TheEnd of Excess - Why this Crisis is Good for America

Something to think about (Time Magazine April 6, 2009)

1. From 1980 to 2007, the median price of a new American home quadrupled
   
2. The Dow Jones industrial average climbed from 803 in the summer of 1982 to 14,165 in the fall of 2007.
   
3. From the beginning of the '80s through 2007, the share of disposable income that each household spent servicing its mortgage and consumer debt increased 35%.
4. In 1982, the average household saved 11% of its disposable income. By 2007 that number was less than 1%.
   
5. Until the late '80s, only Nevada and New Jersey had casinos, but now 12 states do, and 48 have some form of legalized betting.
6. From the beginning to the end of the long boom, the size of the average new house increased by about half.
7. The average American gained about a pound a year, so that an adult of a given age is now at least 20 lb. heavier than someone the same age back then.
8. In the late '70s, 15% of Americans were obese; now a third are.
   

Things are different now, we can't just save pennies. We need to manage these times and think of new ways of doing things.

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Best,

Ben