With the struggling economy as the larger theme of this election year, people are looking for answers. Housing is still a hot topic for many, especially in the high-flying real estate boomtowns across the nation. CNN/Money writes that some of the hardest hit cities may see real estate drops of 50% of more!
That’s amazing to consider, but even more amazing to me are the statistics they put out on unemployment in some of the California cities. 18%? 10%? Wow.  Numbers don’t lie, but I can tell you that I’m sitting in one of those cities as I write this, and if unemployment is that bad, you can’t tell it from all the people out shopping and running around town. The restaurants are pretty full, the roads are crowded, the stores are open and summer is getting underway for all the kids.
Certainly appearances can be deceiving. After talking with some of the locals, the small business owners indicate that sales have definitely slowed down compared to a year ago.  With food and energy prices skyrocketing that’s no surprise these days. But even with the slowdown in spending there are jobs to be had in service industries. Just not the kind of jobs that replace good paying industry jobs to support larger families. But if you’re looking for temporary or minimum wage service jobs, you can find them.
Even with real estate, there’s a few folks looking for the bottom. Where I’m sitting, foreclosures are still up but bidders are jockeying for position to get the best deals on houses, often bidding the price up more than listed. Will we head up from here or just wallow around for a while? Most likely the latter. But those tax rebates we’ve put to work have both good and bad news to go along with them. Consumers are spending more money with free handouts, but the deficit isn’t getting any better either.
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