The next day at BP, Doug sat at his desk going through some paper work. He had the television muted and occasionally reviewed the reports all the networks still had going on about Vicky. Florida had been devastated but Georgia and South Carolina were hit hard as well. Martial Law still reigned over Florida and the only ones going into Florida were the FEMA workers and National Guard. An intermittent stream of people were leaving, the lucky ones who only lost everything they owned but were spared their lives. They either salvaged a vehicle or hitched a ride out of the state as there was nothing for them in Florida anymore.

Sheila came in to Doug’s office. “Doug, turn the volume up.”

Doug grabbed the remote on the edge of his desk and turned it up, expecting to see more horrific storm stories. Instead he saw the Vicky Breaking News interrupted by another “Breaking News” story. He looked questioningly at Sheila.

“My dad called me to tell me to watch this story as it would most likely impact everyone in the United States.”

“The EURO’s DEAD” the screen displayed. The announcer talked about how Greece, Spain, and Italy defaulted on their debt and the talks to bail them out failed. Rioting spread through Europe in almost every city, banks were either having runs or were being looted. Armies everywhere tried to quell the rebellion but there were too many people and the armed forces and police were quickly overwhelmed.

“I understand that terrible things are happening over there but why would that affect us over here?” Sheila asked.

Doug answered “Many think that as goes Europe, so goes the United States a short while later. Everything is globally tied together now; isolation doesn’t exist in the financial markets.”

Chapter

The combination of the collapse of the Euro and the chaos and turmoil in Europe spread to the United States quickly. The Dow Jones Industrial Average plummeted in the aftermath of Vicky. Starting out at a robust 12287, the Dow fell on news of the devastation over ten percent to less than 10990. Global markets around the world had similar reactions. Then the Euro collapsed. Markets fell another ten percent. Large banks once deemed too large to fail collapsed around the world.

Demonstrations started on Wall Street protesting corruption in the banking and finance industries. Millions of Americans became bankrupt overnight. The large pool of baby boomers scheduled to retire had that rug yanked out from under them. Immediate layoffs in the United States reached twenty-five percent. Europe ran over fifty-percent unemployed and nearly all of them protesting their loss of livelihood. China’s big real estate bubble collapsed overnight as did their holdings of foreign currencies, especially the US Federal Reserve Note. When China dumped all the FRN’s it was holding the rest of the world followed. The dollar overnight devalued to about 20% of its previous value. Boomer’s whose stock portfolios were vanquished now had most of their cash holdings become worthless. The countries that came after China and Japan in divesting themselves of dollars became extremely belligerent demanding some form of payment. No one would touch US debt with a ten-foot pole. The demonstrations on Wall Street spread to every major city in the United States. Israel and Iran were threatened each other with much bluster and the other fallen Middle Eastern nations were reformed by military powers imposing a dictatorship.

Politicians scrambled because they’d hit the debt ceiling and under present economic conditions there was no way anyone in Congress would put their name on a proposal to increase the debt. President Packard issued immediate withdrawal orders for the fifty thousand soldiers in Iraq and the thirty-three thousand in Afghanistan. Bases were closed in Germany, Japan, and North Korea and the troops were pulled out and downsized to join the ranks of the unemployed.

The dollar fell further when the Oil Producing countries quit pegging oil output to the dollar. Gasoline rose to the point where companies could not afford to transport the raw materials or goods they needed so more people were laid off. The people left that had a job could not afford to drive to work.

All cities used to relying on Federal Tax monies coming in started going belly up as the money dried up. Teachers, policemen, firemen, librarians, maintenance workers were laid off. Municipalities went bankrupt overwhelming the courts with their requests to redo their pension plans.

Unions suffered the worst since their formations. With hundreds of people willing and able to perform for each one of the jobs available Union demands became a joke. Many Unions disbanded as businesses were reluctant to hire anyone belonging to a Union.

Out of work youth with nothing better to do joined up with protests around the country often instigating violent behaviors such as throwing bottles at the few policemen still lucky enough to have a job. Tensions rose. People died. Politicians promised. Nothing got better.

Roads fell to shoddy or no maintenance. Water mains broke and instead of repairing them, they were shut off. Electrical grids were being overwhelmed as more plants were being taken offline and the old grids were forced to take more loads. Nuclear power plants were under red-alerts and many had already been shut down as a precautionary measure. Electrical workers spent long hours trying to patch the existing infrastructure.