GreyWolf

Seriously... hard to say MUNK - only guides are the current overall state of the economy and confidence in future prospects.

At the moment there is much worse on the horizon - we just seen the tip of the iceberg. The home problem will increase and that causes other ripples - partly because the home/construction market comprises around 23-25% of the economy. Just checked comments Robert Schiller made about 72 hours ago, (chief economist at MacroMarkets and a person who forecast this problem years ago) - his comments were that it would get worse and there were no signs of any slowdown or turnabout in the foreseeable future.

In the next 72 hours there is an expected reduction of interest rates by the Fed in an effort to boost the economy, but that also weakens the dollar and there has already been some weaking in anticipation of a Fed announcement.

A positive aspect is that the weak dollar should aid exports - and, to a degree this has happened, but not to a level which would make much difference. (There were extra exports of around $150billion over the last year, but that was literally wiped in just over a week recently when the Fed printed around $80ish billion more fantasy dollars and China dumped around $65 billion in currency.) It takes more serious manufacturing/export ability to sustain that level of loss.

There are other potential external factors which could very seriously blow the whole scenario out of the water for many decades - or forever. One is the possibility of not a petro-dollar, but a euro-dollar. It is estimated that this would place the US in the same economic position as Argentina at it's worst level. Another is if bankers lose more confidence - China can have a massive impact on a hoped US recovery by dumping more of their dollar holdings.

It's a long story where many levels can affect things, but overall, only my (based also on what others more qualified are reporting) is there is little chance of seeing the worst for perhaps 2 years. From that point, it depends on who takes the initiative to get out of the swamp - and, assuming someone will - it's a massive challenge and could not see a full recovery, but maybe over a ten year period, it should stabilize to levels which were common a few years ago, tho the dollar may probably never reach recent levels again, partly due to more external factors and where there is a shift of economic power to nations actually producing wealth (eg Asian and China).

The easy read? Don't hold your breath and hope for a recovery - that is a sure way to commit suicide