THE IMPACT OF CULTURE ON THE ECONOMIC CRISIS

• Main Author: CARINA-ELENA STEGĂROIU
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Academica Brâncuşi 2016-06-01
• Series: Analele Universităţii Constantin Brâncuşi din Târgu Jiu : Seria Economie
• Subjects: economic culture; economic crisis; economic culture ascetic; economic hedonistic culture
• Online Access: http://www.utgjiu.ro/revista/ec/pdf/2016-03/30_STEGAROIU.pdf

This premise of this paper is based on the concept of hedonistic culture, which contributes to financial fragility, damages assessment of future capacity (generating investment myopia and short-termism) and enhances current opportunism. The paper aims to analyze economic culture as a factor of influence on the global economic crisis, considering the culture of modern capitalism that should be defined as a hedonistic culture, and this culture can contribute to global economic crises. According to the hypothesis of this article, the economic culture and not the individuals underlie economic decisions. Accordingly, the decisions that are taken in the economy, influenced by the dominant culture can have both a positive impact on the economy or a destructive one by generating or maintaining economic crises. The current economic culture authorizes extensive use of loans, including those for consumption, thus generating financial fragility and consequently economic crisis. Hedonistic culture leads operators to focus almost entirely on short-term consequences of his actions to the detriment of long-term outcomes. It is this connection plays an important role in explaining current global crisis resistance. Opportunism emphasized as part of the hedonistic culture also affects the generation and maintenance of the global crisis and unethical behavior by refusing to invest in strategic areas for the economy. This is particularly the widespread use of credit, including the consumer, in preference to short-term investments at the expense of long-term, low appreciation of the future and also a high and growing opportunism. The global crisis is the result of interdependence agents, burdened by debt, especially short-term constantly growing which is a high financial fragility, directed almost exclusively at short-term gains and tend to cheat in their mutual relations.