Today's crunch feels like '70s

http://www.ajc.com/services/content/business/stories/2008/07/13/seventies.html

The above internet address of the title of the article speaks about some of the similarities of todays problems in the U.S. and those of the 1970s where gas prices quadrupled. However, it is good that at least so far there are not fist fights at gas stations over people cutting in on one mile lines to buy gas.

However, on the other hand globalization was not yet a problem like it is now and there was no Subprime meltdown affecting not only U.S. homeowners but also unhappy mortgage investors worldwide.

I can remember in 1969 still being able to buy gas at independent gas stations for 17 cents a gallon,(I was college age) and being able to drive in my friends 1956 36 horsepower VW bug from from Los Angeles to Mt. Shasta to go climbing and it cost less than ten dollars round trip.(around 1200 miles). Those were the days. Then gasoline reached 40 to 50 cents a gallon and we couldn't even buy it at that price because there were mile lines and fist fights breaking out all over because of people who cut in gas lines. I usually waited until the lines were the smallest to get gas which usually meant 2 pm to 4 pm or after 9pm at night. I didn't like to watch people get hysterical and physically fight over gas and the prices. Because these things often got out of hand with tire irons, knives and guns. The average person tends to be less violent now than then. People then were used to a much rougher world where children commonly played with toy guns and prepared to fight and die and be drafted into the military and die in wars. Death was much more real and pressing and present to the average person then than now. On TV we watched bloody dead and dying U.S. soldiers being blown apart and being carried away every single night on national TV. It wasn't like now when all the blood and death is hidden completely away from Americans except in words.

I didn't understand national and international economics like I do now in the 1970s.
It wasn't until the early 1980s that I really understood economic problems worldwide and how nations all affected each other. So when most South and Central American nations defaulted on their large loans from the U.S. it caused the Savings and Loans to collapse in the United States. Many people lost billions of dollars and were wiped out and many died or commmited suicide because of this here in the United States. Bear Stearns and Indymac foreshadow more of this sort of thing right now. It is said that 90 banks in the United States could potentially fail. Everyone should make sure to have no account or group of accounts in any one named bank to total more than 100,000 dollars. If you do you might lose all or part of it that isn't FDIC insured. However, if enough banks fail then FDIC could be wiped out and only a home safe or a coffee can buried in your yard or something like that would work. My Grandad buried 25,000 dollars in his front yard during the great depression in a coffee can to weather that storm. I think a safe you set in cement somewhere in your house is a better idea, personally, or a safety deposit box.(Even if a bank fails it shouldn't affect a safety deposit box). Only a bank fire might be a problem then.

At the time of the collapse of the Savings and loans I owned property that was very remote and was home schooling my children with my wife. We prepared by buying food that could be stored long term in 50 gallon drums and buried it in the ground preparing for a collapse at that time. However, what I didn't understand during the Savings and Loan collapse was that the rest of the world wasn't going to let the U.S. collapse. However, now the U.S. has lost its good will from much of the world. Our financial survival as a nation might be dependent on Obama becoming the new JFK. (JFK is recognized along with Reagan as the most popular President of the 20th Century worldwide). Clinton was a very popular president worldwide as well.

When the nation has a popular President, America is more likely to financially do well and to survive in general better. America has completely squandered world good will since 9-11. We live in very scary times as a result.