{"id":178,"date":"2008-03-16T04:18:40","date_gmt":"2008-03-16T09:18:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.angelsdesk.com\/angel\/blog\/?p=178"},"modified":"2008-03-16T10:57:23","modified_gmt":"2008-03-16T15:57:23","slug":"playing-against-the-bank","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.angelsdesk.com\/?p=178","title":{"rendered":"Never play against the Bank"},"content":{"rendered":"

The children playing in the backyard at sunset.
\n15 March 2008
\n<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

I don’t gamble; I have never<\/em> gambled.\u00c2\u00a0 Gambling is a losing proposition.\u00c2\u00a0 You know that the odds are in favor of the house.\u00c2\u00a0 Why give away your money?<\/p>\n

Yet, with all my education and savvy — with all of\u00c2\u00a0my self-righteous attitude<\/em> — I still got involved with credit cards<\/em>… icky, horrible credit cards.\u00c2\u00a0 Talk about giving your money away.\u00c2\u00a0 I should just go to\u00c2\u00a0Discover Card\u00c2\u00a0and write them a check for several thousand dollars — why bother with the thinly-disguised middle man of 22% APR.<\/p>\n

I hate credit cards, and yet I have never evolved the self-discipline to get out from under their thumb of\u00c2\u00a0financial slavery.\u00c2\u00a0 Was the Illustrator book worth it?\u00c2\u00a0 Was the plushie Belle doll worth it?\u00c2\u00a0 Are any of our transitory consumer trinkets worth indenturing our future and the future of our family?<\/p>\n

I read this article<\/a> on credit card rates increasing even though the Federal Reserve is cutting rates, and I got so upset with myself for ever getting involved with these legalized loan sharks in the first place.<\/p>\n

Five years ago, when we got that first credit card to pay for Savannah’s vet bills, my only knowledge was: “Credit cards are bad.”\u00c2\u00a0 Now I understand so much more.\u00c2\u00a0 I understand how the whole debt trap works — the interplay of the minimum payment, exorbitant APRs, and outrageous fees.\u00c2\u00a0 You combine these with our consumer culture and\u00c2\u00a0the human desire for immediate gratification, and you have a money-making machine for the banks.<\/p>\n

But I guess, like I’ve said before, out of adversity comes knowledge and experience.\u00c2\u00a0 I’ve read\u00c2\u00a0many personal finance books and understood them on a theoretical level.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0But now that I have personally lived the chapter on “Consumer Debt,”\u00c2\u00a0I understand it intimately.\u00c2\u00a0 So let me pass my knowledge onto any young people that might be reading this entry:\u00c2\u00a0 “Credit cards are bad.\u00c2\u00a0 Stay away from them.\u00c2\u00a0 If you can’t afford it, don’t buy it.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The children playing in the backyard at sunset. 15 March 2008 I don’t gamble; I have never gambled.\u00c2\u00a0 Gambling is a losing proposition.\u00c2\u00a0 You know that the odds are in favor of the house.\u00c2\u00a0 Why give away your money? Yet, with all my education and savvy — with all of\u00c2\u00a0my self-righteous attitude — I still […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-178","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-recovering-consumer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.angelsdesk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/178","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.angelsdesk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.angelsdesk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.angelsdesk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.angelsdesk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=178"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.angelsdesk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/178\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.angelsdesk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=178"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.angelsdesk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=178"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.angelsdesk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=178"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}