11.11.09
Fingers In Ears: I’m Not Listening!
If you are at all aware of the world around you, you know that the U.S. and most of the world is experiencing an economic downturn. As part of our national response, the government has pumped billions or even trillions of dollars into keeping the financial industries going, including commercial banks, savings banks, credit unions, consumer finance companies, mortgage lenders, insurance companies, and investment banks. They have even jawboned these companies, telling them to help keep consumers in their homes in the hope that arresting the mortgage slide would enable people to once again borrow against their properties and spend money. In other words, the Bush and Obama administrations’ hope for recovery is based on a return to the asset price bubble of the past twenty to thirty years.
This should scare you. Because when you hear “recovery is coming, recovery is coming”, what you should hear is we are going to make sure that we get a truly devastating and unique economic depression. Unique because nearly every depression in the past two hundred years was deflation-based. To have one where most prices are deflating, while certain prices (energy, for example, and very likely food) are rapidly inflating will be even more devastating. Just wait until sales of almost everything fall through the floor (I’m talking double-digit percentage drops, something we have not seen since at least the 1930s) as people see prices decline, yet food and fuel prices run in the other direction with almost the same speed. Some won’t be able to afford to buy food, while farmers won’t be able to sell food for prices high enough to cover their costs.
This, of course, will lead to some civil unrest. I’m hoping this is peaceful: protest marches about the availability and pricing of food and fuel (and jobs), rather than some kind of violence. I still remember watching some of the college protests on television in the late 1960s and early 1970s. As an elementary school student, this was quite frightening. Were these crazed and violent people coming to burn down our homes and schools and kill us? (This inability to put events into proper perspective is another reason why children should not be watching television or browsing the Internet without parent supervision, including some discussions that bring historical context to the situation.) You and I can help to minimize the disruption of these things by reducing our dependence upon outside resources–plant a garden, so you can raise a portion of your own food requirements; put aside some water and canned foods, including food for your dogs and cats; get a first aid kit; get some blankets and store them with the rest of your emergency supplies–and by helping to ensure that our family members, friends, and neighbors are also provided for.
But you should not allow the government, the financial industries, and their media servants to deceive you. Stop listening to them, or even better, listen with a critical ear. When someone announces that the recession is ending, ask yourself how gross domestic product can begin to increase when 70% of that figure comes from consumer purchases, and consumers are still losing hundreds of thousands of jobs each month. And then ask yourself why they would attempt to fool you into believing that things are getting better if the economy is clearly still down in the dumps?
Are you getting it yet? Perhaps the financial industries have some control over the politicians. I’m not suggesting anything illegal, such as kickbacks. Instead, I’m suggesting that campaigning for office is increasingly expensive. As the largest beneficiary of government handouts over the past couple of years, and as the beneficiary of such laws as the 2005 Bankruptcy Elimination Act, the financial industries wield enormous power in Washington. They have a lot to gain and a lot to lose.
Rather than allowing the government / financial industry / media message to influence you, block it out. Use your brain and think for yourself. Do not allow anyone–least of all someone on the Internet that you haven’t even personally met–to do your thinking for you.
Because if you think for yourself, you will quickly realize that you should be cutting your consumption and putting away some reserves for the near future. But here’s something else you should be thinking about: if there is a food or water shortage and you obviously aren’t being affected, your neighbors will kill you and take your food and water. Piling up guns and ammo won’t help either, because some of your neighbors can match your firepower. Instead, your preservation plan should include your neighborhood’s residents and even your town’s government.
Back in the 1930s, nearly everyone had an uncle who had a farm. Families could send their teens and young adults to help Uncle Jim in Kansas, even though he didn’t really need any more “help”. This meant that they’d have food to eat and some tasks to keep them busy, keeping them from becoming hobos or joining the “roam from town to town looking for work” brigade. Now, very few of us have that connection, so we have to find ways to reduce our dependence on “the system” for our basic needs. The political and economic system of this nation is buckling under the corrosive effects of undue influence by corporations of all kinds, and the entrenched power brokers are not going to easily surrender their control. It could take between two and ten years for their power and influence to be torn away by the continuing economic crisis.
And, no, I’m not advising anyone to turn into the kind of survivalists that head for Idaho with a cache of food and guns. Again, if things ever got that bad, your weapons are not going to be sufficient to keep everyone else out. Nor should you be piling up gold–you cannot eat or drink gold, so it won’t help if basic survival is in question–or other ‘barter-type’ assets to trade for food and water. Instead, your focus should be on getting through a moderately difficult period (but more difficult than today) for a period of two to five years. In that length of time, you will exhaust your stored food and water, so your plan should include marshalling the resources to replenish those necessities.
As individuals, you should be working out what you need to do to ensure that your family gets through. But if your family is anything like mine, don’t think that telling everyone to cut spending and save up is going to help. Neither, in this age of apartment dwellers, is telling everyone to start a garden or raise chickens and rabbits. Instead, you have to be like Joseph in Egypt, preparing the way for your family members, friends, and neighbors to also get through the rough spot. As with Joseph, this isn’t a reason to brag or be bossy, but to understand that God is positioning you to help preserve your family, your friends, and your neighbors.
Again, you have to shut your ears to the message they want to send you. Use your own eyes, ears, and mind, and you will make better decisions. You really have to be like a small child who puts his fingers in his ears and says, “La, la, la, la. I’m not listening.”
One more thing I want to add. I really don’t think it will be big business and big government that gets us out of this economic mess. I think it depends upon you and I to start and / or grow our own small, locally-owned businesses (SLOBs) and to put people in our localities to work in productive jobs. It depends upon us finding local (or at least domestic) suppliers and products. It depends upon us using our brains and not allowing someone else’s agenda-influenced news to dissuade us from preparing.
…..
IceRocket tags: Economy, Econolypse
Technorati tags: Economy, Econolypse
=-=-=-=-=
Powered by Bilbo Blogger
