Moving From Saving Cars to Saving People
January 10, 2010
Although I am a political junkie I am more of a human well-being advocate. The official unemployment rate, for example, rose by 2.3 percentage points from its recent low of 4.4 percent in March 2007 to 6.7 percent in November 2008. Read it for yourself, http://www.bls.gov/opub/ils/pdf/opbils71.pdf.
The bail out to help save cars is 1.5 billion dollars. As I witness the new model cars being advertised on television my thought is, “I can’t buy it”. If millions of Americans are out of work, because of unemployment, if thousands of families are losing their homes, and if many are dying because they can’t afford health care, how is the heck are they going to buy the cars that are being produced by this auto bailout?
1.5 billion dollars is plenty to reduce the average American consumer’s debt. There are five ways this money could have helped stimulate consumer spending.
- Forgive student loans http://www.finaid.org/loans/
- Extend unemployment benefits to those who can’t find jobs. http://www.ktka.com/news/2009/jan/20/unemployment_extended_benefits_almost_two_month_de/
- Reduce mortgage payments, by paying up to 30% of the total loan http://www2.journalnow.com/content/2009/jan/18/mortgage-behind-walkaways-hurt-neighborhoods-devas/business/
- Forgive the health care bills of working Americans. http://www.journaltimes.com/articles/2009/01/21/health/doc497741dd08fd8561710934.txt
- Actually put cash in the pockets of citizens (more than 1,000 dollars)
Okay, so the government can’t do everything. We can not wait for the government to save us. It is obvious that the corporations take precedence over individuals. If we don’t change our perceptions about how to get things done in the world there will come a time when those who don’t know how to pull together will die. We have come full circle to a place in time where
- Doctors need to make personal house calls and lean more towards preventive medicine.
- Families need to come together and create a pool of money for each member to go to school.
- Those who have food need to feed those who don’t.
- Mortgages need to be paid by multiple (more than 2) employed members in the household.
- Extended families and family run businesses need to come back in style.
When surviving becomes and issue the best thing people can do is come together on all levels. Teachers who complain about not making enough money in the school system can began to home school the millions of students that are not making the grade in public school. The bottom line is that although those at the top “seem” to be holding the cards we who are on the bottom have a lot more power than we think!
Love & Peace
Single Mama Diva
