1929 vs. 2009: Depression Bound?

Yeah, I guess you can say things went pretty poorly in 2008. Stocks posted one of the worst years on record, with the S&P 500 falling more than 40% through late December. Once-proud Wall Street firms such as Lehman Brothers and Bear Stearns collapsed or were forced into mergers at fire-sale prices. Home prices continued to plummet and consumer spending slowed to a drip, leading to loads of worries for the nation's retail corps.

Gulp. So what's next? Of all the doomsday prognostications about the current financial crisis, one looming question stands out: Will people look at 2008 as the start of the next Great Depression? Are we in for another round of soup lines, ballooning unemployment and street-corner entreaties of "Brother, can you spare a dime?"

Fact is, no one knows exactly how deeply or for how long the current recession (which officially started in December 2007) will extend. The Great Depression started in August 1929 and lasted a whopping 43 months. The nation's unemployment rate stayed above 20% for four straight years, from 1932 to 1935. ...