The economy

The economy. Most of us are tired of hearing about it. We know that things have previously been better here in the good ol’ United States. The June inflation rate was 5%, the highest since 1990 or 1991. We all love going to buy gas these days!!

Let’s put it in perspective, though. I want to use my rose colored glasses for a moment. From 1973 until 1982 our inflation rate was never below 6 percent with many years in double digits! (OK, 1976 was 5.75%)

Suppose you live in Zimbabwe. Annual inflation rose in May to 1,063,572 percent! That’s right – over 1 MILLION percent inflation. I read that in July it is up to 2.2 million percent!! A loaf of bread now cost what 12 new cars did a decade ago. A small pack of locally produced coffee beans now costs close to 1 billion Zimbabwe dollars – the price of 60 new cars a decade ago. That’s for a small pack of coffee beans!!! Economic analysts say unless the rate of inflation is slowed, annual inflation will likely reach about 5 million percent by October.

Manufacturing industries, now running at below 30 percent of their capacity, are reporting growing absenteeism by workers facing soaring commuter bus fares. They can't afford to get to work to earn a paycheck!

With inflation soaring, you need a wheelbarrow to haul around enough cash to buy groceries! The Zimbabwe government is trying to help out. They just introduced a 100 billion dollar bank note! You read that correctly – a 100,000,000,000 dollar bill.

Imagine how hard it is to design currency with 11 zeros on it. Or worse… 1923 Germany -15 digits and 1946 Hungary with 19 digits.

I don’t really like it, but I think I can live with 5% for a little while.

As England’s previous Prime Minister Tony Blair said, referring to the United States, "A simple way to take measure of a country is to look at how many want in... And how many want out."