Forbes: Jacksonville in "Economic Free Fall"

[St. Auggie]

I love fear mongering.  It sells.  This will make someone money. 

[Ocklawaha]

Considering most of the shit about Jacksonville originates in Sports Illustrated, a Jacksonville hating branch of Time-Warner, I was worried when I saw this was from Forbes. Had it been a TW Group article it certainly would have been negative, however in the case of Sports Illustrated the story would be so full of holes that one couldn't use the discarded magazine for ass wipe.  Should anyone from Jax. get the bright idea to use SI for this purpose, you will probably develop a raging rabid rash in the nether regions of your anatomy.

Forbes is a railroad hating publication with never a kind word to say about Amtrak or US Conventional Passenger Trains, writing them off as a wasteful democrat hay ride for train aficionado's.  Writing about cities would be a far more serious and credible endeavor for these  pompus, paginal, pontificating, poison pen, parvenues.  Once the realization struck me that EVERY other major Florida metropolis was likewise listed in their doomsday economic report I recalled these are the same family folks that own the "Forbes Ranch" development in Southern Colorado.  Funny, Colorado Springs, Pueblo, Antonito, Alamosa, Chama, Durango or Tao's all dogged their wrath. Once sales pick up in the cryospheric pan arctic ranch, they're likely to back off of Florida, California or Nevada.

OCKLAWAHA
panjandrum deluxe

[finehoe]

http://www.businessinsider.com/20-cities-where-the-recovery-never-happened-2010-3#7-jacksonville-fl-14

[Tripoli1711]

How silly.  We just had a big forum on whether there is any "good news" or not.  Whether there is any true "recovery" or not right now is open for debate, though some trends appear to be getting better.  This article presupposes that "the recovery" is already over.  What hogwash.  When you have a bigger boom (like all the cities on that list except for Detroit), you are going to have a bigger bust, meaning you need more "recovery" to get back to the "peak", which was their criteria.  A city like Lynchburg, Virginia, where I've been living the past 2 years never moves very much at all one way or the other.  Therefore, I guess the recovery happened here already.  Now I am reconsidering my imminent move back to Jacksonville...

[finehoe]

This article presupposes that "the recovery" is already over. 

The April 15 edition of The Economist agrees: 

"The American recession is over. In the summer of 2009 real GDP and industrial production hit bottom and resumed growth, and expansion in both measures strengthened as the year ended. Industrial production has continued to grow in early 2010 as, in all likelihood, has output. By the end of the current quarter the American economy may have returned to its pre-recession peak in real GDP."

[Tripoli1711]

First, they hedge by using terms such as "in all likelihood" and "may have".  Secondly, it does not serve to support the article's presupposition that the fabled recovery has ended.  Recovery is an action relative to the organism being considered.  Like I said, Lynchburg, Virginia or Eugene, Oregon may have completed their "recovery" already.  Just because recovery may be slower in Jacksonville or Phoenix or may not have yet begun doesn't mean the world has passed us by.  Does anyone really think Phoenix is going to become Detroit and never recover?

[finehoe]

it does not serve to support the article's presupposition that the fabled recovery has ended. 

"By the end of the current quarter the American economy may have returned to its pre-recession peak"

returned to its pre-recession peak = recovered

[Tripoli1711]

I guess its just a matter of semantics.  The way the article read to me was like these cities "missed the recovery".  In other words, these cities lost out on their chance to get back to where they were before the bubble burst, and are now proper F'd.  I just don't see that as following logic given where this nation is right now.  It might take Jacksonville and other cities longer to "recover", but like I said, in large part that is because the bubble grew so large here compared with other sleepy places.  Yes, the American economy on the whole may "recover" before Jacksonville or Miami or Phoenix or Vegas does, but that does not mean those cities are now foreclosed (pun intended) from ultimately recovering in the near term... it might just take a little longer.

[finehoe]

I didn't interpret the article as saying this was some kind of a permanent state.

My own opinion is that the recession is not over. It's not. These ivory tower dwelling academicians can easily spout off whatever statistics support their rosy image of the American economy, but nothing can change the fact that jobless claims are rising, housing prices are falling, banks continue to fail, and any rise in GDP is in some part due to government expenditures funded by treasury bill sales to foreigners, which will eventually cost US taxpayers TRILLIONS.

The only thing I have to ask myself to really figure out whether the US is better off or not is: What problems that caused the crisis have been fixed?

None. In fact, they have been worsened.

The Fed keeps rates artificially low and the government spends more and more, especially subsidizing mortgages that were the problem in the first place.

What is the economy to most people? Its certainly not some GDP figure. Its their job or lack of it. To the people, the recession isn't over until the unemployment is over. That could take a generation for the US.

[Tripoli1711]

I am rather certain our opinions about almost every issue surrounding and raised by your last post differ.  That being said, I agree 100% with the content of your last post.