Planning for tomorrow

This summer we have seen some devastating fires in the West. Many people have lost their dream homes and will have difficulty rebuilding them over the long term. We have also lost a lot of our natural forests. Many see this as a tragedy as well. However, the burning of forest is a natural gardening tool that improves our ecological situation because if there were no forest fires, the brush would become so thick that it would choke the life out of trees and ruin many animal habitats. It's an example of something that appears to be horrible on the surface yet actually has a long-term beneficial effect.

Interestingly, there are some parallels in our economy. Sometimes it is necessary to endure some pain immediately to gain long-term benefits. If we let too much of our national debt accumulate, the debt would put our country in so much ruin that the U.S. economy would cease to have value. Businesses, as well as citizens of our nation, would suffer tremendously and we would lose our status as a world power. We would cease to make progress because the more debt we accumulate, the harder it would be for us to rebuild our economy.

Some fiscal austerity right now can save us from becoming a nation like Greece in the future, just like a forest fire today can provide for a healthy environment tomorrow. Everyone needs to practice a little fiscal austerity, from the policymakers down to the average American citizen, in order for our economy to rebuild to the robust forest it was several years ago.

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