Tuesday, 17th March 2009
Beat the credit crunch to a pulp!
The Credit Crunch is all over the news. It’s on everyone’s minds, and by now, also making its way into everyone’s pockets. Even if you’re not yet experiencing the ‘tightening of the belt’, the thought of it will soon start keeping you up at night... and not in a good way!
It all started in America when banks lent money to people without jobs, who lived in trailer parks, and were regular guests on the Jerry Springer show. The poor bankers, supposedly financial experts in assessing risk, were shocked out of their skins when these people couldn’t pay off their loans, and now we are all paying them off for them, hence the economic crisis. If it’s any consolation, banks seem to have learnt their lesson, and are now being extremely careful about whom they lend money to; so much so, that today, if you lend a tenner to your brother, you could easily end up being one of the world’s biggest lenders.
In Malta it’s not just the Credit Crunch that is taking its toll on the economy. Amongst other things, there’s also the threat that our utility bills could end up costing us more than our children’s education. Also, with unemployment on the rise, the only jobs out there fall in the RAPE category – Really Anally Paid Employment, and because of our silly need to eat and to have a roof over our heads, we have no choice but to SOD it – Sign Or Die!
Still, the Crunch, the Squeeze, the Crisis, or whatever you want to call it, is not all doom and gloom. In fact, we should all take it as an opportunity to get creative with our money-saving efforts. A friend of mine for instance, is now buying two-ply toilet paper and pulling the sheets apart. In this way he ends up with 2 rolls for the price of 1. He also insists that one square of toilet paper is all you really need! Another friend who is in the sign-making business, has taken advantage of this economic situation by specializing in signs that say ‘Closing Down Sale’, and ‘Clearance - Everything Must Go’. Her best selling sign is the one that says: ‘Repossessed by (enter your bank’s name here)’.
Probably the best advantage one can take of this economic situation is to do what Suze Orman is doing. This clever woman has found the most lucrative recession jobs of all. She makes a fortune telling the American people not to spend their money, except on her books and seminars. She goes on Oprah to put the fear of God in everyone insisting that if people do not take her advice seriously, even the light at the end of the tunnel will be turned off.
If you’re one of the brave ones, who despite the crisis are still planning on tying the knot and hooking up for the rest of your life, you can save big money by investing in a pair of credit-crunch-priced engagement rings from M&S. They only cost €18 and are described as “dazzling diamante” guaranteed to “add instant sparkling style.” Clearly these are remarkably cheaper than the €2000 you would usually pay for engagement rings, and the M&S logo on the back of them is just a small compromise for the money you save.
They say that the crisis will not hit us as hard as it hit the Americans, and hopefully this turns out to be true, because the Maltese, quite literally, do not have as much fat to live off as most of the Americans do. Anyway, whichever way it goes, I am going to stay on the safe side of life until this whole crisis thing blows over. I will only invest in the safest bank around - the one bank that has stood the test of all times is pink and round, and although it goes by the name of PIGGY, it never lends money to anyone without my permission!
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