Grant County residents have been watching the economic news with interest and concern.

Even with a bailout plan, Greg Jackson, owner of Jackson Oil, said last week he isn’t expecting any quick fixes for the economy.

“It will turn around, but it’s going to take time,” he said.

He said he’s no expert on the situation, but it seemed like “they should have tightened up before this happened.”

“Maybe we are all going to have to do with less,” he said. “The federal government – they’re going to have to quit spending.”

Maurice Kimball of John Day also felt the economy would take some time to straighten out.

“I watched the stock market go below 10,000 this morning,” he noted. “It’s not going to be easy and it’s not going to be quick.”

As for the bailout, he said, “I didn’t like it but it had to be done. It had to be done, otherwise all the credit markets would go to zero.”

Kimball recalls living through the tail end of the Great Depression.

“I don’t want to go through that again. I don’t want to see babies and kids going without food,” he said.

Rich Boren, owner of ER Printing and Graphics in Dayville, urged people to think of the glass as “half full.”

“We have more positive things going on than negative,” he said. “The current financial ‘crisis’ is caused by the negative-focused reporting of the media coupled with the negative political climate from both branches of government. As soon as the new president and legislators are sworn in and the negative advertising stops, the overall optimism of the population will rise and culminate in confidence in the future which will stimulate spending.”

He said the “Band-Aid fixes” occurring now will allow the financial markets to recover.

“This confidence will stimulate the stock market which will in turn stabilize and return it to its previous levels – safeguarding retirement funds,” he said. “Ultimately, the housing markets will recover, reducing the government’s exposure to failed mortgages. It comes down to confidence – in our government, our president, our financial institutions and our stock market.”

Carol Kilpatrick of Mt. Vernon said she’s not happy about “rich bankers being bailed out.”

“But the chickens have come home to roost because of eight years of deregulation. If people had been paying attention, this wouldn’t have happened,” Kilpatrick said.