists 7 reasons why; for example, let's take look at insurance:
4. Insurance and building codes. Every year, insurance rates soar from mounting "natural" catastrophes, obscuring the fact that the planet's coasts are increasingly uninsurable.
Insurance underlies the building and construction trades. If those rates skyrocket, that system must keel over. Once people lose faith in the institution of insurance?—?because insurance can't be made to pay in climate-crisis conditions?—?we'll find ourselves living in a Planet of Slums.
Most people in this world have no insurance and ignore building codes. They live in "informal architecture," i.e., slum structures. Barrios. Favelas. Squats. Overcrowded districts of this world that look like a post-Katrina situation all the time. When people are thrown out of their too-expensive, too-coded homes, this is where they will go.
Unless they're American, in which case they'll live in their cars.
But how can dispossessed Americans pay for their car insurance when they have no fixed address? Besides, car companies are coming apart with the sudden savage ease of Enron's collapse. Indeed, the year 2009 is shaping up as a planetary Enron. Enron was always the Banquo's ghost at the banquet of Bushonomics. The moguls of Enron really were the princes of contemporary business innovation, and the harbingers of the present day.
Comments (3)
On another matter : Michael Crichton is dead?!!! bummer, this guy was good.
D'yer reckon I'm going to take any notice?
££££££££££££££££££££££££
they make perfect E's
Things in canada will never be cheaper than the US
As a retail worker in canada i can say for sure its cheaper in the states. but if you get caught your paying taxes on your way back into the country.
1.) USA - 13m
2.) Japan - 4m
3.) Germany - 3m
4.) China - 3m
5.) UK - 2m
6.) France - 2m
7.) Italy - 2m
8.) Canada - 1m
What does this mean you say?
It says that you might beat us at health care, or bad movies, or complaining - but you will never, in a THOUSAND years, beat our economy.
Ehm, nominal GDP of EU 2006 = 14.6; USA = 13.2
http://jeviens.blogspot.com/2008/02/countries-with-highest-gdp.html
Also, as far as I can tell, American dollars are the only currency which have a smell ^_^
Anyways, the $-design is a 100 times better than the east-german looking Euro notes. I am so glad that we kept our danish kroners.
http://freshfrommesh.blogspot.com/2008/02/countries-with-highest-gdp.html
Regionalists.
Compare like for like, GDP PER CAPITA or by Currency.. USA is 9th or 10th in the world per capita and lower than EU by currency so this joke stands.
The strength of your economy compared to others is why America is the brunt of this and other jokes, not how many crap wobbly American planet killing cars you can pump out because your fat arse broke the last one within a year
Peace and love USA, as long as you're not bombing people you're a bit like the odd cousin who, despite being slightly retarded, somehow became really rich.
But still no-one can stand a conversation with for more than 5 minutes because you keep scratching your balls and picking your nose
It's like bragging you have a big penis... and yet not knowing how to use it properly.