Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.

For those keeping track of such things, about a year or so ago the stock market was twice what it was today. Or, to put it more accurately, its dropped by 50% since then. Whats it mean to me? Not much..I have almost nothing in the stock market. However, the blowback is totally different….I (and you) are affected indirectly as unemployment rises, people who were counting on the market to fund their retirements become broke, municipalities become money-starved, etc, etc, etc. Interesting times. But youre ready for it, right? Right?

So, we have an official definition of a recession…but what about a Depression? How do you tell when a recession becomes a depression?

Here’s an article speculating that we may be in one now.  The article goes on to state that we may not be in a depression. In short, a depression, it seems, is oneof those things that you dont know youve had one until youre past it. Its obvious though that even if this were a depression no one in power is wanting to be the one to slap the name on it. Its a recession, a prolonged recession, a severe recession, a lengthy recesssion…but its not a depression.

This sort of Orwellian newspeak is going to become more common here as things progress. The unemployed will be ‘underemployed’, the morons that bought $700,000 houses on $40,000 incomes will be ‘victims of greedy banks’, and people who, as Santelli says, “carry the water instead of drink the water” will be ‘the rich’….and we all know that the rich are evil, mean, nasty people who deserve to have 40% of their paycheck go straight to someone else.

Are we in a Depression? I dunno….The lefties and Clinton apologists are quick to point out that during Slick Willie’s administration things were just wonderful. Well, the stock market and unemployment numbers are pretty much where they were when he gave a state of the union address that called the nations situation good.

Whats this got to do with anything relevant to the usual topics? I suppose the important thing here is that it really doesnt matter what anyone calls it…recession, depression, stagflation, recovery, etc. What matters is the result it has. If the talking heads on the television said that we are ‘officially in recovery’ and that all economic indicators were pointing to a bull market just around the corner it would be meaningless if, the next day, you lost your job.  Don’t think that just because some pundits say things may get better towards the end of the year or next year that we’re out of the woods. Heck, Im pretty sure we’re not even as far in the woods as we’re gonna get.

So, no, its not a depression. Not yet. And we won’t know until its over. But in the meantime don’t be lulled into complacency because its ‘only a recession’. Personally, I can look around me and see the failing businesses, empty storefronts, banks with non-existent interest rates, lots full of new cars, and houses with ‘price reduced’ signs and get a far better indicator of the current economic situation than Ill ever get from official sources.