We must learn from mistakes, look ahead

March 5, 2009 by Jason Emord 

Americans are being punished for unchecked greed

I wonder if the question that repeats in my mind goes through yours, too. Do you think what I do when you drive to school? Do you think of it when you clock into work? Go to the grocery store? Turn on your TV? 

What happened to America?

No one can escape the news of the recession. It plays on every newscast and flashes across the headlines of the newspapers lucky enough to remain in business. 

We regularly see our co-workers being handed the pink slip. When we drive past giant liquidation signs taped to the sides of stores we knew since we were old enough to peek out the window of our parents’ car, we see America changing. 

Gov. Jim Gibbons’ proposed budget cuts, President Barack Obama’s stimulus package and giant states like California running out of money are all wildfires created by the American lifestyle. That lifestyle reminds me of the roaring 20s, that great economic boom that splashed the lighter fluid of greed from the Atlantic to the Pacific. But when the stock market crashed it swept the country in the flames of karma. We were greedy; then and we paid for it. 

Evidently we have learned nothing from the history books and now we will be given the lesson over again. Perhaps this time the punishment will be worse. 

So what happened? What went wrong in America? Was it really all greed? 

If it was just greed we cannot blame only the people on Wall Street who play the high stake game of the stock market. We can’t blame the auto industry or even the state or federal governments. We blame everyone. 

That’s right, all of America is at fault for the problems we are facing now. Americans forgot how to live within their means. They forgot how to save money, how to prioritize, how to make a budget and how to make a living.  

Americans have lost sight of the American Dream. The family, the house with two cars and the whole fantasy that has captured the entertainment industry is constantly spit into the mainstream media fueling the ideal life that never existed. That ideal perpetuated irrational and irresponsible behavior among seekers of the American dream.

Banks took advantage of these hopeful people and promised them adjustable rate mortgages that got them into their homes. Like fortune tellers the lenders told of futures where the home values would rise, and like fortune tellers, all the eager homebuyers got were a handful of empty promises and an empty wallet. 

What about American businesses? The major corporations are really the governors of the country. They decide who works and who doesn’t. They decide who lands where in the economic caste system of America. Job security has vanished, as less people feel confident in employers. 

In order to keep profits high, companies cut costs, hours and personnel. Stores raise prices because shipping costs are too high. Transportation costs go up because the price of gasoline goes up, while Strip employees have to stand and wonder how they are going to pay for their child’s braces while they fill up the tank of their SUV. 

What kind of a dream is this? Why should employees fear for their jobs even when they do their best? What kind of security do we have when the federal government must bail out everyone that got us into the recession in the first place? 

If America does not change its mindset, if it does not make an attempt at fixing the flaws that ignited this wildfire, what will we see in decades to come?

It is time for Americans to learn one big lesson from all of this: Live within your means. 

The lesson is simple and is far easier to do than it is said to be. All you need to do is look at your paycheck subtract the necessities, savings and so on. The corporate mindset needs to learn to value customers and employees more than profits. Meanwhile, the federal government must set an example for states and Americans by balancing its own budget. 

If we can change America to value more than wealth and to look past creating social welfare programs that discourage personal responsibility we can become a great nation. Community, family, responsibility and honesty must become the ideals that America holds dear. Not property, not wealth, not power. 

The pursuit of happiness does not occur with the acquisition of material wealth but by accepting of responsibility. The father who lends a hand in his son’s first grade class, the teenager who does community service in a hospital, the CEO who puts his employee’s healthcare at the top of his priorities are the type of people America needs.