(Photo: China Photos/Getty Images)

“We are now the largest debtor nation in the history of the world. We owe $13 trillion, and we get $1 trillion further into debt every fifteen months. That’s the world giving up on America.”
—Jim Rogers, investor, who has predicted a stock-market fall and commodities boom

(Photo: Anna Summa/Getty Images)

“The house next to mine in Florida sold for $105,000 in 1998, $765,000 seven years later. My guess is that it may more properly be worth around $275,000. Getting from $765,000 to $275,000, if it happens, is going to involve a lot of pain.”
—Andrew Tobias, investment guru, who has warned of a real-estate bubble since 2002

(Photo: Rick Maiman/AFP/Getty Images)

“The American consumer is toast. We’re talking a multiyear adjustment, at least two or three years, maybe more. Does that mean America is over? Does that mean we have a whole new world order? The jury’s out on that.”
—Stephen Roach, former chief economist at Morgan Stanley, who in 2004 warned of impending economic “Armageddon”

(Photo: Eric Thayer/Getty Images)

“I think we are maybe 10 percent into this crisis. The economic distortions have been building for longer than we’ve seen in the history of the world. Never have we had such confidence falsely placed in a reserve currency.”
—Ron Paul, former presidential candidate, who advocates a return to the gold standard

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Related:

• Archive: “Intelligencer”
• Articles by Carol Vinzant
• Table of Contents: Jul 28, 2008 issue of New York | Subscribe!