From The Federal Coffers To Ours, A Climate Of Credit Exists: Are You Having Your Own Debt Crisis?

July 25, 2011]----As Washington battles over raising the debt ceiling, are you experiencing a debt crisis of your own closer to home?

There is an unhealthy climate of debt in America, starting with our Federal government, and rippling all the way down to the financial sector and 'Main Street.'

Where did this climate of debt come from? Where did this permission to spend more than we earn or in the Federal government and financial sector's case, have massive expenditure with an acute imbalance in revenue, bad management and obscene salaries?

For many on Main Street, cost of living have simply just outrun their income. Slow salary increases fall far short of bridging the cap between expenditure and income, so the credit cards pick up the slack most of the time.

Trying to pay off what is owed every month can seem like a hamster on a wheel, for the added interest can leave the balance sheet looking pretty bleak without the much desired dent--and the cycle of debt doesn't decrease for we continue to spend.

There may also be an uncanny correlation between our government's spending and our own. We operate in a climate of excess and social status is measured by what we own. The fancy car. Big house. Designer clothes. Electronics galore and in our country's case--the super power--big brother to the world.

We have never seen a war we didn't like. Military spending has overtaken everything else. Tax cuts for folks who makes millions and billions is another stunning expenditure that boggles the mind--and we borrow to pay for all of it.

On Main Street and Wall Street, stuff has become the only benchmark for measuring our success even more now than ever before. Our children have learned this unhealthy part of our culture by observing us and the sad thing is we are leaving an unsure, uncertain, shaky financial future for them.

Which means they will be in even more debt than we are if there isn't a seismic shift in our thinking and the way we operate in this country. According to Dr. Martin Luther King, we need a revolution of values.