Tis The Season

‘Tis the season to be jolly, particularly if you’re in the business of lending money. Slogans like Black Friday and
Cyber Monday have earned a place in the American lexicon to describe the chaos that is the season’s busiest
shopping days. The Internet moguls are offering free shipping, and the malls are opening at 6 a.m. so everybody
grab your plastic and let’s celebrate God. It’s all so festive; then comes the New Year and the credit card bills start
arriving. Talk about your sobering moments.

    Americans are increasingly dependant on credit cards even while the credit card companies are charging rates
that, not long ago, would have been equated with loan sharking (or Shylarking, after all this is a Brooklyn website).
With interest rates as high as 35%, and fees which once averaged around the $10. mark, now reaching $40., the
credit card issuers average a yearly profit of $1.5 billion. With over 144 million Americans carrying at least one
credit card, that numbers is poised only to rise. Happy Holidays.

    The banking industry, with collusion from the Supreme Court and various other federal offices, have done their
best to ensure that the banking industry can demand and receive whatever they ask for in terms of fees. Supreme
Court decisions such as Smiley vs. Citibank gave lenders carte blanche to charge fees free from regulation. In the
same way, the federal office of Comptroller of Currency named itself the sole regulator of the credit card industry
thereby immunizing the banking industry against interference from any state legislation that may try to impose any
restrictions on these plastic pushing piggies.

This occurred in 2004, under George W’s administration - no surprise there. The accidental president next went
after the bankruptcy laws, hammering away at them until it was all but impossible to file a bankruptcy claim no
matter how many jobs you lose or how many operations you undergo. Unfortunately, that insulting maxim about
when pointing the finger of blame, there are always three fingers pointing back at you, holds true here.

    The banking industry is not a community support group; it is an industry run by rich men seeking only to get
richer. No matter what their slick marketing advertisements claim, the only thing priceless to them is finding another
way to keep us making another 35% interest rate payment, and the only privilege membership has is the privilege
of paying three times the ticket price for your purchase. They do spell it all out right there in the contract we sign
upon receiving their cards, its all there, usually three pages of it - and in six-point type. It is here that you can find
out all about Universal Default, a clause that gives a lending company the right to raise your interest rate because
you were late on another credit payment, to any lender, anywhere. So we are not quite victims, though we are not
quite volunteers.

    Some of us like to consider ourselves bohemians with a live-for-today approach to life; others just go along with
societal norms and view ourselves in contrast to those norms. So if the average American family carries $8,000 in
credit card debt, and I am only carrying $4,000, then I guess I’m doing pretty well. Often, we don’t take the time to
calculate that the Flat-Screen television that you charged today for $2,000 will wind up costing closer to $6,000 by
the time your finished paying it off. Ditto for that $129 Angora sweater that you bought for grandma to hang in her
closet last Christmas. This year, why not do the both of you a favor? Pick up some lunch and spend the day with
grandma, you’ll both enjoy the holiday more – besides, it’ll piss off the credit card companies if the idea catches on.