I've always been somewhat frugal about what I spend on fabric. Since I like scrappy quilts, I can get my fix picking up a quarter yard of a fabric. If I have a set amount to spend, I'd rather get small pieces of many different fabrics than one big piece (unless I'm needing it for a border). And I've always preferred the on sale fabrics over the pricey ones.
That's the thing about this downturn. For those of us who have always been thrifty, there's not a lot more we can do to cut down expenses. I read an article the other day geared towards cutting expenses. One of them was to try to eat at home most days of the week. HA! We NEVER eat out as it is. As for clothes and grocery shopping, I already do most of mine at Walmart, so....
DH & I are both retired with decent pensions and so far haven't had to dip into our investments, so we're doing okay. However, we aren't spending a lot, mainly because we don't need -- or want -- much. I haven't cut back on fabric purchases because of the economy, but because I need to use up stash -- I don't have room to store any more. Old habits die hard and I still prefer to get stuff on sale when possible; for example, I try to buy batting when it's on sale or when I have a coupon I can use; I just bought a package of Hobbs 80/20 with a 40% off coupon at Hobby Lobby. I did do a bit to help the economy a few weeks ago when I bought a new Babylock serger. :)
Julia > What with all the bad economic news these days, My wife and I were
I wish I understood more about economics than I do. If all of us avoid buying fine fabric at a LQS, what happens to the quilt shop? Doesn't it close? That question became painfully close to me when I read that Kraft foods sales are down 70%. I think I was part of that problem since I started buying store brands instead of my favorites. It seemed like a sensible idea at the time but if all of us did that, we've been shooting a fine company in the back. I wish we had better answers. Polly
Good point. It's like everyone flocking to Walmart when the new supercenter is built in your town. You save a few bucks, on a few things. But the local grocer who's been there for 40 years, and donated to every Boy Scout, Girl Scout, Band, Athletics, etc. etc.etc. fundraiser the entire 40 years, gets driven out of biz. Our LQS shop owner already said she's going to avoid carrying the same things as Hobby Lobby (certain battings, certain notions)....because there's a 40% off coupon and all her customers buy there.She can't price-match them.
Michelle, I agree with you that it can be hard to cut expenses when that's how you've lived for years. I really don't buy clothes. When a pair of jeans gives out I get a new pair. When the turtlenecks or teeshirts are worn or stained, I buy a new one or two on sale. And we also never eat out. I cook. We eat frugally and have many, many meatless meals. Beef is a rarity in our house. We turn the heater way down at night, keep lights off, replaced most of our lights with CF bulbs, the list goes on and on. Probably my fabric purchases are the most discretionary spending we do. LOL.
Oh well, our hatches are battened and all I can pray for is that DH isn't included in the next round of lay-offs. I pray for the economy all the time. Maybe if we all did it might start to "heal" --
While seriously OT, the whole situation of shortage of money is puzzling to me and I suspect most people, economic graduates excepted. The basic question I want to understand is where has the 'money' gone that was happily in circulation a year or so ago? It appears to have disappeared.
We, the people don't have it, clearly or at least I think clearly, the Banks don't have it. The Government probably doesn't have it as they are borrowing from China. Does it mean all this money ended up in China and the Middle East?
I suppose the an explanation is the 'money' didn't really exist at all. What we thought we were spending was illusionary and was nothing other than 'credit', that is we were all accumulating debt and now is 'pay back' time.
Anyone with a more educated insight into the 'mess'.
