Getting Back to Basics

What would the response of Americans be if someone organized a massive tree-planting initiative? In light of the recent California wildfires, the example of Macedonia, a tiny country of only two million people, could inspire similar efforts.

Macedonia has had two summers of wild fires, with thousands of acres of forests destroyed. An opera singer, Boris Trajanov, decided that something had to be done. Yesterday, “Thousands of people were bused to the planting sites , including more than 1,000 soldiers who planted some 200,000 seedlings at 14 sites.” It seems that Macedonians are waking up to the reality of climate change and the need to protect the environment. Continue Reading »

In a forum discussion a few days ago, someone asked “Doesn’t anybody make anything these days?” He was lamenting lost skills, and even enjoyments, that seem to have fallen into disuse. He wondered whether any hands-on hobbies, like the woodworking that he does, still hold interest for very many people. A day or so later, I came across a news article discussing the fact that American children seem to be losing their problem-solving skills.

What’s the relationship? Problem-solving skills are developed by solving problems. But solving problems out of a book, with a teacher to tell you whether you got them right or wrong, isn’t real problem-solving. It’s just finding a pre-determined answer. If you want to learn to solve problems that matter, you have to do it in the real world. Just about the only hands-on skills that most people learn these days are how to use a keyboard or a game controller. Neither formatting a report nor negotiating your way through a virtual maze will teach you how to cope in an emergency situation, or how to do something for yourself when the person you will be paying to do it for you doesn’t show up. Continue Reading »

“A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.”
Time Enough For Love, Robert Heinlein

Some of the skills Heinlein proposed as necessities may be outmoded or unlikely to be called on — after all, how many of us would ever be called on to plan an invasion or conn a ship? The basic idea — that humans should have a basic set of survival skills, will never go out of date. But we now live in a society in which we can pay others to do things for us. We either don’t have the ability to do those things for ourselves, or we don’t have the time. We’ve also been taught that most of the things that need to be done in this world require formal learning, degrees or certificates, and membership in professional or trade organizations.

Grandparents no longer hand down their skills, because most of those skills are out of date. Parents don’t pass down skills because they don’t have any. And the current generation lives in a state of learned helplessness about anything but amusement and spending money.

What have you learned over a lifetime that could sustain you in a real emergency? If the electricity goes out for long periods — or forever? How would you feed yourself, stay warm in the winter, clothe yourself? What would you do if someone in your family became sick, with no doctors or medicines available?

There are many skills that I should have learned along the way and didn’t. I don’t know how to resuscitate someone who’s stopped breathing, though television has showed me how it’s done. Would that be adequate in an emergency? I don’t know. And how much does television teach that we can actually use? In his book, On Writing, Stephen King talked about being part of the last generation of writers before TV. Maybe he’s also part of the last generation to learn practical skills.

The American middle class has been experiencing downward mobility for some time, but it’s been somewhat disguised. The slow creep upward of goods and services has almost, but not quite, been matched by pay increases. Overall, the value of income has been going down fairly steadily, but now, with a sharp rise in prices, mortgage foreclosures and job losses, the truth is hard to miss. The American dream: steady upward mobility, a home of your own, sending the kids to college, and the hope that they will do better than their parents, has exploded into dust.

There may be some comfort in looking around and seeing that most people are in the same boat, but there is also resentment and indignation. “Why did this happen to me? Why should I have to give up so much of what I’ve worked hard for?” Those feelings are natural, but they can get in the way of examining your values and needs, and making changes that can minimize the negative side of lower expectations. It’s a hard blow when your hopes and dreams prove the truth of the old adage: what goes up must come down. Your future depends on how you deal with it.

It doesn’t matter whether you believe climate change is man-made or natural. It doesn’t even matter if you think the whole climate change/global warming issue is a hoax. There is evidence from every part of the world that serious changes are taking place, much of it in places that we never hear about. From the Himalayas, where unprecedented melting of the snow pack has been reported for well over a decade by the native inhabitants, to the disappearance of plant species at Walden Pond, something is happening that has nothing to do with politics or conspiracies.

