Wartime days of austerity taught vital lessons

HAPPY memories of my life as a child during the Second World War were brought back by Jayne Dowle’s article “Lessons in how to face austerity on home front” (The Yorkshire Post, January 8).

That took us back to the start of rationing on January 8, 1940, when I was three. As the war progressed, I learned by heart the first four items on 
my mother’s weekly shopping 
list for the four of us in our family: “2 pounds sugar, butter, marge, lard.”

Those days of austerity were happy ones.

We learned not to be ruled by greed and “must have”. There were no credit cards, loan sharks etc.

People lived within their means... and were much happier than folks today with all their unnecessary, not needed purchases which are encouraged by the media.

A recent WIN/Gallup poll of 64,000 around the world has revealed that the happiest people are those living in Africa.

Makes you think, especially when one reads of the waste 
as a result of “sell buy” dates and what families, in general, throw away these days in our “land of plenty”.