I don't know if I have a handle on it either, but a lot of people were taking out equity from their vastly over appreciated houses, that they were using to fund a lifestyle that they really couldn't afford. When the housing bubble burst, that ability evaporated, along with the attendant bank losses, and stock losses, due to that devaluation. The value loss in the stock market is about 50 % and that is money that has indeed evaprorated. Now housing is returning to it's more reasonable level of pricing, and people are finding that they owe more on the house than it is worth. A perfect storm of forces, that makes for a lack of willingness to spend. The money hasn't gone anywhere, but it's supply source has dried up, and until we get the housing trouble fixed, it will continue to be a problem for everybody. I saw this whole thing coming when we left California and got out of the stock market, entirely, and into fixed instrument investments with government guarantees, and paid cash for my house that I had from the sale of the over inflated price California house I had just sold. I hate to be the one who is smug and say, I told you so, but, the writing was clearly on the wall for anybody to see, but nobody wanted to give up the "easy money" on housing inflation. Now we all are paying the price, and I fear it will be a long time until things return to some semblance of normalcy. Whatever that might be. At least the bread lines are not as long as those in the Great Depression, Yet.
That's like us, Sunny. DH's work is closely related to the building industry, and we all know that's not stable right now. We can live on a shoestring, because there's only 2 of us and we're old :-) That means most everything is paid for (but it's old too!) I worry more about losing the health insurance. I also worry more about young families with children. Cost of living is so much harder for them. Sherry
I agree with an earlier poster. Don't forget your LQS!
I just got back from a (wonderful) visit with DS#2 and his wife. Several of the quilt stores that I visit once a year were shuttered and closed. :<
Times are tough and some people have got to watch every penny IF they still have pennies to watch. But quality fabric is still important. Good tools make our 'work' easier. And the advice and comfort of your LQS should be supported if possible.
joan (and yes, I do work at an LQS) p.s. Yesterday, I left Spring in California and stepped back into Winter in Nebraska! Yuck!
Bingo. (Up front disclaimer: my explanation is totally US-centric)
Econ's not my strong point, either, but it's been like the dotcom bubble was: we can suspend basic math for our convenience.
(The dotcom out of control growth spurt was built on the idea, absurd as it seems, that the more money a dotcom lost, the more successful it was---like somehow basic math was suspended for internet use. That proved not to be true and voila! "bubble" bursts.)
We've been in a deregulated economic climate of predatory lending...yeah, yeah, yeah, we've all heard those terms on the news, but what does it actually *mean*?
Predatory lending: banks, mortgage companies, and who-all ever in the money bidness, pressuring people to take out loans and make purchases that the lender KNOWS the customer cannot afford. Loan types that aren't really meant to be pay-off-able, they're just meant to make money for the lender. (Reasonable payments for a few years, then the entire balance due.....payments designed to increase, sometimes steeply, with the passage of time......and my favorite housing mortgage, the one where we put you in a house/loan/payment that's right at the edge of what you can afford, where your payment is ONLY paying the interest.
That's right. Buy a $350,000 house. Make payments for 30 years. At the end of 30 years, you *only* owe $350,000 on the house.
With the collapse of the lending market goes the housing market.....so now you're doing that with a house that might be now worth $250,000.
Meanwhile, the gummint's been spending all its assets on the war in Iraq....and a vast amount of that not on the military but on paying
*subcontracting corporations* (think Black Water).
For nigh on to 30 years, now, the business climate (and for the last eight or so, the government climate) has been the world of Gordon Gecko and the movie Wall Street: what is "good" has been definied as for the wealthy and corporations to make as much money as possible at the expense of everyone else with as little government intervention as possible. So it's been an open climate of "rape and pillage the country." And once put in place, the economy has teetered on, *depending* on, *requiring* that people keep buying wildly on credit to keep the artificial construct functioning.
(Remember our president telling us that what our country required of us in the face of war was "keep spending, keep shopping"?)
What we have now are the inevitable consequences of that policy.
