I just found this on the Seattle Post-Intelligencer webpage for Saturday, Sept.2. There seems to be an increasing awareness that a big change is in the air.
Sunday, September 3, 2006
Age-old, old-age question: Are we unique?

By MARK TRAHANT
P-I EDITORIAL PAGE EDITOR

You've probably heard something like this before: "Every child is unique and special."

It is a refrain many kids hear repeatedly while growing up. We all have something to contribute to this world, something that only we can add to the mix. This notion is fundamental to the American character, the essence of our individual-based society.

The Lake Wobegon effect is when everybody considers that they are the ones who are above average. (Below average? Well, that's somebody else.)

But everyone can't be that good, that smart or that rich.

"Being born several years in front of the first boomers has made life's game a little easier to play for me than for them," writes William Gross in September's Investment Outlook. Gross is the managing director of PIMCO Bonds -- a smart man who manages millions of dollars.

Gross describes his "good fortune" because he "found a job before the competition got really intense ... bought a home for $30,000 in 1971 before the boomers wanted theirs five years earlier; and ... (had) kids who in turn benefited from similar demographic timing one generation forward."

Think about that concept: What if it's not only us -- as individuals -- that makes the difference in our fortune, but it's also "us" as in a generation. If we're baby boomers, we're special because of our age and our starting point in the race.

Of course, generation is not the only factor. We all make decisions that have consequences.

"But to cut in front of a long line is to recognize the obvious -- that there is a queue of people that want or need something. For the boomers, that something these past few decades has been 'things,' almost 'anythings.' Their voracious hunger for consumer goods and for the high life has propelled our economy forward, indeed it kept it afloat," Gross writes. "They bought homes, then second homes. They bought two cars, then added a four-wheel drive off-roader to explore what turned out to be the suburbs."

And so it is with big screen TVs, SUVs, PDAs and every must-have gadget of the moment.

"But there are changes in the wind, or better yet, the seasons," he wrote. "The green leaves of this long boomer summer are turning now." Turning 60 to be precise -- and shifting from a consumptive society to one of downsizing, retirement and, what Gross calls "off-loading."

Gross' newsletter makes the financial case for the difficulty ahead -- and steps that ought to happen. But I have been thinking more about our "uniqueness" as we surf this demographic wave.

It's too easy to look at these developing trends and slough them off. Critical shortages in retirement programs, Social Security, Medicare and all of the other age-related promises will be problematic for "them," just not for me.

It's the same for a city's personality. It's just as easy to think of Seattle as special; defying the trends ahead. Our regional narrative continues to insist that we remain a red-hot real estate market, ignoring the cautionary data. The rest of the country might be experiencing a pop in the housing bubble, but the "we're different" idea suits our perception of ourselves.

I would suggest Seattle is riding its wave, too. The real estate numbers reflect the swell in the tsunami ahead: In King County we keep building (a 43 percent increase in housing permits), while home resales are shrinking (down 13.7 percent from a year ago). Our inventory of available homes is huge as we shift into an era when no one wants to be the last person to buy a home at its most expensive price.

On top of that, Seattle is a place where mortgage magic tricks have made the out-of-reach home at least seem affordable.

Unsustainable? Remember, that's somebody else's problem. And one reason why the national savings rate grew to a negative $83.5 billion in July, compared with a negative $67.6 billion a month before.

We're no different in Seattle.

Now stretch to another level because even we Americans cannot escape our demographic future.

We think that Social Security or our corporate retirement is a mess because of something we've done. We could have managed it better, we could have ...

Yes, we could have saved more money (especially before the dot-com bubble burst). But the fact is the world is on the cusp of a demographic trend that will dramatically change every nation -- we're all aging and not reproducing ourselves. At the beginning of the baby boom there were more than a dozen potential workers for every retiree. The United Nation projects that number to be 4-1 by midcentury.

How unique and special are we? Your answer might depend on where you ride the wave before it crashes.

Mark Trahant is editor of the editorial page. E-mail: marktrahant@seattlepi.com.

Originally Posted by mandelbrot5

I just found this on the Seattle Post-Intelligencer webpage for Saturday, Sept.2. There seems to be an increasing awareness that a big change is in the air.
Sunday, September 3, 2006
Age-old, old-age question: Are we unique?

snip

I've been reading that housing is in freefall from many places. There are a few who think that we may have already entered a new recession. Most seem to think that we may enter one in 2007. Many think that this one will be much nastier and more protracted than the 2001 recession. Many are speaking of the possibility of a hard landing rather than a soft one. People are fearing that the doo doo will finally hit the fan. Instead of the Reagan Era "voodoo economics", the Bush Era should be called "doo doo economics" (yes, that is my joke). There are many other currents of discontent in the nation, and many are predicting voter unrest to possibly cause Democrats to take control of the houses this November. But I think these people are missing the bigger picture (of course, many are unaware of S&H). People are not satisfied with either party. Dana Blankenhorn is predicting a tsunami this November. I'm not sure we will see a tsunami, but I think that we will see changes in a new direction.

It looks to me that 2007 is going to be a very nasty year.

Here is one from the DailyKos. Many on that site are familiar with the theory.

What I'm Really Worried About

by Steven D
Wed Jun 14, 2006 at 07:51:57 AM PDT

When the next big crisis in America occurs (war with Iran, new terrorist attacks, a flu pandemic, a stock market crash, double or triple digit inflation, etc.) what will become of what's left of our Republic? Will it withstand the assault to our freedoms and liberties from the Radical Right, as it did during the era of the Great Depression or will our Republic end its days in tumult and political violence?

I don't know, frankly, but let me explain why I am so concerned about our Nation's future at this moment in time.

We're living on the edge in America.

