Money. . . So They say

Money. Everyone needs money. Times are tough and many people are in debt and not by a little but a lot. How oh how are we going to solve the economy crisis? It’s very simple really.

DON’T SPEND MONEY YOU DON’T HAVE.

Call me naive or ignorant but I have a simple rule, if I have money I spend it-wisely, not knowing when I’ll have more. If I don’t have the money I don’t buy things. I see people on Oprah complain that they have $20,000 or $30,000 in credit debt. How did this happen? Well when they were in college the credit card companies were handing out applications like candy so they got one and well . . . People were talked into buying houses they couldn’t afford. Lenders who knew they were handing out bad loans but gosh there was so much money to be made in the meantime. Banks leveraged themselves beyond their ability to pay gambling the economy would never tank. They reminds me of the character Wimpy from Popeye “If you give a hamburger today I shall pay you on Wednesday.”.

These people are idiots and I have no sympathy for them. Our free market supply and demand capitalistic culture has taught us to spend, spend, spend. Oh don’t be silly, there will always be money. Banks failing, no way. Our per capita income falling due to lack of business and jobs-ha, never.

So now people are advised on a daily basis by the news on how to save money by eating at home, buying used goods and skipping those pricey gadgets. I watch it all with a combination of incredulous awe and disgust. Either things are really bad or I’m ahead of the curve. Well DUH! of course one budgets. Of course one looks for bargains, of course one - oh never mind.

This is how things got so bad. The country , Like teenagers given an allowance to teach fiscal responsibly only to overspend and come to mommy and daddy with their hand out for more. Instead of telling them no the parents pay off their debt, wag they finger at them with the admonishment “Ok you fucked up here’s some more money, don’t do it again.” and the kids go on with their old wasteful spending ways. Our government has a 1 trillion dollar debt.

The auto industry, the banks, the lending companies, haven’t they learned their lesson? Capitalism rewards success, not failure. That’s socialism's job.

Will we find prosperity again? Will we learn the value of restraint. Will we learn that there is more to life than materialism? Our newly elected administration insists that something must be done now to save the economy. By spending more money we don’t have? With more taxes on a population that can’t afford to pay them now because they don’t have the imaginary money the government is borrowing from them?

Even I know better than that. I have no job and my chances of getting on are as good as winning the lottery so I have to find my own way to make a living. The country in the same position of having to create a new economy with the skills and knowledge we have to offer to the world. Instead of begging people to take what we have to offer, we have to offer something other people will beg us for.