Credit crisis

By the day of today we are supposed to be in a credit crisis. At least that is what the news broadcasts and the newspapers are telling me. So now that I know that we are in a credit crisis, what am I supposed to do with that information?

Let’s first start at where it all begun: Wall Street. Let’s just all blame Wall Street! Of course we can also blame the American government. They were the ones to ease on regulations about borrowing money which gave a lot of American citizens the possibility to spend way more than they actually could. Or we can blame the media because they brought us all the bad tidings which of course had as a result that every single consumer stopped spending money.

Or maybe we can just start blaming the real source: us, the consumers. The reason all this is happening is because we all are unpredictable greedy creatures that all want to live above their standards. People are buying things they can’t afford with money they don’t have to impress people they don’t like. “I want it all and I want it now” seems to be today’s motto. Am I being too pessimistic by now? I would say; check the results.

It started with the American consumers who liked to overspend, until they all the sudden found out that the interest rates increased and they simply did not have the capability to pay back their loans. This had as a result that at first the demand for houses went down followed by the demand for nearly everything. Okay then, let’s just all blame the Americans!
Or should we? Aren’t we having a crisis here in good old Europe as well? We Europeans tend to think, or wish, that we are independent of the USA. Well then, why are we facing the same problems? Probably because we are facing the same source as well; overspending. The reason that the crisis might be a little less severe in Europe is because our European governments were wise enough to make the regulations concerning borrowing money a little more tight.

To come back to my question; what am I supposed to do now that I know that we are currently in a credit crisis? I would say ignore the crisis and just keep spending money. Without consumers that spend money the economy will simply collapse even more. But then again, a little austerity never hurts anyone. Be reasonable and don’t waste money and definitely never spend money you don’t have.