Now comes the news the current economic downturn is officially a recession that’s already 12 months old!

Thank you National Bureau of Economic Research, for telling us what most people with any common sense had already figured out months ago.

By the way our “recession”  has already reached rockstar status…

It’s already the third longest recession since 1948 — But don’t worry, in another four or five months this will become the longest recession in the last 60 years  –  and that dubious distinction appears to be a shoe-in.

– And once again the experts were surprised at the current “numbers” on everything from manufacturing to new housing starts being worse than expected.

It it me or do you notice a pattern here?  For the last 12 months every time an indicator of economic health is announced by the government the “experts” continue to be surprised that it’s always worse than they expected.

Which to me means – the experts don’t have a clue as to how bad things are getting in the economy.  Why else would they continue to be off in their projections?

I’ll tell you what I think is going on:

The way the economic health is measured is outdated and inaccurate.  The system currently in-place is designed to purposely minimize or ignore altogether certain aspects of the economy — which would paint a much darker picture. 

This “rose colored glasses” way of measuring causes the government to  react even more slowly to change   So they do nothing until some kind of crisis happens… and then move at a snail’s pace with their reaction.

Ask any small businessperson and you would have known there was a slowdown in business many months ago.

And for those of you who’ve been laid off or fired – you know all to well that somethings going on.

The most alarming thing to me is that those same experts are saying next year things are going to get worse – which means whatever they’re expecting –  based on their past performance — is probably going to be way too optimistic!

Have you been preparing yourself to face the coming weeks and months?

Sometimes you just have to be willing to see things as they are and make adjustments to how you think and act.  I call it getting “street smart” — using your common sense to protect yourself and your loved ones in a rapidly changing environment.

The Intentional Self-Reliance Workshop  (probably going to change it to “bootcamp” because it’s got a lot of information) will be available soon to help make sure you’re prepared.  Don’t forget to download the free report: “5 Radical Tips You Can Use Now” and get started today taking some concrete action to face the changes coming in the weeks and months ahead.

And, I’m not a gloom and doom guy… Give me a break already.

-Bob Baran