This is not a recession like the early 80’s or the tech bubble burst like 2000. This time it cuts a little deeper. This time it feels more personal. People, business and governments around the world are changing.
Restaurants are shedding their expensive rib eye for more affordable cuts like hanger steak. Buying brands as status labels (Gucci sunglasses from Macy’s anyone?) now come attached with a sense of guilt. It was even noted that the recession has even affected the usual bling world of Hip Hop during this year’s Grammys.
Von Lucy Kellaway of Germany’s Financial Times writes this,
“This is our first experience of recession in the internet age, and so far I don‘t like it one little bit. …The web has mentally joined us at the hip, so we can no longer put our heads in the sand. If that sounds painfully contorted, it is because it is…Through blogs, websites and e-mails the world’s economic ills are fed to us on a drip all day long. It is not just that we hear about bad things faster, we hear about more of them and in a more immediate way.”
On Tuesday the President of the United States will sign the 787 billion stimulus bill into action. One of the much talked about provisions is the executive pay cap of $500,000 which The New York Times points out
“To many people in many places, it ($500,000) is a princely sum to live on. But in the neighborhoods of New York City and its suburban enclaves where successful bankers live, half a million a year can go very fast.”
While many of us may not necessarily feel any sort of pity for those who helped us get into this mess in the first place, we do need to stop to think about the ripple effect this cap may have on us. Executives, forced to sell their lavish vacation homes will further drive down real estate values in popular destinations. Kids are taken out of private schools and put into public schools where classrooms are already crowded because the school system was forced to cut teachers this year. Some of our favorite retail establishments will close their doors. High-end vodka in luxury VIP rooms? This is the end of the age of excess.
“In market-research terms, purchases fall into two categories: staple and discretionary. In the past decade or so, New York consumers have had these things, the need and the want, mixed up. Now, that distinction is being reestablished, and forcefully.” (source: New York Magazine)
For all the bad news, there are bright spots. Families are spending more time together. The national divorce rate is dropping. Movie ticket sales for the past three months have been on the rise. Companies (and employees) are being forced to innovate to survive.
Tyler Cowan an professor of economics at George Mason University writes
“In addition to trying to get out of the recession — our first priority — many of us will be making do with less and relying more on ourselves and our families. The social changes may well be the next big story of this recession.”
On the historic morning of November 5th, people line up in front of the New York Times to get a copy of the day’s newspaper.
In a fast-paced digital world where news images pop up on our screens and then just as quickly disappear, paper seemed the only way to capture a permanent memento of the emotions most of us were feeling.
Leading US newspapers including The Washington Post, The New York Times, Chicago Tribune and San Fransisco Chronicle were all forced to fire up their printing presses for a second time to keep up with the demand.
Say what you will, one could surmise that all those years of watching American Idol taught young people one thing. Their vote does matter.
Rock the Vote, a nonpartisan political advocacy group that targets younger voters, reported that over 2.5 million new registrants signed on for this election, more than doubling the amount in 2004. And turn-out by voters younger than 30 in the 2008 primaries and caucuses nearly doubled that of eight years ago
“The increase in youth turnout has not been a response to Obama, it’s been a response to George Bush … If you’re our age, you’re thinking about the kind of world you’re inheriting, and it’s pretty scary right now.” - Shana Hurley, Tufts junior, President of Tufts Democrats, Tufts Daily
As you read this, it is important to remember that the average American voter is 55-years old. That means that all of our political polling, media coverage and grass-roots organizing has largely been structured around white middle-class individuals. Until this election, 18-year olds on FaceBook were not even a seed in people’s minds. Pollsters suddenly needed to target younger generations who were used to communicating through cell phones and text messages. And then there was the additional question on everyone’s minds: Would they even get out and vote?
And vote they did.
The news reports rolling in this morning are indicating that the youngest members of this country – voters under 30, turned out in record numbers – and they largely voted Democratic. Some reports had the numbers at 66% [Obama] vs. 32% [McCain] At almost 2 to 1 it shows a shifting liberal population that is looking to the President to create a better world than the one they are living in now.
