We are continuing to see the development of an economy where many of the past excesses are going away. The recent crisis will have a sobering effect on many people for at least some time. Further, some of the access to easy money and easy equity loans is just not there anymore.
The good news is that the future economy will be built on a sounder footing. The bad news is that many of the jobs and other sources of income will be more difficult to come by.
A return to some frugality is a good thing but it reduces demand and businesses are not going to expand past the point where they have a high level of confidence. Further, as we see expanding technological communications, the need to visit certain establishments will continue to diminish. I haven't needed to visit my bank, except to use an ATM, for quite a while. It saves on gas but reduces the need for tellers.
The new type of online stores and services will continue to garner greater and greater acceptance. We need to build our jobs in two ways. As I've been saying for quite a while, we need to reduce our use of foreign energy and use domestic and renewable sources. In addition to keeping wealth inside the country, it will also create jobs that can't be exported or eliminated. I'm starting to see some movement in that area and it simply has to happen.
The other thing we need to do is level the playing field so that it is not automatically better to export many jobs. Our current tax system and health insurance system are problematic and penalize companies that make product in this country. If we switched to a more neutral tax system, tax consumption not production, and used that money to fund health insurance for all, we would reduce much of the motivation to export jobs. Yes, some jobs would still be more efficiently performed outside the country, but many other jobs would become location neutral and remain here.
Lets get smart and get going.
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