I am the cause of the recession – I think

Been looking through some bank statements. Normally a depressing experience at the best of time, you would presume in the present climate of ‘hell hath no fury as a credit crunch’, one’s normal resigned mental state to the ever decreasing numbers would be magnified to apocalyptic levels.

But I’m not. Indeed, I’m struck by the bland continual normality of my bank statements. The numbers just seem to all look the same. Clearly I haven’t reigned in my spending, despite job insecurities; clearly I’m not hoarding, or nesting or stuffing bank notes in my mattress.

Am I defying the recession? Is that second pint on Friday night my miniscule contribution to quantitative easing? Or, more likely, if people had the same spending habits as me, far from continuing a happy, bliss filled existence of boom time spending we’d all be in a permanent state of depressed stagnation.

Which worries me, simply because most people I know manage their money like I do. Was our last 10 years of economic growth built upon a tiny fraction of the population whose spiral of borrowing and spending has been the catalyst upon the whole post millennium boom?

I think that it was. And without them, you’re left with people like me. And I’m dull. And I don’t spend much. And I’m convinced that my contribution to financial security of the western world is to close my eyes, dig my heels in, and do all in my power to stop the inevitable force of progress.

For which I am sorry