And The Recession Is A Good Thing Because...?

I think all Americans have finally faced the fact that, yes, we are in a recession. I first caught wind last year when I was in northern Montana near the boarder of Canada and saw the weaker Canadian dollar exchanging for around the same rate as the U.S. dollar. A couple months later I watched as hard earned U.S. dollars traded in for a fraction of a euro (about $1.45 for every €1) in Spain. The lesson there seemed to be to stick to traveling on my own soil, or if I need some foreign flavor, to go south.

Six months later, and now the whole country seems to be freaking out. All these years of saving up, and now those dollars aren't worth much. I guess this would be a good time to invest them in real estate since that market is bottoming out, meaning you can get more for your dollar there. Well, except for the fact that the future size of my paychecks is now a little rockier.

So, why am I actually feeling like this recession thing could be good? Well, like our fine president G.W. Bush has shown with global warming, every cloud has its silver lining. In the case of a recession in the consumer capitol of the world, I'm seeing potentially huge ecological and social benefits. After all, I think we can all admit that we have way more stuff than we need to get by. What's important is that we all have access to basic shelter, healthy food, and medical care. All the rest is frills.

Post-Soviet bloc Cuba is a great example of the beauty that can come from lacking. Since embargoed Cuba lacked outside financial support once Soviet nations fell apart in 1989, the island nation had to quickly figure out how to support its people, especially in urban centers like Havana. Scarcity of oil, pesticides, and other expensive outside products meant finding creative local-based solutions. And thus, sustainable communities are reborn. From increased efficiency and capacity in public transit to government support of natural, green medicine to urban gardens and farms, Cuban communities embraced these economic and practical changes.

In the U.S., we can already see some of these changes sprouting up out of ecological concern. My hope is that communities will become even more self-sufficient, investing in the localization movement as the recession sets in. With gas prices expected to break $4 in the near future, trucking food from 100s or 1000s of miles away results in increased food prices. And don't forget the cost of the petrol-based pesticides that most foods are dowsed in.

But even more immediately, we see that a recession means people consume less. Think of all of the unnecessary gadgets and fashions and luxury items that are shipped from oversees to fill the shelves of our stores. These products are full of toxins, made of synthetics or from materials ripped from the mines of the earth, assembled by overworked peoples who would be better off living traditional nomadic or village lives on farms or in pastures. We buy things because they are the newest and greatest, the "in". When it comes down to it, though, they don't make us better people or give us real fulfillment. It's just a dose of the chaser drug of capital-derived consumerism that more of the world is becoming addicted to.

Yes, a recession is hard. But who ever said that you could get something good without a little hard work?