On the edge of an economic meltdown. All the signs are there for anyone to see if they would only take their blinders off. Debt, both personal and government indebtedness, is at record highs. The greatest income inequality between those at the top of the wealth pyramid and the rest of us since the days of the Depression. An overvalued dollar. Massive trade deficits. An overextended military. Gas prices high and likely to head higher. Inflation ready to take off because of it. Our economy is literally operating on borrowed time.

Then throw in an executive branch determined to amass as much power to itself as possible, while invading the privacy rights of the majority of its citizens. A President who never met a war to which he could say "No." A Constitution and Bill of Rights in tatters. An America reviled in the rest of the world for what we've done to Iraq, for our violations of International Conventions against the use of torture and for our belligerent and militant approach to foreign relations.

Combine that with political leadership in Congress that does nothing but debate the merits of Constitutional amendments to ban gay marriage, laws to ban flag burning and endless recriminations about the threat of illegal immigration. A Congress that has abandoned its function as a check on the power of the President in favor of open graft and a "safe" seat at the trough to keep feeding from the cesspit where political favors are traded daily for campaign contributions, free meals, junkets and (from all accounts) free access to prostitutes.

The final topper: a cheapened and coarsened political discourse sponsored by the ruling elite (and that can only mean Conservatives) and their sycophants in the media that trades in big lies, ugly rumors, smears, slanders, the "stab in the back" myth, hate and incitements to violence against all those who oppose them, from climate scientists to evolutionary biologists, from Mexican immigrants to gays and lesbians, from federal judges to government whistleblowers, and most of all anyone and everyone who considers themselves a liberal.

Personally, what I fear the most is that the next big crisis will trigger an outbreak of hard core fascism. Not the soft fascism of the current regime which flies under the radar of most people, but the kind that suspends liberties permanently and puts people in concentration camps. The kind where violence against its political opponents is not just encouraged among its supporters, but practiced by the State. The kind where genocide thrives.

Everything is in place for such a movement to rise to power. Corporate power aligned with the Radical Right, and political polarization in our country at levels not seen since the days preceding our Civil War. When the shit hits the proverbial fan, people will be angry. They will want to find a scapegoat to pin the blame upon for all that has gone wrong in their lives. And movement conservatives have been laying the groundwork for that moment for over 50 years. Funded by wealthy individuals with a radical agenda to undo the accomplishments of the New Deal, and staffed by religious zealots who preach a doctrine of hatred in the name of Jesus Christ, they have been relentless in their demonization of "godless" liberals who "hate America" and in their own words represent a "fifth column" of "traitors" ready to hand over our country to whomever represents the current menace to our great society (Internationally Communism until 1989, but, since 9/11/01, International Terrorism). But they do not stop pointing fingers merely at "liberals" just as Hitler did not stop at denouncing Social Democrats and Communists. A host of others, from GBLT communities with their alleged "gay agenda" to Hollywood Liberals (code name for Jews) with their so-called agenda to debase our culture and values, from Hispanics and their alleged dreams of Reconquista to Muslim Americans with their so-called obsession with jihad and martyrdom, have also assumed prominent positions in their litany of bigotry and blame. Even African Americans have not escaped their venom, as anyone who listened to talk radio in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina can attest.

In Rwanda, hate radio over a number of years encouraged the belief that the ethnic minority Tutsis were subhuman, vicious killers plotting the deaths of the majority Hutus. Under the direction of certain, truly evil Hutu leaders, who feared their loss of power under the Arusha Accords of 1993, hate radio broadcasts that they sponsored began airing increasingly virulent propaganda with the aim of inciting genocide against the Tutsi minority. As we all know now, those broadcasts were all too effective, and when the ruling Hutu President, Juvénal Habyarimana was assassinated, his death triggered a wave of revenge killings that soon devolved into the mass murder of Tutsis and moderate Hutus by the Hutu dominated military, extremist militias and gangs of young unemployed Hutus.

We like to think that such a thing could never happen here, in America. Yet our own history is replete with racist and nativist movements that have dominated political parties, and even entire regions of the country in the past. Such movements often come to the fore in times of national crisis, when people are most anxious about their future.

The Know Nothing Party rode to prominence in American politics in the years of the first great wave of Irish immigration to the United States. Similar movements arose on the West Coast in response the immigration from China, Japan and other Asian countries.

The Ku Klux Klan initially came to power in the South to terrorize newly freed blacks and set in motion a train of events that would ultimately lead to a century of lynchings and Jim Crow laws. The KKK's fortunes would wax and wane over that period, but it remained a political power in many parts of the country even after the tide turned against its racist ideology in the 1950's and 1960's. Indeed, it still exists today.

Religious zealots who amassed great influence and power in the media and throughout the country by adapting radio to promote bigotry and hate are also nothing new in this country. The first "hate jock" was Father Charles Coughlin in the 1930's during the Great Depression. His anti-Semitic views and fascist sympathies encouraged and supported the fascist organization, the Christian Front that was shut down by the FBI in 1940 when its plot to assassinate several Congressmen and ultimately establish the US as a fascist dictatorship was exposed.

Nor was the Christian Front alone during the 1930's in plotting to overthrow our Republic and install a fascist dictatorship in its place. Indeed, many major industrialists and prominent Wall Street financiers plotted a military coup against Franklin Roosevelt in 1933, which would have created a fascist state. That coup fell apart only after the military man who was approached to lead troops into Washington, D.C., Marine General Smedley Butler, exposed the plot in testimony before the House Special Committee on Un-American Activities Authorized to Investigate Nazi Propaganda and Certain Other Propaganda Activities, other wise known as the McCormack-Dickstein Committee.

So not only can "it happen here", we were very fortunate that it didn't happen 73 years ago, before Roosevelt had time to put in place the New Deal policies, like Social Security, that today's Republican Party radicals are trying so hard to dismantle under President Bush. Just imagine how 20th Century history would have played out with a fascist dictatorship in America aligned with Hitler's Germany.