Check out the community redevelopemnet act Pig. The lending goes back to that. Several administrations have been involved in that going back to Carter. It has been a huge part of the mess. Making lenders lend to folks that have no way of repaying the loans was in no way helping poor folk. Many folk at many levels have been fiscally irresponsible. It was clearly coming even before the govt. got involvolved. Like John said you could see it coming. We live a pretty frugal life in many ways. Every time I see a show about spending less and saving I notice for the most part these are ways we have lived for years. Welcome to my life folks. I grew up in a construction home. Mom wasn't good with money and even though the cyclical recessions were bound to come they didn't plan as they should have. I hated that feast or famine lifestyle. In the times of me me me I wonder what this downturn will do to youngsters that don't know how to do with out either. DH is retired now and we are fairly sound. One kid pretty stable and the other not as sure with jobs. The not so stable one has a large stash and is prepared for the long haul though. When we got burned on Disney stock back in the 80's I said NO to stocks for the most part. That probably saved us a lot of money in the long run. There isn't much integrity with businesses these days and you just can't know enough as a small guy not to get burned. In the long run that will be a detriment to the stock market but short sighted greedy CEO's seem to care not. I wonder if Kraft is down because folks are using less prepared foods? That isn't a bad thing for people but not so great for Kraft. My stash is fair sized and has been in the makings for years. I collect sale, thrift store, yard sale, Ebay and a mix of LQS fabrics. Thankfully I like scrappy quilts. Just a few random thoughts on the economy. Taria
Our money manager said the same thing a year ago. But you can't lay ALL the blame on the homeowners. The banks handed out those mortgages "will he, nil he" and turned around and sold that worthless paper to secondary lenders.
Greed. At every level.
Cindy
"John" wrote in message news: snipped-for-privacy@o11g2000yql.googlegroups.com... On Mar 3, 1:47 am, Edward W. Thompson wrote:
I don't know if I have a handle on it either, but a lot of people were taking out equity from their vastly over appreciated houses, that they were using to fund a lifestyle that they really couldn't afford. When the housing bubble burst, that ability evaporated, along with the attendant bank losses, and stock losses, due to that devaluation. The value loss in the stock market is about 50 % and that is money that has indeed evaprorated. Now housing is returning to it's more reasonable level of pricing, and people are finding that they owe more on the house than it is worth. A perfect storm of forces, that makes for a lack of willingness to spend. The money hasn't gone anywhere, but it's supply source has dried up, and until we get the housing trouble fixed, it will continue to be a problem for everybody. I saw this whole thing coming when we left California and got out of the stock market, entirely, and into fixed instrument investments with government guarantees, and paid cash for my house that I had from the sale of the over inflated price California house I had just sold. I hate to be the one who is smug and say, I told you so, but, the writing was clearly on the wall for anybody to see, but nobody wanted to give up the "easy money" on housing inflation. Now we all are paying the price, and I fear it will be a long time until things return to some semblance of normalcy. Whatever that might be. At least the bread lines are not as long as those in the Great Depression, Yet.
Our LQS has already died the death. She was the heck and gone out past the mall, and then they came along and built a cineplex across the street from her. As a result she was taxed to death, as was the little electrical and electronics repair shop next to her. Nothing left for fabric but TSWLTH and Wallyworld, so I do almost all my fabric buying mail order now.
When it comes to food, I have been shopping mostly at Aldi's and only getting specialty items at the other grocery stores. We do pop up to the corner store for odds and ends and swedish specialties still, always have. I have never bought brand names except on extreme special, or when the off brand is just not up to par. Now that soy and corn have become questionable in the US, we are buying even less at the grocery, digging into our contacts for barter, and buying more of those products at Aldi's where they are mostly imported from Europe. It sucks, but I am not feeding unresearched products that are bred to contain herbicides and pesticides on purpose to my kids. So we are eating a lot more "slow" food, taking more time cooking, and using lots fewer boxed or commercially canned items.
We have been learning how to make cheese for more than a year because it costs less overall than buying it. We have been buying 25 pound sacks of milk replacer mix for drinking and non-critical cooking uses, because it is less expensive than buying it. We have been buying whole eggs and eggwhites dried in 5 pound cans to use where that is OK. We have been trying to grow more of our own food. We have been working for years to try and get the most out of our postage stamp sized yard while still building up the soil so we don't have to buy excessive amounts of fertilizers and etc.
