Hey All,

I've noticed a new popular topic of conversation for people: the "here's an example of the recession" story.

I find it pretty interesting, and they seem to preceed the actual hard news that confirm the stories by at least a few months.

I'm sure you've all had this conversation as well so I was wondering what signs of the recession all of you have noticed.

I'll start: I noticed two things this past week, both relating to golfing. For starters, the local courses I play emailed me coupons for BOGO golf. Not for twilight or midweek play, but for the friggin' Memorial Day weekend. I've never seen that, let alone on what should be a crazy busy weekend. Then I drive past the course Sunday and Monday and notice the parking lot is filled about 2/3rds of what it usually is. And this was with nice weather.

And P.S. - I know we aren't technically in a recession since the economy basically stayed the same last quarter instead of contracting, but that figure fails to account for population growth which means we need a slightly larger figure just to remain the same. So lets stay away from that semantic argument.

A recession consists of at least two quarters of losses though...

If we weren't headed for one, these damn gas prices are surely gonna make it inevitable IMO. I am not dying from them or anything, but it is definately eating up some of the disposable income. Food prices are getting out of control as well.

Damn snowbirds left town and it's 100+ daytime. Golf courses are all empty in the middle of the day here too Me and my buddies only play in the summer, we get to play all the insane expensive courses for next to nothing.

Please explain your argument relating to GDP - negative or Positive and population growth.

The definition of a recession does not change just on the whims of people's political ideology or what seems to be politically expedient at the moment.

I think you should reevaluate your comment about semantics.

The economy has slowed down, but we are not in a recession.

I agree with you. The definition is what it is, I'm not trying to change that. I'm just taking the non-official definition that Warren Buffett and Alan Greenspan have recently used.

Lets just generalize it up a bit and call it an economic slowdown instead.

What examples have you noticed just in your day to day lives? Or have you seen anything on the other end of the spectrum, something encouraging?

My co-worker explains "A Recession is when my neighbor is unemployed, a Depression is when I'm unemployed."

Just like the reasons why we are where we are, we are not going to agree at all, nonetheless the way out of where we are.

That said. I'm doing ok on a single income under $36K. Would be a lot worse off if I paid what others paid for their houses at the top of the market. I was lucky and bought the family house, who my Mom bought and wasn't looking for a huge profit when she wanted to sell it to me.

If I were a tad more conservative, I'd never get to do anything fun.

I'm not seeing anything encouraging. In fact I see the next few years going down the road in a not very optimistic light. Further government meddling, intervention, and regulation don't bode well as far as looking ahead.

Prices of food and gas are rapidly increasing. That is largely due to government. Yet in a global economy some are arguing for more government intervention. That doesn't bode well for the United States.

Let's call a spade a spade. Warren Buffett is a big time liberal and will say anything he thinks will get a Democrat elected. His longtime bullshit story that his secretary pays more in taxes than he does stinks worse than Al Sharpton's bathroom after he has eaten refried beans on 110th Street. Buffet's secretary pays income taxes. She is an employee. Buffett pays capital gains taxes. He is an investor. The two are not the same, yet they make for propaganda fodder for the ignorant and unwashed masses.

I don't know if our country's economy is in a recession, but I know my family's economy sure as hell is. Also, I've never seen so many houses for sale in my neighborhood. I didn't think we had the housing issue in Pittsburgh like on the west coast etc.

We actually did this test. We made a shopping list last month, went shopping and spent $87.16. We went shopping last week and used the same shopping list exactly. Cost $116.97. That's almost a $30.00 difference at the same store for the same products. Granted there are many factors that could cause that but overall it is still a $30.00 increase in our expenditure. Combined with gas, utility bills etc. We have no plans to travel, spend extra etc. We are doing pretty good and not hurting but don't want to find ourselves hurting either.

Quite a few people I've talked with have noticed restaurants taking a hit lately. The higher end the restaurant, the more empty the tables. Combine people cutting back on their disposable income and rising food prices and I think we'll be seeing a lot of restaurants tanking in the next year.

