We are spending a little more than we are raising each year and you wonder how long it can go on. It is too easy for us to borrow.
Now people are worried not about the prospects of buying new things, but about how to pay for the things they bought yesterday, a year ago or years before. It is, as Americans like to say, "a wholly different kind of ball-game".
I urge you to live within your means. One cannot spend more than one earns and remain solvent. I promise you that you will then be happier than you would be if you were constantly worrying about how to make the next payment on nonessential debt.
We already know that the experience of lockdown is a mixed bag. It is increasingly recognised that for many it can be hellish. Enforced leisure - if you are crippled with worry about debts, insecure job prospects, your family's health - is no holiday.
It's very painful to be in debt. I'm the kind of person who would rather almost die than go into debt.
Some people worry because they are in debt; others, because they can't even get in.
I have now the gloomy prospect of retiring from office loaded with serious debts, which will materially affect the tranquility of my retirement.
