Published: May 02, 2009 10:01 pm      

Think positive

A program at two Kokomo churches 10 days ago offered a welcome message amid all the doom and gloom surrounding the national economy.

Dave Ramsey, a syndicated radio talk show host, spoke during a Town Hall of Hope that was simulcast to more than 6,000 locations across the country. The local broadcasts at Oakbrook Church and Kokomo Church of the Brethren were well-attended.

Ramsey offered some perspective to the home mortgage crisis. He pointed out that half of U.S. foreclosures last year came from 35 counties in 12 states. Twenty percent of the U.S. population lives in those counties.

Eight counties in Arizona, California, Florida and Nevada were the source of 25 percent of foreclosures.

Ramsey says investors have made money during every 15-year period in the stock market’s history. Since 1974, he says, the value of the Standard & Poors 500 has grown 1,250 percent, from 63 to 850.

He also offered some historical perspective.

From 1938 to 1940, he said, unemployment grew to more than 17 percent, the Stock Market dropped 89 percent and bread lines were real.

This time, the stock market dropped 57 percent, but the Dow Jones Industrial Average has recently risen from a low of 6,400 to above 8,000.

After the Great Depression, he said, investors who did nothing with their investments recovered in 4 years, 4 months. Those who sold at the bottom realized a 78 percent loss.

During the period from 1945 to 2007, Ramsey said, the average bear market lasted 12.7 months with an average decline of 30.3 percent.

Economists certainly can argue the statistics, but the one thing nearly everyone can agree on is that changing public perceptions is a key to economic recovery.

Ramsey talks of simply refusing to buy in to the negative talk. He urges his listeners simply to refuse to participate in the recession.

That’s a message that might well do the economy some good.

If more of us could adopt a positive outlook, the economy might indeed begin to turn itself around.

We have nothing to lose by giving it a try.

– Pharos-Tribune, Logansport, and Kokomo Tribune