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Debt Crisis

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posted on Mar, 22 2008 @ 12:14 PM
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(Mods please move accordingly..)

This is in response to In Debt We Trust, the video link which is at the top of your screen.

Debt is a natural part of our daily lives as Americans.. and the biggest debate around how much and what kind of debt you incure.. is whether or not it is directly YOUR fault.. or is it the lending industries fault?

I say its both.. and perhaps there are many more people to blame for the situation as a whole..

Many say that America is not going into a recession, that all is fine and that our economy is actually doing good.. that is, we are just in a normal business cycle of ups and downs..

However, I say we are in a recession, and perhaps a depression.. one so new with an entire new method of operation that no one has noticed it yet. Or rather, no one knows what to call it.

What happens when the companies we work and buy from go in the red? The shut down, people loose their jobs and end up on the streets..

But what happens when the companies we work and buy from are having record breaking profits? .. Yet we as a people are so far in the red we are worth more dead then alive 50 times over?

This situation has never been seen before.. because of Credit.. easy credit.

I can go onto a credit card website and apply for a Credit card... I know I will get one, because I make plenty enough money to make my monthly payment..

Except what if I make plenty of money to make a payment, but incured so much debt already that I actually CANNOT.. and have no cash on hand to continue living? This particular situation is happening more and more within an unlikely group.. young 20's.

This is what bothers the hell out of me.. when people say "well a 20 year old has no right getting a credit card to begin with!"

Let me lay out some expenses for a college student in their 20's

Tuition at a PUBLIC school is about 8k a semester.
So you take out a loan... a big loan.. to cover 4 years tuition.. so already your going to be in debt 30k easily.. assuming you get some kind of financial aid or some kind of scholarship..

But.. how does one get financial aid? I remember last year, at 20 I tried to get financial aid.. filled out a god forsaken FASFA form.. what ever.. Asks for my parents income.. I put that down, coupled with the fact that I am a male, and I am white.. I get NO aid.

Even though I live on my own, and have since I was 18. I have my own insurance, my own rent, my own car payment, my own expenses to survive (literally.. ) yet my basis for aid is based on my parents income

UNTIL I AM 24 YEARS OLD! ..

We become independent adults at 18. I have not lived with my parents for almost 4 years now, and I cannot get aid for school without citing them as income even though I pay the tuition..

Talk about fraud.

So we have tuition..

Then we have rent.. about 700 a month to rent an apartment anywhere near the school.. talking within 10 miles or so.. unless you want to end up in the crappiest part of town where kids get mugged on the streets, several girls raped in their college housing in these neighborhoods.. but hey, its cheaper..

Then you have your car payment.. I drive a piece of crap.. so thats not to big of a problem.. but the insurance, which in my state is mandatory is outrageous .. more so because I am a 21 year old male.. again, fraud if you ask me..

Food.... doubled since I started school.. noticeably.. its insane.. I lived off roman noodles and mcDonalds for a long time.. so then I became a 20 something kid with high cholesterol which raises my health insurance and life insurance..

Dating.. Odd to put this down as an expense I am sure, but women are damn expensive..

Working full time, school full time.. sometimes you just need a break, so going out to a bar once in a while..

All of these expenses will be based on a job working nearly full time for $8 an hour.

Is it possible?

No. Its not. I lasted 1 year before I had to take out living expenses loans.. gas went up, food went up, my wage did not.. so I took out credit cards, more loans, more cards, and more loans..

Then I dropped out of school.

I literally was 2 paychecks from getting kicked out of my apartment and defaulting on all my credit cards..

So I dropped out, got a "real job" that said I had "enough college" to get by.. so now I will spend the next few years making good money paying back the college I 1. Did not need to begin with and 2. never finished ..

Its worse for those who do not or cannot go to a real school.. those damn cookie cutter colleges that claim to give you a 4 year degree in 18 months, or a BSN over the internet..

Guess what? .. Its worthless.. you can spend 20k a year to go to one but employers don't like them, they don't consider it real school.. you have just as good a chance with no school at all..

Yet these jokes are excepted. And used.

Society says we must live a certain way.. many people rack up debt on material objects they don't need.. this is true, and is a big problem with Credit..

But for a student who just wants to live a normal life while struggling through the system that works against them..

a bank will charge on a normal credit card 24 PERCENT INTEREST!

