Pet Care Under Financial Crisis
2009-01-31

Our life seem to be seviously influenced by the financial crisis, so do our dogs. We spent less and less on pet goods and other unecessary pet supplies.

Now they seem less likely to consume with the abandon they showed before the prospect of running out of money became a realistic one. The coffee at home will be more attractive than the $5.00 latte at Starbucks. Rather than stopping at the canine bakery, people may now choose to buy more prosaic dog biscuits from a supercenter aisle. The recent decision by Starbucks to close 600 stores recently may be a harbinger of things to come.

But there is more. Boomers and others who have seen their savings devastated could reduce their spending on other items not directly part of the discretionary economy. The wardrobe – you need clothes, but not necessarily new suits every season – may not be renewed quite as frequently. The car may be kept a couple of extra years. This could place the entire auto bailout in jeopardy.

It would be a mistake to assume that there will be a quick and easy exit from the current economic difficulties. An affluent economy is necessarily a consuming society. Such an economy requires both necessities as well as the frills. It needs gyms, Starbucks, dog bakeries and the rest of the discretionary economy, just as it needs automobile manufacturing, information services and grocery stores. The destruction of the discretionary economy may not be as serious as the loss of homes in Detroit or jobs on Wall Street, but it can not take place without destroying the jobs and lives of people.