Why the US will turn Japanese by 2010

How have US consumers managed to keep spending in the face of the economic upheaval of recent years? The answer is simple, says Harry S. Dent in the Daily Reckoning - demographics. The largest section of the Baby Boomer generation will be past their peak spending years by 2010, which will lead to a Japan-style slump. But could there be another market boom before then?

For better or worse, we live in an economy dominated by consumer spending. This fact is a cause of concern for many traditional economists, as they believe that it is largely capital investment on the "supply side" that drives economic growth.

An economy that consumes more than it produces is bound to collapse into insolvency, right? And by this rationale, we're due for a massive economic correction to purge these excesses, right?

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