As a single guy, I'm not noticing the grocery prices as much, but Samuel's post really drives home that point. I wonder what that list would have run a couple years ago.

The litte deli I eat lunch at once or twice a week recently posted an open letter apologizing for having to raise prices on June 1st. They cite skyrocketing food prices and a recent local tax increase as the reasons. I'm curious to see what that $4.10 sub will run me once the calendar flips.

I work part time at a golf course, and last year over memorial day we had 260 players on Sat, and 225 on memorial day. This year, we had 75 Sat, and 70 on memorial day, and it was a perfect day for golf with a good rate.

Yes, I've noticed food prices have gone up. They are going to go up even further. A lot of that is because of this moronic push to use food grains for fuel.

The local government around here doesn't seem to think people are suffering any financial woes. By that I mean, they don't mind raising their fees.

The water tax here is going up another 14%. That is on top of an 11% increase last year.

If we are in a recession as some people claim, why are governments all over the country going on hiring sprees? Why is government expanding? That costs money. That cost has to be borne by the taxpayers. Why isn't government seriously cutting spending if we are supposed to be in a recession as some of these politicians claim?

http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/employment/2008-04-29-stateworkers_N.htm

You do! What course and why haven't we ever had an AZXC tournament at it?

Holy blazes. That's a bloodbath. You never really see it, at least around here, but I suppose we could start seeing golf courses going out of business if this keeps up.

But with the real estate market so hideous it's possible the course would just sit there unattended to for a few years. That sure would look weird.

One of my biggest expenses at the grocery store is soda...

Two years ago, you could get a 2 liter of Coke for about 1.29 full price, but usually either it or Pepsi was on sale for 89 cents or less. Now...regular price is $1.89. Rarely is it under $1 on sale. I've gone to store-brand soda. It doesn't take much to get used to the difference in taste, and the REGULAR price is around 70-80 cents.

Thank God I don't have kids and don't care too much for milk. That's gone through the roof.

Milk isn't to bad here in AZ. Me and my kid go through a gallon every 2 days. Milk is my non-Soda beverage of choice. Frys do half gallons for $1 quite often and 1% keeps for weeks, so I load up when they have those kinda deals.

I'm a milk FIEND but fortunately the grocery store by me still uses milk as a loss leader so I'm able to pick it up for around $2.50 a gallon.

If I don't limit myself, I'll go through a gallon by myself in less than 3 days. I even crave it after a sweaty afternoon mowing the lawn or doing yardwork. Nothing like a glass of skim that's a nanodegree from freezing.

I did a "drive by" of the boat access by the lake I usually fish on last Monday (Memorial day). Expecting the usual overflow of boats and a line at the access, I was STUNNED to see several available slots to park your boat trailer in. It was a windless PERFECT 70 degree sunny day...

I doubt it is recession related, as much as it's probably gas related... You can't drop a decent sized bass-boat in the water for more than two hours without spending at least $50 on gas. Suddenly, my little 50hp two stroke outboard looks a LOT more appealing than that 75hp 4-stroke I was looking at!

My next door neighbor dropped $600 into the tank of his cabin cruiser this last weekend (454 cubic inch 300hp inboard V8). It lasted him ONE DAY on the lake.

A lady at my wifes work took her boat out and it cost her 1600 bucks for the weekend in gas

Business is booming for me... I make double now than what I did 2 years ago, and should continue that same $ figure gain for the forseeable future.

Recession?? Just means less competition for the toy purchases...

:p

Work for Exon or Shell?

What the hell did she do with (at least) 300 Gallons of gas in a weekend???

You've obviously never filled a boat before.

Whatever the price is at the pump for a car...figure the pump at the water (lake, river, whatever) to be considerably more.

At my parent's lake house, when gas was $1.00 on the road, it was $1.75 at the lake. Not sure how large the difference is now...but I imagine it's considerable.

She has a big house/party boat

Oh my GOD that's such an absolutely disturbing waste...you have GOT to be kidding me...