Nah. People will still need to have cars...at least for a couple more decades. It's likely that GM and Chrysler will go bust, but the automobile industry as a whole will rebound somewhat.
Car sales numbers have gone down considerably in all big markets(Europe, Asia, the US).. Japanese exports have fallen 50% party because of this, the rest due to electronics. Unsold cars are parked around Europe, unused, unsold.. There was even news of a ship full of cars that just had to permanently park outside in a dock in Sweden. GM, Chrystler, Ford, all on the brink of bankruptcy, European competitors are now losing money on a big scale, Japanese cars are next. Such a decline in car sales might just be permanent, we have bought cars in the west, switching out cars every year without a need for it, that time might just be over.
I see a lot of struggle at LEAST.
Yes. The insurance industry seems primed for disaster.
How can they possibly avoid it? I cant see the way. When things go wrong, insurance companies are in BIG trouble, not only big, but epic.
Nah. These things will always be in demand. People have less discretionary income than before, but that's a temporary problem.
Japanese exports fell by almost 50% from January 2008 until January 2009. Thats disastrous, its led by falling car sales and falling electronic sales, Japans two biggest industries. Not only that, but the deflation in Europe on electronics is just massive as a result of lost demand and oversupply. European manufacturing declining is mostly because of machinery, while American decline can be contributed also to electronics.
Potential disaster. If the ball rolls, it will sure drag with it this industry as well.
The airline industry has already collapsed. For the past eight years, most of the airlines seem to be operating in a permanent state of bankruptcy.
Its interesting how they actually managed to survive. I read some interesting article in Forbes about companies that were predicted to last the next 100 years. Only 1 airline company was predicted to still be in existence.. Air France/KLM.
When people cut back they easily cut back on travel, the airline industry just cannot afford that, potential disaster.
I was thinking the same when I wrote that, but... What about piracy and free open source software? Are you sure software will not become "the next wikipedia"?
On a second note I was also thinking about the media and entertainment industry.. Can they collapse as a result of piracy and technology? Or will they always be in demand and take a slice of the money cake?
I was also considering "nations/governments".. But that would be the last one to collapse obviously, not so unlikely anymore, that even big nations could collapse economically within 5-10 years after bailing out all industries. And then the people last of course..