“America is facing unprecedented challenges. More unanticipated crises will inevitably present themselves during your presidency. May the next four years be better than the last. I put my faith in you.” - Lauren Sal, Barnard College sophomore + Executive Director of the College Republicans, Colombia Spectator
In the end, it will be interesting to see the effects of this election. Data historically suggests that new voters who participate in elections continue to make civic engagement a life-long habit. One would surmise that given the turn out, the Democrat Party would be the benefactors of this surge of loyalists in the long run.
Maybe we all will. Understanding that their participation and activeness will matter, the young voters of today will soon be the volunteers, the changemakers and the business and government leaders of tomorrow.
Outside of a small clothing boutique in Williamsburg, Brooklyn a chalkboard sign has the words “These Times They Are a Changin” scrawled in large blue cursive loops. Next door at the bodega, neighborhood locals in ball caps and hoodies sit on the stoop chain smoking cigarettes, talking about the events in the news and calling out smack to passerby’s who recently moved into the neighborhood with shiny new shoes and shiny new cars.
Unstable economy. War. Global warming. Political unrest. Foreclosures. Job loss. High prices. Credit crisis. Recession. Depression. Socialism or not? These are the headlines we wake up to everyday. No wonder Americans are looking for ways to reestablish a feeling of control over their world. They are anxious. They are restless. And they’re mad as hell that this country has put them in this situation in the first place.
Last week the UN Council released a report that was picked up largely by news agencies outside of the U.S. that the growing wealth gap, racial divide and urban growth rates here in the U.S. have essentially created “a social time bomb” waiting to go off.
Who can you trust?
For some generations who experienced the dot.com bust, Enron, 9/11 and now the Wall Street bailouts in his or her short lifetime, it seems like barely anyone. More and more people are finding subversive ways to take care of themselves because right now, it seems like no one else will. When anger goes unexpressed it can manifest itself through physical manifestations – most people react with a flight or fight reaction. In worse case scenarios, history has shown us that anger becomes a social force that can move a society to destroy its ability to interact on an everyday level.
Other indications point toward a pressure cooker that increasingly either needs to find ways to release steam or risk the potential of exploding:
- While little attention has come from the national news, there have been a number of local news reports pointing to the efforts being taken to secure increased police controls and riot guards on November 4th with the expectation of civil unrest in major metropolitan areas around the country.
- In states such as Ohio, Indiana and Florida, it’s reported that gun sales have gone up as much as 10-15% in the months before the election. Some argue this is simply a matter of precaution against a largely Democratic anti-gun cabinet. Still others believe that with uncertain future and an economic crisis that crime will go up and it may be leading people to buy guns for personal safety.
- In response to the growing food crisis, Chef Dan Barber was quoted in Grist Magazine as saying:
“…according to some reports, there are now over 12 percent of the U.S. population going hungry, and globally over 2 billion people live on less than $2 a day. When food costs go up 5 or 10 percent for those populations, it is a crisis. And anyone who thinks we can avoid civic unrest under such circumstances is simply not paying attention.”
In a New York Times editorial in response to the economic and credit crisis, Margaret Atwood writes
“As for what will happen to us next, I have no safe answers. If fair regulations are established and credibility is restored, people will stop walking around in a daze, roll up their sleeves and start picking up the pieces. Things unconnected with money will be valued more — friends, family, a walk in the woods. “I” will be spoken less, “we” will return, as people recognize that there is such a thing as the common good.
On the other hand, if fair regulations are not established and rebuilding seems impossible, we could have social unrest on a scale we haven’t seen for years.”
I’m no fatalist. Nor fearmonger. But I do believe that the next few months will bring about some very public outcry for change and if ignored, as Atwood points out, we may very well be heading into a new generation of unrest.
Yes, times are changing indeed!
It is change, continuing change, inevitable change, that is the dominant factor in society today. No sensible decision can be made any longer without taking into account not only the world as it is, but the world as it will be.
— Isaac Asimov
