suicide attempt global crisis financial

Henry David Thoreau:

Simplify, simplify.

Sounds easy enough, live a life of simplicity and you will be happy. Don’t let your possessions own you. Only buy what you need, not what you want. Unfortunately as a race of people we have decided that simple isn’t good enough.

During the Great Depression which lasted roughly ten years, suicide rates increased from 14 to 17 per 100,000. To put this in perspective, a report was just released by Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health’s Center for Injury Research and Policy which shows the U.S. suicide rate rose 5 percent, from 10.5 per 100,000 people in 1999 to 11 per 100,000 people in 2005. The difference between 2005 at 11 per 100,000 and 17 per 100,000 during the Great Depression years is remarkably high.

We are heading into what is arguable a global recession with implications not realized since the Great Depression years and possibly even greater. The biggest banks are failing at an alarming rate, unprecedented government bailout packages, corporate layoffs, skyrocketing foreclosures, drained retirement accounts, soaring energy and food costs, the result of years and years of living to excess. Now the stories of suicide are increasing from despondent people who see no other alternative.

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Recently Karthik Rajaram who was jobless and felt hopeless killed himself and his entire family over his predicament. Carlene Balderrama became a symbol of the mortgage crisis when faced with foreclosure faxed her mortgage company blaming them for the loss of their home, then pulled out a high caliber rifle and killed herself. The mortgage company for Carlene Balderrama has since stopped the foreclosure and allowed her remaining family to own the home outright. It only took Carlene blowing a whole in her chest to get something worked out.

We are only at the surface of this economic crisis and undoubtedly more and more will choose the same path that Carlene and Karthik took. Suicide hot lines, psychiatrists, psychologists, bartenders, drug dealers and pharmacists will no doubt see a dramatic rise in business the longer this climate of crisis remains. Once you’ve already tapped into the system of consume, consume some more, is it even possible to revert back to a life of simplicity? According to Milton Friedman it’s not an option and I can’t say I disagree with him.

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