The threat of global economic collapse has the world wondering if they should keep their money buried in jars in their backyard or diversify their portfolio by keep some under their child's mattress and in the laundry room air conditioning vent.

But while the world burns under a pile of cash, one industry has yet to ask for a government bailout, eliminate executive bonuses or continued to help bring down the value of the Dow Jones industrial average like a calcium deprived Flavor Flav with a life size grandfather clock necklace.

The video game industry is going completely gangbusters, but it has a better chance of weathering the storm than some industries that are so strapped for cash, they consider eliminating lunchroom ketchup packets from their budget as a major balancing reduction.

1. Sales are still and always will be up

Video game sales were always high during the good times. During the bad times, video game sales look like the balance sheet of a Baskin Robbins located next door to a Weight Watchers clinic compared to the rest of the economic universe.

Reuters announced that the independent research firm of IbisWorld projected the entire video game industry would rake in nearly $42 billion by the end of 2009, a figure that has almost doubled since 2004 when things weren't so sucky. 

The Nintendo Wii - because food, clothing and shelter
aren't enough to buy your children's love.

If that's what things are like when things are bad, just imagine how good things are when God decides we can afford to see rainbows in the sky again. Video game executives are able to put 12 coats of gold on their Lamborgini Murciealgo instead of an economic eight. The floors of game developers' offices would be filled with Flaming Hot Cheetos and crumpled Coke cans instead of Andy Capp's Hot Fries and discount RC cola. Packagers in sweatshops would be "encouraged" to work harder with genuine rawhide instead of imitation vinyl whips. 

Speaking of an endless supply of obedient slaves…

2. They have an endless, expendable workforce

A crowd of video game developers go on strike and demand fairer wages, reasonable work times and an increase in "BRAAAAAAAINS".

Nothing keeps a company going harder and longer than an exhaustive supply of drones willing to do your bidding for mere crumbs an hour. It's sad really when zombies get better salaries and health benefits from eating brains for doing the bidding of no one other than an angry and vengeful God. It's in the Book of Revelations. Read it some time. Make sure your bladder is empty first.

The video game industry has the market cornered on in-demand industries. The Bureau of Labor Statistics estimated that the software publishing industry alone has more than doubled since 1990 and expects the demand for a workforce to increase to up to 32 percent by 2016.

Companies will undoubtedly face several rounds of massive layoffs. But as long as DeVry and the University of Phoenix keep cranking out programmers who dread having to design something other than a new way for Duke Nukem to defecate into the open wounds of alien scum.

3. Rich adults with money play games

Your average gamer diversifying his portfolio.

Anyone who imagines that only little kids with negative number rated attention spans and lax parental supervision are the target market for video games should never be trusted with money ever again. That includes bus fare and loose change for gumball machines since these people are old enough to remember a time when gumball machines were a growth market.

A survey by the Pew Internet and American Life Project, according to a recent report by the Economist, found that a whopping 53 percent of American adults and 97 percent of teenagers regularly play video games. The industry's biggest spenders are also young males who have more disposable income than an AIG executive who keeps his unused dollar bills in a Kleenex box.

Any industry would kill to have a target market of overpaid trust fund babies, even if it meant they would have to kill non-metaphorical babies.

4. Stores' "buyback" programs make them money off used merchandise

Being able to sell your old games for new ones sounds like the answer to the misguided dreams you pray to the god of your choice every night. Seriously, pray for something that will pull us out of the muck we always seem to find ourselves in on a daily basis. Hell, praying for a decent sequel to "Resident Evil 4" would be a step-up at this point.

Unfortunately, the "buyback" program stores like Gamestop have are designed to only do one thing: suck more change from the crevices of your being than a gas station vacuum.

It also goes far beyond selling one person a game for $50 bucks and buying it back less than two months later for three dollars in pesos. Take it from someone who used to work at Gamestop. Not me, I mean the guy in the video. I can still afford my own Ramen noodles, thank you very much.

5. Video games, like all entertainment, offer an escape

When times are tough, people are more likely to find ways to escape the troubled world that seems to plague them with every turn. Those who can't afford booze or a gun often turn to entertainment for that escape.

A crowd of unemployed Americans from the 1930s anxiously await word on the release of "Duke Nukem Forever".

During the last Great Depression (no, I'm not talking about your high school prom), two major movie studios may have shut down, but ticket sales soared especially when ticket prices were worth the modern financial equivalent of a nickel and a breath of spearmint flavored air.

Video games will undoubtedly take the place in (God forbid) the next Great Depression (no, I don't mean your future son's high school prom). It's a cheap form of entertainment that doesn't require opening a bar tab or having to scrape together loose change for the high price of a movie ticket, a hot wing appetizer or bail money.


Danny Gallagher is a freelance writer, humorist, reporter and metaphorical baby living in Texas. He can be found on the web at www.dannygallagher.net, Facebook and MySpace at www.myspace.com/dannyghatesmyspace.

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