If you haven't seen the video (embedded above) with Peter Schiff, Euro Pacific Capital president, then I urge you to view it. He articulated his bearish case on Monday, 4 January 2009. For those of you who are tuning in via email or RSS and are unable to see the embedded video, please select the video link to Peter Schiff on CNBC Fast Money.
Barry Ritholtz over at The Big Picture showed a series of unemployment charts. Again, if you haven't seen them, visit Ritholtz's site and view the charts. For a picture story, I especially like the last graph from Calculated Risk. The unemployment graphs reinforce Schiff's thesis of a challenged consumer.
I enjoyed reading John Mauldin's 2010 Forecast: The Year of Uncertainty (PDF, 203 kb). Mauldin chose a very appropriate title. In his article, Mauldin discussed the unemployment and what it might mean for the economy in 2010.
All three sources—video, charts, and 2010 Outlook—point to unemployment being a pivotal challenge in 2010. Unemployment is unacceptably high, especially when you consider the U-6 unemployment statistic at 17.3%. 2010 is indeed the year of uncertainty.
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