I get .8% interest on my bank account. Thats not 8% thats point eight .. not even a whole percent.

Miss ONE payment.. $35-$50 fine.. spend all your money to pay back the fine on the credit card its $35 per charge on your checking account.. I defaulted only once.. paid the $100 to get the card under control, and went negative on my checking by $2...... $2 ..... I was charged almost $350 in fines by payday.. took me 5 months to get "regular" again..

Are the banks and the card companies predatory? Hell yes they are.. they have run this country into the ground.. our dollars don't go far anymore.. it takes virtual IOU's to live a normal life.. yet there is no public outrage for their atrocities and exploitations.. when we should be hanging these bastards in the streets we instead take out more cards and buy more crap from China with them..



posted on Mar, 22 2008 @ 01:09 PM
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Originally posted by Rockpuck
a bank will charge on a normal credit card 24 PERCENT INTEREST!

I get .8% interest on my bank account. Thats not 8% thats point eight .. not even a whole percent.

Miss ONE payment.. $35-$50 fine.. spend all your money to pay back the fine on the credit card its $35 per charge on your checking account..


That should tell you right there. It's more profitable to own a bank and lend out money than it is to save money.

We have seen the rise of check cashing stores in poor and middle class neighborhoods and they charge 300% interest.

Banking has become synonomous with preditory lending upon the weakest and most vulnerable in American society. Our local, state and federal governments have gotten into the action of preying upon the American people as well, by passing taxes and laws willy nilly with little to no accountability.

American life has become all about making more and more money to pay for more and more taxes and interest, with little to no thought about the future of our children.

This is the kind of environment that nazi germany formed in. The german people got pissed off enough to take out thier anger.

Poison the food and water supply, land and air, sell them drugs; all in the quest for profit. Prey upon the people, destroy thier lives, put them in debt, take away thier hope; all in the quest for profit. Feed them propaganda, warp thier minds, destroy thier ability to reason; all in the quest for profit.

Pass more laws, restrict thier freedom, spy upon them; all in the quest for profit. Sue thier business', tax everything, let them extort eachother; all in the quest for profit. Bribe thier officials, export thier jobs, create oppressive regulations; all in the quest for profit. Start more wars, kill thier children, destroy thier cities; all in the quest for profit.

Imprision them upon this planet forever; all in the quest for profit.

Subjugate them to your will lord; all in the quest for profit.


Enjoy your future for as long as it lasts.


"Federal reserve bank to implode 4 years ahead of schedule"
www.abovetopsecret.com...'


[edit on 22-3-2008 by In nothing we trust]



posted on Mar, 22 2008 @ 06:29 PM
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Since you are politically minded Rockpuck and I see you are screaming about economics today, I wondered if you have seen this link? I do not know the credibility of the author or who wrote it, but it may be true, I will leave that for you to decide:

Bush & Roberts about to be exposed by the high court



posted on Mar, 22 2008 @ 07:55 PM
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Interesting link.. knida reminds me of that Won Ton dude, what ever his name was.. guy who supposedly is owed a few trillion.

But after reviewing the other stories on the site.. from Illuminati to UFO's I would say.. not such a credible source, and should not be taken seriously.



posted on Mar, 22 2008 @ 08:28 PM
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Thank you for your excellent post. Corporations in this country, from banking to retailers, are parasitic in nature. They are feeding off of our desire to achieve the "American Dream". Instead, we are in a damn nightmare.

Usury is manipulative. Marketing is manipulative. Speculation on commodities of precious resources is worse than manipulative it's evil.

A huge factor in the question of debt is the actual price of goods. Particularly, why - if outsourcing is supposed to be so economically viable to companies - does the cost of goods and services keep going up and up? Don't tell me it's inflation because the cost has been going up significatly for the past several years relative to wages. The reason is that the difference saved is being pocketed by greedy CEOs and not passed on to the consumer.

As such the consumer is paying more and more for the same basic goods they have already been accustomed to purchasing. If the marketers pimp new products (because everyone knows that from washers and dryers to a pair of jeans, everything is obsolete within a year either due to planned obsolecence to jack more profit, poor quality or the constant barrage of 'new' and better' goods) then the bankers will slide us the easy credit to make the sale.

It's disgusting and I see no end to it - UNLESS - everyone just stops spending money! Hit them where it hurts, on their ledger sheets. Vote with your wallet by keeping it closed. Buy essential goods with cash only. By God, their heads will spin around!
How much 'stuff' do you really need?

