Mark West
Yo Joe!
By Mark West
Am I the only old dope who enjoys hanging out in the toy department with his kids? The uncontainable excitement is akin to a sort of hyper‐stimulation, which seems the natural result of being both surrounded by tons of toys and filled with an unlimited imagination.
I especially take pleasure in finding remakes of toys that I played with as a child, like my fav, G.I. Joes! I was known for the massive offensives launched across my back yard as Joe and Cobra duked it out for neighborhood supremacy. Fortunately, the only casualties of my wars were the occasional soldier chopped up by my Dad's lawnmower. His camo was too good for my eyes, I guess.
A recent trip to Wally World brought a surprise to my eyes. SEVEN BUCKS! What?! When I was a kid, they were two and a half bucks, which was almost three week's worth of allowance. I received a dollar a week for doing my chores.
I admit that I'm disappointed, not so much at the increased price, but in knowing that such inflation is symptomatic of the Age of Austerity. The simplest way to define this Age is in one succinct statement: Pay more, get less.
Higher grocery bills, fuel, and taxes are the earmarks of a society desperately attempting to swim upstream. A society making up ground lost in the vain pursuit of constant economic expansion. Now, nothing is inherently wrong with that other than when such is done by artificially stimulating ourselves out of the occasional, dreaded, yet necessary, recession. It's the economic equivalent of being upside down on a car note because you've traded in a couple of times before payoff.
In making recession a dirty word, we have set ourselves up for an extended period of expansive austerity. States and municipalities followed the Washington's lead in piling up debt during the housing bubble. Now, no one can afford to do what needs to be done. Well, they can't do so without raising taxes because all current funding is being used to pay for the past.
No one likes to buy ten dollars worth of gas and get less gas than they did last year. However, we are responsible for our dire dilemma. We demanded our wants be met by our government and whether we like it or not, those wants cost money. REAL money, that instead of being used for the things we need today is being used to pay for our wants from yesterday.
Hopefully, these circumstances will instruct us into a better tomorrow. Now that we know that recession, while undesirable, is necessary for continuing and sustainable economic growth, we can make better future‐oriented spending decisions. Why? Because knowing is half the battle!
© Mark West
August 12, 2010
Am I the only old dope who enjoys hanging out in the toy department with his kids? The uncontainable excitement is akin to a sort of hyper‐stimulation, which seems the natural result of being both surrounded by tons of toys and filled with an unlimited imagination.
I especially take pleasure in finding remakes of toys that I played with as a child, like my fav, G.I. Joes! I was known for the massive offensives launched across my back yard as Joe and Cobra duked it out for neighborhood supremacy. Fortunately, the only casualties of my wars were the occasional soldier chopped up by my Dad's lawnmower. His camo was too good for my eyes, I guess.
A recent trip to Wally World brought a surprise to my eyes. SEVEN BUCKS! What?! When I was a kid, they were two and a half bucks, which was almost three week's worth of allowance. I received a dollar a week for doing my chores.
I admit that I'm disappointed, not so much at the increased price, but in knowing that such inflation is symptomatic of the Age of Austerity. The simplest way to define this Age is in one succinct statement: Pay more, get less.
Higher grocery bills, fuel, and taxes are the earmarks of a society desperately attempting to swim upstream. A society making up ground lost in the vain pursuit of constant economic expansion. Now, nothing is inherently wrong with that other than when such is done by artificially stimulating ourselves out of the occasional, dreaded, yet necessary, recession. It's the economic equivalent of being upside down on a car note because you've traded in a couple of times before payoff.
In making recession a dirty word, we have set ourselves up for an extended period of expansive austerity. States and municipalities followed the Washington's lead in piling up debt during the housing bubble. Now, no one can afford to do what needs to be done. Well, they can't do so without raising taxes because all current funding is being used to pay for the past.
No one likes to buy ten dollars worth of gas and get less gas than they did last year. However, we are responsible for our dire dilemma. We demanded our wants be met by our government and whether we like it or not, those wants cost money. REAL money, that instead of being used for the things we need today is being used to pay for our wants from yesterday.
Hopefully, these circumstances will instruct us into a better tomorrow. Now that we know that recession, while undesirable, is necessary for continuing and sustainable economic growth, we can make better future‐oriented spending decisions. Why? Because knowing is half the battle!
© Mark West
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