That was an excellent posting NanaDot, and I agree with every point you made.

One other point that I believe is relevant to the theme of your post is the role of the corporate propagandists in securing the people's cooperation by utilizing insidious advertising.

Enlisting hundreds of social psychologists, and "sell out" creative geniuses, television and print commercials became so slick, and subtle that few were able to resist their siren call.

As time went on resistance was weakened in each new generation. By the time those generations of babies who had spent much of their period of early development parked in front of a color television could talk, they could also demand, and demand they did. Partially conditioned parents felt guilt, and desperation when they could not meet those demands, going to absurd financial risks to appease. Then the fully conditioned children became parents with the result that what had once been a rational populace became in a sense, buying zombies. It was a corporate dream, we as a whole were no longer people, we had become consumer units.

In my waning years I still have hope.I do not think that the corporate propagandists have kept pace with technological advances, and are now scrambling like mad to recover lost ground. They are up against devices that eradicate advertisements from television programing, a generation of children who ignore television in favor of electronic games, and the internet where people once again can make choices with out being a captive audience.

Additionally, Corporatocracy became so irrationally greedy that they eroded the wages of the masses to the point that consumer's pockets are empty, and assets are hocked. Try as we might, we can not buy what we are told to buy, even though we are convinced that we want to buy.

It looks to me like we are going to be stretching dollars instead of limousines for a long time. In the long haul we will probably be the better for it.

Our Nation's economic turmoil can be viewed in two ways, either devastating or as a needed wake-up call. I think everyone has their attention focused now!

Isaiah 32:8 says, "But the noble man makes noble plans, and by noble deeds he stands." We need to make changes in our lives now so that as economic blemishes appear, the prepared will not fall.

Some employers took advantage of these kinds of "outs," but others did not. I can't defend every employer, but I can't extend a blanket condemnation, either. Where you work is your choice. How you deal with the benefits you are offered is also your choice. Stay or go, it's up to you.

Plenty of people on every side of the current economic disaster have made extremely poor decisions, but those poor decision weren't all made by big, bad corporations. Some of those poor decisions were made by the very people who are now screaming for relief, and that includes those who signed up for mortgages they could not afford or who expected to make a killing in real estate by driving prices up to ridiculous levels that couldn't posssibly be supported.

If we're going to place blame, let's be sure we spread it around to every corner of where it belongs.

You can trace at least some of the change in the PSR to the point at which 401k's became available (early 80's, as I recall). When you look at charts of PSR rates, you can see the sharp downturn at that point pretty clearly. We absolutely don't save enough, no question, but look at what we're up against - pay daily expenses, put away something for retirement, put something in savings for a rainy day, put something aside for your kids' education, maybe help your parents out...a lot of us can't afford to do everything we need to!

Back in 1929, the Herbert Hoover Committee on Recent Economic Changes noted '...there are new wants which shall make way endlessly for newer wants, as fast as they are satisfied', and in post-WWII, Victor Lebow declared, 'our enormously productive economy ..demands that we make consumption our way of life, ...that we seek our spiritual satisfaction, our ego satisfaction, in consumption... We need things consumed, burned up, worn out, replaced and discarded at an ever increasing rate' - thus was our 'standard of living' based on how much we use up, NOT on how much we produce..

So, WIT, my sympathy for retailers, especially big box types, is pretty slim to none...

We have the chance to literally CHANGE THE ECONOMY to a more rational model if we can hold out and pay it off and put it away, AND tell our elected geniuses that we are going to continue to do so. Debt slavery to CHINA be damned!!!

NanaDot,

Good advice to me. I understand that retailers will continue to struggle and this puts our economy further down in the dumps. I'm just uncertain if there is a win-win solution to this.