Word: trillion
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...anxious group of economists, however, believes the latest Fed tactic is too little, too late. They say the economy is now structurally damaged and incapable of bouncing back anytime soon. Hanging ominously over every sector -- individuals, business and government -- is a crippling pile of debt that amounts to $10 trillion, double the size of the entire U.S. economy. Consumers, far and away the most powerful stimuli in the economy, seem determined to slash spending and pay off loans. The government said last week that consumer installment debt fell 3% in June, the sixth drop in seven months...
Well, the Information Age is here, but it hasn't exactly lived up to its advance billing. While more people are working with their heads rather than their hands, and more than a third of the nation's $5.5 trillion GNP is generated by ideas rather than manufactured goods, white-collar productivity is no higher now than it was 30 years ago. The paperless office remains a secretary's fantasy. Paper-killing technologies like electronic mail and voice % processors go largely unused -- too complicated -- while paper-generating devices like fax machines and copiers are used to the point of abuse...
...provide a loan from one of the financing arms of the big automakers. Want a home mortgage? Call an insurance company or even a Wall Street securities firm. More and more Americans are doing just that. At the end of 1990, banks held a mere 16% of the $3 trillion in residential mortgages outstanding, and less than half of all auto loans...
Tragic as the situation gripping holders of Executive Life and First Capital annuities may be, the U.S. pension system is largely stable. More than $1 trillion in assets currently backs roughly $900 billion in pension liabilities. Those assets are supported in turn by the financial strength of the corporations funding the plans...
Conservatives, meanwhile, dutifully paid homage to these values and scooped up disaffected Democrats. But conservatives failed Americans by trying to ; placate both supply-siders and traditional Republicans with an economic model that included massive tax cuts and higher defense spending. The Republican legacy is a $3 trillion debt, held in large part by foreign investors, and a populace that feels cheated by a government that doesn't seem to work. By 1990, when Bush agreed to raise taxes in exchange for budget cuts from the Democrats, the G.O.P. had run out of promises to make to voters...