Now imagine how which current events could lead to something similar occurring today. A devastating terrorist attack on US soil. An economic collapse. Perhaps even a another catastrophe with results like Hurricane Katrina. A major loss of life by our military forces in the Persian Gulf. Any of these events could conceivably trigger widespread unrest, and political violence. Violence that might have as its end result the formation of a truly fascist security state with all that that entails: loss of liberty, the outlawing of progressive political parties and yes, even concentration camps (which, by the way, America first employed in the 19th Century, for what else would one call "Indian Reservations?").

This is why denouncing the eliminationist rhetoric of the Coulter's, Limbaugh's and Savage's of the world is important to me. We can't simply ignore them, as some suggest, and hope that they'll go away on their own. That simply isn't going to happen. They have their own means of spreading their poisonous diatribes into the homes of millions of our fellow citizens, through hate talk radio, right wing publishing houses, Fox News, and (let's be honest) other mainstream media outlets like CNN and the New York Times. We ignore them at our considerable peril.

Not sure if this is a 4T indicator (well, I suppose it will be if we're all broke), but it is a turn away from some 3T attitudes. Here's a reprint of a Wall Street Journal report on a trend of parents pulling their kids out of private school and enrolling them in public school:

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/06258/722158-298.stm

Many of the parents are doing this for 3T-ish reasons, like elite colleges looking for more public school kids. But, at least one parent thought that her kid would be more socially adept if she spent some time in a large public high school.

Originally Posted by Neisha '67

Not sure if this is a 4T indicator (well, I suppose it will be if we're all broke), but it is a turn away from some 3T attitudes. Here's a reprint of a Wall Street Journal report on a trend of parents pulling their kids out of private school and enrolling them in public school:

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/06258/722158-298.stm

Many of the parents are doing this for 3T-ish reasons, like elite colleges looking for more public school kids. But, at least one parent thought that her kid would be more socially adept if she spent some time in a large public high school.

In Our Commercial Republic if one wishes to be socially adept, I would send a child of privilege to work at Wal-mart (or Costco for Blue Zoned Bluebloods) for several summers.

It would be like a tour in 'Nam and as these people are not about to be going out to Reform Eurasia in the near future it's as close to the coming clash of class as they are likely to get (and, no, talking to the maid, nanny or pool boy doesn't count) in the Global Economy.

Originally Posted by Virgil K. Saari

In Our Commercial Republic if one wishes to be socially adept, I would send a child of privilege to work at Wal-mart (or Costco for Blue Zoned Bluebloods) for several summers.

It would be like a tour in 'Nam and as these people are not about to be going out to Reform Eurasia in the near future it's as close to the coming clash of class as they are likely to get (and, no, talking to the maid, nanny or pool boy doesn't count) in the Global Economy.

Oh, that was good, Virgil, thanks for that!

Originally Posted by Neisha '67

Oh, that was good, Virgil, thanks for that!

... and so true. Perhaps the most instructive job I ever had was the summer I worked at the Zody's Warehouse. Not the worst job for an 18 year old soon-to-be college sophomore, packing shipping cartons with shirts, blouses, pants, socks 8 hours a day didn't require that much effort.

But I saw generally poor treatment of the on-the-floor employees by the ivory-tower beancounters upstairs, ranging from casual rudeness to sudden firings the day before new employees were eligible to join the union. And it cut both ways... coming back from lunch early one afternoon I caught a white-collar theft ring red-handed loading a truck with would-have-been stolen goods. I was invited to join in...and subtly threatened if I refused... but somehow I was able to convince the thieves to unload the merchandise like it had never happened.

The last straw was when one of the floor employees had an altercation with a teller at which the bank had their corporate account. Many of the people working there had no checking accounts, it seems... so the management hauled everyone into an assembly and threatened to disallow everyone to continue cashing their checks there... with all the respect one might show a dirty, mangy dog in a bad part of town. I was one step away from boldly standing up and telling the whole lot of them to flat-out... KISS MY ASS! Who did these people think they were?

What stopped me was a sudden flash of insight: The others around me were truly frightened of the management... whereas I was a middle-class kid on summer break, living at home with my parents, working for some extra change between semesters and going back to school in a week. For many of the floor guys... this was their paycheck-to-paycheck minimum-wage CAREER! I didn't need those holier-than-thou bastards or their money... but other people did. So I sat on my numbing fingers and kept my mouth closed... wisely, I still think.

What that job did was to keep me in school no matter what, and never to take good fortune for granted, no matter how well I've had it.

Originally Posted by Roadbldr '59

... and so true. Perhaps the most instructive job I ever had was the summer I worked at the Zody's Warehouse. Not the worst job for an 18 year old soon-to-be college sophomore, packing shipping cartons with shirts, blouses, pants, socks 8 hours a day didn't require that much effort.

But I saw generally poor treatment of the on-the-floor employees by the ivory-tower beancounters upstairs, ranging from casual rudeness to sudden firings the day before new employees were eligible to join the union. And it cut both ways... coming back from lunch early one afternoon I caught a white-collar theft ring red-handed loading a truck with would-have-been stolen goods. I was invited to join in...and subtly threatened if I refused... but somehow I was able to convince the thieves to unload the merchandise like it had never happened.

The last straw was when one of the floor employees had an altercation with a teller at which the bank had their corporate account. Many of the people working there had no checking accounts, it seems... so the management hauled everyone into an assembly and threatened to disallow everyone to continue cashing their checks there... with all the respect one might show a dirty, mangy dog in a bad part of town. I was one step away from boldly standing up and telling the whole lot of them to flat-out... KISS MY ASS! Who did these people think they were?

