Free In Idaho!

I noticed this article (hat tip MM) about the increased “popularity” of pawnshops and craigslist these days.  It seems that a lot of people are finding it difficult to make ends meet, and are having second thoughts about some of the mounds of junk they have purchased over the last few years.  We are, after all, a “consumer driven economy”.  I wonder if that’s Chinese for “we will bury you”?  Hmmm…

Struggling with mounting debt and rising prices, faced with the toughest economic times since the early 1990s, Americans are selling prized possessions online and at flea markets at alarming rates.

To meet higher gas, food and prescription drug bills, they are selling off grandmother’s dishes and their own belongings. Some of the household purging has been extremely painful — families forced to part with heirlooms.

I expect that most of those who think this is a new thing are much younger than I, and haven’t seen this part of the cycle before, or didn’t notice it was happening.  But pawnshops, garage sales, and flea markets have been around forever.  This isn’t new.  Downturns happened in the 70’s, 80’s, early 90’s, and now the late “aughts”.  Nor is the American consumer’s addiction to debt a new or curious thing.  Drive through any middle American subdivision on a Saturday afternoon and look in the open garage doors and you’ll no doubt see more piles of unused stuff than you knew.  It’s embarrassing, or should be.  And as the cycle progresses, we’ll see a lot of that junk on craigslist, or in the pawnshop, or at the neighborhood garage sales later this spring.

When things are going well we all tend to take on more stuff.  The other part of the equation, of course, is that sometimes it rains.  The economy, like life, is cyclical.  Challenges happen in life, whether it is a health problem, loss of a job, or any number of things that can change life in a hurry.  Many of these things can be prepared for in advance.   And yes, sometimes it’s simply the consequences of excess.  As Michele Malkin wrote, “Chickens coming home to roost, as they say.”  The stuff we thought we couldn’t live without becomes the stuff we can’t live with.  And lest you think I’m gazing down my nose, I’ve been there myself.

One item I’ve never had to put up for sale in order to pay a bill is one of my guns (thank you Lord).  Oh yeah, I’ve sold some at shows, or traded one off, but always with the intention of making room for something new.  That’s not the same as having to sell one or more of them in order to make it to the end of the month.  The thought of having to sell some or all to pay the bills, or worse, to put gas in the truck, makes me twitch.  And it reminds me of something Jeff Cooper wrote about 15 years ago.

I have never been taken with the idea of selling a gun. When you possess a firearm, you possess something of importance. If you trade it for cash, you have lost it - and the cash in your hand will soon be gone. Sell something else!

Yes.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 7th, 2008 at 5:26 am and is filed under Culture, Guns. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.