While the cirumstances are slightly different, I see a lot of similarities to the Russian collapse of 1998, which offers good insight into what might happen here. There's a pretty good article here about it here:
http://www.fas.org/news/russia/2000/russia/part08.htmIn very basic terms, the stock market crashed and money lost most of its value within a short amount of time. Banking basically collapsed, and therefore Banks and ATM machines were shut down. People lost huge amounts of money and nothing could be bought on credit, both for individuals and for businesses.
From that, shortages of meat, cooking oil, flour, butter, sugar, rice, and milk caused a lot of stores to close. Cost for goods, especially foreign goods, went through the roof. Stores that did stay open had long lines and closed often to figure out what to charge for the goods they could sell. Those in the city hit hardest with the food shortage, as they couldn't grow really any of their own food. Families with children or elderly to support also hit very hard.
People that still had jobs were paid in whatever the company could spare, instead of money. Shortages of medicine and medical care became common (also became very expensive). Alcoholism, drug use, and crime skyrocket. Abortion rate goes up, school drop-out rate goes up, percentage of those with sexually transmitted diseases, like HIV, increase. Basically, a big mess for quite a long time.
It might not happen the exact same way in America, but I see a lot of similarities. The stock market is down, money is losing a lot of its value, the price of goods and medicine is way up, ect. It's like almost the same thing that happened in Russia is happening here, just not as fast. All we're waiting on is for banking to collapse, and if that happens I bet it will speed things right along.
Previous Topic
Index
