Private schools struggle along with parents

It’s no big surprise to parents who have been tracking rising private school tuition to hear that some of their peers are dropping this particular expense from their household budget. The recession finally issued the verdict to them: This is no longer affordable.

Some of the smaller private schools have been scrambling to keep enough students to sustain them. As much as we sympathize with anyone’s struggle to survive, maybe the free markets will have some positive effect here. Mainly that means when demand declines, so will the price of each year’s education.

Or at least remain stable? Some parents would settle for that.

Spend, spend, spend, then pay off balance

It’s a relief to hear the credit-card processors report that more and more cards are being swiped as more purchases are being made in Hawaii, presumably by folks feeling a bit more confident about their finances. A lot of that is coming from visitors, they say, which brings more outside money into the economy.

But there’s a cautionary note here: The purchases may add up to bad news later if folks let it get out of hand and are unable to pay off the balance at the end of the month. Stockpiling debt was one big cause of the recession, we all remember.

Bob Harrison, First Hawaiian Bank president and CEO, seems to think it’s all good, at least for now. “Even though spending is increasing, debt is stable,” he said. With any luck, the crash of 2008 is still fresh in everyone’s memory and we’ve all learned our lesson.

Lecture over. Now — especially you dear tourists — go back to your spending.