With all of the doomsday news about THE ECONOMY as if it were an entity unto itself, it should be pointed out that THE ECONOMY is actually made up of millions of smaller “economies” called businesses, companies, corporations, and sole proprietorships. The indicator of how well each of these smaller entities handles their money management responsibilities is what makes up the general condition of THE ECONOMY.

I saw the economic crisis coming years ago, and I’ve been warning my readers and my business owner clients about this dangerous financial condition for the past several years. The current economic condition is never the fault of THE ECONOMY. The money management practices of businesses, the government and American households create the economic condition.

Let’s take AIG (American International Group, Inc.) for example, since they just received a bailout loan of $85 billion from the Federal Government. This is a multi-national company selling insurance, investments and retirement accounts. That means their income comes out of the pockets of individuals and other companies, and they have a fiduciary responsibility to pay their clients’ insurance claims and invest their investor clients’ money in things that are supposed to make the client money.

This company, with trillions of dollars in assets, is not just experiencing financial instability, they are beyond broke. They had to have a huge bailout loan to have a prayer of surviving for one more day. And what did their press release say? They said, “Policyholders of AIG companies around the world can rest assured that AIG’s commitments will continue to be honored.” What I feel must be said is that they committed TREASON [Treason: Betrayal After Trust] against their policyholders and drove their company to the brink of bankruptcy and could not honor their commitments to their policy holders, so ‘We The People’ have to bail them out and now We The People own this company which is collateral against the loan.

Is this debacle the fault of regulatory mistakes? To a degree it possibly is. Is it due to the current “economic scene”? No way! This is a company that is so large that it has massive effects on creating the economic scene. You don’t drive a trillion dollar company into bankruptcy overnight or over a few months. And I’m not singling out AIG here. Look at what is happening to the banking, mortgage, real estate and investment companies.

There is no confusion in my mind about how this happened. The treason starts with small violations of sound financial policies and continues to evolve into gross financial irregularities, all in the name of posting a profit and making the stockholders happy. The senior executives of any publicly owned company consider it their first duty to please the stockholders every quarter, year after year, even if it is at the expense of their clients. The senior executives in power at any given time do not want to be the ones bearing the bad news to the stockholders and, in doing so, put their personal reputation and their million dollar salaries on the line. So little violations begin, and then bigger and bigger ones, until complete betrayal of not only the policy holders but, the shareholders as well, becomes reality.

And make no mistake, the consumers and clients of those companies are also committing treason against themselves. According to the newest data from the Federal Reserve, as of December last year revolving consumer credit card debt stood at 943 billion dollars. Revolving debt is set to reach one trillion dollars later this year. That’s *trillion* with a “tr”. Earlier in 2008, a Vice President of a U.S. bank stated that over 24 Billion dollars was paid out in interest, late fees and over-limit fees last year on credit cards. That means Americans are committing financial irregularities and treasonous acts against their own households’ economic well-being. But the credit companies are equally to blame for granting that much credit to consumers who can’t pay the bill.

The early warning signs of this economic crisis were evident 3 years ago. It’s been in the news for that long as well. Were the corporate executives and the American consumers just not paying attention? Did they hear the warning signs and ignore them? Well, the financial condition of THE ECONOMY that each of us as individuals create with our financial actions is going down for the count. So what are YOU going to do to take responsibility for your own financial condition?