My mom told me they lost quite a bit in theri retirement funds..and some others they had invested. She had that worried look on her face. My dad wanted to retire next yr. They don't know now if he will be able. He is now 63 and has worked sometimes 3 jobs in his life time. How dare they take away his time to rest and enjoy his life? I hope AIG had a big time on our dime! Sickening!

I had to sit in the FIA or in some states known as the DSS office trying to get medicaid so I can have my baby here in 6 weeks and not be hit with all of the hospital bills because we are losing our medical at the end of this month. GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

Oh geez...I hope it works in your favor. They owe us BIG for this bail out. Good luck with the baby. :)

I'm watching what I spend and am banking what I can , we bought wood so we can cut back on oil and even that was hard to find and of course like everything else the price was right up there ,,what can you do ...welcome to middle class ...arent we the ones every single politician says they were or are going to help ??? I am so sick of all of it...

When I saw that Lehman Brothers was filing for bankruptcy and AIG needed $85 billion to stay in business, I figured the economy was in trouble.

I wrote a journal entry entitled Are We Headed Into A Depression discussing some of the things I've read and learned [I'm an accountant and love economics]. I postulated that we are headed into a depression as about every 80 years there's a great depression like in 1929. At the time I was in favor of the bailout assuming it would stablize the markets and prevent a depression but now I'm not so sure.

The reason the government couldn't let AIG fail is because they issue insurance for such things as city and state bonds that are used to raise money. If cities and states can't sell bonds, they can't raise money apart from taxes and you can imagine the impact that would have on the economy!!

I'm absolutely dumbfounded how rapidly the market has tanked--it's down 2200 points in less than two weeks with no end in sight. I sold everything I had in the market as I woke up the other day thinking that if it continued like it was [300 point drop the day before], there wouldn't be a market in another month or so. Better to put what I have in a money market account and retain my principle than watch it evaporate as it's been doing.

I think it was Wednesday that I saw that Iceland's currency was in a freefall and the country was on the verge of bankruptcy. I guess they have a lot of banks where the UK and Europe have stashed their money so now the UK at least is freezing Iceland's assets in hopes of recouping the losses. I can only imagine the horror the Icelandic people are going to suffer this winter with their country being bankrupt!! It's not exactly the kind of climate that lends itself to homelessness....

I hope this G8 summit or whatever it is that's taking place at the White House this weekend comes up with some solutions, but I doubt they will. Sadly, I think we're in for several years of very lean times. I think people would be wise to make sure they have enough cash on hand to get through a week or two in case their bank fails.

Forget it.....who has time to watch the NewS..we are making news....buy the stock market before the Christmas rush now.

Let see what happen this weekend.

I don't know chit, but seem to me that everytime the minium wage went up, cost of livein went up higher... inflation is gettin so out of control..
so i reckon it's bound to happen....cost of livin needs to be frozen to give the workin class a chance to catch up...
WE need jobs and forty hour work weeks and we need to represented for our taxes...
this is basically taxation without representation... end of line...

my folks lost lots $ when the stocks fell in 2000 when W came into office. they've been diligently working well past retirement to build it up again. now, i have no idea what's left for them.

@freedom2
We could but it is beyond ridiculously priced, we are a family of 5 soon to be 6 that will be living off of unemployment...yikes