Cheers and Fears For Our Economy

If there is no cash saved for emergencies, then by all means start saving by cutting back on any unnecessary expenses. Examples that come to mind are eating out, excess entertainment expenses, multiple trips to the coffee shop and driving just to be driving. Usually there is a lot of fluff in our spending habits that can be trimmed back to save some cash. If there is outstanding debt, make sure you have an emergency fund of several months of expenses in place before working on decreasing debt as quickly as possible.

Most likely unemployment will continue to increase. While we all hope it happens to the other person rather than to us, layoffs can hit almost anyone. Jobs will be hard to come by so be ready to take something out of your comfort zone to make ends meet. Perhaps this will lead to a new career. There have been many new fortunes started on the garbage pile of unemployment.

Another strike against a thriving economy is our huge government debt. The economic crisis, the war on terror and the increase in government will make this even bigger in the years to come. Most likely our national leaders will try to find ways to increase taxes in the name of paying off the deficit. Even more likely is that any tax money they do pass will only slow down the recovery and increase the number of government programs.

The deficit may lower the dollar in relation to other currencies which could improve our exports if the other countries are not in a worse recession. Exports could be one of the early methods to come out of our slowdown. The key is find ways to put people back to work with businesses can be make money and pay a fair income tax resulting in a good profit for the business’ risk taken.

So batten the hatches because we are in for some tough times ahead. We will each feel the effects but more importantly we each can take responsibility to make the necessary changes to make it through and be part of the solution.