People, all they love and care about is money - DON"T GIVE IT TO THEM!



posted on Mar, 22 2008 @ 08:35 PM
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Originally posted by kosmicjack
... I see no end to it - UNLESS - everyone just stops spending money! Hit them where it hurts, on their ledger sheets. Vote with your wallet by keeping it closed. Buy essential goods with cash only. By God, their heads will spin around!
How much 'stuff' do you really need?

People, all they love and care about is money - DON"T GIVE IT TO THEM!


Oh don't worry thats gonna happen all by itself. As inflation takes ahold, bank notes are called and jobs are eliminated, discretionary spending will come to a screeching halt. Housing prices will continue to fall as people (er, I mean consumers) on fixed incomes won't be able to afford anything except the bare neccecities of life.

This thing is just getting started.

I see several lawyers advertising that they are willing to sue the federal government (Social security), on the behalf of consumers, for increased benifit payments. That's a good start. A second and third round of payouts from the IRS would be another positive step in the right direction. If we can just get the feds to send out monthly cash payments to every american citizen (I mean consumer), we might be able to continue consuming.

[edit on 22-3-2008 by In nothing we trust]



posted on Mar, 22 2008 @ 10:09 PM
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Im actually kinda glad that I have bad credit and cannot get any more credit cards or anything like that. Im 27, married and make about 40,000 a year, while my wife makes about 20,000 and we can barely keep our heads above water....and we are the comfortable ones out of our friends. It is getting a little ridiculious...



posted on Mar, 23 2008 @ 06:36 AM
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This is the worst kind of story. Because this is directly effecting us. A lot of other threads talk about UFOs world domination and all that and I think. Well it's neither here nor there and either way dosn't effect me. But this, this credit debt this crap idea that it's ok for a young adult to be poor. An average young adult that isn't rich has to front 30k and 4 years to make a descent living for the most part. Is there no other way? Is the best that we can get if so then ok. But if not.. Well then what? How do we change it? Almost willing to follow someone anyone that can organise us.



posted on Mar, 23 2008 @ 07:21 AM
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What would happen if everybody would stop paying taxes or their debt ?
Money would lose their value ? No, just that the banks would disappear. Money are in endless supply we do not need banks to "loan" them to us. "Peak Money" cannot exist

Same thing with taxes, the state can make all the money they want, why stress the citizens with taxes ?

All this mess must be cleaned up. Money are a tool used by people to trade. They must be created by the state and just given to people. There would be no banks and no electronic money. All paper.

Need a loan ? Borrow from the state, interest free.

Interest free loans would not make money worthless. You would still have to pay them back. Who does not pay them back do not gets any more loans forever, until that loan however small it's paid. And like banks do today (I heard they did not do this in USA recently) the state would not give $1000000 loans to people who obviously can't pay

The state would look at the market and see if the monetary mass must be increased or decreased - this is a thing they already do. Many say the state is incompetent, only private companies interested in profit can do a good job at managing the money supply, I say to them that the state already does it.

I am sure they have some indicators that show them if there is need for more money- then they create more and just send them to people. And people buy more stuff, and the economy grows and then they make more money and send them to people and so on.

If the money supply needs to be increased then every person in the country would receive in the mail an equal amount from the total sum
If it needs to be smaller then taxes appear - bigger taxes for the rich, none for the very poor, and the taxes are there only until the decrease in monetary mass has been achieved

The people who are employed by the state would be paid with newly created money. But this would not lead to much inflation. Let us say every 5 years taxes would need to appear - this only in case the economy is not growing, then people would just receive money in the mail. And the capitalist system would continue very well with all this, no need to change to communism
Even if I hate this consumerist thing it would be better then what we have now I think


[edit on 23-3-2008 by pai mei]

[edit on 23-3-2008 by pai mei]



posted on Mar, 23 2008 @ 11:20 AM
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Originally posted by pai mei
"Peak Money" cannot exist

Same thing with taxes, the state can make all the money they want, why stress the citizens with taxes ?


It is hypocricy for the government to print money at will, not care about where it goes and still tax it's citizens to death.

Abolish the IRS and then who cares what they do. Then they can send everyone in the world free money if they want.

