How is it still possible? I'd really like to know.
Might U.S. workers come to like a shorter workweek?
Setting aside, for a moment, acute financial worries, furloughs might also help answer larger questions underlying the economic crisis: What will America look like when it is over? Will it resume being a nation of spenders instead of savers? Will Americans be content with smaller houses and fewer things? Weren't they working too much, anyway?
Okay. I am setting aside these acute financial worries for a moment. Will there be an autopsy when it is over?
Smaller paychecks, she said, would "dampen down the competitive consumption that's associated with the high-hours economy," leading to a sustainable way of life.
The solution to a debt crisis is smaller paychecks? This will create a sustainable way of life? I must be missing something.
Other studies have shown that vacation, leisure time and shorter hours reduce stress and physical ailments like heart disease - though those ills can pile up again if you can't pay the mortgage or the car mechanic.
I can't believe I'm reading this. Yes, those ills can pile up. Wasn't I just told to ignore the acute financial worries for a moment though? I guess that moment ended.
Without money for nightclubs or dinners out, she said, "you can't be as busy because you don't have as much luxury."
Call it forced un-busy-ness (declining business pun alert). You really won't be busy if you are employed in the nightclub and/or restaurant business. As a side note, what happens to a service economy when people stop paying for services?
Officials Encourage Unemployed Chinese College Students to Seek Jobs in Rural Areas
China is currently facing a rise in unemployment rates throughout the nation. It is estimated that 20 million Chinese migrant workers have lost their jobs this year. Meanwhile, unemployment is soaring among college graduates. Chinese authorities are encouraging unemployed college graduates to seek jobs in rural areas as solution to the unemployment problem.
Meanwhile, we should embrace the idea of relaxing, taking vacations, and working less? Seriously? Good luck on that one!
When the tough gets going, the tough gets going home to relax in front of the TV. Here's a sampling of what we might see.
Lack of traction action and lack of monster trucks! We're turning this economy into a giant dust bowl Thursday, Friday, and Saturday! This IS a grandma's boy great depressionary Sunday picnic! You'll be borrowing the whole seat but you'll only use the edge!
That seems to be the theory anyway.
Hello, I found your blog on a google search for "optimism." I guess there are different levels of intervention. The smaller pay check, fewer work hours etc is not going to be the solution, but it may be one outcome of the overhaul of excess that our culture has embraced.
ReplyDeleteIn any case, if you want some ideas for practicing your own personal optimism, I wrote a piece about this on Huffington Post. We can't always impact what is happening in our lives, but we do have choices about how we narrate the story...
All best,
Tamar Chansky
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tamar-chansky/how-to-practice-safe-opti_b_167443.html
Tamar Chansky,
ReplyDeleteThanks for the link and I can certainly understand and even sympathize with the points of your article. The world does not need more pessimists. It never has and it never will.
That being said, I do think we have a slight disagreement on the definition of an optimist though. I tend to think...
Pessimist: Expects the worst possible outcome.
Optimist: Expects the best possible outcome.
Realist: Expects the most likely outcome.
Using that criteria, history has shown that although I started an Illusion of Prosperity blog in 2007, I was actually leaning towards optimism.
Using hindsight, the economy is doing much worse than I expected. For example, the stock market has lost more than 40% since starting this blog. Fortunately, I was also leaning more towards realism than most. I sold all my stocks in 2004. I felt we were trying to "borrow" the recovery from our grandchildren and I didn't think it would work.
In my opinion, we are doing it again but in a much bigger way. There will be more unintended consequences. We can't borrow our way back to prosperity, especially since excessive debt is one of our problems.