Things are bad all over, there is little doubt about that and even with small mentions of 'green shoots' starting to pop up in the media, it is easy to see that many people are still suffering deeply.
Retirement plans are up-side down, and people are hurting.
Given the isolation of Australia (where this writer lives) it is sometimes easy to focus on our own pain and not really notice what is going on in countries around us.
Many people blame the United States for beginning the snowball that kicked the recession off, but with tent cities reminiscent of the Great Depression beginning to appear in the USA, it is hard to ignore the fact that the people there are suffering.
Planning for retirement is sending some deep into depression.
In the same way, as we in Australia are, they are searching around for answers about who is to blame.
Recently America's fastest growing trade union SEIU (SERVICE EMPLOYEES INTERNATIONAL UNION) held a rally in New York to protest the huge bonuses Bank Of America executives are paying themselves despite the fact they have had to be bailed out by the American government.
The people protesting were very outspoken in their views and it does not take much listening to realize that they are very unhappy and hopping mad at the recent events in the American financial sector.
Some of those getting the huge bonuses, were the very ones that created the retirement planning guide or portfolio, that was now decimated.
If the protesters at this rally are to be believed, people in America see things in a very similar fashion to those in Australia and many other countries; bankers led us into this recession and then borrowed taxpayers money to give themselves almighty bonuses.
In the meantime the tax payers who are footing the bill are losing their jobs,their own homes and they are seeing their planned retirement going down the toilet.
In so much as America's plight tends to effect the rest of us, things are still looking pretty grim.
The 405 club is apparently the fastest growing alliance in America and it was formed to support the countries unemployed.
Bowery's charity reports an alarming growth in the number of families seeking help with basic survival.
Neither of these are good signs.
There are those that say we cannot completely blame the banks for the state of the world economy.
Many people think that in a way we are all to blame; citing greed as the vice that got us into this mess.
According to them people used money they did not have indiscriminately and without thought for the consequences.
Maybe, but we were also encouraged to increase our wealth so we were planning for retirement? Perhaps the most frightening thing about this obsession with who is to blame is that it may be preventing us from seeing the real question here.
How do we turn things around? Whoever is to blame, there seems to be little doubt that we all have a responsibility to try and change our ways and help to pull ourselves out of this financial recession.
For some people, the lucky ones who have kept their jobs, this may just be a case of making sure that the money they spend in the future is money they have actually earned.
For others it may be time to make a major reassessment of their lives and start casting around for new ways to make money to provide for themselves and their families.
Perhaps they need to re-evaluate any retirement planning guide they had and simple change direction.
It's becoming obvious that the Man is not going to provide.
There certainly seems to be a lot of opportunities out there for those people who are willing to re-evaluate and see this recession as an opportunity - instead of a curse.