Personal Rant About Economics and Out of Control Spending

SPENDING... DEBT... $$$$$$... OUT OF CONTROL CONSUMERISM...

Okay, this post and topic IS NOT AN AREA OF SPECIALITY for me.

So, this is just a brief observation with a bit of a rant and rave.

I have a friend who is a very good accountant and business manager and I joke with him about "mystical accounting procedures." By that, I mean that, to my uneducated and unenlightened eyes, accountants and financial people make wonderful and magical things happen with figures! Wave the wand/pencil, move the numbers and presto, shazam!

Smoke and mirrors. The man behind the curtain.  Slight of hand.

(I recently read an article about widespread financial mismanagement and fudging of figures to put off bad news that would alarm investors by adjusting figures and anticipating making things up in later quarters.)

We have been living WAY BEYOND OUR MEANS for a long time.

Our nation is in massive debt. Many states are in debt. Companies are in the red. Do I need to say anything about the average American family being in debt?  The dollar - what a joke on the world market (and a bad joke at that).

We spend much more than we earn. We live way beyond our means.

And we think this won't come back to bite us?

We may be in the midst of a WAKE-UP CALL about our finances and spending. I find myself wondering if there is a CORRECTIVE coming our way. Maybe we are in it. Maybe we'll find more mystical ways to avoid the financial reckoning we have been putting off.

I think it is wise, sound stewardship to start spending within our means (which probably means we have to do some radical NOT SPENDING FOR A SEASON), do whatever you need to in cutting back, living more simply, and GET OUT OF DEBT.

I have a cartoon that YOU MUST SEE. But it was a gif file and would not post on to the site. So I put it in a PDF.  Download WhatBill.pdf  It captures our unrestrained spending mentality very powerfully.

Okay, that's my rant and rave.

Brian Rice

Oh yes . . . and I do think leaders ought to think very carefully about these matters, both for our families and our organizations. What you want and what you actually need and what you can afford are often VERY FAR APART. If you can't afford it, then don't want it and in many cases (but not all) you don't need it.

Comments

[Rob Hager]

Finance has been an area of great interest for me for some years. It seemed confusing and elusive, fear of the unknown made it that way. Runnig several businesses forced me to be immersed in finance daily. Most recently I have a better understanding for the need of financial planning and the impact proper planning has on the future events and how I can respond if I am prepared. One can gain control over other people and situations with the ability to "Work the numbers". I experienced this in a partnership "gone bad". I really never connected spiritual principals with finance, they were two different worlds with a language of their own. I never stood up and paid attention until I had my first business failure.... It forced me to dug deeper to gain an understanding of how money is connected with both a negative and positive persona and how we can become bondage to it.

I could rant and rave here as well; how about the present mortgage crisis? We are led to believe it is someone else's responisbility, clean the slate and sin no more.... isn't this a new platform for the canadates to embrace? The mortgage bankers got greedy, narrow margins, big profits, oh well, shame on them, we just happen to be a victim of this spin. We get bailed out, forget the fact we are responsible for ourselves, then things will be all rosey with smooth sailing ahead. I don't buy it.

Being a good steward of our resources is our responsibility. I have taken on the challenge to embrace the adversity that came with my past failures, learn from these opportunities, change direction, then use this knowledge to mentor others. I want to be a tool that is well honed, know the real numbers and face the music. Reality isn't always pretty or easy, at least I am living witin my means. Less is more!

Thanks Brian I appreciate your "Ranting and Raving"