Ponderings on the recession

While this recession is certainly hitting some people hard, there are a lot of young professionals, who, so far, seem to be weathering the storm without any problems. In fact, some of us are approaching the point of having disposable income, and looking for a place to invest it.
If someone were to buy 1000 GM shares now, at $1.60 a share, and hold on to them while the economy bottoms out, then begins climbing back upward — and assuming a company like GM survives the fall-out — such a person could make out like a bandit. If GM’s stocks were to return to half their April ’08 value, an investment of $1600 would net a return of  $23,400. That’s 14 times the initial money, in what could be a fairly short amount of time.
We’re not, ourselves, thinking of such an investment, but a friend is. As I stated earlier, I haven’t a lot of confidence in GM. And we’d rather invest when things begin curving upward, not while they’re curving downward. But that change in curve direction can’t be too far off, and one wonders how many opportunities you get in your life to buy when things are really low…
I don’t know my financial history well enough, but is this how previous recessions were turned around? Have people historically made money this way? We dabbled in the stock market a little bit a few years back, made a very thoughtful and researched buy and sell, and made enough money to buy a couple nice couches. It was certainly something we’d consider doing in the future… What say you, Internets? Any advice out there?

One for the old ego, via my inbox

Apple’s Forgotten Future
Presented by Jon Wise
In 1985 Steve Jobs was forced out of the company he co-founded, by a man he hired to run the business. While Apple carried on with the momentum set by the Macintosh, having their share of hits and misses along the way, what Jobs did next would help shape technology for the next 20 years, defining the modern Mac in a way few people have imagined.
Come out on Thursday and learn more about this almost-forgotten chapter in the history of our favorite fruit-named computer…

Jon Wise is a Senior Technology Developer at [redacted] with 10 years of experience developing software applications for Windows and the Web. He’s a graduate of Conestoga College’s Computer Programmer/Analyst diploma, and most recently worked in New York on a manufacturing performance analysis system called [redacted].
He’s been a Mac user since 1993, when he found an old Mac 512k (FatMac) in a dumpster, and brought it back to life. Since then he has worked, in some capacity, on every major Mac OS release since 4.x, although he’s never pursued Mac software development professionally. Jon has published articles on Macs in (the now defunct) eLondon Magazine, and was interviewed by Wired Magazine for an article on Apple’s Newton MessagePad in 2002.
Jon currently lives in [redacted], with his wife Nicole, and two children: Benjamin (2 years old) and Abgail (1 year old), and enjoys travel and video editing on his Mac. He owns and regularly uses a MacBook Pro, an Intel Mac Mini, an AppleTV and an unlocked iPhone 2G.
Here’s hoping I have my voice back by then!