Plume responds:
Which is why I've decided I'm not paying my credit cards off, or my cell phone bills. (If the bills gets too high, i just jump ship and get a new free phone with a new cont......ract.) I do the same type of thing with car insurance, oh, and banks.
The two ideas are:
1. That stuff stays on your credit for 7 years from the day it goes into "collection" (IF you already used one of your free "banruptcy passes within 10 years) So, when things get too bad, you suffer 7 years. big deal. Time flies. Plus, during that time you can always get married or sweet talk someone into co-signing the stupid car you NEED.
It's well worth the 10's of thousands you may be down.
I know someone right now who is in his 40's with 50k worth of debt and is still doing the "noble" thing and pay that off....when??? he only has 20 years left. Why not take the seven years and start from zero again. Actually, if he wanted too, he could take his immaculate credit that he busts his ass to keep afloat every month and max out all his lines of credit. So, he starts from like 50K, not zero. THAT'S A 100k turn around in 7 years!! Then you start fresh with new credit cards and you roll on towards death.
The only reason this friend doesn't like that idea is not because it is logically flawed, which is isn't at all, butbecause it is "unethical." Which brings us to the second point, following along with your topic of corruption among the coporate bigwigs, shitting down on us.
The same credit card companies (for one) that we struggle to pay on time to maintain our dignity and so they don't skyrocket our APR at the slightest snafu, who act with less honor than a small-time loan shark, are turning around getting bailouts of their own!!! They frown on debt. They keep their own fucking score to decide what you can have in life, and yet, they get to whitewash millions of dollars when they fuck up!! These are the people with whom we must maintain some sort of ethical relationship??
I say f---- em. Life is not as long and epic as you think. This isn't for everyone now. But, if you're just spending your whole life in a hamster wheel, struggling to save for the "future" we always talk about, as if the present, which is the only thing real, is meaningless and you're are actually either losing money each year with emergency expenditures, credit cards and upside down loans, or you're barely squirrling away enough to get washed away with the first medical bill that your scandelous insurance doesn't cover, then stop. Step out of the constant calculator in your head and concentrate.
Play the game. They made the rules. You get like three do-overs. Not to mention, our friends on the left LOVE to give out free help, by the billions. If you can't make something work with all of that, then you weren't meant to have anything anyway. It's OK though, there are charities for people like you.
Remember. This is America. Land of Opportunity. The same opportunity these corporations have, we have. They just have no shame. There's no shame in playing the game!
After further debate he continued:
Ah, you said it : "those of us who pay our bills and try to avoid becoming overloaded with debt suffer......" the bank doesn't suffer because it doesn't do that. It takes the "bailout."
I'm simply suggesting a way to follow them out of the... emergency exit, so to speak, to leave the Titanic with the wealthy folks, rather than drown with the middle class.
It is an argument which faces scrutiny when it comes to morals. "Those of us who....do the RIGHT thing" can look down at those who snuck out with the aristocrats. There the argument will never pass the test.
But when stripped of these "morals", which are put in place by an entity that mocks them, the pure sensibility of it can not be challenged.
Of course, I am simply presenting an alternate view. Furthermore, I definitely do not suggest this as a way of thinking for everyone, nor would I preach this to the masses. Certainly, if everybody followed suit, our economy would crumble (to the point where we can no longer mask it by squeezing the "righteous" middle class)
Still, I feel secure in the fact that this illusionary "valor" that comes with honoring the fine print of a contract you were subconsciously swayed into signing through sophisticated propaganda and advertising schemes, by a crook who who honors nothing himself, is enough to subdue most.
This again leaves no argument outside of theory or idealism, as the FACT is that one person's decision to take the "safety valve" used by the PIC themselves will go unnoticed during their own whitewash.
I'm very sorry, AJ, don't be mad at me. lol But unless I am openly rallying for something, I tend to dismiss the arguments that go, "well, if everyone did what you say you're doing....." because often I agree. I don't think EVERYONE should do anything at once.
granted, me giving out financial advice is sort of like a quadrapalegic ski instructer, but.....
