“Spend It or Loose It; No Money For You!” says Uncle Sam

With the engine of our economy slowly coming to a halt, the new buzz phrase that’s been flying around capital hill is “economic stimulus package”.  I think that finding ways to spur economic growth and slow the run away train of recession is a great idea, however I don’t think that a spending spree is the correct way to approach our issues.  There is something fundamentally wrong with the government giving us a check for the sole purpose shopping;  it blew my mind to hear that officials are second guessing issuing a stimulus check because people might not spend the money but actually save it instead!

At the heart of the failure within our banking system and financial markets is a common theme, too much debt. It’s no wonder that we’ve found ourselves in the middle of this mess when we have our top elected officials telling people to go out and spend their money instead of putting it away for a rainy day.  What happened to saving money and building up a nest age?  Here’s a novel idea, wouldn’t it be wise for the government to issue a debt reduction package?  How about giving each American a large check they can use to pay down credit cards or other debts such as autos, student loans, and lines of credit.  As I pointed out in my recent article “Living Beyond Our Means Or Simply Living” many people across the country have been using credit just to survive.  Going out and blowing government sponsored money on a new video game system simply makes no sense to me.

Clearly we need productive ways to jump start our economy and stop our slide towards recession, but using tax payer money to finance mp3 players, plasma t.v.’s, and $10 cups of coffee isn’t going to solve our problems.  It’s time to change the mentality of buy, buy, buy and take an approach of save, save, save.  Is it just me, or is there something funamentally wrong with the government telling people to go spend versus being worried about people saving?