Time Dynamics and the Economy

I've come to realize this week that the United States economy is in many ways like my time.

I know at any given time exactly what I need to do and how much time I have to do it. I can anticipate my homework and project deadlines and plan accordingly. I know how fast I can work and I always know exactly how far ahead I will be 'next week' if I keep working at my peak efficiency.

However, without fail, some unexpected and pertinent time-sucker comes up every week. Sometimes it's an assignment that takes 2 or 3x as long as expected. Sometimes it's a surprise project given at the last minute by a professor. Sometimes its a lab-related project that needs to get done. Whatever the cause, I'm never ahead and just barely treading water to stay up on what was originally supposed to be easy baseline deadlines.

Every year we hear more about the national debt and the need to balance the budget. Every year we hear from our political leaders that they project that the budget will be balanced in a few years and we'll start making that money back. Every year we hear about some unexpected but pertinent expense that needed attention in the past year that prevented us from balancing the budget on time the first time around. Every year is the same thing.

When I was in my undergraduate education, I thought I was managing my time well and making appropriate sacrifices. Then I got married and had to re-evaluate priorities and cut back on certain activities like climbing and hockey. Then I had a son and had to again re-evaluate and cut back on how closely I follow sports and other leisure activities. Then I entered grad school and had to cut out pretty much everything except what was necessary to keep my family and education intact. After all that, I (like everyone else I know in my same position) am still trying to find the right balance between school, church, and family obligations and priorities.

I'm not sure if our national finances are in the undergrad, marriage, child bearing, or grad stage but I think it might be time to re-evaluate and just cut out everything but the bare necessities.

There are always going to be matters that are worthy and great uses of my time that I just simply cannot attend and will have to be cut out. There will always be a continuous stream of applications for causes worthy of our tax-dollar funding. Someone has to start taking on the responsibility of judging what needs to be cut out.