“People Are In Debt By Design.”
Quote:
<< U.S. household debt has topped $15 trillion as the majority of Americans face some sort of healthcare, student, housing or credit card debt. “Wages have stagnated, regulations on the financial sector have been rolled back,” says Astra Taylor, co-founder of the Debt Collective, who notes that rich people can avoid their debts through loopholes and accounting gimmicks unavailable to most average borrowers. “People are in debt by design.”
Watch the full interview with Astra Taylor: >>
It’s true. When I was a kid, our neighbor, Jeff Maxwell, had a workshop in his backyard. On the wall, he had a postcard with a cartoon of a man with short arms, and a really baggy pair of pants. At the bottom, it said
“What everyone needs are short arms and deep pockets.”
I didn’t know what it meant until later, it suddenly dawned on me and understood it. It meant that the world makes it very easy to spend money; it’s much easier to spend than it is to earn it. Thus if you make it harder to spend your money with short arms and deep pockets, you’ll be better off.
So when I got old enough to feel the burdens that two kids put on my parents, I avoided bugging them about money. I never asked my parents to drive their car. Later, I got drafted at 19 and spent 3 years in the Army and learned by the School of hard knocks about money.
