Home Economics
“Home,” wrote Robert Frost, “is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.” Small wonder that when we’re faced with economic hardship, that’s where we retreat. As Rogan Kersh, a professor of public policy at New York University, recently told ABC News, recessions bring out our nesting instincts. According to Kersh, “This holds true across income classes and other demographic groups: from college students to retirees, we’re turning back to the home front.”
We don’t really have much choice. All recessions involve cutting back, but overleveraged Americans seem to have taken a hacksaw to their expenditures—the personal savings rate more than tripled in 2008 and is still rising. Even most Americans with big mortgages, little home equity, and too much on their credit cards are struggling to get rid of debt the old-fashioned way: by paying it off. We can hardly have new fun while we’re still working off the excesses of yesteryear.
Or rather, we can’t buy new fun. The emergence of leisure activity as what economists call “market production”—something that is bought and sold—is a relatively recent phenomenon. Until well into the 20th century, most leisure was “home production,” created and consumed without much cash changing hands. Our ancestors made parties out of things they needed to do anyway—quilting, raising a barn, eating—or they entertained one another, singing, reciting, dancing. Either way, any trading was strictly on a barter basis.
…more…