Plants are on the move to more favorable areas as their environment becomes too hot or dry. Flowers are blooming earlier in response to unusual warmth. Animals are changing their mating and migration patterns. Species of amphibians are in danger of extinction from diseases that are flourishing with the change of climate. These are not just single events, but trends that are being carefully tracked over years and decades.

In hundreds of ways, environmental disaster is creeping in on us in the background, and sooner or later the financial concerns and environmental concerns will merge. The problems that the average person is dealing with on a daily basis already have more to do with the environment than with the financial meltdown. The rising prices of food and other commodities are a function of the costs of energy (transportation), of drought, and of climate shifts that are decimating growing areas and species.

Small changes taking place over time add up. We have to think beyond whether global change is real or whether we can stop it by our actions. Garbage is garbage, whether it’s in landfills, floating in the ocean, or contaminating our food and air, or high in the atmosphere. We each contribute to it, and we can each reduce the accumulation and its impact on our lives and on the earth.

Polar bears have become a recognizable symbol of climate change, but polar bears don’t live in our backyards, and don’t really convey the message that we are also being affected by climate change. Polar bears are merely a symptom; for the causes, we need to look in our own backyards.

Shoppers are flocking to thrift stores, families with teens are learning how to say “no,” to requests for the latest and shiniest toys, and drivers are discovering the (sometimes dubious) joys of public transportation. But will all this economizing last? Is frugality just another temporary necessity that people will gladly give up when (and if) things return to normal?

The environmental movement isn’t much of a presence these days, even though green living is a buzzword that’s often in the news. When financial survival is a priority, there’s going to be more concern for financial than environmental solutions. This means that green living and frugality aren’t translating into the environmental consciousness of the 70s and 80s. Saving the earth seems far less important than saving ourselves. For the average person, just getting through this economic crisis is about all they can deal with.

On a larger stage, though, this can be a short-sighted mistake that will have eventually have serious consequences. A news report in Wired indicates that investment in green projects is slowing down because money is so tight. “’The general economic slowdown is taking everybody’s eyes off what was an increasing momentum around concerns of climate change and the cost of energy,’ said Paul Maeder, a general partner with venture capital firm Highland Capital Partners.”

The current drop in the cost of oil (which is probably temporary) is also contributing to decreasing interest in long-term energy projects. The danger is that, companies that are developing these projects may well go out of business, just when they are badly needed. It’s happened before, and is one of the reasons why technological advances in energy production have been few and far between over the last few decades.

Taking care of today’s problems may be the top priority, but we also need to keep an eye on the consequences of ignoring long-term problems and solutions. It’s difficult to absorb the idea that, in the long run, saving the earth is a requirement for saving ourselves, but it’s just as important for individuals as it is for corporations, governments, and investors.

Behind the headlines about banks and bailouts are the doings of the ordinary people who are most affected by tight money. Cutting back is a rock that ripples throughout the pond, and the ripples are beginning to make the news.

Thrift stores doing well and worrying

A New York Times article about boom times for thrift stores reveals that while more people are shopping at thrifts, the new frugality is also a problem. “…the same economic woes that are sending buyers their way are causing donors to hand over fewer items, so that many stores are running low on inventory.” Long-time thrift store patrons probably never imagined a day when their favorite shopping spots might run out of stock. But thrift stores depend on donations, and when too many people have second thoughts about giving away perfectly good clothing, the shelves and racks are going to empty out.

Where do the clothes go if they’re not going to the Salvation Army, Goodwill, and other thrifts? They’re either staying in the closet a bit longer, or replenishing thin wallets when they’re sold on eBay and Craigslist. Don’t wait too long to do your thrift store Christmas shopping.

What’s the matter with kids today?

