Some Realistic Information on Collapse

Building on the previous two posts, we present further information on the rapidity of economic contraction in the world. As we've been harping on for quite some time, the severity of the 2007 Depression is not to be underestimated. At the same time, many Government and other official statistics appear to be 'cooked,' to say the least.

The IMF has recently predicted that the Republic of Ireland's economy is going to contract by 13.5%... between 2008 and 2010. This is hopeful, in our opinion. The Irish Republic has had quite a binge on easy-credit-leveraged growth, via the Euro. The time, we posit, has come to pay the bills, and we aren't exactly confident that the Irish economy has any depth of resiliency to draw upon in this situation. We frankly expect that the IMF's drop of 13.5% in the Republic's economy could be realised - even exceeded - in just this year alone.

The most realistic data we've seen so far is from the UN Office for Drugs and Crime. According to this BBC article, in 2008 opium production fell 16% world-wide, and cocaine production in Colombia has dropped 28%. We suspect that these drops occurred in the second half of 2008, as the onset of the Depression neared. In all honesty, we're not sure how drug production and economic activity are correlated... but we suspect that the collapse in opium and cocaine will be mirrored by collapse in the greater world economy.