In Debt-No Sympathy Here

[QUINNSCOMMENTARY]

I am looking at the front page of USA Today June 18, 2008. The story reads, “How rising home values placed your finances at risk

The point of the story is that as home prices were rising banks raised credit card limits, banks plied customers with offers to open new accounts and then they guided card borrowers to home equity and thus put their homes at risk.

“Card issuers extended too much credit too quickly because of phantom equity, we are told. “This reckless extension of credit is contributing to the financial vulnerability that many families are facing. “As home equity and credit card limits rose in unison consumers overextended themselves

Do ya think?

One couple featured in the article ran into trouble when they opened up new credit cards and withdrew home equity. Now they owe $30,000 on credit cards and $105,000 on a home worth $63,000.

Americans now have nearly $1 trillion in unsecured debt, most of it on credit cards¦and all this BEFORE the gas crisis.

If you buy all this, then you must admit as was mentioned in another thread, that American are, in fact, morons.

So, we blame our financial stupidity on the banks, we blame the gas we use and its costs on the oil companies, not the SUV we drive. Who do we blame our stupidity on, our parents? Oh wait, I bet it is our teachers, who is that fool who did not include a course on common sense in the curriculum?

Credit was “way too loose so people gorged themselves with no forethought as to the potential consequences? They were incapable of saying, gee what if I can’t pay this, what if my spouse loses her job, do I really need that vacation or flat screen TV?

Should I save first and pay with cash for the things I want? What a concept!

I was in a Costco last night; you know those gigantic warehouses where you can buy food and stuff cheap. People we in fact, buying up the place and as I stood there and watched for about 30 minutes I noticed the buying of a basket full of liquor, giant boxes of muffins, gallon jugs of pickles, huge boxes of goldfish crackers, a few CDs and books¦all the necessities of life, real cheap.

Sorry, no quarter given by me in all this. When my wife and I were struggling to pay the mortgage and raise four children many years back, we didn’t have credit cards, we saved for a year drive on a three day vacation and we drove there in a bare bones Plymouth Duster that we kept for ten years, we lived in a very modest house and we needed 10% down to buy it. And I worked two jobs while going to college for nine years at night.

Criticize me if you will, but tough luck, that’s what you get for not paying attention in common sense class 101. :sneaky:

[yaaarrrgg]

QUINNSCOMMENTARY;892553 wrote:

If you buy all this, then you must admit as was mentioned in another thread, that American are, in fact, morons.


Didn't you make a thread a while back, saying the difference between U.S. conservatives and liberals, was that liberals assume Americans are morons? I think that is backwards ... conservatives generally hold fellow humans in low regard.

What I see, as the issue, is that we have developed a society based on consumption. It's not sustainable. People are encouraged to buy as much as possible, because it helps the economy short term.

[mrsK]

Same thing is happening here.

Everyone wants everything now.No more saving for things it has to be instant everything,sad to see.

[Galbally]

The thing is, once the banks stop lending ridiculous money to people, either unsecured, or on equity on houses that are losing the value anyway, that behaviour will simply not happen anymore. People just wont be given the money in the first place, so they will have to make do without it.

What I find unbelieveable is the massive amount of indebtedness the US has now, the country owes something like 53 trillion dollars to its creditor nations, thats insane! If I was the incoming president I would be very worried about how the country intends to get some sort of fiscal responsibility back or else the economy will simply disintegrate eventually, the only thing that seems to be holding it up now is that no one can really call in any of this debt as it would collapse the while world financial system, and make the credit crunch look like a garden party.

In Ireland, we have followed the US model of prosperity, and for a while it definetly worked wonders, but the cracks are very obvious at this point as we are at the end of a massive, and completely unsustainable property boom, we import enormous amounts of oil relative to the size of the country, we have invested very little in public transport, but an awful lot on German Cars and roads, (with everything being planned like LA) we have spent most of the money we earned on an awful lot of short-term conspicuous personal consumption instead of saving or investing wisely.

Now we have a lot of problems, as the party is ending, and people are being thrown off the pyramid. What the answer is? Bugger if I know? But stop wasting money on rubbish would be number one, stop borrowing and start saving, buy what you can afford, and only borrow for things that you absolutely need, like a house (but a resonable house that's within your means)

[QUINNSCOMMENTARY]

yaaarrrgg;893361 wrote: Didn't you make a thread a while back, saying the difference between U.S. conservatives and liberals, was that liberals assume Americans are morons? I think that is backwards ... conservatives generally hold fellow humans in low regard.

What I see, as the issue, is that we have developed a society based on consumption. It's not sustainable. People are encouraged to buy as much as possible, because it helps the economy short term.


I did say such a thing and that is based on the fact that liberals as a genralization see the need for more and more federal help, programs and such that impact things that conservatives belive are the responsibility of the individual and not government. This debt thing is a good example, a conservative would say they got in the trouble let them get out, a liberal would say we need more control over lenders, more laws and restrictions, more ways to "protect" the unsophistiaced consumer [from themselves as it tunrs out].

Watch Congress and see which way we go.

And I agree, we consume and consume even without any real need.

[Galbally]

QUINNSCOMMENTARY;893431 wrote: I did say such a thing and that is based on the fact that liberals as a genralization see the need for more and more federal help, programs and such that impact things that conservatives belive are the responsibility of the individual and not government. This debt thing is a good example, a conservative would say they got in the trouble let them get out, a liberal would say we need more control over lenders, more laws and restrictions, more ways to "protect" the unsophistiaced consumer [from themselves as it tunrs out].

Watch Congress and see which way we go.

And I agree, we consume and consume even without any real need.


Yeah, but erm, its been the supposedly "prudent" pro-business Republican-oriented lobby that has been eroding the regulatory framework within banking and in business in general that has led to such an enourmous amount of problems now. Telling people they have to have more responsibility for their own actions, while ensuring that Wall Street and big business absolutely need take no account of their actions (except for some token arrests, once the damage has already been done). Its not really about inequity, but a Republic that is only geared toward allowing its most powerful citizens to contine making as much money as quickly as possible and to hell with the long term national consequences will eventually fail.

For a short lesson from history, as the Roman empire collapsed from within, on the surface it actually appeared grander and grander, as the large scale landowners, senatorial and governor class aquired ever more wealth and slaves, and money, but the actual citizens (that the strength of Rome and her legions were based on) became increasingly impoverished, the centre selfishly drew increasing amounts of the wealth unto itself, and ensued that every other sector of society became irrelevant by debasing the value of citizenship and keeping them quiet with bread and circuses (as it were). This happened to the point where they no longer had the will or ability to prevent the overwhelming military collapse when it came. The citizen backbone of the Republic was lost, and replaced with placated plebs, and mercenary solidiers, who when the time came, took the empire for themselves. Indeed the rulers no longer understood why they had become so weak, because they had long before that come to believe their own propoganda, the rot within society had spread so deep, and the apathy almost complete.

That situation has some (though not all) parallels with our modern Era in the West, where we have become delusion about our entitlement to global power, while indulging ourselves in self-absorbed navel gazing and decadence on a scale not seen, well not seen since the Romans did it best all those years ago. Its my firm believe that what we need to rediscover is the true idea of particpatory governenace, self-reliance, and traditional western pragmatism and rationalism, and stop burying ourselves with faddish, feel-good politics involving moral relativism, self-indulgence, and wishful thinking; whether common sense will break out soon, is anyones guess though.