Instead of putting beans in their ears, they’re more likely to have their fingers in their ears, refusing to listen to parents say “no” to their requests for the latest toys or most popular brands of clothes. According to another New York Times article , the more affluent the family, the bigger the shock when teens find that they’re included in the family retrenching.

Most teens have little concept of where their family’s money comes from, or where it goes. They just know that they can usually have whatever they ask for. Worst of all, most of them have never worked and don’t know how to manage the money they’re given or the credit and debit cards they’ve been using so freely.

The family dramas are tough on both parents and children, and the battles are going on all over the country. Welcome to the real world, kids.

On the road

Finally, we learn that the sky-high cost of gas last summer had benefits and costs. According to MarketWatch , Americans drove 15 billion fewer miles in August than they did in August of 2007. And now that prices have dropped, they’re still hopping onto public transportation in record numbers. That’s a huge savings in gasoline consumption, and it probably reduced air pollution in urban areas, but there’s also a downside. Highway and bridge projects depend on gasoline taxes, and when people are driving less, there’s less income for those projects. Secretary of Transportation Mary Peters says that’s a problem, but she’s also aware that gas taxes aren’t necessarily to best way to fund anything. ” ‘We pay for transit the same way we pay for road and bridge projects — with federal gas taxes,’ she said. ‘Relying on the gas tax is like relying on cardboard to keep the rain out — the longer you use it the less it works.’ “

Getting back to basics in almost any area of life should be a fairly straightforward process. But it usually isn’t. Take something as relatively uncomplicated as switching from pre-cooked foods to homemade foods. Making the change means that you have to know how to cook. But when you have a couple of generations of people who’ve grown up heating food in the microwave, or adding a few ingredients to boxed mixes, cooking skills are in short supply. So cookbooks come into the picture. And food items that you have to learn how to use — spices and herbs, baking powder, oils, etc. Tools to cook with — pots, pans, measuring spoons. Where do you start? What are the basic essentials?

If getting back to something as simple as real cooking is so difficult, how do we retreat from a serious mess like the current wave of mortgage defaults? It’s easy to lay the blame at the feet of lenders, but we need to ask why they managed to get away with the tactics that led people into desperate financial binds. Should we transfer the blame to all those gullible people who believed that the interest on their variable-rate mortgages would either stay level or go down? Who believed that their income would always expand to meet expenses. Who didn’t understand their credit card statements well enough to see the warning signs that said “you’re overextended.”

We need to go much further back if we’re going to lay blame or, preferably, determine the causes for a population which can’t cook and which doesn’t know when they’re being financially bamboozled. We need to go back to the schools, which were charged with educating students for the real world. And then back to the system that educated the teachers.

Blame may make us feel good, but it doesn’t do anything to change the situation. We need to understand how we got where we are. Once we know that, we can start thinking about how to bring about the necessary changes.

When the economy is expanding, people have more discretionary income to spend, with two results: 1. They become accustomed to having items that were once considered luxuries, and those items slowly become necessities. 2. Product lines become more diversified, with pricier and more exotic choices being offered.

The diversification and expansion of product lines is both a response to and a cause of consumers’ desire for variety. But it also supports consumption as a social game, which makes me wonder why the once-popular term “conspicuous consumption” hasn’t been revived. The purchase (and display) of expensive items has always been one of the perks of wealth; now it’s accessible to anyone with the price of a chocolate bar or a fancy brand of tea or coffee.

The interesting question is: what will happen to people’s psyches and to the market as tightening budgets translate to tightening wallets? When you realize that the daily latte from Starbucks is costing you close to $100.00 a month, the decision to cut back and the pain of withdrawal can have both psychological and social effects. Walking into the office with a thermos of coffee brewed at home, rather than a tall cup of almond-mocha-licorice-mint latte from Starbucks can be either a statement of independence from gustatory fashion or a shamefull confession of financial difficulties.

