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Thread: Potential USA Recesssion?

  1. #1
    Registered User JAK's Avatar
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    Default Potential USA Recesssion?

    Is the potential, possible recession stopping you from purchasing a mandolin these days?
    John A. Karsemeyer

  2. #2

    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    Not quite. Some fear of something will always loom.
    Last edited by ColdBeerGoCubs; Sep-03-2019 at 5:16pm.
    Gunga......Gunga.....Gu-Lunga

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  4. #3

    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    In the short term, recent events might cause some to accelerate purchases of Chinese made instruments. I received e-mail today from the Mandolin Store that on Oct 1 prices of Eastman instruments would be going up by 6.5%. It is effecting most MIC instruments, not just Mandolins. Many USA made instruments builders are taking the cue and raising prices as well.

    Frankly, if fear of a recession is making you rethink an instrument purchase, maybe you should be putting your money towards something more fundamental than a luxury item in the first place.

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    Registered User slimt's Avatar
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    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    Weve been in turmoil up here for a while. The answer is no. Ill still keep buying. No time like now to be buying from folks that spent more than they should have.

  7. #5

    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    Quote Originally Posted by slimt View Post
    Weve been in turmoil up here for a while. The answer is no. Ill still keep buying. No time like now to be buying from folks that spent more than they should have.
    Used instruments to be sure!

    Also, this is a great time to be buying from UK builders, if you're not in the UK. Brexit has hammered the Pound against the Dollar. Down to $1.199 today, the lowest in 34 years.

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    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    Nope ! I live and spend like tomorrow might be my last ! Waiting on my new Girouard F4 !

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  10. #7

    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    Recession, sickness, and other kinds of misfortune are always possibilities. Buy what's within your reach and pay reasonable prices, and you will be happy and might even be able to make back what you paid, eventually. Can't live life worrying about the uncertainties, there's enough factual stuff to be worried about. :-)

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    Registered User Gunnar's Avatar
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    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    A mandolin can get you through times of no money, but money won't get you through times of no mandolin.
    - does anyone know who said that?
    Mandolin: Kentucky KM150
    Other instruments: way too many, and yet, not nearly enough.

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    Registered User William Smith's Avatar
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    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    Nothing is stopping me as I buy what I want, Wife and kids are clothed and fed, bills paid very little debt! house paid for, land etc..I was already told once I wouldn't live another year and that was in late 2011 early 12-I was in bad shape healthwise! Life is full of uncertainties and no one is promised tomorrow! So life does go on in one way or another. I've never been one for new mandolins but was sold recently on one and slammed my $ down! No regrets, they all should increase in worth in the future for my Wife/Kids when I'm gone as I expect I'll go long before them, I'd rather have my $ into something tangible than look at a statement and wonder where it goes or a 401K that could take a serious dive and loose thousands but that's me and if that happens maybe instruments will only be worth to keep you warm by a fire?

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    Pittsburgh Bill
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    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    Quote Originally Posted by JAK View Post
    Is the potential, possible recession stopping you from purchasing a mandolin these days?
    No
    Just cannot seem to find a used Stiver A with a radius. Fs are much more common as Lou has not built an A in a while. Scrolls just don't do anything for me (I know, don't tell me, I'm the odd one).
    When a nice A with a redius comes aloing I will pull the trigger, so to speak.
    Big Muddy EM8 solid body (Mike Dulak's final EM8 build)
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    MandolaViola bratsche's Avatar
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    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    Quote Originally Posted by Gunnar View Post
    A mandolin can get you through times of no money, but money won't get you through times of no mandolin.
    - does anyone know who said that?
    I dunno. You? I know that the Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers said something.... ehm, "somewhat similar"...

    bratsche
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  18. #12
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    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    While there is currently no recession happening there will always be the potential for one in the future. They seem to occur in somewhat regular cycles and another downturn will surely happen. I've managed to live through numerous recessions as my inventory of mandolins, guitars and now a fiddle steadily increase.

  19. #13
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    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    I only make big $$ purchases when I have the money to spare. I don't divert from my regular savings for them. I play for me and this isn't a business investment.

    Jamie
    There are two things to aim at in life: first, to get what you want; and, after that, to enjoy it. Only the wisest of mankind achieve the second. Logan Pearsall Smith, 1865 - 1946

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  20. #14

    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    Quote Originally Posted by Pittsburgh Bill View Post
    No
    Just cannot seem to find a used Stiver A with a radius. Fs are much more common as Lou has not built an A in a while. Scrolls just don't do anything for me (I know, don't tell me, I'm the odd one).
    When a nice A with a redius comes aloing I will pull the trigger, so to speak.
    Why not buy the Stiver A that you like and have the fingerboard raidiused and get a new bridge for it? Not substantially more money than a fret job alone.

