About this Media Hype on the World Economic Crisis

During these economically troubled times (or so the media reports) I find it hard to find evidence of this financial turmoil in daily life!

I tend to read the Financial Times frequently as it helps me to fall asleep on a plane, I read the Wall Street Journal to get an opinion from across the Atlantic and I read the Economist when I feel masochistic!

I read endless views, news and opinions on the economic woe facing the world and I cannot transgress what is written in black and white (pink and black in the Financial Times) to reality! Is the world on the brink of depression, recession or simply facing stagnation? Is the third world suffering increased poverty due to higher food prices and are we about to face crisis in the UK and USA due to the supposed higher cost of living, higher taxes and a shortage of the Black Gold? I think not!

Looking into this: property has been overpriced for many years in the UK so what is being seen now is a readjustment to more realistic value! What the news fails to report is that house prices are falling, not because of some mystical force but due to the fact that demand has lessened due to media hype warning potential buyers away! For many years, first time buyers have been unable to get onto the property ladder or if they have managed to do so through scrimping and saving (and family handouts) they will remain in hock for most of their adult life! Now with property prices falling (albeit a gnats whisker of a fall) it maybe possible for those starting out in life to leave their parents domain before the age of forty!

Food prices are increasing on media hype over an increased population, lack of suitable farming land and increased costs of raw materials and fuel needed to farm that land! In a nutshell I say "rubbish". The world has sufficient land to grow all the food it needs and more! If the planet was in real crisis, golf courses could be turned over to farm land, those areas used to grow crops for bio-fuels (a pathetic waste of arable land) could be re-utilised for food crops, people could stop drinking beer and spirits (hops and barley) and such food items that provide no malnutrition whatsoever could be banned thus providing even more land for suitable food crops – like Pringles crisps, muesli bars and most sugar-coated items for the local bakery!

Oil prices are certainly rising; most likely due to speculation by investors but what the media fails to report is that this might actually be a good thing for the planet and not a disaster as is constantly reported! History has taught the world one thing, that economic crisis stops the average individual thinking about the future! This oil crisis has in effect relegated to the dustbin the fact that the planet may slowly be dying due to our continued use of fossil fuels! Environmentalists, governments, business and the average person should be celebrating these higher costs; this could be the opportunity many have been waiting for, the true birth of alternative forms of energy; solar, wind, hydrogen fuel cells and of course fusion!

Oil prices are rising and the average person is finding it harder to afford to use their car! I would like to take this opportunity to suggest that it might be time for some people to get off their behinds and walk; share a car to work, sell the SUV and buy a smaller car (hey, take a chance and buy a bicycle) and stop complaining! Perhaps the media should highlight this opportunity to help people become healthy again, perhaps even to help people give consideration to their environment rather than decry the cost of fuel! An angel dressed as the devil perhaps?

The BBC recently reported that higher household fuel bills were seriously affecting lower wage-earning families! A single mother of three was then dutifully trouped out to give her sob story to the masses! She said "I now pay 60 pounds a week on gas bills; I just can’t afford to feed my family"!

I live in a bungalow in Edinburgh! It is an old house that creaks and rattles in the wind! It has no insulation what-so-ever, the windows are single glazed and due to the fact that the house needs to breath I have vents under the seriously holed and mismatched floor-boards. If I lit a candle it would soon blow out! To keep this house above-freezing in winter I have to have the gas-heating on full blast, plus electric heaters in each room! I still have not managed to break the forty pounds per week gas bill. In fact, if I took my roof off and switched the heating on I still don’t think my fuel bill would be sixty pounds!

The poor single mother might simply have to look no further than the dishwasher, the four mobile phone chargers (one for each child and herself), the television in each room, the video games, the espresso machine, the hairdryers, the open windows and doors, the clothes dryer, the hair curlers, the patio lights, the chiming doorbell, the Ipod, the game boy, the fish tank, the electric guitar, the outdoor heated swimming pool, the micro-wave, the Jacuzzi……… all those things that poverty-stricken people in Britain seem to have regardless of the money they earn! Hell, even those on state support have these things!

The Seafarers Money
A seafarers expereinces with money, striving to save for retirement!