Don't you love it when people call it?

[StageLeft]

As you may know, Iceland is rather fvcked right now. The stock market is down (or was recently) 90%, their dollar is cheaper than toilet paper, unemployment is on the rise, police are using tear gas to quiet the riots, banks collapsing, being nationalized, all the good fun that the US is really flirting with at the moment, to be frank.

Link

This guy wrote in May of 06 this article which actually is a pretty good analysis of what happened.

BTW, did I read that right above--that Iceland's national debt was 300% of GDP, or was that including private? The US' by comparison is less than 100% but growing very quickly and on pace to hit 100% in the very near term at current pace.

EDIT: It's clear that some see great similarities while others will profess how parallels are ridiculous and the US is nothing like Iceland. In reality there's some overlap, but I certainly have no idea how much.

 

[RabidMongoose]

I'm going to Iceland in a couple of months. I think that it's going to be interesting.

I thought that a large part of the problem with them is that their three largest banks had assets worth a total of about 10x Iceland's entire GDP...so when the global financial crisis happened, they had a collapse of epic proportions.

 

[masteryoda34]

Only question left is how long will it be before this happens in the US?

 

[Dari]

Having a high debt really isn't a problem if most of it is owned by natives. It becomes a serious problem when you owe foreigners.

EDIT: swapped GDP for debt. Sorry.

 

[babylon5]

Originally posted by: masteryoda34
Only question left is how long will it be before this happens in the US?

USA is too big to fail.............

Oops

 

[masteryoda34]

Originally posted by: babylon5

Originally posted by: masteryoda34
Only question left is how long will it be before this happens in the US?

USA is too big to fail.............

Oops

QFT

 

[Lemon law]

The only problem with the Skoorb type reasoning, is that for every person who saw the future correctly, 2020 hindsight, there are 20 chicken little types who say the sky is falling when its not.

And then when we elevate that one in 20 type, their next prediction is all too likely to be wrong.

But never mind me, I was only a clueless dimocrat, as we have been saying for eight years now, GWB&co has been leading us into a trainwreck. Poor George, born with a silver spoon in his mouth, aping similar
Ronald Reagan policies, but unlike Reagan, the disaster GWB brought us blew up on his watch. And lucky Ronald got out before the problems dumped on GHB. Making him say, read my lips, gotta raise taxes when GHB was right all along when he called Reganomics, voodoo economics. Is that irony or what.

Cheer up Iceland, GWB&co stinking thinking helped collapse the economy of the entire world.

 

[bamacre]

Originally posted by: Lemon law
The only problem with the Skoorb type reasoning, is that for every person who saw the future correctly, 2020 hindsight, there are 20 chicken little types who say the sky is falling when its not.

And then when we elevate that one in 20 type, their next prediction is all too likely to be wrong.

But never mind me, I was only a clueless dimocrat, as we have been saying for eight years now, GWB&co has been leading us into a trainwreck. Poor George, born with a silver spoon in his mouth, aping similar
Ronald Reagan policies, but unlike Reagan, the disaster GWB brought us blew up on his watch. And lucky Ronald got out before the problems dumped on GHB. Making him say, read my lips, gotta raise taxes when GHB was right all along when he called Reganomics, voodoo economics. Is that irony or what.

Cheer up Iceland, GWB&co stinking thinking helped collapse the economy of the entire world.

As much merit as there is in blaming Bush for this mess, you totally ignore the fact that much of it was created during Clinton's years as well. The Democrats are responsible for much of the blame, too.

 

[nullzero]

The economic crisis is happening in other countries now... Like the riots in lativa http://bankimplode.com/blog/2009/01/15/riots-in-riga/

Coming to a city near you lol....

 

[daniel49]

hmm seems to me Iceland was held up as an example , not to long ago, when it comes to energy independence.

Guess that wasn't enough to keep thier head above water?
Had to lugh at the headline tho, Iceland experiences meltdown. Thought I was in a Global Warming thread again.

 

[Sedition]

By far the onion had the best prediction since Nostradamus about 8 years ago this week.

 

[PokerGuy]

Originally posted by: Lemon law
The only problem with the Skoorb type reasoning, is that for every person who saw the future correctly, 2020 hindsight, there are 20 chicken little types who say the sky is falling when its not.

And then when we elevate that one in 20 type, their next prediction is all too likely to be wrong.

Agreed 100%

But never mind me, I was only a clueless dimocrat, as we have been saying for eight years now, GWB&co has been leading us into a trainwreck. Poor George, born with a silver spoon in his mouth, aping similar Ronald Reagan policies, but unlike Reagan, the disaster GWB brought us blew up on his watch.

Complete baseless drivel as usual. Trying to pin the blame for this disaster on any one thing or person or even administration is simply stupid. There are many many things that factored into this, greed being the main one.

 

[Zebo]

They are cold too and drunks....No offense but Iceland ? Who gives a &$^? one subdivision in Ca like Pacific Palisades has more people than Iceland. Hardly a world barometer.

Incidentally, if you care, Iceland is about to get richer because they are selling exploration rights around their Island.

 

[zephyrprime]

Originally posted by: bamacre

Originally posted by: Lemon law
The only problem with the Skoorb type reasoning, is that for every person who saw the future correctly, 2020 hindsight, there are 20 chicken little types who say the sky is falling when its not.

And then when we elevate that one in 20 type, their next prediction is all too likely to be wrong.

But never mind me, I was only a clueless dimocrat, as we have been saying for eight years now, GWB&co has been leading us into a trainwreck. Poor George, born with a silver spoon in his mouth, aping similar
Ronald Reagan policies, but unlike Reagan, the disaster GWB brought us blew up on his watch. And lucky Ronald got out before the problems dumped on GHB. Making him say, read my lips, gotta raise taxes when GHB was right all along when he called Reganomics, voodoo economics. Is that irony or what.

Cheer up Iceland, GWB&co stinking thinking helped collapse the economy of the entire world.

As much merit as there is in blaming Bush for this mess, you totally ignore the fact that much of it was created during Clinton's years as well. The Democrats are responsible for much of the blame, too.

The other people to blame are us. We ordinary people have become greedy and started esteeming the wallstreet crooks. And the citizens of the world still haven't put an end to the 500+ year old scam that is fractional reserve banking. We are all responsible for that. The fault is not entirely due to our government. Haven't you noticed that the entire world is in dire straits? Even countries where there are no democrats or republicans are facing a crisis.

 

[zephyrprime]

Originally posted by: Zebo
They are cold too and drunks....No offense but Iceland ? Who gives a &$^? one subdivision in Ca like Pacific Palisades has more people than Iceland. Hardly a world barometer.

Incidentally, if you care, Iceland is about to get richer because they are selling exploration rights around their Island.

Iceland's problems are a microcosm of our own and the world in general. It's true that due to their small size nothing that happens in iceland will have much effect on us but that is besides the point. Iceland's experience is valuable to us because they are the canary in the coal mine.