In 1992 Bill Clinton's campaign manager James Carville famously exclaimed "It's about the economy, stupid!" And I believe that to be more relevant than ever. Each day there seems to be news that while something may be looking up, five other things are still looking downward in terms of economy and jobs.
Some time back I read an article about a 'new normal' for the economy and job market. The gist of the article was that things won't go back to the way they were. Which is understandable as things change. Take an article I read this morning about jobs being made obsolete by technology- technology is not the problem itself but the companies who integrate the technology without thinking about the people they're tossing out on their ears. It used to be there were jobs that paid well that only required a high-school diploma. This lifted many families into the middle-class and enabled them to send children to college who then in turn moved into the upper middle-class. But now those high-school diploma jobs are rapidly drying up and even a college degree sometimes isn't as valuable as it once was. Now I still feel a college degree has value and sometimes it can get you ahead in the job line but the cost of education is something that has to be addressed, too.
Living on the cheap used to be what you did when you starting out or getting back into the game after getting knocked down. Now it's normal for so many people even for those who have a steady job. Wages have not kept up with inflation and the vicious cycle that the powers-that-be can't seem to realize is that without money to spend there is no real way to stimulate economic growth. Companies come back and say they can't hire and increase wages without cutting into profits. Bullshit- these greedy bastards cut wages and people starting in 2008 and then put the fear of joblessness into the remaining souls they had on the payroll and squeezed more productivity for less money. But I will say that's starting to come back on some companies (Wal-Mart comes to mind- I read an article about how their sales are starting to hurt because they won't hire enough people to stock and service their stores).
But I wonder how people would change if they did have more money- would they more careful? Would they focus on managing debt and saving more money? Or would they revert to the free-wheeling spend-for-all ways pre-2008? Personally, as long and as hard as this recession has been I don't think people would revert to pre-2008 ways if wages did take an upturn. I would hope that people would listen to common sense and not give in to consumer madness. Now some nitwit-pundits will say if people are too cautious then it will perpetuate the cycle of a suck-ass economy. Why would that happen if people will spend money but not at insane levels? I don't see a need for insane corporate profits and get-rich-quick bullshit like it seemed to be pre-2008. For me, as I earn more I'm sticking to my goal of getting out of debt and building up a solid savings and investment plan. And I won't live beyond my means for any damn corporate entity or some dumb-ass pundit who doesn't know jack-shit about the real world.
The new normal right now of living on the cheap sucks. People should be able to have money to spend on what they want to instead of having to say 'no' to themselves and worst of all, their kids. And I'm not talking about gold-plated Mercedes spending desires here- I'm talking about being able to go the movies or eat out once a week type of spending here. I'm solidly middle-class and even if I got rich I don't think my mindset would change. Going without does bring things into perspective both good and bad and the good far outweighs the bad in the sense that you see what really matters: the people around you and how you live your life. If you can take care of yourself then you can help out those with even less.
Poverty sucks and it's not a choice. But living hand-to-mouth and on the cheap because you have no choice also sucks. So when it comes to the economy, stupid it's not just a catch phrase: it's a way of life that shouldn't be.
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