The papers are all saying so: this is the greatest economic crisis since the Great Depression. We’re all beginning to believe it. Formidable investment institutions have crashed and burned; strong banks have failed; lending institutions have gone out of business; and now buying and selling are slowing down to a crawl, if not a stop, from what has been a very long and very imprudent run. The government bail-out, which has always bailed us out previously, is not starting the machine running again. What will happen next? Wait and see. That’s about all we can do.
The fact is, no matter how or when a recovery comes, we can be sure it will not be sudden or even soon, and certainly not complete. Most likely, we are going to be asked to do with less, for a long time–as a country and as individuals. And how will we respond to this challenge?
A sense of scarcity has a way of engendering fear into people, and fear has a way of making people hostile and mean-spirited and self-centered. We could go that route, as a country. We could stop giving out the little foreign aid we are presently giving. We could crack down even harder on undocumented workers. Charitable organizations and non-profits could shrink to a fraction of their former size. Our most vulnerable citizens–poor people, people without health insurance, disabled people, indigent elderly–could well be left to their own devices, such as those might be. Government-supported institutions such as schools and prisons could easily become overcrowded and increasingly disfunctional.
And we could go that route as individuals. We could hunker down and protect ourselves. We could attempt to continue our wasteful lifestyles as Americans, angry that gasoline has become so high and that food has become so costly to import. On the other hand, we could learn from these hard times. We could change our ways.
As a country, we would change our priorities. Instead of soaking billions into foreign wars, we would pay attention to the infrastructure of our own country–that is, to the needs of the people, including education and health care. Insead of throwing our weight around, seeking empire, we would become a country among other countries, acknowledging our interdependence. We would come to understand that it is just wrong for us to continue to consume such an unfair share of the earth’s resources. In short, we would gain some humility as a nation.
As individuals, we might begin to learn that our well-being is tied to the well-being of all. As a matter of fact, perhaps as global warming gets worse, we will understand that our very survival depends on our being genuinely neighborly and co-operative. We’ll undoubtedly have to live on less, and that will mean that we will not be so concerned about new fashions every season. We will wear our clothing until it wears out, and we may even repair our underwear and socks. We will not eat strawberries in the winter, but rather will find new ways to prepare local produce that doesn’t have to be trucked in. We may join the “slow food” movement, because we’ll be spending more time at home, and therefore can actually cook most of our meals. Entertainment will have become more of a luxury than a given. We will travel less and get to know our neighbors better. We will ride bicycles and walk a great deal more, and we will therefore be in better physical condition. Because we will not be able to consume as a pastime, we may spend more time with family and friends. Because we will not be distracted constantly by what we will buy next, perhaps we may decide that we will take up a spiritual practice. We may come to know ourselves better, to acknowledge our need for others, and to shift the emphasis in where we spend our time and energy–that is, the stuff of our life.
Who knows? When we look back on this time, we may decide that this crisis was the catalyst we needed to make the changes that have been calling to us for a long, long time.
