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The Ultimate Depression Survival Guide
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The Ultimate Depression Survival Guide

Protect Your Savings, Boost Your Income and Grow Wealthy Even in the Worst of Times

Martin D. Weiss
Wiley, 2009
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Recommendation

In this savings and investment “survival guide,” financial publisher Martin D. Weiss proclaims that the world is entering another depression. According to the U.S. Government Accountability Office, his investment advisory and rating firm outperforms all other companies at “forecasting future financial trouble.” Indeed, for two decades, Weiss has accurately predicted “nearly every large financial failure in the United States,” including the latest financial collapse. When it comes to doom-and-gloom financial prognostications, Weiss has excellent bloodlines. His father, J. Irving Weiss, was one of the few economists who predicted the Great Depression at the time. So what does this modern-day Cassandra have to tell us? Weiss claims that as wretched as things are now economically, they will get much worse in the years to come. However, in addition to dismal tidings, he offers numerous specific, well-informed recommendations on how to protect – and even increase – your assets during the “Second Great Depression of modern times.” getAbstract suggests that if you want to study fiscal advice that covers the spectrum from pessimism to optimism, this book expertly handles the pessimistic end.

Summary

The “Second Great Depression”

Many people didn’t think it could happen again, but another Great Depression is just around the corner. Its causes include a disastrous housing collapse, a meltdown in home mortgages and history’s most significant global debt crisis. Note that the word “depression,” not “recession,” applies to what is coming and, indeed, what is partially here already: a major economic contraction that will last many years, create huge unemployment and wipe out most individuals’ wealth.

Some disturbing signs portend dark days ahead. One of every ten U.S. home mortgage holders is delinquent or in foreclosure, and 40% have less equity in their homes than the debt remaining on their mortgages (that is, their value is “upside-down”). Famous U.S. companies are “bankrupt, bailed out or bought out.” In response, the government is assuming massive, crushing debt in an attempt to rescue entire industry sectors.

America is not the only country throwing huge amounts of money at troubled companies to keep them afloat. Is this a sensible policy? No. In fact, it is doomed to fail. Quick recovery is impossible. Too much public debt exists and no will exists to...

About the Author

Martin D. Weiss, Ph.D., is the founder and CEO of a financial services and investment publishing firm. Fluent in nine languages, Weiss chairs the nonprofit Sound Dollar Committee, an organization his father originally created to help balance the U.S. budget.

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