There was a caller on a conservative radio show who was giving the tired argument about how ‘those illegals’ were making it hard for him to make ends meet. He said something in his rambling tirade that made me shake my head at the stupidity of people. He said, because of the bad economy, he had to make a lot of sacrifices to pay bills. He mentioned, because of the economy, he had a $70000 credit card bill. Now, you have to understand before he made that statement he was upset about how the country wasn’t living within their means. Again, because of the illegals flooding the country, his words, the country was borrowing money to pay for people that didn’t deserve help. He talked about how all the borrowing was bankrupting and mortgaging his kid’s future.

Again, he has a $70000 credit card bill that he said had to go so high because he was trying to make ends meet.

Just like a lot of calls and articles I’ve read where stories are given that are supposed to illicit sympathy for the subject, the deeper you dig into the meat of the argument the less sympathetic the subject becomes. Mostly this happens because the subject is so willing to talk in talking points they don’t see the error in their logic.

This man who has thousands of dollars of debt and is upset that the government is spending money they don’t have is doing the same thing the government is; borrowing on money they don’t have to support a lifestyle that is unsustainable under present conditions.

I would hazard to guess that if you have $70000 in credit card debt you aren’t using the credit card for emergencies. Using a credit card for some groceries or clothing sometimes isn’t going to get a bill of $70000. Like most of the calls and articles I've seen with people in similar situations, this gentleman probably is trying to live on the level he had when he had the good paying job, possibly hoping to ride out the economy and be stronger at the end of the cycle. He will hold on to the off road vehicles, the summer home, the fancy appliances and all the other trappings and probably hoped that the credit card fix would be temporary.

I know the feeling. I went through the same situation in the mid-90s. What I learned was at some point you have to divest yourself from those things that are dragging you down because credit will not save you. As an emergency, yes it is a good stop gap measure but honestly, if you get to the point where you are buying groceries with a credit card you are too far gone.

People don’t want to adjust and I understand because it is a hard thing to do, but, and this is where people can get real testy with governments, at some point you have to make the hard decisions and it won’t be pretty. Many people aren’t willing to make the tough choices. I have countless articles about middle class families struggling to make it during this downturn in the economy and by reading the articles carefully you can tell the people really haven’t hit rock bottom. One article I have talks about how a single mother is struggling to provide for her kids. It’s so sad and you can see the tears as you read her story, however when she says how she HAD to buy her 17 year old daughter a USED car instead of the new car she wanted, sympathy was gone. When she mentioned about the 19 year old non college son who was living with her but didn’t even try to get a job, my sympathy meter was empty.

I have an article about the family who was ashamed to get food from the local charity. The husband has been out of a job for over a year, the wife just lost her job. They have young kids and they don’t know how they are going to provide for the private school they attend. What, private school? They have three cars and aren’t able to enjoy the vacation home. Wait, three cars and a vacation home? I’m supposed to feel sorry because you have three cars, a vacation home, and kids in private school and you are ashamed to get food handouts and you’re claiming to be poor?

Now when I think about struggling, I think about how last week when I was low on money and I had to pick up Ramen at 6 for a dollar, a loaf of bread and two cans of peas and make that last for a week. I think about how I have things stuffed in my apartment because I couldn’t afford the storage fees where I had my stuff stored for the past three years. I have a test I give myself when I think I’m going to struggle with the bills. I have an Xbox 360 I won from my old job, and when things get tight I think about how I’m going to sell it. Honestly I don’t play it much and I probably don’t need it but I use that as a warning bell, because if I have to sell that I know I have to make more hard choices in making sure I can make ends meet.

I have had to make hard sacrifices. Yes, there were environmental and other concerns as to why I gave up my car, but when I took into account what I was paying and the upkeep of the car, the choice I had was to try to get another job to pay for the car or get rid of the car. In this economy, giving up the car was the only logical choice. So I take public transportation to work and it does eat up a lot of my time, but now I pay a WHOLE lot less than when I had the car.

That’s why when I read stories of people ‘struggling’ in the economy I have to question things, because I don’t see where they have hit rock bottom, nor do I see them allowing them to make the hard choices they have to do.