[edit on 23-3-2008 by In nothing we trust]



posted on Mar, 23 2008 @ 06:10 PM
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The Problem:

I'm going to try and state this simply, because if I can get you to understand the problem, then you're going to be able to also see the solution clearly as well. If you don't get it at first, just read it again. Eventually, it sinks in...


A bit of history:

1) Once, gold and silver were considered the only “real” money, but it was heavy and risky to carry around...

2) So people paid goldsmiths to store the money, and got paper receipts for it...

3) After a while, people used the receipts like money, and left the gold in the bank most of the time. So the bankers got clever and came up with a scam...

4) The banks printed off receipts for more gold than they actually had, and “loaned” those receipts out to charge interest on it. They kept their fingers crossed hoping that not too many people would come in trying to redeem their receipts for real gold all at the same time. This let them make a lot of money charging interest, because they could charge interest on MONEY THEY DIDN'T HAVE.


An analogy can be made using property and titles. Here's the scam in another way:

Step 1: Acquire a vacation home.

Step 2: Sell the title to the home to one person.

Step 3: Sell the title to the home to ANOTHER person.

Step 4: Hope they both don't show up on the same weekend!


Fractional reserve banking lets a bank say to a depositor that all his money is safe and sound at the bank at the same time they get to loan most of it out to someone else so they can charge interest on it. So there are two people with a legitimate claim to the same pile of money. (So whose is it, really?) Then the borrower deposits their new money into another bank, which loans most of it out too. The process continues over and over, and if you do the math, there is far more money CREATED by banks in loans than existed in the first place.

Considering all the interest being made on all these loans you see it is a very profitable scam. The risk comes when too many people come asking for their deposits all at once. Then the only thing the banks can do is call in as many loans as possible and see how much they're able to cough up, which is invariably far less than what people thought they had tucked away safely in the bank.

One final note: in the vacation home example, the banking scam works the same way except... THERE IS NO HOME! There is no gold backing the receipts anymore, so essentially we have all been trading titles without property!


What's the result?

1) Almost every dollar that exists is owed to a bank somewhere, because at some time in history, it was created when it was loaned out.

2) Far more dollars are owed to banks (because of compound interest) than even exists! So as a country, we cannot possibly get out of debt under this system.

3) There is no money, in the real sense. Just checks, data stored on computers, and promises. It is all created by typing on a keyboard, and signing signatures. The only tangible assets in regard to money is the collateral we pledge when we ask for a loan. The money they loan you comes from nowhere, but the assets you lose in foreclosure are real!

4) Because the US government borrows from the Federal Reserve, bankers have the power to influence our society and government by controlling finance. They decide to create (or not create) money depending on who's asking, and for what. They choose what projects get funded, and let other needs wither on the vine by starving them of working capital. This subtle yet immense power is more than enough to undermine democracy, and guide the course of a nation's history.


What is the solution?

Simple. Money must not be created in the form of loans. It must be something that once created, circulates permanently. Otherwise many forms of abuse and deceit can work their way into the system, and a class of parasites will rise to power in society by cleverly disguising the fact that they can create money from thin air.

[edit on 23-3-2008 by ianr5741]



posted on Mar, 23 2008 @ 06:14 PM
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That was an amazing explanation that anyone should be able to understand. You have probably just jolted a lot of people wide awake. Thank you.



posted on Mar, 26 2008 @ 09:02 AM
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Fed-Up Money Treks to Bhutan to Grasp Gross National Happiness

Twigs crunch outside, a voice calls out from the dark and an apprentice enters the chamber gripping the ``Mopai.'' The ancient 250-page goatskin volume provides human calculators, called ``tsips,'' with intricate mathematical and astronomical formulas to compute a client's fate and fortune before birth, during life and in the afterlife.

``I am one of the 40 calculators,'' Jamtsho says over cups of the pungent yak-butter tea his predecessors began serving clients here in the Kingdom of Bhutan more than 1,500 years ago.....

Last year, Jamtsho says, some 300 American and European bankers and businessmen made the grueling journey to Bhutan -- a country smaller than Switzerland, with 180 broadband subscribers, five elevators and less than 700,000 inhabitants -- to have the calculators of Pangrizampa use the hand-scripted Mopai as a financial forecasting tool. Full Bloomberg


Some friends think I'm a bit odd because I smudge my screen with sage when I open my trading platform. Compared to Tshering Jamtsho...I'm a piker


Edit: Looks like a bad link, sorry.





[edit on 26-3-2008 by OBE1]



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