On the silver lining of a bad economy...

In a bad economy, it can be tough to keep our heads keep and remain optimistic. But I find some silver lining amidst all the gloom and doom.

We used to be so busy making money, focusing much on the job and work. But as the economy turns bad, my hsuband and I have actually had more communication and talks, from things like how our business is going (pretty stagnant right now but thankfully it's debt-free and requires no additional bank loan), to expense control. Times like this, we learn to be more flexible. We cut all non-essential expenses, including dining out, toys to kids that they hardly touch after the excitement from the act of buying wears off in less than a couple of hours, and all the extras that we've been carrying which we shouldn't have. Those extras include some 20 website domain names that I've registered and kept, but never got round to using them. So, last month, I dropped all the domain name registration, saved the 5 that we are using or might still use.

The kids don't actually mind about not dining out at all. They find it boring, sitting around in the restaurant waiting for food and not having anything else to do. (Food is just food for them.) And the kids have been doing more outdoorsy activities, rather than just going to toy stores and buy toys they don't play (and destined for either donation or trash or recycle bins). The other silver lining is, we find more time to do things at home together. My husband has been doing a bit more baking (from pies to muffins), rather than buying from bakery and supermarkets. The kids love the baking "project" together. The more (quality) time together, as a family, is definitely a plus.

Of course, all those expense curb mean even less spending in the economy. But I've come to wonder out loud: Do economic improvement really depends on consumerism and consumerism alone? Given that consumerism (of material goods) involves extracting more from the environment. Do we really need or want that? Do we really need to upgrade our cell phones or get the latest ipod every year or so? Would a more service-oriented society could facilitate economic growth, without having to tax the environment so much?

I'm not an economics major, and I don't have a way to measure the economic impact of the above propositions. But I do hope that, as American's wherewithdrawal in financiing their ever-increasing consumer spending has come to an end, it would allow us to collectively dig deeper into our soul and ask ourselves if all those spendings are really needed or justified, and our place in history as custodian to the environment and this planet earth.