Bye-bye to buy, buy

Here's the quandary this Christmas season: I feel guilty if I spend money I should be saving, and I feel guilty if I don't. I'm haunted by the woebegone eyes of lonesome store clerks.

If there's anything you need, now is the time to buy it, with some places practically giving stuff away. (Hint to retailers: A measly 10 percent off isn't going to clinch the deal this year.)

On Black Friday, De Beers Diamonds ran a full-page ad headlined "Fewer, Better Things." In the spirit of belt-tightening, De Beers was urging consumers to ditch the cheap stuff that you "buy and do not cherish," urging them to instead "make wiser choices with greater care." Pictured beneath was a pair of diamond earrings.

Here's another choice: How about no?

Over years of relative prosperity, we've accumulated way too much stuff: gigantic TVs, gas-guzzling cars, handbags and shoes that cost hundreds of dollars, every gadget known to mankind. Boomer parents indulge our kids, then wonder why they act so entitled. Our own parents grew up in the long shadow of the Great Depression. They preached to us constantly about the value of the dollar, and of hard work.

My father arrived here alone and broke from England. As a teenager he worked 14 hours a day to put himself through college and medical school. My mother's father lost everything in the Depression. My parents never bought a new car or had a credit card. They paid cash. I remember my father taking us to one movie: "The Sound of Music." I don't ever remember us going out to dinner.

Although we grew up in leaner times, many of us have gone into debt to get our own children everything their hearts desire. We've financed trips abroad and meals out that have become almost a birthright for them. Our children have been to several countries and have studied abroad. By the time my daughter was 20, she had lived on three continents. One of my son's friends got his own BMW convertible at age 16.

Some girls spend hundreds of dollars on prom night: dress, hair, nails, facial, makeup, limousine, while many of us have never hired a limo ourselves, or had our hair up-do'ed. And they're teenagers.

Some parents spend hundreds on our children's birthday parties, hiring clowns, DJs, ponies, and magicians, or renting out function rooms with caterers and bands. Our kids have grown up with great expectations, which we have fed and fed and fed. If this tanking economy does anything good, let's hope it makes such excess embarrassing.

How did we, who grew up differently, so enable our offspring? Some of it is cultural: We had the money, and naturally we spent it on our kids. Or we didn't have the money, and we still spent it on the kids, creating a huge consumer debt that has contributed to the economic crisis we face today.

Naturally, every generation wants the next to do better. But somewhere, we went overboard. We've confused excess with success. Our kids have grown up with a "more is normal" attitude. Now they're in for a huge jolt.

Boomers' children may be the first generation not to better - or even meet - their parents' standard of living. As adults, they may not be able to live as well as they did when they were under our roofs. America's position in the world has declined. The competition is stiffer in a global economy, and it doesn't help that Chinese counterfeiting pirates have been undercutting us for years. Jobs are scarce for many veteran workers, never mind recent graduates who may be better off moving to India and snagging one of our outsourced jobs there.

The government and parents can't be of much help. There won't be enough money in Social Security before long, and pensions will be a thing of the past. On top of all this, the young'uns will be saddled with the country's record debt - a shameful legacy from our generation. As boomers live longer and longer, we'll spend down the inheritance we hoped to leave our children.

This is all a long way of saying that I'm nervous enough to be cutting back in small and large ways. I've told my own kids that Christmas is going to be cheaper than cheap in our house.

I think I've gone overboard. During one recent lecture, my daughter listened as she laced up her boots. "These are the boots Daddy gave me," she said, "back in the days when we celebrated Christmas."