What stopped me was a sudden flash of insight: The others around me were truly frightened of the management... whereas I was a middle-class kid on summer break, living at home with my parents, working for some extra change between semesters and going back to school in a week. For many of the floor guys... this was their paycheck-to-paycheck minimum-wage CAREER! I didn't need those holier-than-thou bastards or their money... but other people did. So I sat on my numbing fingers and kept my mouth closed... wisely, I still think.

What that job did was to keep me in school no matter what, and never to take good fortune for granted, no matter how well I've had it.

Just after high school, I had a similar experence. One of my uncles was the maintenence man at a large textile factory in North Carolina. He helped me earn some money for college by working in the warehouse. As I found out, I had one of the best jobs in the place. I was able to move around as opposed to the people on the line who had to tend to hot machines all summer long. The guy with the best non management job was the forklift driver. It wan't hard to figure out why he had the best job. On my first day working there, he sat beside me at lunch and started talking to me about unions. My uncle had warned me that this might happen and if it did, to say that I was happy with my job and my boss and say nothing more. More to protect my uncle than to protect my temporary job, I did as he suggested and the company spy did not try to start another conversation with me the whole two months that I worked there.

The thing that got to me and made me determined to graduate from college and not end up permanently in a place like that was an experence I had one monday morning. I walked in one monday and happened to look one of the ladies who ran a loom straight in the eyes. I'd never seen a look like it before or scince. She had a look of pure dread in her eyes. She was trapped in a bad job with no education and no future. I was determined to never end up where she was.

As I have described before, I verify turning schemes using an analysis of the frequency of certain kinds of events see http://my.net-link.net/~malexan/Saeculum-model-2.htm Awakenings can be verified or identified as period with higher-than-normal levels of religious or "spiritual" events. In recent centuries Awakenings have been associated with rising levels of alcohol or recreational drug consumption and crrime.

Both Awakenings and Crises have been times of elevated unrest as shown by higher levels of "unrest behaviors" like strikes, riots, demonstrations, uprisings etc. Thus, crises can be indicated by rising trends in "unrest". Unfortunately, my unrest timeline ends in 1991 (thats when the reference data ends) and I have not been able to extend it so I cannot apply this tool to the problem of identifying when the 3T/4T transition might occur.

Another way to verify turnings is through other historical cycles that align with the saeculum. To apply this method requires accurate dating for the other cycle.

For example, S&H point out that their cycle corresponds to the Schlesinger political cycle. The 4T should be associated with a liberal era. S&H also identify a correspondence between their cycle and the Kondratiev cycle (K-cycle). The K-cycle is best represented in modern times by the long-term (secular) stock market bull and bear market periods. Since the 1920's alignment between secular market trends and turnings has been quite good:

Stock market Saeculum
1921-29 (bull) Unraveling 1908-29
1929-49 (bear) Crisis 1929-1946
1949-66 (bull) High 1946-1964
1966-82 (bear) Awakening 1964-84
1982-2000 (bull) Unraveling 1984-????
2000-???? (bear) Crisis ????-????

Based on my forecast for the start of a secular bear in 2000, I forecasted that the crisis would begin soon (see reprised post on the Kondratiev thread in The Future forum).

Recently I found a site that gives the frequency of internation terrorist attacks since 1968. The frequency for deadly attacks shows a saecular pattern (see below)



Terror attacks can be considered as a type of unrest and so changes in "trends in terror" might be a useful indicator for turning changes. To this figure I added Federal non-defense spending as a percent of GDP as a measure of the Schlesinger cycle. Liberal eras are indicated by growth in non-defense spending. Prior to the new deal such spending ran around 3%. The New Deal liberal era raised it to about 8-10%. The postwar era did not see a rise above this level,indicating a conservatvie era. The level then rose to about 20% over the 1960's and 1970's, indicating a liberal era. This trend was halted around 1980 and spending was flat in the 1980's and down in the 1990's, indicating a conservative era. Since 2000 it appears to be on the rise again, sugggesting that a liberal era may have begun with the new century.

Liberal eras are associated with social moment turnings. So the shift in Federal spending suggests a turning change around 2001.

I now have three trends in politics, economics and social dynamics that show changes in direction around 2001. A previous trend change occurred in the early 1980's, the time of the last known turning change. This suggests that the early 2000's saw a change in turning as well, which means we probably entered the 4T with 911.

Originally Posted by Roadbldr '59

What stopped me was a sudden flash of insight: The others around me were truly frightened of the management... whereas I was a middle-class kid on summer break, living at home with my parents, working for some extra change between semesters and going back to school in a week. For many of the floor guys... this was their paycheck-to-paycheck minimum-wage CAREER! I didn't need those holier-than-thou bastards or their money... but other people did. So I sat on my numbing fingers and kept my mouth closed... wisely, I still think.

Man, I've had a number of those experiences, from the moving company with the deeply unsafe and illegal trucks, but where I met middle aged men who took pride in being the best loader in town or helping carry my weight when I tweaked my back

to the chicken factory full of immigrants and small townies where a light duty injury was an indefinite sentence to the most mind numbing boring jobs in the whole plant, but where ppl stayed because out in the country ANY work with health insurance was valuable enough to trap parents

to the job laying cable where one dude took the time trying to get me to back up a dually/trailer combo with only the outside mirrors - he cared about my skill development

to the UPS dock at 0200

to the cafeteria workers in college

and so on and on and on.

To quote CCR "I'm not the priveledged son" but this kind of exposure to those for whom this is what puts food on their table, the work they get to be proud of when done well, the work they invest their identites in, well it's both humbling and inspiring.

wouldn't hurt our future leaders one bit to hump trucks for a summer or four.

