Not Just an Economic Crisis

And so again after a visit to Renu's blog, I'm compelled to convert a comment into a post, because one thought led to another which led to a third ..... so on and so forth, till its just too long in the comment form.

Straight off, let me say that I struggled mightily with economics and finance in my formal education and still do not fully understand the intricacies of both. But what I do understand very clearly is this: you violate His laws, you will pay a price someday. As you sow, so shall you reap, or to borrow my sister's favourite acronym, JKVB - Jaisi Karni Vaise Bharni (and now look at the amazing coincidence that as I was going through some of my regular blogs, I came across Goofy Mumma's latest!)

In many places, I recall the current economic crisis being described as the failure of the capitalist philosophy. I disagree.

I see this crisis as the failure of regulatory authorities who should've ensured organizations didn't overstretch their limits. I see this crisis as a failure of organizations themselves in that they were over-ambitious. Most importantly, I see this economic crisis as an after-effect, the result of a much more deeper cause: a moral, ethical & spiritual failure.

Very simply, people got greedy.

Right from childhood, we're taught that greed is bad. In fact, Christianity considers it as one of seven deadly sins. Deadly sin. I find it really amazing that people get so immersed in their careers and money-making that they forget these basic truths along the way. Many will scoff at anything to do with religion & spirituality; they outright dismiss simple values as 'touchy-feely crap' and see them as having no connection to the "business world".

And yet, when this crisis first erupted, and companies - supposedly well-established industry giants - started collapsing one after the other, the first thing people ran towards was God. Churches, in New York City especially, reported record attendance as desperate souls from the corporate world turned to Him for some way out of the mess they'd gotten themselves into.

I repeat: you violate His laws, you will pay a price someday. You can't ..... restrict God to a slot in your life. You can't say, ok God, I'll come see you in so&so place of worship, I'll give some money to xyz charity and that's it, be happy with that, what I do in my job is my business, not Yours.

Many people (including some members of my own family), believe that their "security" and their "status" lies in the size of their bank balance. Everything else comes in second to the all-important goal of money. Instead of work being a part of life, it becomes their whole life, to the exclusion of God, their own health and personal relationships. So when you make that sort of uncontrolled greed your way of life ....... how do you expect to walk away unscathed? And for a crisis of this magnitude to have occurred, its not just a few people here and there who went astray, but entire generations, entire societies that are to blame.

Anything taken to an extreme is bad; so the fault does not lie in capitalism per se, but in the unchecked, unbridled capitalism and materialism. I still believe in the capitalist philosophy, so long as we operate within a moral and ethical framework at the individual and the larger organizational and societal levels.

The values of hard work, honesty, saving and spending within your means are extolled by most faiths, and they are meant to guide us in all aspects of life. They are NOT irrelevant or outdated in present times however "modern" we consider ourselves, and whatever our accomplishments, none of us is above them. Provided we adhere to these guidelines, we have every right to enjoy the fruits of our efforts.