Tri-State Neighbor: South Dakota Farm Newspaper

As the various money markets in our country and around the world were doing their deep sea diving act a few weeks ago, all I could think of was the old story about the two cattle feeders on the Titanic. Between sips of coffee, one said to the other, “Ah heck, let's ride her down. She'll come back.”

As a person who spent his professional life in that business, I can relate to that scenario with a lot more knowledge and experience than I can to the Dow Jones or Bill Jones or whatever index is under discussion.

What I know about the stock market I have learned from my wife or during the meetings with the fellow who handles our adequate supply of disposable cash. I should add, that is assuming that my wife allows me the privilege of accompanying her when she makes her tax preparation visits.

It's not that I don't know about budgets and cash flow and balance sheets and spread sheets and, ah forget it. Who am I kidding?

I don't know and it's way to late in life to start learning. I do know that a 3 or 4 percent drop in one of those markets warrants a lead in the evening news and that has been the case on several occasions.

As of this writing, the president and Congress are in the process of some type of cash infusion and all they have left is to come up with something, which makes everyone happy. That is often a difficult task because anytime a process attempts to appease the masses, the end result is disappointment.

Regardless of how much free money one receives, there is always the assumption that someone further up the food chain got more and that ain't fair!

Oops, I used the word free in regards to money from Uncle Sam and unless the powers that be have planted some type of cash tree behind the White House, it ain't free. Not by a long shot! Somebody kicked in via the Internal Revenue or else it was borrowed. Probably a lot of both because we seem to be awfully good at the borrowing thing and tax revenue to the federal treasury continues to run at all-time highs.

Lord forbid that Uncle Sam would do what most of us have to do, which is figure out where we can save a few dollars as we go about the daily business of living. After all, it's just money and as long as we can print it or borrow it from another country, why the concern? As long as the voters are relatively happy going into next November, well, we'll worry about “down the road,” when we get down the road.

It probably warrants a mention that it doesn't seem to make a lot of difference which party or politician we are talking about because at some point the vast majority become involved.

I find it a bit interesting, if not amusing, that for the past several years the war of wills between the administration and Congress has been non-stop and that applies to almost every single topic.

The past few weeks, and perhaps it is out of necessity, the dialogue has taken on the appearance of a family reunion. Let's hope the end result is helpful to our nation's economy.

Common sense, however, would seem to dictate that at some point spending our way out of economic problems is not going to be the answer.

Sadly, that same lack of fiscal discipline is running rampant amongst much of this nation's population. That applies especially to our younger folks who have yet to take a real pounding money-wise.

I hope that they never do, because I have three children and their families in that age category.

Of one thing I am certain, a 35-year-old couple with three children, a time share in Florida, two top of the line vehicles and a $330,000 variable mortgage on a $450,000 home will probably not benefit a whole lot when they receive their $1,600 rebate check. They either have enough income to balance the books or they don't.

I don't mean to pick on the kids, but whatever happened to putting off a purchase until there is some extra cash to pay for it?

When did a $27,000 credit card obligation become the norm rather than the talk of the town?

Why am I concerned? Simple. Unless we change course, who in the heck is going to pay for my Social Security and Medicare?!

I'm kidding. Although the Wosters are a long way from wealthy, we would figure out some way to keep on going and paying bills, should those benefits be reduced or, for that matter taken away. I suspect many would.

I have written before about how much the Wosters have kicked in to those programs over the years and how much we are now taking out and I wonder weekly how long can we continue without major changes in these programs. That is magnified a thousand-fold when we consider the huge numbers who will soon be joining us as recipients these and other federal dollars.

I don't know about the readers, but the most important part of our life is our children and those three little girls. All I want for them is the same wonderful life in this best of all countries that I have had and I simply do not see how that can happen unless we change our fiscal ways. How hard is it to reduce spending across the board by 1 percent? If a business can do it or a family can do it, so also can the government. Let's hope we begin the process sooner than later.

Remember the annual convention of the South Dakota Farmers Union this weekend and also those who serve in harm's way. Be safe and thanks!

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