The amount of shelf space devoted to unusual and expensive teas and coffees, and the aisles of organic foods, complete with a dozen varieties of tofu, will undoubtedly start shrinking. Purveyors of one-of-a-kind non-essentials will have to scramble to cope with a changing marketplace. And the very rich, whose difficulties consist of having to cut back on the size of their next boat purchase, will have the social prestige of mindless spending all to themselves again.

Social and economic change means that old niches are constantly sliding into obsolescence. But new niches and opportunities open up at about the same rate, sometimes even faster, as entrepreneurs take advantage of technological advances. So, are the current economic upheavals a catastrophe in the making, or an opportunity for those who have the knowhow to stay ahead of the curve and are willing to take risks?

Both, depending on where you’re looking and the filters you use for viewing. Social change always has its costs, and the faster and more extreme the changes, the higher the costs. Everybody has to take some hits, but the poor are usually the ones who suffer most. There are ways to structure society that can minimize and alleviate the suffering, but that takes foresight, and the willingness to consider more than our own personal interests.

The speed at which change is now taking place, and the massive discontinuities that are part of it provide opportunities for unprecedented innovation and creativity in all areas of life. That includes the solutions to already-existing social problems. If we look at extreme departures from the norm as mostly destructive, we will cling to traditional ways of thinking with even more desperation as the speed of change increases. And that in itself will contribute to the problems. Whether this rigidity develops primarily in response to changes in everyday life or to changes in the society as a whole, it’s the surest way to guarantee that things will go from bad to worse. Panic and a blind faith in old ways are not reasoned responses, and will never produce the solutions we need.

During the big downsizing spree of the 90s, the evening news was full of human interest stories: the family struggling to make ends meet, the former middle manager living in his car, the job hunter sending out hundreds of resumes. I don’t watch television news any more, but I’m sure the same stories are running. It would certainly make a realistic counterpoint to the political hot air that consumes everyone’s attention these days.

One thing about the 90s stories that really fascinated me was the number that focused on people’s attempts to find new jobs after they had been downsized or outsourced out of their supposedly secure positions. They talked about the number of resumes they’d sent out, and how long they’d been at it, but one thread that ran through the stories was that they were looking for exactly the same kind of job they had lost. Somehow, it hadn’t penetrated their consciousness that if their particular type of work was proving to be something less than essential to the world’s business, it might be time to think about developing some new skills, some job qualifications that met changing demands. They kept running down the same track, wearing the ruts deeper, and never once considering the possibility of trying another track that wasn’t so worn.

And I wonder how many of today’s job refugees are repeating that pattern. “This is what I’ve learned to do to earn a living. This is what I have to do to earn a living. Surely, all the jobs can’t have gone away. I guess I’ll just have to keep trying. Send out more resumes tomorrow… and the next day… and the next day.”

Human beings don’t generally react well to sudden, extreme changes in their world. When the social and economic order begins to break down, there are several possible responses. The usual one is: do nothing; go about your everyday routines and pretend that nothing is happening. The second most frequent response is to place blame. The third response is panic.

The one thing that can be said about all three responses is that they do nothing to solve the problems that are causing the breakdown. Ignoring the situation guarantees that it will continue to get worse. Finding someone or something to blame seems to be a step toward finding solutions, but the chosen scapegoat rarely has anything to do with the root causes. Scapegoats merely create the illusion that something can now be done. Panic, the final reaction, not only contributes nothing to a solution, it makes the situation far worse. The only valid response is to acknowledge the reality of the problems early on and begin the search for the root causes and possible solutions.

At the heart of these responses is the problem of personal responsibility. As societies grow larger and more complex, responsibility for all but the most personal decisions is taken out of the hands of individuals and parceled out to faceless bureaucracies. We could almost say that the primary function of a civilization is to destroy the possibility of personal responsibility. The result is that whole populations are reduced to a state of what psychologists call learned helplessness. The sheer complexity of the problems, and the laws which surround and impede any possible actions make it obvious to every citizen that they have no power to create change and might just as well not bother to try.