I have been scanning the forclosures and the tax auctions, keeping in touch with agents, and reading the classifieds and swap sheets searching for a better place to live.
We have actually been doing most of this for a while, so economics are not making a huge difference. We are perhaps just better prepared than some.
You're right, Polly. Some people may still be to afford to spend like they have in the past, but others who can are afraid of job losses in the future are reigning in spending in order to save, and this has a detrimental effect on the economy. So if we can afford to support a business, we probably should. As for me, my spending habits haven't changed because I was never a big spender anyway.
Kraft may be down, but a local cheese processing plant is hiring because they make store-label cheese for the Kroger supermarket chain and Kroger shoppers are evidently buying more of the store label cheese.
Julia > I wish I understood more about economics than I do. If all of us avoid
That's 2008's 4th quarter *profits* for Kraft Foods, down 72% (sales rose 6.2%); they blame it on stores marking down prices & cutting inventory/orders. This will have a huge impact on the salt market.
In regards to the subject, the new depression, John said, " It is strange, how this whole thing came about. Who would have thought."
Many of us. Millions of us saw it coming; many of us didn't over-extend, go into debt w/ money we didn't have for things we didn't need.
For sure, when I buy those super fat quarter specials from Keepsake Quilt> I wish I understood more about economics than I do. If all of us avoid
I have asked for years: "how is it possible to have continual growth? How can an economy grow forever and isn't there a place where the growth collapses?" I was asking those questions of legislators and congressmen and economists for the state and federal government in my role as a newspaper reporter. Everytime I asked the question I was assured that perpetual growth was not only possible but assured. I have always assumed that perpetual growth is a cancer. So we opted for a fixed rate mortgage, never took out equity, paid credit card debt as soon as possible and used the things only for real emergencies. We have one car, our sons go to the community college and are paying their way through, my medical bills are our biggest "splurge" and even there I have waited a long, long time for some tests that I probably really need because we just don't have the extra money.
Now I know those people I asked about growth all those times were guessing and worse. They were basing laws and regulations and budgets on a faulty assumption. So people "flipped" houses, financing the new one before paying off the old, bought cars with home equity, used those evil checks the credit card company sends out every couple months to entice us to charge "just as easy as writing a check" and worse. And now we're all in trouble. Greed and stupidity and willful ignoring of reality. Yeah, sure, the economy can grow forever. And I can eat all I want and still wear that cute size 8 that's hanging in my closet (untouched since I did a little unchecked growth myself ) and we can use all the gasoline we want as long as it's cheap because oil reserves won't run out for another 100 years. Heh, good one on our great-grandkids I guess.
I have no answers, just a lot of anger. And a lot of it is at the guy who told us that it was our patriotic duty to go out and spend money in the wake of 9-11. Go shopping. That'll show those bad guys. And a lot is at the banks that consolidated and kept floating money that never really was money but only numbers on some screen.
Mostly I'm angry at myself for refusing to move to Montana and live off the grid when my husband wanted to when we were young and healthy and strong. Maybe we would have found a better way there. Now I'm stuck in the middle of a middle class life that maybe is a lie and maybe won't last much longer. Sigh.
I *think* a lot of people except the investment bankers who invented this giant housing pyramid scheme (and they're unknowing or perhaps greedy victims) knew the piper would have to be paid. We lived in Las Vegas (now the land of foreclosures) during the housing boom. We watched people buy houses using those horrible ARM loans. I kept asking myself, don't these people watch the markets at all? Don't they know in
3 or 5 years when the loan resets the interest rate could be very different--and in all likelihood higher because it was fairly low then? Then the mortgage brokers came up with the "no money down" loan. Eke! That was worse.
However, at that time, I figured if the brokers make bad loans, then they'd have to eat them. Who would figure they'd sell them off like some prized commodity? And who would be stupid enough to buy them? Uh, did I mention the investment bankers?
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