Originally Posted by antichrist

Man, I've had a number of those experiences, from the moving company with the deeply unsafe and illegal trucks, but where I met middle aged men who took pride in being the best loader in town or helping carry my weight when I tweaked my back

to the chicken factory full of immigrants and small townies where a light duty injury was an indefinite sentence to the most mind numbing boring jobs in the whole plant, but where ppl stayed because out in the country ANY work with health insurance was valuable enough to trap parents

to the job laying cable where one dude took the time trying to get me to back up a dually/trailer combo with only the outside mirrors - he cared about my skill development

to the UPS dock at 0200

to the cafeteria workers in college

and so on and on and on.

To quote CCR "I'm not the priveledged son" but this kind of exposure to those for whom this is what puts food on their table, the work they get to be proud of when done well, the work they invest their identites in, well it's both humbling and inspiring.

wouldn't hurt our future leaders one bit to hump trucks for a summer or four.

I have had similar experiences (including graveyard at UPS) and agree 100%. Wouldn't hurt 'em at all.

"If a congregant says her top concerns are health care and national security, suggest that Jesus would make abortion and gay marriage priorities." -- Quote from the LA Times (today's issue) concerning tips (from Focus on the Family) for clergy to persuade voters

Sounds very 3T to me...

P.S. Mikebert, it seems that using your numbers for economic cycles with respect to turning cycles, the new turning tends to start two to three years BEFORE the economic cycle shifts.

Wouldn't this place the 3T dates around 1979/80 - 1997/98 rather than 1984-2000? (Personally, I find it very hard to consider any 90s year anything other than 3T... which is one reason I disagree with your theory linking the various cycles together)

Originally Posted by Seminomad

"If a congregant says her top concerns are health care and national security, suggest that Jesus would make abortion and gay marriage priorities." -- Quote from the LA Times (today's issue) concerning tips (from Focus on the Family) for clergy to persuade voters

Sounds very 3T to me...

P.S. Mikebert, it seems that using your numbers for economic cycles with respect to turning cycles, the new turning tends to start two to three years BEFORE the economic cycle shifts.

Wouldn't this place the 3T dates around 1979/80 - 1997/98 rather than 1984-2000? (Personally, I find it very hard to consider any 90s year anything other than 3T... which is one reason I disagree with your theory linking the various cycles together)

The depression crisis began in 1929, the same year as the market trend change. It ended in 1946, three years before the market trend change in 1949. The High ended in 1964, two years before the market trend change in 1966. The Awakening ended in 1984, two years after the market trend change. The turning change happened -3 to +2 years relative to the market trend changes over the last four turnings.

This suggests that the next turning change should happen between 1997 and 2002. Since the 1990's were obviously a 3T (and the data I present supports this contention) the turning change was going to be after the 2000 market trend change this time, just like it had been in the 1980's. (I said in August 2000 that the crisis was starting soon--not that it had started back in the 1990s). The data I present in the post suggests 2001 as the crisis start--which is NOT in the 1990's. It is also when, coincidentially, 911 happened. Remember I predicted that the start of the crisis was imminent 13 months before 911 (see Kondratiev thread in The Future forum). I did not make this claim after 911. Thus, I get to use the fact that 911 happened "right on schedule" as evidence in favor of my contention that the crisis began in 2001.

In no way do I or did I ever claim that the 1990's was anything other than a 3T. How did you arrive at this conclusion?

Originally Posted by Semo '75

"Art at its most significant is a distant early warning system that can always be relied on to tell the old culture what is beginning to happen."
-- Marshall McLuhan

Superman, or more accurately Clark Kent, returned again in Smallville, part of the Fall 2001 line-up. Though the first episode debuted after the towers fell, it was planned and in production before Osama Bin Laden was a household name, and before the mood in America darkened considerably. The "new" Superman wasn't a superman at all -- the show's producers described the show's aesthetic as "No tights, no flights." Clark was re-imagined as an awkward and confused adolescent coming to grips not only with his rapidly approaching adulthood, but also with the incredible powers he was blessed --or possibly cursed-- with. (Needless to say, it was an instant hit among Millies.)


I could probably come up with some more examples (most notably The Fellowship of the Ring) but I think that's enough for the moment. Turnings are defined not by events, but by the public's perception of those events, and its response to them. I've said before that I believe popular culture is a kind of distorted reflection of popular attitudes*, which suggests that something was in the air in the very late '90s and early '00s that some of America's top writers, artists, and producers recognized and wanted to comment or capitalize on.

So I'm with Mike here, in that I think that a case can be made that the Fourth Turning was on its way as we entered the new Millenium. I've said before that I believe the arrival of a Fourth Turning would look and feel very different in real time, as it is lived be real people, than it does when we read paragraphs in history books.

For example, a number of sociologists and historians of the 1930s have pointed out that the unrest on college campuses during that period probably rivaled the turmoil on campuses in the '60s. Throughout the '30s, battles between unions and police were common -- even on the streets of major cities like San Francisco. Organized crime ran rampant in the big cities. The American public was transfixed by media circuses like the Cleveland "Torso" murders and the Lindbergh baby kidnapping. The Bonus Army marched on the nation's capital and was driven back by Patton and MacArthur. Huey Long led a Southern political populist insurgency. Wealthy businessmen approached retired Major General Smedley Butler to lead a coup against FDR. FDR himself, while popular, faced withering criticisms from both the Right and Left and many of the initiatives he proposed were shot down in Congress.

The line between the previous Third and Fourth Turnings was nowhere near as neat and clean as Strauss and Howe suggest, and many seem to believe. It was amorphous, ill-defined, and (to most Americans who lived through the period, at least) pretty much invisible.

I wouldn't say that the line between the 3T and 4T was invisible. People definitely knew something was in the air during the early 1930s. Lots of people feared a new civil war, a new revolution, or the rise of totalitarianism.

