New York's banks and brokerages generate one of every five tax dollars in the state. The state's budget is already suffering from declines on Wall Street, and Paterson last month said that revenues would be hurt by declines in Wall Street bonuses.

Ouch!

Every one of these falling dominoes would be a job lost:

   

Yep - I work at an investment bank and we're being told to expect some major cuts and before the end of the year.

   

Yikes. Your resume all up to date Bart?

   

You betcha! Lehman Bros. in London reportedly let go of 5,000 people today. We'll see what happens at their NYC office in a little bit as they just closed for the day there. I'm guessing more than a few will have to hit the road.

Luckily, and I mean very luckily, Mrs. Bart and I sold our Oak Bay house last month and the money is pretty safe with HSBC (we're keeping the cash out of the USA to legally avoid capital gains taxes) so we have some liquidity just in case the US goes all in the crapper.