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  22. #15
    Jerry Cobbs jerrycobbs's Avatar
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    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    If I were into high-end instruments it might give me pause, but my wife and I tend to focus on finding things we enjoy playing without breaking the bank. My Eastman OM is the most expensive new instrument I've ever owned. My wife has a violin and a viola that came from thrift stores, not first-chair orchestral quality but solid wood and very playable. I just ordered her birthday present, an electric fiddle, from a guy in Canada who crafts instruments in his spare time and is very affordable. Recessions are a good time to pick up bargains and restore them to playing condition.
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    -- Misc: a cello, 2 cigarbox guitars, charango, djembe, slide dulcimer.

  23. #16
    Mando accumulator allenhopkins's Avatar
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    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    The "business cycle" will trend downward, sooner or later. People with advanced degrees and many publications, who spend their lives studying economics, disagree on "when" and "how much," but I haven't heard anyone say that the economy will expand continuously forever. "Trees don't grow to the sky," as they say.

    But [a] foregoing a purchase because of a potential recession, which may be six months or three years away, is making an immediate decision based on rumor and punditry, and [b] unless you're buying a Lloyd Loar Gibson F-5, or something comparable, the financial impact of the decision's relatively minor -- as compared to buying a house, automobile, boat, etc.

    Certainly there have been times in my life when I had to think hard about coming up with $1K, but that had more to do with my personal "business cycle," than with overall economic conditions. If one's job/income situation is likely to be significantly worsened by a recession, I'd recommend more caution, but that would be true regardless of the economic forecasts that get bandied about 24-7 on cable.

    I've heard that country music recording sales rise during economically depressed periods, so maybe there'd be more chances to play that new mandolin, for audiences seeking solace from the vicissitudes of the stock market and the unemployment rate.
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    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    Quote Originally Posted by stevojack665 View Post
    Why not buy the Stiver A that you like and have the fingerboard raidiused and get a new bridge for it? Not substantially more money than a fret job alone.
    Explored that option. The only A I have found was priced too high and had a flat fret board. By the time I would have purchased it and had the work done I would almost have had enough money in it to commision a new build.
    Big Muddy EM8 solid body (Mike Dulak's final EM8 build)
    Kentucky KM-950
    Weber Gallatin A Mandola "D hole"
    Rogue 100A (current campfire tool & emergency canoe paddle)

  25. #18

    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    No, in fact, maybe we should take it as an encouragement. If the economy implodes, maybe traveling bards will be the only people able to earn money. I for one plan to stand in front of the train station with an open case and see what that nets me.

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  27. #19
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    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    Quote Originally Posted by stevojack665 View Post
    Used instruments to be sure!

    Also, this is a great time to be buying from UK builders, if you're not in the UK. Brexit has hammered the Pound against the Dollar. Down to $1.199 today, the lowest in 34 years.
    Any UK builders (mando or guitar) that you would recommend checking out?

  28. #20
    Registered User T.D.Nydn's Avatar
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    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    Don't base your life intimadated by a so-called up coming recession or you will make it happen,,,live your life without fear...

  29. #21
    Registered User JAK's Avatar
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    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    Okay, no more wimpy hesitation!
    John A. Karsemeyer

  30. #22
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    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    There's MORE THAN a "potential, possible" recession coming - it absolutely WILL happen, eventually. Just as we all absolutely WILL be dead, eventually. Might as well use the interim to buy instruments and make music. That could even make some folks happy along the way... so that they don't have to, ya know, keep counting how many days they have left.

    As Dylan said: "He not busy living is busy dying."
    - Ed

    "Then one day we weren't as young as before
    Our mistakes weren't quite so easy to undo
    But by all those roads, my friend, we've travelled down
    I'm a better man for just the knowin' of you."
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  31. #23

    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    A couple thoughts.....

    Don't buy as an investment, buy because you like it.......

    Collectors who bought "high" in 2008, still have those instruments today, because they can't sell them for half of what they paid -- fine instruments, for sure -- just not an "investment".......

    My friend who is a second-generation antique store owner and raised in the business once told me the key to his success, he said "you don't EVER want to run out of money!"

  32. #24
    Registered User T.D.Nydn's Avatar
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    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    Never invest in anything you don't have a direct interest in..

  33. #25

    Default Re: Potential USA Recesssion?

    Retired, fixed income, recession doesn't effect me other than hopefully bringing down the prices of toys I might buy.

    I'm an economics junkie, read a lot of classics econ books, attended the local Federal Reserve events. As others have said recessions are an inevitable part of our economic system and certain fundamentals point to one in near future. The one additional point I'd like to make is that, even in the absence of those predictors, recessions can occur as self-fulfilling prophecies because people act based on what they think is about to happen. Last poll I saw said that 60% of Americans are expecting one so all we need is some time or a precipitating event for the prophecy to come to fruition.
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