Ten Things Since I was Ten…
When I hear sobering headlines like “the economy is shrinking at fastest pace since 1980,” and “we are living in the lowest level of growth since 1980,” it’s down right frightening. Some in the media have accused the new Obama administration of waging a campaign of fear to get their stimulus package passed… but still, numbers don’t lie. Our economy is in bad shape.
But when I hear President Obama using words like “catastrophic” and make statements like “if we don’t act immediately… our nation will sink into a crisis, that at some point, will be much tougher to reverse,” it triggers the chronic optimist in me. Call me crazy, but no matter how bad life ever got growing up, my mother always consoled me that “the sun will still come up” tomorrow. And fortunately, she was right.
In 1980, I was ten. Unemployment was approaching 10%, inflation at 14%. Things were pretty bad. But the world didn’t cease to exist. The sun still came up, birds continued to sing and rainbows didn’t disappear.
And by the way, here are ten things that weren’t around then…
10. Artificial Hearts, Statins and Viagra
9. DNA Fingerprinting
8. Global Positioning Systems (How did we ever get there?)
7. PCs, Laptops and Blackberries
6. MP3s and iPods
5. DVDs
4. Personal Email, Google and Facebook
3. Camcorders, Digital Cameras and Web Videos
2. Hybrid Cars
1. A Starbucks on every corner
Imagine life WITH the worst economy as today WITHOUT all of those things we encounter in our everyday lives… How in the world did we survive?!
The Senate passed an $838 billion Stimulus Package today. Seems like a lot of money, and I hope it works. But if it doesn’t, I bet the sun will still come up tomorrow.