Going back to the Awakening, was the beginning sharply defined? Not very. Keep in mind that social turmoil began to increase in the mid 1950s with the Civil Rights Movement. The early 60s were filled with Marches and protests in the nation. The 1963 march is a national historic event...yet it occurred "just before" the turning change in 1964 (in T4T) and a few years before the GEN starting year (which was 1967). So the difference is not as clear cut. Many places were already in social turmoil by the late 1950s with the advance of Civil Rights. So what makes 1961 different from 1967? For Kevin Parker, the Awakening didn't enter his life until 1967, even while many places (UC-Berkeley, for instance) had been in an Awakening mood for years by that point. The movements of post 1963 had clear Awakening overtones. MLK's Dream speech and the Port Huron Statement were made during 1Ts. It can be argued that these (especially the Dream speech) were Awakening events. But the movements after the assasination of JFK were geared heavily towards cultural reform. The SDS became radicalized by the mid 1960s, and the Black Power Movement was born at around the same time. It is pretty much safe to say that by 1968, pretty much the whole nation was in the grip of Awakening, with widespread unrest, new spiritualist movements, etc.

I think the same can be applied to this decade. The current politics of upheaval seemed to take root in late 1999 with the Seattle anti-WTO riots. The economy underwent its first "Great Devaluation" in 2000 when the stock market Crashed in March (so much for Dow 36,000 and Nasdaq 10,000). Mike originally made this premise. Given what has occurred, such a case can be made. E2K was another event that could possibly qualify. Of course, 9/11 remains one of the top contenders. Then there was the Iraq War, which touched off the largest anti-war marches in American history. And many people can remember when 500,000 people in NYC marched against the Republican Party during the GOP Convention. Or what about the raging E2K4? And then there was Katrina/Rita. The places affected by Katrina/Rita and other hurricanes last year are in a Crisis mood. A Crisis Mood does seem to have taken over in places such as New Orleans. So at what point do we say the Crisis began? What places in the US are under a Crisis mood? What are today's counterparts to UC-Berkeley's 1965 (where Awakening was thriving) and Newark's 1965 (which was still in the calm 1T social environment)? In 1929, the Crisis mood only took over a few places. With the banking panic of 1930 the Crisis spread even more. With the international economic system crashed in 1931, the Crisis spread even more, and by 1933 was in full gear across the entire nation. We have not yet had our 1933 or 1968. But have we had our 1929 and 1964 yet? I believe so.

Originally Posted by Mikebert

The depression crisis began in 1929, the same year as the market trend change. It ended in 1946, three years before the market trend change in 1949. The High ended in 1964, two years before the market trend change in 1966. The Awakening ended in 1984, two years after the market trend change. The turning change happened -3 to +2 years relative to the market trend changes over the last four turnings.

This suggests that the next turning change should happen between 1997 and 2002. Since the 1990's were obviously a 3T (and the data I present supports this contention) the turning change was going to be after the 2000 market trend change this time, just like it had been in the 1980's. (I said in August 2000 that the crisis was starting soon--not that it had started back in the 1990s). The data I present in the post suggests 2001 as the crisis start--which is NOT in the 1990's. It is also when, coincidentially, 911 happened. Remember I predicted that the start of the crisis was imminent 13 months before 911 (see Kondratiev thread in The Future forum). I did not make this claim after 911. Thus, I get to use the fact that 911 happened "right on schedule" as evidence in favor of my contention that the crisis began in 2001.

In no way do I or did I ever claim that the 1990's was anything other than a 3T. How did you arrive at this conclusion?

That conclusion came from using the numerical models to 'predict' the start of the 3T instead of directly using S&H's numbers.

Seeing the economic cycle changing sometimes BEFORE the turning and sometimes AFTER means that it would be hard to justify a direct causal relationship between the two... although I do grant it would still let other linkages between the two be very possible.

That being said, though, I can read these graphs and find a case for 4T starting around 2006 (the GDP pattern seems to change a few - maybe even five - years before the turning does) or an off-beat cycle (note that the three lines changed from a relatively stagnant mode to their sharp 'traditional' saecular trends sometime around 1993 or 1994)

but then again, you're an economist and I'm a mathematician (and an analyst in particular). This means that while I think that there's little difference between a line which is rising very slowly for the moment, a line which is literally flatlining, and a line which is currently falling very slowly - and a big difference between a line which is rising very slowly and a line which is rising dramatically - you seem to consider the latter two to be closer together (in other words, I look at a graph like this and look at the magnitude of the derivative; you pay more attention to its sign)

I guess I was trying to say that the trends for the past 20 or 25 years were sufficiently different from the past that they themselves could be perceived as outliers to your model (as 1997 was clearly a 3T year, for example) and further, one could easily look at the graphs and draw very different conclusions from yours...

Originally Posted by Seminomad

Seeing the economic cycle changing sometimes BEFORE the turning and sometimes AFTER means that it would be hard to justify a direct causal relationship between the two... although I do grant it would still let other linkages between the two be very possible.

I think there is a tendency to force fit things into our favorite patterns. There are any number of elements that one can find leading into crisis. My own 'classic' pattern involves an economic downturn early, which increases the tension in all other aspects of society, political, religious, military, etc... There is often a 'spiral of violence.' Sometimes, the spiral comes from terrorist / freedom fighter groups such as the Sons of Liberty or John Brown's abolitionists. Sometimes it manifests as escalating external wars. The escalation of violence tends to end with a Lexington Green / Fort Sumter / Pearl Harbor incident that clearly provokes full mobilization. The Third Turning political attempts to maintain compromise or stagnation, to maintain the status quo, break down as opposing factions become more extreme. In the United States at least, there tends to be a conservative president that history doesn't view favorably, followed by a transforming Grey Champion who is remembered as great.

It would be nice if all these elements always occurred, and in the same order. They don't. It would be nice if the various elements were always equally important. They aren't. If you look at S&H's markers listing when the various crisis periods began, they are all over the place. The Revolution Crisis supposedly began with one of the spiral of violence incidents in Boston. The Civil War Crisis supposedly began with the election of the Grey Champion. The Second World War crisis supposedly began with the economic collapse.

