The average individual credit card debt in this country is roughly $9,000. The average rebate check that the economic stimulus package will send out to individuals (around May) will be in the hundreds. Pundits speak with straight faces on how unfortunate it will be if people save their rebate checks or use them to pay down their debts instead of going out to buy TVs made in another country. Last night, I heard yet another one on the News Hour with Jim Lehrer speaking straight-faced about how this is the time for even more mass consumerism.
And they’re serious. Those constitute rare, I-want-to-attack-the-TV, moments for me. Our nation is propped up on fake money – the massive spending deficits of our government and the huge personal debts that almost all of us have accumulated. If people don’t use that money to pay down their debts, we’re going to have bigger problems in the future when the credit industry collapses and a majority of Americans go broke overnight, or when China decides to recall the massive amount of American debt that it holds.
“Are you not ashamed of your eagerness to possess as much wealth, reputation, and honors as possible, while you do not care for nor give thought to wisdom or truth, or the best possible state of your soul? … Wealth does not bring about excellence, but excellence brings about wealth and all other public and private blessings for men.” – Socrates, in Plato’s Apologia (Defense)
