Oh, I don't think we'll recover from this in any one or two years if we let things collapse. One or two years, that wouldn't be all that terrible. But it'll be worse than that, a lot worse, from all the signs. You've got 150+ year old institutions disappearing here, businesses that DID survive the Great Depression, but are now gone. And, it's a vicious cycle, once it starts rolling.
Step 1) Banks collapse, then there's less credit available out there, less liquidity in the market. They stop loaning even to each other, except at exorbitant rates, or to anyone who isn't provably wealthy. We're just about to this step now. Without any liquidity in the market, we'll be firmly in step 1 within 3 months if not sooner.
Step 2) Bank runs begin, people start taking out all their money. Rich folks buy hard assets. The price of gold/silver/platinum begins to soar. This probably happens within six months. (So buy gold now if you're against the bailout, it'll be worth much more later.)
Step 3) Lacking liquidity in the market, businesses that are credit-dependent, which is a whole lot of them, begin cutting back. The layoffs begin. Unemployment soars. It reached 25% in the Great Depression. Nobody knows how bad it could be this time. Timeframe -- 12-18 months from now. It takes a while to get to this step. When the investors jumped out of windows in the Depression, most people shrugged and went back to work. A year later, the hard times really began, for everyone.
Step 4) Call this one The Long Suffering. Very little work available. If you're dependent on having a job for your income, start worrying, a lot. Soup kitchens spring up. Homelessness climbs. Shantytowns of homeless begin to appear. Crime soars, especially theft of all kinds, but really, all kinds of crime. This is the time when the poor (and the percentage of the middle class who were very job-dependent on income and are now homeless and poor too) start selling off anything and everything, and this is when those with some means step in and start buying up stuff at firesale prices, to sell some years later for big profit. Nobody knows how long this step could last. Could be 3 years, could be 10 years, might never really recover.
Step 5) Slowly, businesses rebuild, as best they can, using cash and whatever credit they can find that they can afford. As banks slowly spring back to life, credit begins to flow again, though initially at very high interest rates (supply and demand), allowing more people to move back into buildings instead of living in tents. As more credit becomes available, the economy begins to accelerate. Eventually, someday, maybe, we reach the same point we were at 3 years ago.
The indications are that this could be at least as bad as the Great Depression. So, I'd guess 5-10 years before we're past this, without any liquidity aid. I don't know if infusing the markets with liquidity would just delay this and make it worse, or not. Nobody knows. With some actual enforced regulation though, I don't think the Big Collapse is inevitable. But I'm assuming it *is* inevitable, just in case either there is no bailout or there is one and it doesn't work.
It's a gamble either way. But boy, if the Big Collapse happens and we didn't even *try* to avert it, a lot of people will be standing in soup lines and then kicking themselves all the way back to their shantytown tent cities.