Our topic for the January future salon is Financial Crisis.

Bloomberg today (November 26) put out this article, saying the total so far is $7.76 trillion.

U.S. Pledges Top $7.7 Trillion to Ease Frozen Credit (Update2)

Prior to the current crisis, as of fiscal year 2007, the US government was running a deficit of $248 billion, per year, with the net present value of the US government's future obligations under GAAP accounting rules estimated to be $54.6 trillion. (Figures for fiscal 2008, which ended Sep. 30th, should be released by the Treasury Department by the end of this year.) Remember also that Joseph Stiglitz estimated the total cost of the Iraq War will be $2 trillion (some people are telling me he's now saying $3 trillion), of which at least $500 billion has already been spent.

The question for us futurists is, where is this all going?

We'll be meeting on Jan. 23rd at 7pm.