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Have a healthy recession

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Amidst all the bad economic news is one little ray of light: the health of individuals tends to improve during a recession.  Death rates actually decrease as productivity drops, with the exception of suicide deaths.  People with more free time tend to get more excercise and eat better.

This study investigates the relationship between economic conditions and health. Total mortality and eight of the ten sources of fatalities examined are shown to exhibit a procyclical fluctuation, with suicides representing an important exception. The variations are largest for those causes and age groups where behavioral responses are most plausible, and there is some evidence that the unfavorable health effects of temporary upturns are partially or fully offset if the economic growth is long-lasting. An accompanying analysis of microdata indicates that smoking and obesity increase when the economy strengthens, whereas physical activity is reduced and diet becomes less healthy.

From the 2000 study “Are recessions good for your health?“

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blur

The deal just got $10k better!

http://vancouver.en.craigslist.ca/reo/1173094044….

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realpaul

blur:

#53 Blur , great post. What kind of an idiot would have dropped into that deal. $500 ++ K for a sub – 1000 sq ft mini pit in Lougheed. This deserves THE GOLDEN BWahahahahahahahahahah 🙂

Flipping Real estate 101 is when you pay NOTHING down and assign the contract for a profit, not take out a mortgage and hold for two years until you've lost your shirt and people are laughing at you for putting hilarious ads like that on CraigsList.

Help Meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee .

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Dave

VanBanker:

Most bears had been calling for a correction for quite a number of years. Hardly on schedule. A broken clock comes to mind…

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VanBanker

"Dave Says: May 15th, 2009 at 12:29 pm Not quite. We have a long way to go before their predictions come true. Here is what I said a year ago, “… if there is a correction, then I predict values will drop from 10 to 15% (nominally). So, if it breaks 15%, I will have been wrong. I will further add that a correction of greater than 10% will only occur due to an external factor (e.g. higher interest rates > 1.5%, higher unemployment ~ + 2%, or a recession).” Not bad, hey?" There will not be a correction, unless there is a correction (but I'm still "right" because I added some phoney conditions to hedge myself). Way to go Nostradamus. The correction has come right on schedule just as many predicted. That's 1/1 so far. The next leg down… Read more »

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Dave

Anonymous:

Not quite. We have a long way to go before their predictions come true.

Here is what I said a year ago, "… if there is a correction, then I predict values will drop from 10 to 15% (nominally). So, if it breaks 15%, I will have been wrong.

I will further add that a correction of greater than 10% will only occur due to an external factor (e.g. higher interest rates > 1.5%, higher unemployment ~ + 2%, or a recession)."

Not bad, hey?

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patriotz

Anonymous:

Is anyone gambling on the stock market these days?

Gambling involves the creation of risk without return. Players put money in a pot and take it out according to some random event. Everyone's winnings is someone else's loss.

Investing involves committing money to capital, which has an expected positive risk-adjusted return. That is, you might make a lot of money, you might make a little money, or you might lose money, but on average you make money.

However when capital markets are overpriced (in a bubble) investing takes on characteristics of gambling, since your return depends not just on earnings of capital but on selling to a greater fool.

Anyway getting back to the stock market, I was buying a few months ago but now I'm selling.

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Anonymous

This would be a good time to pat one self on the back, for being right all along VHB, Condohye etc.

Is anyone gambling on the stock market these days?

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realpaul

For the past several months the deniers have told us that ' we are at the bottom' and at the end of every month they are proven to be wrong. They draw another line in the sand , a little further back, and say "now this is the absolute bottom" and here we are moving lower gain. Real GDP is forecast to lose 6% in Canada this year, this is proving to be an optimistic forecast, annualizing the monthly data it looks more like 12 to 14% negative GDP. That means a lot further to go on the downside and more than double the current number of unemployed as a consequence. "OTTAWA — Manufacturing sales plunged a surprising 2.7 per cent in March, wiping out the previous month's gains as auto parts producers and Quebec aerospace factories cut back their… Read more »

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blur

Any taker?

http://vancouver.en.craigslist.ca/reo/1172253038….

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Hovering

http://finance.yahoo.com/tech-ticker/article/2483…

the title says it all really: If You're Not Petrified You're Not Paying Attention

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trackback

[…] May 2009 · No Comments This from VanBanker at vancouvercondo May 12th, 2009 10:43 pm […]

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patriotz

Denialisrampant:

Don’t get mad, get stoned. Free dope to get you started down your own personal trail of destruction.

