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Bad economy? Do what you love
Stephanie Chen, CNN
As job security from corporate America fades, Jackson and others see the economic downturn as an unexpected chance to transform hobbies or youthful fantasies, once-dubbed impractical, into grown-up careers.
“I’ve spent most of my professional life making money for other people’s companies,” says Laura Waldusky, who opened her own jewelry shop this month in Houston, Texas, after being unable to find a job in 2008. “Why not invest my talents in, well, myself?” iReport.com: Tell us how you’re surviving
Waldusky, who worked for major labels like Louis Vuitton in the past, tried to find a design job for months when the stock market plunged last fall, but says job opportunities were scarce. She had been designing her own jewelry as a hobby for many years and decided to use her savings to make her jewelry business a full-time gig.
Professionals are realizing the prescribed path of a college degree leading to a lucrative job may no longer exist, as the volatile economy takes a toll on some of the soundest professions, such as banking and law. Almost every day Fortune 500 companies announce more layoffs, leaving remaining workers left to fear they may be next.
Some small businesses owners say launching a new venture in tough times is better than doing nothing.
(24 February 2009)
Just heard about a couple who lost their high-paying jobs and decided to heck with it – they’ll spend the next 14 months travelling. -BA
Could the bad economy be good for your health?
Caleb Hellerman, CNN
… Yet amid the ominous signs, there may be a silver lining, according to Christopher Ruhm, an economist at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. His research links hard economic times, surprisingly, to lower death rates and better overall health.
For one thing, Ruhm says, when people tighten their belts, they tend to cut down on vices like smoking and drinking. They also get into fewer accidents. According to the Federal Highway Administration, Americans are driving about 2 percent fewer miles than they did a year ago. They’re also driving more carefully: the road fatality rate per mile traveled is down 6 percent.
But the good health trends aren’t limited to fewer traffic accidents and less reliance on so-called vices. In a 2007 paper, “A Healthy Economy Can Break Your Heart,” Ruhm calculated that a one-percent decrease in the unemployment rate corresponds to a 0.75 percent increase in deaths from coronary heart disease. That doesn’t sound like a lot, but that adds up to an additional 3,900 deaths in the United States in a given year.
Why would a strong economy be less healthy? That’s the tricky part: Ruhm’s numbers are based on raw mortality data; they don’t hold the answer. But he does have a few ideas.
For one thing, during a recession, there’s less pollution, which helps people with heart conditions and asthma. Laid-off people also have more free time: Mark Wooten didn’t exercise or cook healthy meals when he was driving a forklift 12 hours a day.
Other benefits are indirect. For example, during a recession, the use of public transportation goes up, which corresponds to more physical activity. Ruhm also speculates that during a downturn, people might spend more time with friends and loved ones, the kind of social support that other studies have linked to good health.
(24 February 2009)
Interesting discussion at TOD’s DrumBeat. It begins:
Paranoid: I would not be too quick to come to any conclusions here. It matters to your health whether you are unemployed for a short, or long time, whether many of your acquaintances are also unemployed, whether your benefits have run out or not yet. etc. etc… People who are voluntarily tightening their belts may cut down on vices (though other reports are that people are using chocolate or alcohol as “treats” to replace expensive vacations (also a weird concept, by the way…)), but people who are living under a lot of stress for a long time are usually found to have increased rates of smoking, overeating and problem drinking.
Leanan: I thought it was interesting because it ties into some other studies that have found the death rate actually decreases in times of trouble. I’d assumed it was due to “caloric restriction” – the observation that animals that are half-starved live longer, perhaps because their energies go toward cell repair rather than reproduction. We know the death rate did not increase during the Great Depression, though the birth rate decreased.
From Beverly Hills to shoveling manure on a farm
Stephanie Chen, CNN
They bid farewell to their beloved trips to the opera and museum, the beach and Buddhist temples. They ate one last time at their favorite restaurants serving Indian curried chicken and warm bowls of Vietnamese pho.
Leah Bird and her husband, Ed Wright, have traded their comfortable two-bedroom apartment and jobs in Beverly Hills, California, for life in a trailer on a five-acre Oregon farm.
No longer do the couple hear roaring fire trucks in the street or chatter from patrons dining at outdoor cafes. On this farm, the dominant silence is occasionally interrupted by the sounds of frogs and crickets.
“It’s not necessarily a lifestyle that has ever seemed attractive to me,” says 28-year-old Bird, between tending to the farm animals: two sheep, two Nubian goats, miniature horses and geese. “I always saw myself as more of a metropolitan person, but you know, without money, this was our best option.”
The couple’s drastic lifestyle change — one they chose — came last October when Wright, 48, lost his job managing life insurance portfolios for millionaires at a private firm in Beverly Hills.
(26 February 2009)
How we’re going to save more
By Pat Regnier, Money Magazine
It won’t be by renouncing all ‘frivolous’ spending. It’ll be by focusing on the big things – and resisting the urge to beat ourselves up.
… If you’ve got a decent income, changing your brand of coffee or being the last person in your zip code to buy an iPod just isn’t going to get you very far. To make a real difference, you are going to have to cross out a major line item. The private school. The house with the great address. A parent staying at home with the kids. Or the plan to retire early. These are not frivolous, spendthrift things. Responsible grown-ups can choose among them. It’s just that most of us can’t choose every single one of them.
There’s been much wringing of hands lately about the conspicuous overconsumption of the 1990s and early 2000s. Many people feel that we’re simply being punished for buying all those flat-screen TVs. Maybe we could appease the angry money gods with a bonfire of surplus Prada bags.
But guess what. Most Americans really weren’t unusually self-indulgent. At the height of the boom, Elizabeth Warren, a Harvard Law School expert on bankruptcy and consumer debt, crunched the numbers. In 2005 the median-income family was spending substantially less of its income on clothing, appliances and food – even after including meals out – than families did in 1972. If it seems as though your closets have filled up with trinkets and baubles, that’s partly because that stuff got a lot cheaper relative to incomes. Where the spending really grew was in the big fixed costs, including mortgages, health care, child care and college tuition.
(26 February 2009)
Bartering booms during economic tough times
Emily Bazar, USA TODAY
… Giesler and Rietsch are among a growing number of people turning to bartering to help them survive the recession. In barter, people trade goods and services without exchanging money.
Barter “absolutely thrives in bad times,” says Roger Staiger, a professor at Johns Hopkins University’s business school. Last month, a Denver developer asked Staiger for help restructuring a loan. Lacking cash, he gave Staiger a Colorado ski trip, and the developer’s wife is designing his Web page.
“This is part of the underground economy that does not contribute to the GDP (gross domestic product), but it absolutely contributes to helping people and fostering trade,” he says.
(26 February 2009)
