If there's a number everyone is watching these days, it's the price of oil. Already, Saudi Arabia is planning to increase output to cope with demand. Still, the experts say that may not be enough unless the US Dollar bounces back up.
And even then, the huge demand for resources from countries such as China and India will keep prices high in the foreseeable future.
We are getting consumed by consumption.
I remember seeing the crisis in Ethiopia on BBC recently, whilst having my lunch. I lost my appetite after seeing the stick thin children being turned away by the volunteer medical personnel, because they were not "skinny" enough.
Food prices have shot up that even the humanitarian agencies are not able to afford to feed everyone there, only able to save those that are critical and could die of they do not get some food into them there and then.
Here, we are bombarded by page after page of ads that asks us to spend, spend, spend. It's most probably to keep the consumer spending their dough, so that the economy can keep going.
The smart people are scrimping and saving whenever, wherever they can; driving less, cooking at home more, watching the Euro '08 through "non-traditional" sources...
Some are taken in by the "cheap/clearance sales" that's taking up most of the mass media ad spaces. Spend, and you save now!
How soon before they raise fuel, food, services, etc prices up again, to catch up with your "savings" during the "sales"?
We live in a city where we are accustomed to comfort. How many of us will change our habits for the new, less optimistic economic environment?
Better question, how soon will it impact the people in their high towers before they make a policy that will benefit the people that "voted" them in?