That would be the corporate version of "Dope will get you through times of no money better than money will get you through times of no dope."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fabulous_Furry_Freak…

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techdeath

Stevee & reductimat , Getting any kind of information in this town is like a spy vs spy game. I just think it's relevant from the aspect that if the MSM is doing it's damndest to suppress information it must be as important to disperse it quickly before the smoke being blown up the collective civilian asses gets into our eyes and the entire population gets zombied out thinking that we live in a place where nothing happens. Is there a 'lobby' which tries to suppress and promote certain ideas, sheeesh, it almost seems so. One little stat that I came across today is that approx 12% of all tech workers have been laid off world wide this year. Vancouvers tech lobby announced today that 15000 people were employed in the biz here, that information that ws released was from… Read more »

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Anonymous

"Massive" layoffs. That's "hilarious".

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ReductiMat

Techdeath, thanks for keeping us updated on the layoffs for Microsoft's In-Game Ad Business Unit.

I've been looking for numbers on that specific business unit for years now. Those thirty-eight people that got laid off will certainly leave a world of hurt for any neighbouring country.

Yes, keep up the great "reporting".

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housingsuperbulltime

One thing is clear and that is you cannot lose by buying a condo in downtown vancouver right now. Here's some bull facts for you bears:

1) Interest rates at all time lows

2) Networth destruction party was defeated, leading to cautious bulls re-entering the market after getting jitters prior to the election

3) International investors from asia are back spending lots of money in Vancouver after realising that the best place on earth's economy is largely unaffected by the "recession"

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Steevee

Techdeath,

I appreciate you posting the information you have access to. Keep the numbers coming, please. It is so hard to get any real info from the MSM these days.

Steevee

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Denialisrampant

Finally it's said, "Robert Djeikanski is murdered by the RCMP thugs" says expert.

"VANCOUVER — Being Tasered five times by RCMP officers contributed more to the death of Robert Dziekanski than being physically restrained by police, an expert doctor told the Braidwood inquiry Thursday.

Dr. Keith Chambers, a Vancouver epidemiologist, found there were two factors that contributed to the Polish man's death at the Vancouver International Airport on Oct. 14, 2007 — the five Taser shots fired at Mr. Dziekanski and the subsequent physical restraint by four Mounties."

http://www.nationalpost.com/news/story.html?id=15…

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Denialisrampant

Don't get mad, get stoned. Free dope to get you started down your own personal trail of destruction.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090514/ap_on_bi_ge/u…

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techdeath

Microsoft announces 'Massive' layoffs, up to 28% of all employees.

http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?s…

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techdeath

Kodak lays off 200 employees in Vancouver, all highly paid professionals, made official yesterday. Another big chop at Nokia this week, really highly paid professionals gone. Some departments shink 90%, others 100%. Not one word in the local newspapers. I guess the speculation about trading Luongo is more important. GM announces mass chopping of dealerships, thats here too. I heard about a major call center getting the axe, about 1300 involved there, I'll confirm that when they get the bums rush, probably tomorrow.

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observer

Apparently the green shoots are starting to wilt. They were probably just weeds anyways.

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Aleks

kersplatt:

I was just about to link that. Very interesting that even in the US where the bust has been on for years, developers still aren't willing to sell for what the market will bear and think they can do better by holding onto unsold condos. It would be one thing if there weren't any buyers, but from the sounds of it there were lots of buyers, just not any fools.

Also interesting that they were only planning to sell 20, and then cut it off after 11, when there were actually 48 unsold condos in the building. Which means they're still sitting on 37 unsold units waiting for the market to bounce back. That's a lot of money to be bleeding every month.

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mk-kids

Wow, with all this increased pressure from the RE shills these days, I think its time for someone to post an updated version of VHB's chart – you know the one that shows YOU ARE HERE against the backdrop of housing prices historically and graphed on the mean… anyone?

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kersplatt

VanBanker:

#35. I also love how these monkeys refuse to entertain the idea that a period of real estate price inflation which was thousands of percentage points above thier own inflation targets can not come back down to represent the natural inflation that they themselves have stated is healthy ( ie 2%p/a) in thier control of CPI. Like its OK to let wages stagnate and pensions stagnate and thats 'nominal inflation' but pouring the gasoline of low intrest rates into the market place causing massive price inflation is somehow sacrosanct and now that prices are up there they should be defended. It's laughable.

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