“Ah, how I love the smell of burning credit scores in the morning.”
While this is not something meant to be a joke, it is something that concerns all, with no one exempt, including those with a zero balance on their credit cards.
We all bear the costs of unpaid balances and the reckless spending of those who rely on the “kindness of strangers” including the government.
When a local newspaper has a front page article on “Americans have record amount of debt,” you have to be alarmed.
The Scale of America’s Debt Crisis
The article reports Americans are struggling under $18.78 Trillion dollars in household debt. This number continues to grow and shows no sign of stopping. The number, now $4.63 trillion since 2019, is up 33%.
Credit Card debt is up 29% to 1.28 Trillion, auto loans are at $1.67 Trillion, up 26% from 2019. Mortgage debt is up 38% and now stands at 13.17 Trillion.
Why Consumer Debt Keeps Rising
These numbers are onerous and to think it all happened in a vacuum, denies the public’s desire to be “given” things to which they are unentitled.
The coach does not start a third stringer to make all “third stringers” happy. The fans who want a winner would not allow it.
That they allow themselves to be so considered to be given first string honors with a third string economic history, shows that other things are amiss in this “all things to all people.”
“From each according to their means to each according to their needs,” something from Karl Marx is alive and well in a “capitalist society.”
Where once debt could land you in prison, today, that same debt is sold along with others and is given “value.”
Median home price nationally is $423,000, the average car price is $49,100 and used car prices are $26,000. These numbers, while disturbing, show no sign of abatement.
The Hidden Cost of Easy Credit
Credit Card interest is 24%, making the “minimum payment” something that never allows the ability to pay off the card balance.
This untold tale makes many indentured servants to those who hold your credit in the palm of their hands.
The young people, fully removed from the economic fray, not by choice but by being told “Don’t worry about it, you have bigger things to worry about; there is a math test on Monday.” “Are you studying for it?” “No, I plan on being sick on Monday.”
The paper did not comment on the article, and will not as the cost per each paper is $2.00 and copy and they dare not induce cost savings of the customers to start with eliminating the newspapers.
As bad as all this sounds, it is worse. We have our ongoing bills that “Must” be paid, the taxes, the fees etc. along with others, the tuition, the “phantom” costs of owning that $423,000 “home of your own.”
The Illusion of Ownership and Financial Freedom
Speaking of which, you “own” your home subject to paying those pesky taxes, just so you know.
If we continue to go on in our lives, our economic history defines us in more ways than one.
We become part of those who are “uninvited” to participate in ways to ameliorate our economic profligacy. We do not have the entrance fees to participate in the stock market that makes investing our ability to fight those who would make us paupers.
We do not see that the beginning of one thing has an ending. Work or careers, no matter the endeavor, eventually come to an end and without investment in the private sector, any idea of “retiring” becomes just that, an idea.
All the “things,” the “stuff” we thought we needed, becomes useless and worthless.
Our idea of improving one’s self, never happens although the ability to do so is better than it has ever been. We keep on believing that “something will come up,” or “ I will be getting a raise,” to allow our bad spending habits to become worse.
If we add all this up, those who we do not know or care about our personal problems will find ways to end all this increase in debt: they will find ways to make the worker redundant.
by Dr. Richard Pitz