Mike is into the economic cycles. S&H are into their generation theories. I am into the spirals of violence. Thus, everyone will have a tendency to view one set of markers as of special interest, and might try to calibrate the overall position in the turnings in terms of their particular markers. For example, S&H's generation theory suggests regular timing, so they choose events to mark turning borders rather arbitrarily, to make the timing right rather than to be consistent.

I would prefer not to make any one set of markers dominant. In our current crisis, Mike makes a case for economic markers being past. The escalating foreign spiral of violence is obvious, as is the lack of total commitment. We are still spiraling. No Pearl Harbor exclamation point has been reached. To me, it seems likely that Bush 43 will be remembered as the bad president, though I see no obvious potential Grey Champions lurking in the wings.

Is there one clear marker that is always important, that can be clearly recognized? The economic data is fairly objective and measurable, but are the generation boundaries? Can we recognize a Pearl Harbor when it occurs? Can we identify the Grey Champion without 20 20 hindsight?

Gut feel, I have us still in cusp. Economic signals are present, and the spiral of violence is building but not yet peaked. We have a bad president whose attempts to address the crisis issues are not perceived of as working cleanly. The generation cycles are suggesting something ought to be happening right now.

But if one tries to insist on an absolute 3T / 4T boundary, it is a question of definition as much as of fact. Again, there are multiple sets of markers. Some markers are more important in one crisis, less important in the next. The markers do not always occur in the same order. If there is no agreement on which observable marker is more important than all others, there will be disagreement.

Gut feel? September 11th was spectacular enough as a media event to stand in the history books along side other turning boundary events from prior crises. I think it led to a false fourth. The actions that followed it are not likely to define the crisis solution. The unity it briefly created was not sustained. Still, it has enough media impact to overshadow the other markers we have seen thus far.

Is that an acceptable and satisfactory argument if one is trying to find meaningful objective patterns in history? Not really. Unfortunately, history is complicated. Perhaps we could identify five types of markers that are usually present, and call it when three out of five have been observed? I don't know. I just don't anticipate we'll all agree on a single marker type.

Originally Posted by Seminomad

That conclusion came from using the numerical models to 'predict' the start of the 3T instead of directly using S&H's numbers.

Seeing the economic cycle changing sometimes BEFORE the turning and sometimes AFTER means that it would be hard to justify a direct causal relationship between the two... although I do grant it would still let other linkages between the two be very possible.

That being said, though, I can read these graphs and find a case for 4T starting around 2006 (the GDP pattern seems to change a few - maybe even five - years before the turning does) or an off-beat cycle (note that the three lines changed from a relatively stagnant mode to their sharp 'traditional' saecular trends sometime around 1993 or 1994)

but then again, you're an economist and I'm a mathematician (and an analyst in particular). This means that while I think that there's little difference between a line which is rising very slowly for the moment, a line which is literally flatlining, and a line which is currently falling very slowly - and a big difference between a line which is rising very slowly and a line which is rising dramatically - you seem to consider the latter two to be closer together (in other words, I look at a graph like this and look at the magnitude of the derivative; you pay more attention to its sign)

I guess I was trying to say that the trends for the past 20 or 25 years were sufficiently different from the past that they themselves could be perceived as outliers to your model (as 1997 was clearly a 3T year, for example) and further, one could easily look at the graphs and draw very different conclusions from yours...

How did you use the economic cycle to make this prediction without first obtaining the correlation between the economic cycle and the saeculum? You state that the turning change occurs 2-3 years before the turning change, but this is not so. On average it occurs 0.75 years before the turning change, with about 3 years of variation on either side.

Of course there is no causal connection between a stock market cycle and the saeculum. Why would one think there would be? All I was saying is the two are correlated and correlation is is all you need for prediction.

There was no GDP cycle presented. There was a stock market cycle.

I am a chemical engineer, not an economist.

All I am doing is trying address whether or not a turning change has occurred. I think it is obvious that turning changes cannot be detected in real time by inspection--otherwise there would be no disagreement over whether we be 3T or 4T.

I look for changes that in the past have occurred at the same time as turning changes. Something that happened in 1993/1994 is not useful for this purpose because these years are nowhere near a turning change. A change in long-term stock trend as indicated by a peak/trough in valuation occurred in 1929 (peak), 1949 (trough), 1966 (peak) and 1982(trough). That these dates are within three years of a turning change is interesting because another of these trend changes (a peak) obviously occurred in 2000. If the same pattern holds then there should be a turning change within three years of 2000.

Originally Posted by Bob Butler 54

Perhaps we could identify five types of markers that are usually present, and call it when three out of five have been observed? I don't know. I just don't anticipate we'll all agree on a single marker type.

I seem to recall a thread a while back that listed some 10-11 markers, and asked us to vote on the 3T/4T status of each of the markers. (Maybe it was this thread.) I remember Sean, Jenny and Eric posting extensively on it, with most coming to the conclusion that the markers indicated about 60-70% 4T.

I think it would be enlightening to dig it back up and see if our perceptions regarding the status of the markers have changed in the last year... (especially since it's my personal opinion that the Social Moment came one year ago, with Katrina...)

I'm surprised no one mentioned the Foley scandal yet. Is this just a more intense version of Monicagate, or will this scandal have actual political consequences? This scandal is seems to be putting public corruption on the minds of many Americans, and this could generate political fallout in November. It seems like in general, the public is not happy at all. In fact, many news articles are stating that voters are getting more restless.

Of course, public anger is not limited to this scandal, but it likely involves a perception of public corruption, and a souring economy. Some people have compared the current period to the mid 1970s with recession, oil shock, scandal on Capitol Hill, and a restive public. 2007 is increasingly appearing to be a nasty year.

