It’s not like we don’t know PT 1: Bubbles burst
We know - we have for quite some time - US national debt is going North. It will surpass $15 Trillion this year.
["US debt grows by leaps and bounds"]
We know Canadian debt is going North. It will surpass $600 Billion this year or early next.
We know personal debt in Canada is going North. It is now at $150 debt per $100 income for the first time in human history.
All these things we know. What we don’t know is what to do about it.
We know the days of $15 oil (price per barrel), as in the early 1980s, are over. We know oil prices have increased four-fold in the last ten years alone.
We know global oil consumption has grown steadily since 1984. We know global oil consumption, as from 1996 - 2006, cannot be sustained.
1996 - 71,669,000 barrels, a 2.19% rise over 1995
2006 - 84,977,000 barrels, a 1.16% rise over 2005
(Source: United States Energy Information Administration)
We know the oil bubble will burst, that it may have an unstoppable leak already.
These things we know. What we don’t know is what to do about it.
I’d recommend, just off the top of my head, long distance training.
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It’s not like we don’t know PT 2: Food prices will rise steadily
We know US debt, Canada's debt and personal debt will eventually back many families into a corner from which they will only escape with a smaller lifestyle.
We know oil prices have quadrupled since 2000, global oil consumption has grown steadily since 1984 and the cheap oil bubble will soon burst. What we don’t know is what to do about these things.
Personally, I think long distance training is in order.
For example, if personal debt is like an ever-tightening noose, a person or family should seek assistance from a bank or financial advisor, strictly monitor credit card use or cut them up, begin keeping a detailed budget, reduce spending on non-essential or frivolous items, develop the habit of living - for the long-term - under one’s means. That's for starters.
As many know, long distance runners work hard for weeks, months and years to train for fast marathon times. Success doesn’t come easy.
Individuals and families must train themselves too, over the long term again, to steadily decrease debt and then to accumulate savings.
Thanks to recent news, we now know the cheap food bubble will soon burst, if it has not done so already.
Canadians and Americans have enjoyed cheap food for many, many years. It has been reported that Canadians on average spend 10% of disposable income on food, Americans - 13%, while in China the average is 39%, even higher (45%) in Indonesia. (Feb. 14, London Free Press)
A senior market analyst predicted that “food prices will likely increase 5% to 10% over the next year or so.”
Already much complaining has started.
One subheading in the recent news article declared, “Record high prices blamed for political unrest.”
While that is definitely true, the reverse is also true, that political unrest will also soon be blamed for record high prices because unrest, e.g., in Libya, will jack up the already rising oil prices.
There are several other factors affecting rising grocery prices, but so far no one has suggested that long distance training will help ease the pain.
I for one think it will.
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It’s not like we don’t know PT 3: Potato chips out. Apples in.
There are many things we know concerning national debt, oil prices per barrel and subsequent gas prices at the pump.
(Hint: They're going North.)
As well, we know the cheap food bubble will burst and the days when the average Canadian can spend only 10% of disposable income on food will be gone.
According to the Feb. 14 issue of The London Free Press, a senior market analyst predicts that “food prices will likely increase 5% to 10% over the next year or so.”
There are several factors affecting rising grocery prices, but so far no one has suggested that long distance training will help ease the pain.
I do so now.
For many years I trained my body to cover approximately 1,000 miles over 6-month periods (including dozens of hill workouts for strength, speed workouts for faster times, 20 - 25 mile long runs to increase stamina) in order to prepare for one shot at a 26.2 mile race on a specific date, e.g., The Forest City Marathon right here in London, Ontario.
Increased strength, speed and stamina helped me prepare for the next marathon (and other distances, e.g., 10 km., 21.1 km., 30 km. races), and the one after that, and the one after that, etc., for 10 years.
I learned over the course of my racing decade that long distance training principles (e.g., “a marathon starts with one step”) can be applied to other matters.
For example, the effort made to put a little bit of savings away each week produced something substantial at the end of one year, more at the end of two, and so on.
The pain associated with putting aside a little bit of savings might hurt at first, but then the pocketbook and mind and heart gets used to it, and the items that were reduced (e.g., restaurant meals, movies) to provide the savings are forgotten.
