It’s a good thing I spent the energy to check out The Economist today or else I would’ve missed this scary landmark I recall clearly in college. Besides their Thurston Howell III manner of talking crap about labor rights, I found it comical the publication chose a picture showing people trying to figure things out by reading the New York Post, a standard Murdoch noise machine.
Anyway, the Stock Market took a 22-23 percent nose dive. Something around a few hundred points. I didn’t find out until that evening since I was rather self-absorbed in classes, chasing ladies and we managed to hit a Monday-night drinking special. I do remember being pretty worried. I called my father the next day because he was working for a bank in San Diego. Dad seemed rather unconcerned. ABC tried to prevent panic through a presentation days later with help from the Muppets. Other pundits explained how it wasn’t a big deal due to inflation, SEC regulation and margins require more money put down than the legendary 10 percent you read about in history textbooks.
Most of this panned out in the short term, especially when Mark Russell (a PBS-based political comedian) made jokes about what the Reagan Flak Machine labelled a “correction” in the market. The bottom didn’t fall out immediately as it did in 1929 with Black Tuesday. It just worked its way into a Recession as Reagan’s second term wound down. Anything to keep people distracted from the illegal things this administration was doing against Nicaragua and Iran.