OK. So the Dow Jones index has plunged nearly 500 points as I sit down to write this. The U.S. economy is clearly in a recession now as stock values have dropped close to 20% since last fall – the big red flag in every economist’s handbook that indicates a recession’s presence. In fact, stock markets all over the world are getting slammed this week – London’s fell nearly 5.5%, Germany’s dropped 7.16%, Japan’s is off 3.86%, and even China watched stock values slide over 5%. It’s clearly bad all over.
But I am going to push all that off to the side for a moment, because, frankly, the worth of humanity isn’t tied up in stocks, bonds, indexes and other numbers. Sure, they make life easier or harder – depending on which way the balances swing – but they don’t determine who and what we are, especially in moments of crisis. Will we panic? Will we stand on the sidelines and watch? Or will we cinch the belts a little tighter and get ready to dig ourselves out of this mess?
Me, I vote for option three for I see it in operation much of the time. Here’s a small example from this morning. A woman gets a flat tire out near my youngest daughter’s preschool. I stop to help out. Before a few minutes have passed, so does a Fairfax County police officer. He puts on his emergency lights to warn traffic, then without pause begins to change her tire. He could have told me to do it, could have let her husband do it (he arrived in short order after his wife called him via cellphone). But he just jumped in and got it done – see problem, apply solution, wipe hands, have a nice day. Fairfax’s finest at work.
Stuff like that, even though it’s small scale, helps keep my faith in humankind at a high level. In fact, it goes on pretty frequently all over the world – neighbor helping neighbor, stranger helping stranger – but of course that isn’t dramatic enough for TV or print journalism these days.
There are exceptions, of course: The Washington Post wrote a nice front-page story a while back (above the fold no less!) about two twin doctors who – on their own – flew to Afghanistan in a plane they rented, choked full of supplies bought on their nickel, to provide medical services in the dusty remote villages of that mountainous war-torn country. They got robbed, they got threatened, they even had to beg for protection from local drug lords so they could help people they didn’t even know.
So, yes, we’ve got some very tough days ahead as the global economy is poised for backward slide that a lot of well-paid experts didn’t think would happen. But there’s enough resilience and willing hands out there to help us get through them.



January 23rd, 2008 @ 8:21 am
In the last few days we have seen two huge gestures to encourage people to keep spending: Presdident Bush announces large tax breaks and the Fed cuts its rate by .75%
What else could prove how fundamentally powerful the consumers are in this whole structure. The mere notion that consumers want to retain more of their hard-earned money by spending less sends the entire system into a panic, and the most powerful institutions in the world bend over backwards to appease the all-powerful consumer. Unfortunately, this also shows that the system requires consumers to continue spending their money even when the world is already over-saturated with useless material. At some point we have to accept that if we want to reduce our levels of consumption, or at least be smarter about what we buy, then we have to accept the idea that our standard of living will change. This need not be a bad thing, we have to be brave! It will weed out some of the less important elements.
January 23rd, 2008 @ 9:41 pm
Sean, Sean, Sean! Please don’t try to be an economist. “The U.S. economy is clearly in a recession now…” Not so. The book definition of the “R” word is “Two consecutive quarters of negative growth.” We haven’t even had one. Yes, slowing. Yes, volatile. But I still see lots of signs of growth. To your point, we will tighten our belts, but we still have it pretty good compared to a lot of others. There are countries where a flat tire might be anything from robbery to death, depending on where and when it happens. Maybe if the Post, WSJ, USA Today, Fleetowner, and others focus more on the positive as in your example, we will look back on these times scratching our heads and wondering what all the fuss was about.