Related to our rising food bills: I bet there are 40 - 50 food items in homes across Canada and the US that most people can quite easily do without. (Rising body weights suggest I might be onto something!)
Turning back the tide of rising prices will be impossible, I’m afraid. It will be easier to trim the fat on grocery lists and in kitchen pantries.
I suggest we get into the long-term habit of cutting one non-essential food item off our grocery list every two or four weeks and choose to eat more fruit or vegetables in its place.
Twinkies out. Locally grown carrots in.
Potato chips out. Apples in.
Soda pop out. Diluted fresh juice in.
I recall the first time I tried to eat my homemade oatmeal without two spoonfuls of brown sugar. Yuck. It was as appetizing as a hill workout on Gibbons Hills during the early stages of marathon training. My body just wasn’t used to it.
However, after a few weeks, I stopped missing the sugar and was enjoying the taste of the mixture of oats, Red River cereal and bran, sweetened with a few diced cranberries, currants and raisins.
I don’t drink pop anymore. It’s far too sweet. I drink cooled juice from the pot after steaming vegetables. Or I drink diluted apple juice, or grape juice. Or water. Good old tap water. (And you know I drink the occasional beer. Yummy. And too much tea and coffee by some standards).
["One cold Guinness please. I can have two? Make it two!": GH 2004, London]
[Special note: It has been said that if you want to see what you're going to look like in 20 years, look at a photo of yourself crossing the finish line of a marathon. The photo above shows how I'll look at age 74. I'll be ordering Guinness! Good one! Sorry, I digress.]
Our bodies have been bombarded with too much sugar and high-fructose corn syrup and salt for years. It’s hard to buy breads or bagels anymore that don’t have 3 - 6 sugars listed under ‘main ingredients.’ Even salt and bottled lemon juice now contain sugar.
As grocery prices rise by 5 - 10%, I am confident that many Canadians will be able to make substantial savings by trimming nonsense foods from the weekly grocery list and train the body to accept the less exciting (aka sugary, fatty, salty) taste of real and healthier food.
Sure, some people will have to learn to cook, but isn’t that what TV is for? (The mindset of the long distance runner will help along the way).
It’s not like we didn’t know this was coming.
More to follow. (You knew that too!)
***
It’s not like we don’t know PT 4: Food Freedom Day? WTHeck?
Here in Canada and the US we know debt and oil cost$ are going North.
We know food cost$ are going North and one day we’ll have to cook more meals to save $$$.
Meanwhile back at the ranch, where snow-covered Canadians have time to calculate which day our grocery bills will be paid off, some of us know that Feb. 12 was Food Freedom Day 2011, “the date by which the average Canadian has earned enough money to pay for groceries for the entire year.” (Feb. 14, London Free Press)
["Long-term training needed to live under our means"]
Right now there are a few factors that are keeping that date from being pushed quickly into March.
According to economists, they are the following:
The high Canadian dollar
the high proportion of food costs unrelated to crop prices such as marketing and transportation
intense retail competition
However, crop prices will eventually buffet Food Freedom Day.
Here’s why:
North American crop prices - for corn , wheat and soybeans - are surging.
A high percentage of foods contain corn, corn syrup, corn starch, wheat and soy.
Our meat stocks - beef, pork and poultry - get stuffed to the eyeballs with corn and soy.
So, as you already likely know, Food Freedom Day won’t likely be celebrated on Feb. 12 in 2012.
It strikes me funny that many North Americans pay any attention to such odd conventions, i.e., Food Freedom Day, Tax Free Day (the date by which we have earned enough to pay off our taxes), Mortgage Free Day, Christmas Bills Free Day, Golf Membership Free Day, Cable Bill Free Day, etc.
It’s funny (funny “odd”, not funny “haha”) because those dates are more about willing deception than whimsical convention.
How can we say to ourselves that we’ve earned enough to pay off our groceries when some payments are made by credit card and personal debt is going through the roof? How can we be free from taxes when national debt is higher than it’s ever been (in Canada and the US) in human history? How can anyone celebrate Mortgage Free Day when their line of credit is growing faster than the mortgage is declining?
Some of us are such maroons.
These things we know, and long-term training is needed to get many North Americans even close to living under their means.
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Please click here to read a series related to US debt.
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