Austerity is Alive and Well in America

[MindMover]

A common criticism of the so-called "libertarian conservative" strains of European and U.S. economic analysis is that the populations of these regions are not undergoing enough austerity. Their public sectors are bloated and inefficient, with public employees receiving way too much in the way of salaries, benefits and pensions. That has certainly been true in the recent past, and still persists to some extent, but these analysts fail to notice the clear trends that have developed over the last few years. The truth is that public austerity is already well underway in America.

The reason why it goes relatively unnoticed is because it is happening primarily at the county, city and state levels, rather than within the federal government. A recent Reuters report has found that the job losses in state and local governments across the U.S. over the last three years have been the worst losses since Department of Labor records begain in 1955. Many of these towns/cities have been hit hard by the real estate bust and subsequent decline in property tax revenues, as well as weak consumer demand and diminishing access to state/federal aid. Lisa Lambert reports for Retuers on this clear trend of deepening austerity across the towns of America:

http://theautomaticearth.org/Finance/austerity-is-alive-and-well-in-america.html

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[Warpy]

1. I see austerity at work at every bus stop in this town

Most of the people standing there have a clunker sitting in the driveway. They find it cheaper to take the bus than put gas into it and drive it to work. I see a lot of them packing lunches instead of heading out to fast food places.

I also see more empty store fronts every single week as the drop in business from people who are making barely enough to feed themselves disappears.

[izquierdista]

2. It has further to go

They can sell the clunker in the driveway and get bicycles. Bicycles cut down on the need to buy gasoline and car insurance.

They can tear out their front lawn and plant potatoes. With some care, a 50'x20' potato patch can yield a half ton of potatoes.

Now that the garage is empty, they can collect firewood from all over town and store it for the winter.

If they have planter boxes under the windows, they can be on the lookout for some medicinal herbs and plants to grow to take the place of health care. Aloe is a good one to start with.

They can spruce up the gutters and downspouts and dig a cistern for when the water utility goes BK.

Austerity can go a LOT further. If you need any more ideas, check out North Korea Today at http://goodfriendsusa.blogspot.com/ to find out what people do when the government has completely given up on them.

[Warpy]

3. What works in GA won't work where I am

and using a garage or any other building to store firewood is just plain stupid since firewood will bring in termites and carpenter ants. It's best to store it outdoors, far away from buildings. While the surface of the bark might get wet, the interior will continue to dry.

NK is what happens when an aristocracy (in this case, of party insiders) takes over and completely loses sight of anyone not directly engaged in serving and protecting them.

That's really what we're trying to avoid here and we have a limited window in which to do so, violent revolution becoming inevitable if that window closes without changes being effected.

[GoCubsGo]

10. It doesn't work in GA, either.

We have termites, carpenter ants, and a plethora of wood-eating beetles and roaches down this way, as well. And, along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts we also have Formosan termites, which are far worse than the native ones. Better to put a $5 tarp over the wood than put it in the garage.

I'm not convinced there will be a violent revolution. Too many passive sheep in this country who will sit back and wait for others to do the job. Just like they've been sitting back and taking all the shit that's been flung at them for the past 40 years.

[Warpy]

13. Oh, things will have to get worse before it happens

but if weasels like Paul Ryan have their way, it will get worse at an ever increasing pace.

While the theft was slow, during the years from Reagan through Clinton when people thought they were doing just fine by substituting debt for wages, everything was just rosy in the garden. The credit spigot has been cut off for most people and they're finally noticing just how far they've fallen compared to their parents and they're getting angry.

That bodes ill for the wealthy continuing to fleece us as fast as they want to.

[Zalatix]

5. If all of America did that, the corporate state would utterly collapse.

[JVS]

6. "Now that the garage is empty, they can collect firewood from all over town and store it"

fire-wood should be stored away from the house due to pests.

[izquierdista]

9. This is relative as well

If the garage is concrete block and your neighbors are so poor that they will steal it (thinking North Korea again), the pests outside the garage are more of a problem than the pests inside.

[crunch60]

8. My Mom was a child of the depression, so she taught me many of these things. I still do them today.

I dislike waste in any area, food, clothing, goods etc. I recycle everything I can. My art is made from recycled materials, china, pottery, metal, tile and lots of other stuff I find on the sidewalk, ready for garbage pick-up. Much of it perfectly usable, sometime like new. It's disgusting what people throw out.
Anything I don't use or need, I give to the local thrift or freecycle. I support small business in the community, buy the best produce from a local Mexican Mercado, because it's near me and has great values.

What is important here, is that this style of living is my choice. Before I retired and made good money at my job, I lived the same way. I just don't buy into the hype of out of control consumerism, or the need to keep up with the Jones. Link to freecycle.

http://www.freecycle.org/

[hfojvt]

4. those sound like good things to me

I like to see people being frugal, packing lunches instead of eating over-priced fast food. And I like to see people using mass transit.

Empty storefronts are not so good, but I have never liked a consumerist society either. In some sense too, an empty storefront becomes an opportunity. I would not have been able to start my store without an empty building to put it into. Lots of businesses come and go too. My own store only ran for seven years, and I saw a number of stores come and go next to me and across the street. A restaurant, a pizza shop, a clothing store, a flower shop, a drug store or two, a jewelry store and a teacher's store.

Of course, that town I was in has been sorta stagnant. It was 5,000 people when I was there and so was nearby Reedsburg and Baraboo was 8,000. Now, twenty years later it is still 5,050 people while Reedsburg is 8,666 and Baraboo is 11,244. So Richland Center may not be the best example.

[woo me with science]

7. if people do it, they should do it

because they want to, not because they have to.

[Warpy]

12. When you're living on the edge

that one meal a day when you don't have to cook and wash dishes is a luxury.

What they're spending in place of money is time: time to shop for extra food, time to prepare and pack it, time spent on a slow bus or waiting at the bus stop.

A 20 minute commute by car can take over an hour on a bus with a transfer or two.

Think about that. How much is your time worth?

[NNN0LHI]

11. I watched the bustling town I grew up in torn down and get paved over with asphalt

Used to be 24-hour restaurants, theatres, big wedding halls, all kinds of stores, you name it. All gone now.

That happened during the 1980's.

Don