Frequent readers of this and related blogs in what some have called the “Manosphere” or even “Roissysphere” will know well about our writings as to what Humanity can expect in the coming decade. Although written from the standpoint of human sociosexual dynamics, they nevertheless have wide application accross the body politic. I urge my readers to checkout blogger The Fifth Horseman’s excellent report published earlier this year, entitled The Misandry Bubble for more on what I’m talking about here.
But suffice it to say, that the past decade brought with it a number of “bubbles” “bursting”; first, it was the so-called “tech bubble”; then, it was combined one-two punch of the real estate and banking “bubbles” as the last decade came to a close. We’re still struggling mightily to climb out from under that bubble as we speak – just in time to grapple with three more major bubbles that loom large on the horizon: what some have called the education, healthcare and public sector bubbles. In case you haven’t already noticed, all three are tied into each other – and promises to make what went down in the Fall of 2008, just two years ago – look like child’s play.
Among other news media outlets, here’s the latest from Newsmax.com:
Philadelphia, Chicago and Boston Are Study’s Worst-Off Pensions
Tuesday, 12 Oct 2010 07:36 AMPhiladelphia will run out of money by 2015 to pay pension obligations with existing assets, and Chicago and Boston by 2019, a study by economists at Northwestern University and the University of Rochester forecasts.
The report, “The Crisis in Local Government Pensions in the United States,” warns that mounting liabilities threaten “the ability of state and local governments to operate.”
The study examines 77 of the largest municipal defined pension plans, covering 2 million public employees and retirees, roughly two-thirds of the nation’s total. The estimated liability of all municipal retirement funds is $574 billion, according to economists Joshua Rauh of the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University and Robert Novy-Marx of the University of Rochester.
Read more here.
And here’s what came up on my Yahoo! News this morning as I went to check the mail:
11 State Pension Funds that May Run Out of Money
Posted Oct 18, 2010 03:50pm EDT by Gus LubinHere’s a shocker: The most immediate state pension crises aren’t in New York or California. They’re in Middle America.
When it comes to state pensions in the most trouble, do places like New Hampshire come to mind? Probably not, unless you live there, and maybe not even then.
After all, it makes sense that the biggest, most populous members of the union, where budget follies are fairly common, would be facing the most urgently needed fixes. The truth is considerably different. The Granite State claims the No. 11 slot, and it’s not the only unexpected name facing pension woes.
Read the whole thing here.
Now, I try to be an optimistic guy, but expeience has taught me to temper it with a goodly dose of reality, too. This state pension thing is intimately tied into education and healthcare, to say nothing of the gov’t itself, either directly or indirectly. The tax bases, at all levels, are shrinking, at a time when both legal and illegal immigrant labor supresses wages, and as outsourcing of everything from manufacturing to legal and medical services is and has been afoot not only for quite some time now, but at an ever-quickening pace.
I’m no one’s economist and I welcome anyone’s guess on the matter as it’s as good as mine, but from where I sit, we’re screwed.
For real.
Comment & reply, holla.
The Obsidian
PS: I suppose it is nice to see that everyone else’s is finally catching up with us “manosphere” blogging types; we do tend to be just a weebit ahead of the curve 
