Anyone else? - you don't have to be an economist to answer this, just alive and living in a country that's in the world somewhere! 😂

Lee 

The future prospect of a recession in Italy seems ever more likely as it has suffered its second quarter of negative growth in the past nine months. Output has shrunk to its lowest percentage of 0.3% in five years. However Italy is not yet officially in recession as this requires there to be two consecutive negative quarters.

Italy is the third largest eurozone economy and it is by no means the only European country suffering an economic slowdown at the moment, as must of us know. Denmark and Ireland are already either in recession or teetering on the brink of it. The European economic slow down has on the whole been triggered by a combination of the global credit crisis, US economic weakness and rising inflation. The Italian economy has also been hampered for some time by poor productivity, labour unrest and political instability.

Finland is doing pretty alright.

Seems like we learned something from 1991 when we went BUST big time! 

i guess as long as there are talented people with US, Europe (more specifically UK) and Japan there is no question of economy engine/ baton changing hands to BRIC nations. 

having said that impact on India with the current uncertainities is likely to be the least compared to the other countries with huge domestic consumption.  

Well, the problem with (not only) Europe is that it’s becoming a kind of a financial trap and people are finding it increasingly difficult to live there happily – or as comfortably as they used to: even if they are paid (still) astonishingly high salaries (for less and less done) relative to most of the world, more and more of what is left after tax is immediately sucked away by higher cost of living (– what was supposed to go back for ‘public good’ now has to bail out the banks.)

Those who can afford to travel far and wide will have a good comparison … also regarding the quality of living, which will not necessarily be in Europe’s favor - when you really think about it!

And it becomes a real trap for those who borrow money to consume and/or pay for insanely priced ‘assets’ which, indeed,  remind more of (well turned to, right?) liabilities. When you earn you can borrow. When you borrow you have to pay back. To pay back you have to earn. … it’s hard to escape.

For example: for the price-equivalent of a house in Europe, you can get plenty of real estate elsewhere (where the cost of living is also much lower), which would actually give you a reasonable income + a place to stay, making it a true asset as opposed to a liability towards a 20- 30 year(!!!) loan for a piece of ground and a few bricks, which even households where both adults work struggle to afford. (How comes the prices in some places doubled just over a decade?! Did incomes there also doubled - or what, have everything else become half-price so people could afford to use money on something new – or have someone witnessed population-growth explosion?)

Thankfully, the world offers many choices (fingers crossed politicians will not spoil this) for all those bright and open-minded. A lot of migration is already on its way – both virtual and real. Many will benefit, many will lose …

Interesting point, I migrated from Europe to US 10 years ago. 

It is still tough (in Germany) for what I consider middle class to buy a home or be financially independent (read - enough that you don't have to worry about the cost of food that you eat & can have vacations). With jobs that my parents had it was possible to buy a house, put 2 kids through university and still have annual vacation and decent cars.

With the same jobs today, I think they would struggle paying for our studies. Looking at the US though, I would say it is very much similar.

There was an article on CNN explaining how it looks in a household that makes 250K annually.   It wasn't as luxurious as one would think.

Yes there is a house and there are private schools for the kids and there is vacation but I did not see the BMW or Mercedes in the garage or Louis Vuitton Handbags.

What makes me nervous about the US is that there is no savings in most households for emergencies. 

Cheers

JK