Never be satisfied with what you achieve today, it pales in comparison with what you are capable of doing tomorrow.
While politicians on Capital Hill take group photo’s, play electoral games and contemplate their proposed bail out of our plagued financial system, the stock market continues to grind lower. The rescue plan would involve the U.S. government spending $700 billion on questionable assets from the growing number of distressed financial institutions – nationalizing the money losing part of the financial sector. As President Bush try’s to bully Congress into “rising to the occasion” and approving the legislaton, leading lawmakers resume difficult negotiations that will be debated for years to come whether the bail out plan gets approval or not.
Let the reality check record show that neither portfolio managers, economists or government leaders know for certain if the stimulus plan under consideration will help stop the bleeding or even stabilize markets at all.
What we do know..? The subprime mortgage crisis, credit crunch and weakening dollar have crippled capital markets sending financial giants crashing to their knees and pushing our economy to the brink of collapse. Making matters worse, the housing market continues to plummet, there’s no credit for anyone with anything less than perfect credit history and the consumer is dying. People on fixed incomes, who thought they were on cruise control, are now feeling the inflationary wrath of raging fuel, food and healthcare costs.
The prudent man’s rule when calculating how much one can afford to pay for a home without getting in over your head is typically no more than 3-4x your annual income.
In 2005 (the peak of the United States housing bubble) the economy was booming, jobs were plentiful, consumers were spending and the real estate market was unstoppable. However, irresponsibly unnoticed the median home price had become six to nine times greater than median income. That was the sign banks chose to ignore. Despite this dislocation, lenders were tripping over themselves to make loans based on the unrealistic misconstrued concept that property values would always continue to soar.
Was there anything better then rolling out of bed, pouring yourself a bowl of Captain Crunch with Crunch Berries and plopping down in front of the TV in your pajamas to enjoy your favorite Saturday morning line up?
1970– In the early days we were entranced by the slap stick off-the-wall shenanigans of Bugs Bunny, Tweety, Sylvester, Heckle & Jeckle, and Woody Woodpecker. And who could forget that pathetically mischievous, yet ingenious, Wile E. Coyote and how his dastardly plans to capture the Road Runner were consistently foiled by those faulty ACME rockets or simply out-witted by the Road Runner himself (which usually ended up with an explosion and trademark puff of smoke).
Back in the late 70’s and early 80’s, my brother and I spent many road trips in the back of my mother’s station wagon. Booster seats didn’t exist, there were no such thing as air bags and seat belts were just something you tucked into the crack of the seat to get them out of the way. We were simply tossed into the back cargo area like loosely packed groceries.
There were no handheld gaming devices or cell phones – we had one of those primitive triangular peg board puzzle games and the Rubic’s Cube. Most of the time we would just sit back there and watch the other cars. Like many kids on long trips we found amusement in waving to anyone who would wave back, signaling truck drivers to blow their horns… but, our favorite pass time was One Eyed Jack.