I am not a luddite, far from it. I am however someone who understands that lots of his friends who are older are now obsolete, and you can not blame that on the goverment, or the economic decisions of bankers, but on the basic concept that tech has reduced lots of jobs to nothing. 
Long term it will be fine, but short term this tech change is a real issue that is not being addressed. 

The post office for example lost $16b this year, and I expect it will lose 3x that next year.... I do not know where a stamp is in my house. 

I am not a CPA, but I have taken a fair number of accountings courses, and I use a almost full time CA. Mint.com has completely changed by view of cash management/control and has reduced the need for a CA/CPA to deal with my personal paperwork/issues. It does not yet do the business's or the international accounts. It has reduced my time spent on cash management to 1 hour a month from 2-3 per week. 
I think within 5-7 years it will spit out a tax return for 90%+ of its users.  
 

John, you are very funny. What is sad is some people would agree with you :-). 

Raising taxes is going to happen, and frankly it is going to be way more across the board then Obama is claiming. There just are not enough rich people to take everything from. 

When tax rates go up, anger over government spending will go up. 

However no amount of tax raises is going to get us out of this mess, our spending has to be balanced, program by program. 

America has voted, 

I did not vote for it, but we are going to get the result of that vote. 

Tax rates are going to go up, the current plan is just to bleed anyone where ever we can and not have a clear system of taxes. 

We are going to get some sort of nationalized medicine, so lets at least make it clean, and easy to have market choice. All I am proposing is everyone puts into a pot and gets out their percentage of the pot. Then you can buy what ever insurance you want with that money as long as it meets minimum standards. There is a lot more free market in my view.

SS is going to go bankrupt unless we change it

And yes as a small business owner, I rather like what Canada has done to drop corporate tax rates to get business moving, and have higher personal tax rates. It works. 

Collectively we are going to get higher tax rates, the question is how do we get them in a way that makes sense. I would rather we clearly laid out where money is coming from and where it is going. 

Joan, 

I like platinum, for that sort of bet. 

In a recovery we are going to make more diesel trucks/cars and gas..

In an inflationary cycle it tracks gold. 

It is also very close to its cost of production right now, so you have signficant downside protection vs gold which is at record prices. 

David,

If you can do a fixed rate mortgage go for it. Have you checked out Homepath?

btw, what is the interest rates on the student loans? Are they private or public. Are they fixed. 

I am keeping mine btw, I have about $135k of them, but they are at 3% fixed for 30 years. (was the cheapest money I was going to find). 

If the goverment can not deliver the services without collecting enough revenue, its only option is going to be to print money to make them/deliver services.  The goverment today is printing money (and selling debt to itself), at some point that will cause a devaluation of the $, which will be inflation based. 

 The first major person/banker who says the goverment can not pay its bills without printing money/defaulting will spark a run on interest rate and start an inflationary cycle. 

In Portland, I can not buy rentals (getting out bid), lots of $$ chasing real assets. Rents are starting to go up signficantly. 

Jetstream, 

We are not Japanese, we are spenders not savers. There is signficant asset inflation going on right now (try to buy a cheap house). 

I do not see asset deflation as an outcome anymore, did for a while, but not anymore. Just to much money is floating around, and it is starting to chase stuff. 

Benjamin

Debt is great in an inflationary cycle if:

1. Interest rates are FIXED.
2. You have enough cash to service 6-9 months of hell. 
3. You have a real asset that you bought with the debt that generates cash flow. 

Otherwise debt will kill you. 

Benjamin

Angmoh, 

In the UK you have variable rate loans, so if you do not hold some cash, you can get caught in an interest rate squeeze. If rates go to 15% can you make your payments. 

In the US interest rates are fixed so you can reduce that risk. 

Joan, 

I fully support more charity, and if we did more of it, much of this cliff issue would disapear. 

If times are bad now, take the current situation and add in 30% annual inflation :-).

Benjamin