A couple of years ago my business partner told me that it was time to pay off revolving credit cards. I did. A year or so before that I wanted to go to a top-ranked wellness center to lose weight and I asked him if the company would pay for it and he said, “No. You ate it. You lose it. You pay for it.” And I did. Recently I have been seeing televisions ads that scream, “I owed $45,000 on my credit card and they settled for $11,000.” Then there is the name and telephone number where some Debt Resolution Company of record can do the same for you. Five minutes later an ad on the boob tube shouts, “I owed the IRS $155,000 and I only paid $21,000.” There is a phone number to call to end your Internal Revenue problems.
Whatever happened to personal responsibility? I am wont to say that all the free-loading started in 1959 with the birth of credit cards: BUY NOW. PAY LATER. This 50-year old baby is as responsible for personal financial malfeasance as anything else.
With all these “get out of jail” passes being pandered to the public, it is time for someone to call a spade a spade: most people are hanging by their fingernails financially because of the need to have what we can’t afford. As a kid when we asked our mother if we could have a bicycle, she would say, “Yes. Buy it with your own money. Cut lawns to get the money.” We were living under the Eisenhower Era, right after the end of World War II.
A great comic from 50’s and 60’s television, Red Skelton used to act in skits featuring a rogue character named Freddie the Freeloader. Freddie was always mooching off friends and conning unsuspecting strangers. I was reminded of Skelton and his Freddie the Freeloader creation when I saw these ads to let people off the hook for their indebtedness.
To quote my business partner, “You charged it. Pay what you owe.” The same goes for taxes.
I am Albert Clayton Gaulden and I approve of this message.
