THE TIPPING POINT

Spoilt sportsmen, conniving politicians, dishonest financiers; they all get caught eventually. And yet it often seems that, instead of kicking their sorry butts, we meekly accept their nonsense.

Perhaps that is the price we feel has to be paid for being associated with winners. Perhaps it’s what we feel has to be done to keep the leaky ship of state, sport or enterprise afloat. Hei aha? Whatever the reason, the tipping point always comes and change happens.

Right now we’re seeing it happening with regards to ‘the economy.’ As millions of homeless, jobless, cashless people (and those who are about to join their ranks) wake up to the fact that someone is making a financial killing off their misery, they are taking to the streets in protest.

Waves of civil disobedience are rippling across North America, the Middle East, and Europe against the moneymen who profit at every turn of the screw. The brokers, insurers, bankers and financiers, as well as the princes and politicians who serve their interests; to millions across the world they all deserve to be thrown out on their ear. And who can blame them for feeling that way?

However a word of caution.

It is good to see the rising awareness amongst the middle-class in particular that our nations and economies are not being run well by those in power. But, unless we understand that it is our own attitudes, expectations and practices that feed the problem and support those in power, nothing will change for us.

It does not matter what kind of government it is. Democracy, autocracy, theocracy, and even that strange beast called plutocracy (the rule or power of the wealthy); they are all addicted to an economic system called money upon which all international trading and commerce occurs. In turn we are addicted to it, mainly as borrowers.

As with any addiction, we who suffer from it are all subject to the increasingly centralised control of the money by an increasingly small and powerful group.

So, until enough of us understand how the addiction works and how to recover from it, nothing will change. In fact it will just get a whole lot worse as the cycle of boom and bust recurs on ever-increasing scales.

How do we break the cycle? Well, the people I respect most are all advising the same things. First, stop spending on anything but the necessities and pay your debts down. Second, drop your expectations and ‘use it up or wear it out, make it do or do without.’ Third, grow your own food as much as possible. Fourth, make alliances with likeminded people.

Depending on how much of this advice you take, when the tipping point comes (and it will), you’ll either already be in recovery, in jail, or dead and buried.