by Francis Jock

Created on: February 24, 2009   Last Updated: May 15, 2009

The uncertainty surrounding the recession is on everyone's mind these days. All across the nation, working class families are worried about surviving the recession. There is plenty of bad financial news to go around: the stock market has declined to a 12 year low, unemployment continues to rise, and the government's economic stimulus plans are pumping our economic future into a financial abyss, and the price of gold bullion is hovering near an all time high. The looming question is how are the small businesses, private investors, or middle-class families going to survive these difficult financial times?

There are numerous reasons that we are in the maws of economic recession or more likely, an undeclared depression. While the disaster in our national housing policy and Wall Street's propensity for thinly disguised Ponzi schemes are certainly quite valid there are other reasons, as well. There are the failed tax cuts of the Bush administration, followed by the Iraq war without end in the volatile Middle East, and the price manipulation of oil and natural gas. While we're at it, we shouldn't forget to mention the imbalance in international trade, the wage wrangling of labor and the short sightedness of our major industries, either. The expansion of government and the impending explosion in social entitlements, married with the retirement of the Baby Boomers should also be added, and this is only the short list.

Perhaps it's best not to dwell on everything that's wrong with the economy. If you think about how we got here, you would have to realize, being the rational person that you are, that the guilty finger of blame is really pointing right at us. As a nation, we allowed it to happen, perhaps bewildered, confused and disbelieving along the way, but it happened and it's here to stay. Now we have to come to terms with it and place our vast creative energy, intelligence and will toward surviving these perilous times.

There really isn't any single best solution to point at, as if just doing this or that would get the economy back on track. That's because if there were, we would surely be working towards it instead of throwing trillions of dollars all around, hoping that fixing a lot of small problems will fix the larger problem. But we're not, and the best minds in the nation have decided that we should endure until the ship of the national economy rights itself. We believe that we have a good Captain at the helm, so together, we are going to navigate the dismal

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