Dandelyon's Worlds

The more I ponder our economic woes, the more I come to the conclusion that everyday middle-class consumers are the wind that powers our economy.

 

Let me explain why I say that.

 

Certain politicians right now are making a big point of giving economic power to “job producers”. In other words, they want us to make sure rich people and big corporations can keep paying a lower percentage of taxes than a middle-class family, and be happy about that because of a belief that this means they will automatically create new jobs. However, I have not seen this happen. Instead, over and over, I’ve seen corporate executives say, “not enough people are buying our product, so we have no choice but to lay off workers.”

 

Bailing out the banks didn’t stop that behavior, tax loopholes didn’t stop that behavior, lower tax rates on corporations didn’t stop that behavior—and why should it have? If few are buying, paying more workers to make more stuff is not profitable. It could even reasonably be called wasteful.

 

Big business is all about profit. To a corporation, taxes are just a cost of business. If they can still make a profit, higher taxes on a business won’t convince them to stop participating in the economy.

 

Families, however, are about living and having a good life—now and on into the future. To a family, money isn’t an end—it’s a means. A means to food, shelter and clothing. A means to fun and beauty. A means to security.

 

If a family doesn’t have enough money to survive comfortably, they cannot participate meaningfully in the economy. If they don’t have enough to feel secure, even if they have a good surplus of income over basic costs they will dramatically cut back their participation in the economy, saving for a rainy day in the hopes that if they save enough, they will survive the next layoff, illness, or other disaster.

 

As a result, and in contrast to a business, taking more taxes from a family that's already scared or struggling has a dramatic effect on that family's ability and willingness to participate in the economy.

 

It’s not the “job producers” that drive the economy. They’re just the people at the wheels of our figurative sailing ships. With no wind to fill the sails the guys at the wheels may have power and prestige, but the ships drift. For the ships to move, you need to fill the sails with the wind of commerce. For the ships to move, you need millions of people buying things.

 

For the ships to pick up speed, you need the breeze created by money freely and joyously changing hands.

 

So sure—squeeze the middle class and the poor. Give the money to the steersmen, who will save it up hoping for a sunny day in the future when they can use that cash to make more profit. After all, we're doing just fine drifting around, right?

Our heater started right up this year. And then stopped a few days later.

I just found out that fixing it will cost more than $1000. Replacing it would be smarter in the long run, but would, of course, cost even more.

And I still don't have a permanent job.

If this had happened last year while I was on unemployment, I would likely have qualified for some help in paying for a replacement. But as it is, even with the week off and 3 and 6-hour work weeks last month, since I was getting some unemployment during those weeks, I'm pretty sure I made just enough over the last three months to not qualify.

I hate asking for help. I'd much rather pay my own way. But aving reached a point where I was willing to ask for help, finding out that I can't get it is depressing.

And to top it off, my laptop computer turned itself off at lunch while I was writing an article for a EMG zine, even with the little fan thingy underneath it whirring away.

Life Ain't Fair. But mostly it works out OK, with good will and elbow grease and the right kind of luck.  And the support of friends and family.

OVFF was this weekend, and I wasn’t there.  The decision was made long ago; gas and heating costs are way, way up; groceries are up; everything is up except, of course, my salary is about the same.  Hotel rooms are expensive, but not nearly as bad as gas for the trip.  But this year, instead of sitting around town when all my friends were in Ohio, I ended up driving into Chicago.  The Aunt who was a second mother to my sisters, brother, and me, and now to our children, had been in the hospital all week with something they first tried to treat with antibiotics; when that didn’t work, she was scheduled for major surgery for yesterday.  So my daughter cancelled her social plans and we drove in to Chicago, to help with a cousin’s birthday party (you can't cancel such things, esp. when the kid just started at a new school) and visit my Aunt both Saturday and Sunday.  I made an extra trip Saturday night to take her her mail and her checkbook, so she could pay bills and have one less thing to worry about.  I also did a bunch of little things, like cleaning perishables out of her fridge, bringing in plants before the first real freeze, turning down the thermostat, stuff like that, so when my Aunt gets home, it will still be comfortably homey.  And I took her absentee ballot application to her.  It was good to see her, and spend time talking in person instead of on the phone.

It was also very good to hear, yesterday, that the surgery went a little faster than the doctors had guessed it might, and that things look good.  Of course, she’ll be in ICU a while, and we’ll keep worrying about her for some time, but we can hope the worst, of this challenge at least, is behind us.  

I wouldn’t have been able to be there if I’d already been in Ohio, so, although I very much miss seeing everyone I’d have seen at the con, it’s just as well I didn’t go this year.  It was good to be able to be there for someone who’s always been there for me.

I have these tall, beautiful tomato plants that have just a very few green tomatoes on them, pretty much the first of the season. The purple “green bean” plants are bug-eaten and no longer flowering. The herbs are doing well, but while fresh herbs make the food taste really good, they don’t significantly reduce the grocery bill. But the growing season will soon be over. And my financial situation is much like that of many Americans, despite our President’s repeated claim the last 7 years that the economy is strong, and now things have gotten so blatantly bad that even he has to admit there’s a crisis. I worry about paying for “little” basics like heat and food.

With my asthma and allergies, and sleep apnea besides, there’s no way I could keep the hours required by getting a second job of the normal, boring sort; and extra income from creative things is harder to come by when the economy is bad, though I’m trying. I sent out a screen play to Hotel Guignol; and two re-written short stories to new markets, and finally got set up on http://portraitadoption.com/ , with the first two test portraits uploaded and accepted, and a few more to scan and crop and upload in the next few days. And I started a new short story last night, though I’m only a few paragraphs into it.

So, here’s hoping that a light is about to appear at the end of this tunnel!

Like (mdlbear), my life has been much out of balance for far too long.  A lot of this is finances.  When the Weed took office in the white house, my finances were comfortable.  Barely, there were too many times I had to choose between things that really mattered to me, but I didn't feel as if my life were precarious.  I was able to put more into my 401K than the minimum needed to get the company's half-matching contribution to it.  I believed I would be able to pay for materials, and, when needed, expert manpower, for renovating my house.  And I was looking at trying to get to more cons & fests.  Now is quite a different story.  I really wish I could go to Minicon, but the gas money isn't doable.  Never mind hotel and membership and eating out.  Sigh.

Kathy Mar said it best, one time when I started to say, "I know money doesn't make you happy" and stopped, at a loss for words.  She said, "but not having enough money can make you miserable".  Too, too true.

Or maybe Julia Ecklar "how can I find balance with no ground beneath my feet"?

In other areas, some of them, anyway, balance is a bit better than in recent  years.  I've been doing a little songwriting; and having fish in bright tanks, proving both light and "wild" natural behavior to stare at (and fish fry swimming happily by the bed) seems to help the winter-induced lethargy significantly.  It's amazing how much babies can cheer a person, even if they're tiny and cold-blooded and not the least bit cuddly.  (Though upon turning the light in the tank on late one night, I saw that baby fish do, at least sometimes, sleep in a "puppy pile".  Maybe it's just the huge, warm-blooded hairy monster that doesn't inspire them to cuddle.)

But I keep on wishing for more money or more time, or better yet, both. 

There's people going past our offices, chanting something, like a protest march I can't hear through the windows.  Wonder what's up?  (I went to look, but all that I can see now is multiple squad cars hanging out.  All my co-workers could tell me is that the protesters, if that's what they were, were on bicycles.) 

Oh, well, off to my tax appointment.  Didn't realize I was making it for Equinox when I made it...