US - Response to a slowdown

I just flew from San Francisco and the airport was busy, very busy. It seemed like most flights were full and overall it seemed like it was business as usual. Every single leg of mine in the US I have travelled and this is at odd times on weekdays, every single seat was taken up. The flights are so full that on my SFO - NWK flight, there were 45 standby passengers for upgrade to business. And this is after all business class seats were full. All 16 of them.

I was unable to see any visible impact of the global slowdown, financial crises, and various other bad news that seems to originate regularly from the US. And I guess that’s what makes this is the greatest country in the world. Wherever I went, I saw happy faces, busy shops, malls that were full. I've observed over a period of time that the best way to determine spending is not to check out the crowds in the shops or malls, but observe the lines at the checkout counters. These were long, with most customers having large shopping carts full.

Wherever I go, the conversation revolves around the current financial crises and the impact on businesses, both globally and worldwide. I guess that a lot of the impact may not be visible. Nevertheless, the feeling I got was that the atmosphere and the energy was far more positive than it was a year ago or even 2 years ago. This is based on simple individual observations, and since I'm neither trained nor an expert, it’s possible I'm imagining or just plain wrong. Nevertheless, I believe that we  are at the beginning of a reversal and that 2012 and 2013 is likely to be good years for the US. This, by extension means I'm predicting happy times ahead for the rest of the world.

I'm a contrarian, not by choice but it seems by virtue of what I think is likely to happen. As I write this the economic crisis seems to deepen not only in the US, but globally. Greece, Ireland, were already in trouble and now most of the other European nations including the UK, France and Germany have issues if their own. These are exactly the reasons I believe a turnaround is round the corner. When you are at the bottom, no matter what you do, chance are you'll end up going up.

All experts are predicting that 2012 and 2013 are likely to be worse years than 2011 and 2012. They were wrong in 2010 when they predicted happy days ahead, and I hope they're wrong this time too. In addition to making me feel good about being right, the bigger picture is that we'll have a happier, financially stable world.