Leave your feedback Share Copy URL https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/investors-hopes-for-turnaround-dim-as-markets-plummet Email Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Pinterest Tumblr Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Transcript As fears over the economic crisis continue to erode investors' confidence, markets at home and abroad are feeling the effects. Financial analysts discuss how the markets relate to the realities of the economic turmoil. Read the Full Transcript Notice: Transcripts are machine and human generated and lightly edited for accuracy. They may contain errors. JEFFREY BROWN: Once upon a time, and not so very long ago, the Dow Jones industrial average was almost double what it is today, and millions of Americans lived in a far more financially secure world than they do now.What kind of impact is that dramatic drop having? We take a look from four different perspectives.Jim Ellis watches the broad economy as assistant managing editor of BusinessWeek. Jane Bryant Quinn writes on personal finance as a best-selling author and columnist for Newsweek and Bloomberg.com. Mark Funkhouser is the mayor of Kansas City, Mo. A Democrat, he previously served 18 years as that city's auditor. And Dan Ariely studies market and investor behavior as professor of economics at the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University.Jim Ellis, I'll start with you. Even just a few weeks ago, it seemed that the markets had calmed a bit, even gone up a bit. What can you tell us about what's driving them down again now?JIM ELLIS, BusinessWeek magazine: I think that there's been a general re-pricing in what people think will be the future value of earnings. And that supposedly is what stock prices are. I mean, investors are saying, "This is what I think companies will earn and they'll pay out in stocks, in dividends going forward."But that's not the case now, because people are understanding that the economy is in much worse shape than we originally thought, that not only is the U.S. economy in bad shape, but foreign countries are going through the same sort of recession scenario that we're going through.And that's really important, because right now about 37 percent of all the earnings of U.S. companies come from overseas. They're about six, eight months behind us in a recession, so even when we start coming out of this maybe later this year, the foreign markets that we so depend on to prop up our own economy aren't going to be there.So the market is saying, "This economy is going to be in trouble for a lot longer than we thought, and, therefore, we have to adjust stock prices down."