(No poll since I want explanations.)

I find it rather strange that I don't see a lot of discussion about the economy (in particular the consumption side of things) apart from the bottom lines of the companies involved. So, I just want to ask how you think the economy would go in the next few years, and maybe the impact on ourselves.

To make it simple, let's divide this into the three regions we normally track here:

US: I don't think the economy will be able to sustain the momentum it had in 2014. The shale oil boom is starting to blow up due to low oil prices, and...I just don't think that QE is working for the typical consumer.

EU: It'll be flat and stay flat. I doubt Grexit will happen while Tsipras is in power, though.

Japan: I don't think Abenomics is working, the economy will stay flat because everyone else is doing it now.

...or something like that. It'd be interesting to see how people here perceive the way the economy is going.

Allot of those countries need a real recession that purges the weaker elements of their economy.

Recessions and companies failing are part of a healthy economy as they free up resources for more effective/efficient people to utilize. You can only prop up the weaker companies with special privileges and bailouts for so long.

Zombie firms are a problem, but the alternative is severely painful.

Economics is demand-driven, after all. If you "let" General Motors go bust, for instance, that's a ripple effect that could put millions out of work, which means millions of people scraping by and buying only the bare essentials; not buying cars, not buying houses, not buying TVs or movie tickets or good restaurant meals. This creates a further knock-on effect as other car companies now have to contract.

Supply side economics doesn't solve this because no matter how easy you make investment, people are NOT going to invest if there's no demand for a product or service due to the depressed economy. They'll invest in safe things like financial instruments or Sovereign Debt (which is why, despite effectively negative shadow interest rates on Treasury bonds, people still buy 'em because it's safer than plugging it into an auto startup).

This is not to say that supply side is useless: an economy with low barriers to investment and entrepreneurship is going to be more nimble than an economy with high barriers, but when you have a slump, money in people's pockets is what unsticks the system. Governments all over the world are scared of "handouts", however, or stuck in pigheaded belt-tightening loops which simply make the process worse (lay off government workers and guess what? That's less people who can buy consumer goods, so less demand for capital investment from companies providing consumer goods, etc. The lower taxes in no way make up for that, especially because in a lot of these cases those taxes simply are diverted into debt payment and not actually lowered).

For the OP:

The U.S. economy is making its way back, although the return of people to the labor force is going to keep the unemployment rate steady and keep wages stagnant for a while, because it will be some time before labor force participation is corrected.

Europe is going to go through a long run of stasis unless Germany gets their head out of their collective kiester and lets QE and stimulus happen.

Japan, however, seems to have realized their error in the increased sales tax, though it remains to be seen if they can divert in time.

China will cool off, but hopefully not shrink.

Russia needs to diversify NOW or risk losing all momentum entirely.

It all depends on the price of the oil in my country. I live in Norway, which was built by oilmoney.

Just read an article recently that 95% of shale oil in the US could still be profitable off of 40$ a barrel. Currently, it's at 50$.
It's expected that the price war will continue into the summer.

Mixed bag. The lower energy prices will aid utility and transportation based companies and add savings to consumer pockets. It will definitely affect oil producing companies and countries in negative fashion.

Much of next few years is how much the markets responds to lower pricing with demand.

the US is fucked, there are mutliple debt crisis just to break out(shaleoil companys, students, homeowner,carloans)
and most grow came from shaleoil, an industrie that cant survive if the oilprice stays below 80 for some time(they make profit at 40, and evben at 30, but just as long as they dont drill new holes)

europe on the other hand is profiting a lot from the lower oilprices, but has a lot of other problems, they can grow, but just if an impulse comes from outside.

South America is fucked.
Brazil and Argentina are stagnant and show no sign of recovery.
Venezuela is doomed and will probably stop being an important player at this rate.
Worst part, all of the smaller economies of the region are following the radical left that is crippling our opportunities for expansion.

The UK is currently doing great ATM, but I am very worried that the rest of the world doing pretty shit will make our growth stagnate again. But that's where I'm hoping that the low oil prices will help kick start the European economies, especially Germany. If we can get Germany and the UK growing strongly Europe, the US doing decently and Japan starting to move things will look a lot brighter, as like they say, a rising tide lifts all ships, but I do feel like the PIIGS+France are just going to fuck things up in Europe again soon enough, as the only country that has actually move in any positive direction is Ireland, and how much of that is just because of us (The UK) doing well remains to be seen.

Economics is demand-driven, after all. If you "let" General Motors go bust, for instance, that's a ripple effect that could put millions out of work, which means millions of people scraping by and buying only the bare essentials; not buying cars, not buying houses, not buying TVs or movie tickets or good restaurant meals. This creates a further knock-on effect as other car companies now have to contract.

Losing jobs can be painfull for the economy but also has long term positive effects. General Motors was a failure and was a waste of economic resources that needed to be freed up for better existing companies and new entrants to the market. And the other upside is that the economy does not accumulate losers like General Motors who create a potentially more dangerous situation. If one general motors going out of business is bad imagine ten going out of business at once? The government will reach a point where so many companies fail because they have been propped up to long by the government they can no longer stop what will then be a real depression.

Supply side economics doesn't solve this because no matter how easy you make investment, people are NOT going to invest if there's no demand for a product or service due to the depressed economy. They'll invest in safe things like financial instruments or Sovereign Debt (which is why, despite effectively negative shadow interest rates on Treasury bonds, people still buy 'em because it's safer than plugging it into an auto startup).

Even in depressed economies there is a demand for goods and services that people will be willing to invest resources into producing to meets these demands and possibly seek out new markets oversea's which is something America desperately needs given it's trade deficits since the mid 70's. There might also be more incentive to invest in auto start ups if barriers to new entrants were decreased and companies like general motors were allowed to fail freeing up market space.

This is not to say that supply side is useless: an economy with low barriers to investment and entrepreneurship is going to be more nimble than an economy with high barriers, but when you have a slump, money in people's pockets is what unsticks the system. Governments all over the world are scared of "handouts", however, or stuck in pigheaded belt-tightening loops which simply make the process worse (lay off government workers and guess what? That's less people who can buy consumer goods, so less demand for capital investment from companies providing consumer goods, etc. The lower taxes in no way make up for that, especially because in a lot of these cases those taxes simply are diverted into debt payment and not actually lowered).

If governments all round the world are afraid of handouts that's the first I'm hearing of it. Their has not been a single country that I could honestly say engaged in meaningful austerity including Germany. And while laying off government workers means less consumption from their end they also mean less taxation on the other end. If the government workers can't buy as much they can simply seek customers from the excess capital that is no longer being wasted on government expenditure and is in their own pocket. And while some jobs may disappear other jobs will be created, governments have at times let recessions run their course and the economy recovered in due course. The problem is that so many jobs should not exist be them government jobs or the jobs of people working at propped up companies that when the government can no longer stop them failing it will take the economy years to recover.

Europe is going to go through a long run of stasis unless Germany gets their head out of their collective kiester and lets QE and stimulus happen.

More inflation is not going to do anything other than discourage saving which is a big part of the problem in the first place. When people consume beyond what they produce it will always catch up with them. China will be unwilling to sustain American consumption forever.