Upside of the Credit Crunch

Contrary to what my children think, I'm not that old. But I can remember,clearly, a time when the credit card was not a feature of our social landscape.

I got my wages, in cash, each week in a brown paper envelope, My employer built and sold widgets. He financed the business out of sales, but had a small development loan, from the bank, to buy bigger machine to make better widgets. I lived out of my income but had a small overdraft facility to cater for emergencies. Our property values didn't sky rocket (up or down!) but it didn't seem to bother anyone.

Now with the advent of our flexible friend, our model has changed and we are pressured to live, not out of what we have, but out of what we don't have. And that;s fine as long as you can keep all the balls in the air. But, if they fall, we realize only too clearly that credit (compared with real money) is a little like the Emperors New Clothes - pure fantasy.

The upside of this economic turmoil however, is that even if I can't now afford to retire, my widow can always rely on MasterCard to make sure I'm buried in a smart new designer T shirt and Nike sneakers, rather than the cheap undertakers shroud I would have been forced to wear in the good old days.

I guess thats progress?