What do you think the ramifications of the Foley scandal will be?

Originally Posted by Finch

I seem to recall a thread a while back that listed some 10-11 markers, and asked us to vote on the 3T/4T status of each of the markers. (Maybe it was this thread.) I remember Sean, Jenny and Eric posting extensively on it, with most coming to the conclusion that the markers indicated about 60-70% 4T.

I think it would be enlightening to dig it back up and see if our perceptions regarding the status of the markers have changed in the last year... (especially since it's my personal opinion that the Social Moment came one year ago, with Katrina...)

C'mon folks! Don't make me have to wade through 10,000 posts (which is how many I'll get if I search on "are we in a 4T?"

Originally Posted by Finch

C'mon folks! Don't make me have to wade through 10,000 posts (which is how many I'll get if I search on "are we in a 4T?"

Rick:

Go to the "Fourth Turning Indicators" thread in this forum (Special Topics) and read the first post.

Originally Posted by Semo '75

"Art at its most significant is a distant early warning system that can always be relied on to tell the old culture what is beginning to happen."
-- Marshall McLuhan

If that's the case, what does CBS's new Jericho TV series tell us?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jericho_%28TV_series%29

BTW, I'm hooked.

Originally Posted by Mr. Reed

I'm surprised no one mentioned the Foley scandal yet. Is this just a more intense version of Monicagate, or will this scandal have actual political consequences? This scandal is seems to be putting public corruption on the minds of many Americans, and this could generate political fallout in November. It seems like in general, the public is not happy at all. In fact, many news articles are stating that voters are getting more restless.

Of course, public anger is not limited to this scandal, but it likely involves a perception of public corruption, and a souring economy. Some people have compared the current period to the mid 1970s with recession, oil shock, scandal on Capitol Hill, and a restive public. 2007 is increasingly appearing to be a nasty year.

What do you think the ramifications of the Foley scandal will be?

Yah. I tend to see the Blue Awakening, the optimistic problem solving part of the Awakening, as running from Rosa Parks and the civil rights movement through 1968 and the Chicago Democratic convention. No, the entire country wasn't in awakening in the 1950s, but the preliminary rumblings were active. Watergate, the Fall of Saigon, the Hostage Crisis, the Oil Crisis and the National Malaise turned it all sour. The GI "Big Government Solves Big Problems" paradigm went away ugly in the 1970s, then Reagan came in with a more selfish and supposedly smaller less ambitious unravelling approach.

Our recent string of 'catalysts' -- E2K, September 11th, Afghanistan, Iraq, Katrina and assorted Washington scandals -- does have a similar feel. If someone were to show up, make promises, and make a sincere effort to deliver on them, we could see a tidal change. We feel ready for it. I just don't see anyone stepping up to the plate yet to make it happen.

I also don't necessarily feel that great men appear every four score and seven years. Ordinary men just end up in power at a time when it is necessary to do great things. We'll have to see.

Hmm.... My spell checker wanted to turn Foley into Folly. Feels about right.

Originally Posted by Mr. Reed

I'm surprised no one mentioned the Foley scandal yet. Is this just a more intense version of Monicagate, or will this scandal have actual political consequences? This scandal is seems to be putting public corruption on the minds of many Americans, and this could generate political fallout in November. It seems like in general, the public is not happy at all. In fact, many news articles are stating that voters are getting more restless.

Of course, public anger is not limited to this scandal, but it likely involves a perception of public corruption, and a souring economy. Some people have compared the current period to the mid 1970s with recession, oil shock, scandal on Capitol Hill, and a restive public. 2007 is increasingly appearing to be a nasty year.

What do you think the ramifications of the Foley scandal will be?

I think one reason it resonates is because it's so similar to the scandal that recently rocked the American Catholic Church to it's foundation: Pedophilia and cover up.

Also, it doesn't help that in this particular case (though I'm sure there are others on both sides of the aisle) it was a self-righteous Christian Republican who actually championed childrens' rights in these matters, IIUC.

One thing is for sure: Public confidence in our institutions just keeps going down, down, down. What would happen if a large enough group of people (critical mass threshold kinda thing) lost confidence in our very electoral process, like with the Diebold problem and political maneuvering (Harris, Blackwell, the Gregoire/Rossi controversy) the likes of which we haven't seen in a long time?

Originally Posted by Bob Butler 54

Yah. I tend to see the Blue Awakening, the optimistic problem solving part of the Awakening, as running from Rosa Parks and the civil rights movement through 1968 and the Chicago Democratic convention. No, the entire country wasn't in awakening in the 1950s, but the preliminary rumblings were active. Watergate, the Fall of Saigon, the Hostage Crisis, the Oil Crisis and the National Malaise turned it all sour. The GI "Big Government Solves Big Problems" paradigm went away ugly in the 1970s, then Reagan came in with a more selfish and supposedly smaller less ambitious unravelling approach.

Our recent string of 'catalysts' -- E2K, September 11th, Afghanistan, Iraq, Katrina and assorted Washington scandals -- does have a similar feel. If someone were to show up, make promises, and make a sincere effort to deliver on them, we could see a tidal change. We feel ready for it. I just don't see anyone stepping up to the plate yet to make it happen.

I also don't necessarily feel that great men appear every four score and seven years. Ordinary men just end up in power at a time when it is necessary to do great things. We'll have to see.

Hmm.... My spell checker wanted to turn Foley into Folly. Feels about right.

S&H do say that the problems of the 4T catalyst will seem familiar to most Americans then alive. Of course, these problems are rather new to Millies, but probably most Xers would find some of the problems familiar.

I don't think that the Blue Awakening ended abruptly in 1968. Rather, I think it changed focus to New Age spiritualism, environmentalism, and the counter culture. The 1970s may be back, but in a shadow form. The main difference will be the generational lineup, which should make our response to the problems much different from before.