Dog Days of Recession Revisited
The “dog days” continue now into spring and early summer. Not the “dog days of summer,” as the expression usually goes, but the dog days of recession. Recession relentlessly drags on in our spirits, even when reports of economic renewal bring fleeting promise. Fears of “double-dip” recession effectively counter any too bold assertion that the worst is now over.
Recession is here for real, even though the stock market rises and consumer spending grows slightly. Unemployment figures remain stagnant, and unemployment reality is worse than indicated, especially within certain communities.
Most of us manage to trudge on regardless. Most still have jobs, most still have houses, most still have retirement accounts and most of us can drive wherever we want to go. But this fragile security is no longer present forever growing number of people.
Is it now time – even past time – for the more fortunate among us to become more mindful of those in need?
You may respond that no one is forgetting them. You may say, like the little pig who built on a stone foundation: “Misfortune is their own fault.” But even stone foundations have crumbled this time.
When Congress adjourned last autumn for a week’s recess without extending unemployment benefits, it raised the question of how deeply pressing the need of those dispossessed of work and housing is to those still secure. Of course, every lawmaker knew the measure would pass when they returned, and those politically opposed could still cast negative votes in conscience that the measure would not fail.
Who takes account of the added distress felt by those now out of work and virtually penniless? Their pain only grows more acute while lawmakers cut government assistance programs, threaten citizens with termination of Medicare and Medicaid support – dampening what fragile recovery now exists by delaying approval of our national debt extension.
Most states lack resources to aid a flood of new applicants to welfare rolls, especially applicants without children. Still, pressing need continues to mount. “For Sale” signs dot neighborhood lawns like unwelcome litter. A woman stands at the Wal-Mart parking lot exit, holding a “family in need” sign in front of her and looking despondently from side to side hoping someone will pay attention and stop. Somehow you just know this is no scam, not this time.
Unemployment benefits, even when extended, will not last forever. Despite the smug advice of some fiscal conservatives, our only solution now is economic stimulus. Our future depends on improved — not gutted — public education, clean — not polluting — energy, productive and well-employed — not chronically unemployed — citizenry. A renewed economy is now our only road to immediate recovery and long-term prosperity.
If economic imperatives were not enough, the moral imperative in this economic crisis, as in recent weather flood and tornado disasters, demands that we care first for those harmed and worry about balancing budgets later. Reduced spending can no more bring help to those suddenly without employment than it could cover the mounting costs of wildlife care and coastal cleanup and restoration.
Thrift is certainly our best long-term fiscal value, but this value must include enough flexibility to address critical needs when they arise. Failure to address present economic and environmental needs strikes at the very heart of our moral conscience as a nation. We can hardly excuse lack of action now by a decade of profligate spending sponsored by those who would not advocate
restraint.
Now is the time to act, and we must act to support improved employment opportunity, improved education, environmental restoration and clean energy production if we are to preserve our integrity as a nation.
Only then will these dog days end.
We survive only so long as our communities survive. We are prosperous in the long term only when we all share prosperity.
This is what we mean when we say: “life works when we work together.”
