Actually, if you are thirty you have experienced a worse recession. When Reagan came in office interest rates were unbelievable, and unemployment was high. After a year or so, interest rates were over 20% and unemployment was 10.2%. That was pretty bad, but we recovered quickly because Reagan was willing to take that initial hit to correct the economy, and then get back on track. The problem now is that everyone is so politically motivated, instead of having the necessary backbone, and narcissistic, that they think they can resolve the problems and provide a soft landing, and do it in an unnatural way. That is why we pulled out of the last Major recession relatively quickly. When Roosevelt went into office in '32, he had the same attitude that is the prevailing attitude now, did not allow a hard landing, and the economy stayed bad for 9 years, then we had the war years, which really helped the economy, because so many people went back to work, and had nothing to spend money on, so that they saved like no other. It probably helped them save because they had just come out of the depression, and everyone was fearful that as soon as they came out of the war the depression would just continue. Instead, housing boomed, with home subdivisions being built for the first time. (Leavittown in New York was the first major subdivision, before that, no one had ever tried to build one before) Lots of people went back to school, and people were spending like no other to just get back where they were before the war started.
The problem now, besides lack of leadership, is that there is no national cohesion, or sense of purpose, and it is causing people to feel over whelmed and to pull back inside themselves. On a positive note, it is causing people to be more frugal than they have for years. That same frugality is a two edged sword, though because people are not spending.
