Think that the financial crises encompassing the globe have little to do with you and me? Wrong – we are the people who are paying for them all.

How do we pay? In significantly increased prices of goods. Soaring prices are pervading every aspect of our lives. They give rise to that scourge of prudent people who save for the future, inflation. The cost of living goes up. The value of our savings accounts goes down.

Can anybody stop it?

Those who have accumulated a little money now find that they cannot trust the stock market to maintain its value. A bank deposit will earn perhaps 1% or 2% – but with worldwide inflation at over 6% that means that their money will be worth half what it is today in less than twelve years.

Some aspects of life are even more inflationary than others. Notice how much your healthcare insurance is increasing – on average 9% a year; the cost will double in eight years even without making provision for the more expensive health technologies being developed. Fuel is rising in price daily; a developing world needs more and more energy to satisfy new demands. Greater affluence brings with it a requirement for more food and we are already seeing some basic food prices – for example, wheat – trebling in less than a year.

What will be the impact of world population increase to nine billion by 2050?

Why has our money become so vulnerable when financial managers have more information and easier processing than ever before?

The answer is disarmingly simple. We have rewarded those in charge of our money, and of business generally, on the basis of instant performance, not on the basis of future stability. They have responded by pursuing short term returns, sometimes mortgaging the future and invariably leading to greater risk-taking and overstretched borrowings.

Who made those demands? We, as shareholders, have taken a dangerously short term view, demanding maximum dividends now, forgetting that future value is more important than present return.

The result is that a relatively few people have acquired huge wealth by risking other people’s capital while not bearing any of the risk themselves. A good example is the “sub-prime market”.

“Sub-prime” means, and should be called, the “Desperately High-Risk Market”. And the risk has dramatically failed. But not for those who have already taken their commission and salted it away. Their rewards are a one way street. They enjoy the profits but do not suffer the losses. Losing their reputations, they will console themselves by counting their dollars.

How are we to protect our modest savings?

I wish I knew. Smart dealing on the stock exchange seems a risky business even for those who know what they are doing. Investing in funds provides no guarantee of continuity. Managed funds might seem to be an answer except that almost every prospectus is written in such a way as to be totally incomprehensible, even to the people selling it. Some funds, including some that were misleadingly sold, have already gone bust.

Currency dealing is a dangerous game as every expert admits. Commodities can produce a tidy profit – or a gargantuan loss. They are not for the feint hearted.

Looking for people to blame for the present situation is less useful than trying to find a solution to it. Perhaps we can ask our banking and fund management wizards – those people who are so highly paid because of their great financial knowledge and wisdom – to present us with some practical solutions. By doing so they will be able to demonstrate to us their undoubted value to society.