And without a pick-up in the pace of investment it is hard to imagine any return to a healthy growth path. The main risk is that rising unemployment rates will undermine household confidence and depress spending. As long as jobs are still being lost, there is plenty of potential for destabilizing feedbacks.
Lower employment can trigger more mortgage defaults and put additional stress on key financial institutions. In other words, as long as the employment picture continues to worsen, the risk that things could deteriorate again remains great. 2.