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If I had the money to do it I would buy Gold. The price is high right now but I only see it going even highter. My two cents.

Do you guys mean buying physical gold, or buying gold futures? Sorry, I'm not good at this economic stuff.

as a card-carrying student/Bullshit Artist of Economics I've determined that.....
Fuck it. all I plan to do is try to work 90 hours a week when I graduate in May whatever I can. Immigrants did it. It might kill me, but its the only shot I have.

Then I'm going to start examining the best fit of financial instruments for planning on my mom to maybe, one day, retire. All of my siblings are kind of intentionally unaware of the fact that she has nothing saved and things are getting really grim, and that you can either watch her begin to become one of the cat-food-eating ladies in 10 years or help. Dad'll be ok as soon as the youngest gets off child support in a few years. My SO might start to hate me and resent me for my concern, but oh well.

I came close to doing it (90 hour wk week) a few times when things got tough (and in Asbestos removal no less, ech ech ech scummier than working in a porno store full of pedophiles) ..... It will probably ruin my body, my life, my relationship, and my mind. Oh well. Vittles before all else.


Hey, 2 people called about warehouse jobs /night gigs while I was posting this. A new record.
Or:


All I really plan to do is put myself in a position to scam Olympics-comers if Chicago gets it a la the World's Fair. Thats the only plan .I'm not sure what you expect in this thread.


For Me: Seek work others won't take and do it alot. While I will probably establish the right day job eventually, after putting 600 resumes out there for the last 4 months, I'm more than excited to get back to being a janitor. Its a sick, simple pleasure of living to mop floors, if you have a good mop.
If you have assets, get creative with your care and regard for your well being.

I don't. I don't feel bad for me, either. Tough shit might cattle prod all of us into improving our savings rate. That would do great things, in some ways.

I'd get into the Metals Markets generally- if not even gold, getting involved with the increasingly scarcer materials like COPPER or SCRAP IRON even, will be profitable, and you need no broker, nor 1000.00 for an ounce. I've got ways about that, but I have to go buy some toilet paper, so I'm ending this post.

Wood Goblin wrote:I've been told that municipal bonds are a good investment right now, but I can't give you any data to back that up.

Gold has been performing incredibly well lately and is generally a safe place to park your money; even when the market it volatile, there are limits as to how low the value will get. However, I understand that there's quite a bit of speculation in the gold market right now as people look for "safe" places to park money. If the stock market improves any time soon, look for a decline in the value of gold. Also, gold has been hitting record-level prices, which is usually the worst point to invest in something.

Exactly. Precious metals are experiencing a bubble. Americans with all liquid assets in dollars are pretty much stuck with them for the time being, since they're essentially worthless abroad already to the point where they're almost an investment opportunity. Since you can forget putting it into real assets, municipal bonds pretty much look like the one way to go for the time being.

FuzzBob wrote:

Wood Goblin wrote:I've been told that municipal bonds are a good investment right now, but I can't give you any data to back that up.

Gold has been performing incredibly well lately and is generally a safe place to park your money; even when the market it volatile, there are limits as to how low the value will get. However, I understand that there's quite a bit of speculation in the gold market right now as people look for "safe" places to park money. If the stock market improves any time soon, look for a decline in the value of gold. Also, gold has been hitting record-level prices, which is usually the worst point to invest in something.

Exactly. Precious metals are experiencing a bubble. Americans with all liquid assets in dollars are pretty much stuck with them for the time being, since they're essentially worthless abroad already to the point where they're almost an investment opportunity. Since you can forget putting it into real assets, municipal bonds pretty much look like the one way to go for the time being.

Seconded.

I also am looking into Corn Futures, as oil goes up, corn will also...

dontfeartheringo wrote:Interesting that your guy recommended the same investment plan that I am considering.

Yeah, this is a guy who upset most of his underpaid staff when we all found out that for Christmas, he bought his wife a Jaguar and paid cash for it. CASH! He was pretty good at being rich.

I wouldn't recommend this in general, but if you can get into a position where you're a small-time weed dealer, you'll probably do pretty well there. Especially if you're friends with a cop. That'd probably work like a champ, so long as you weren't big enough that they'd be banging down your door.

slincire wrote:I've been thinking of converting my meager savings to Euros.

That train has already left the station. I was considering investing in international bonds or a mutual fund that invests in businesses that exclusively operate in China.

However, China's economy is facing some of the same problems we are and the time for investing in foreign currency itself has passed. The rates of conversion(back and forth) will take away any profits you might see.

The main point is....if you have dollars at this point, you are stuck with the dollar. Also, by yanking our money out of the economy we are only making the problem worse. I for one love this country, not our current government, but this country. I'd like to see our economy back on it's feet as soon as possible. It looks like TIPS bonds are a sound idea


I'm been looking into this and asking friends in finance for help in this matter. However, the conversations I've already had with them are pretty bleak. The average investor really doesn't know what to do at this point and there is no clear cut area to invest.

BTW: Great Thread.

i buy surf boards.

Hunker down. Drive less, take the train and/or public transportation when I can. Buy less shit- and buy only what I need. Exercise instead of eating lunch out. Take a bag of almonds to work and some fruit. That's what I plan on doing..

my 401k is already starting to lose money without me doing a damned thing. That kind of sucks because I have been putting 20% or so of my salary in it for the past 5-6 years.

I guess I should re-assess how the stocks are divvyed up and go for the less volatile ones.

I would think that if you have extra $$ - investing in companies that "power the world" not just the US would be smart. Like Cisco, for example. Green technologies, even in a recession are going to make money given the situation with fossil fuels.

My house would sell for much lower than it assessed in 2007, and it would take a while to sell it at all.

On the upside, my house could sell for less, but I could also turn around and buy for less.

This year I needed to buy a car (having the same vehicle for 11 years on its last leg) I knew I was getting a bonus at work a little while ago, so I put the bonus towards the car and paid off more than half of it. It's a godawful ugly tan-poo colored Toyota Prius Hybrid (the most unpopular color) and the dealership wanted to get rid of it, so even though it was more expensive than more gas guzzling cars, I got it. I'll try not to be a typical smug Prius driver, but I will say 45-60 miles to the gallon are real nice, and the car is more than half paid off! These cars were supposed to have waiting lists of people lined up to buy them, but in my experience that is just bullshit. I went to four dealers that had 10+ of them sitting on the lot and they were selling them for 3-5k off MSRP. I'd hate to be a Ford/Chevy dealer about now. I guess what I am saying is if you have to buy a car, spend a little extra money to get the most gas economical car you can get.


I'm not buying any more gear. I'll have to make do with what I have now. I'm actually selling stuff to minimize what I own (keeping only what I need)



I'd be curious to hear an honest, no conspiracy theory laden recommendation from Clocker Rick, if it can be kept to a single paragraph, 500 words or less, with no mention of "9/11 or the evil banks and the jews" that control them. You know, something that could actually be a beacon of hope for USA families in these times, from the PRF's foremost unemployed and/or rich Libertarian with too much time on his hands with a high-speed internet connection. A positive, thoughtful recommendation, y'know? Can it be done?