{"id":4391,"date":"2009-04-08T12:21:03","date_gmt":"2009-04-08T18:21:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wordpress-367309-1145705.cloudwaysapps.com\/?p=4391"},"modified":"2009-04-08T12:21:03","modified_gmt":"2009-04-08T18:21:03","slug":"cutting-out-credit-cards-living-within-or-beneath-our-means","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/cutting-out-credit-cards-living-within-or-beneath-our-means\/","title":{"rendered":"Cutting out Credit Cards: Living Within (or Beneath) our Means"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Cutting<\/a><\/p>\n

There\u2019s more to buying that high-tech gizmo or fancy new clothes, especially if you put it on plastic.\u00a0\u00a0 If you\u2019re anything like the so-called average American with combined balances on your credit cards pushing upwards of $10,000 per household, then you\u2019re paying a lot more than the purchase price after factoring in an exorbitant interest rate on the unpaid balance.\u00a0 Just one credit card with a balance of $15,000 and a monthly minimum payment of $300 based on an interest rate of 13 percent would take nearly twenty years to pay off, amounting to nearly $9,000 in interest, according to the website Cardweb.com.<\/strong><\/p>\n

To save or spend?<\/p>\n

This raging debate among economic recovery pundits mask the reality that based on our current \u201cfree trade\u201d global economic system, what we really mean by spending is consuming.\u00a0 And in this global free trade system, ecological costs are “externalized” if we use the correct economist’s jargon.\u00a0 As a result, we pollute, destroy and exploit where ever we can.\u00a0 If you can\u2019t do this in the United States very easy thanks to national laws and regulations, well then, export your manufacturing and service operations to places that don\u2019t have many, or any, regulations.\u00a0 Then import these products back into the U.S. to sell at a big box store, plopped down where there used to be viable farmland.\u00a0 For example, these BIG companies move operations to places where poor people can sort through toxic junk computers for scrap or to places where throwing something away can\u2019t possibly ruin our own clean air or water in our communities.<\/p>\n

According to Emily Kaiser\u2019s analysis for Reuters:\u00a0 \u201cU.S. President Barack Obama needs to convince Americans to spend now and save later in order to get the U.S. economy back on solid footing.\u201d\u00a0 It doesn’t have to be this way.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

How are we going to grow spending with millions of American\u2019s without jobs, without health insurance, with nominal (if any) \u201cemergency savings,\u201d dwindling 401(k)s, perhaps, even, without a home?\u00a0 We will not, or cannot, unless every one ends up working for the government, perhaps helping out with the U.S. census.\u00a0 Putting it on credit cards is not a sustainable way to go either.<\/p>\n

Millions of Americans now recognize this path we\u2019re on.\u00a0 They’re cutting back, if not trying to pay off altogether, their credit cards.\u00a0 According to Lucia Mutikani for Reuters (April 7, 2009)<\/a>, \u201crevolving credit, made up of credit and charge cards, plunged at a 9.7 percent rate, or $7.79 billion in February [2009], the largest dollar drop since the Fed started tracking the series in 1968.\u201d\u00a0 So Americans are finally saving some and cutting back. Many Americans, like my family, are growing at least some of our food, exchanging items for free within our communities, or in various ways choosing to simplify and live within our means.\u00a0 Now I have more time to hang out with my son!\u00a0 Credit card users beware, however.\u00a0 If you stop using the cards long enough, the BIG banks that issue them will simply close your account.<\/p>\n

Here’s the sustainability story not told often enough.\u00a0 Despite what the BIG bankers, economists and BIG government might claim, our economy operates under the laws of nature, not just the laws of supply and demand.\u00a0 That\u2019s right.\u00a0 Nature runs its course in cycles (spring, summer, fall, winter) and so, too, does our economy.\u00a0 Our economy is based, in part, on natural resources on a finite planet, so our economy cannot grow infinitely.\u00a0 Ecopreneurial enterprises, whether for profit or non-profit, recognize this, guided by the \u201ctriple bottom line<\/a>.\u201d\u00a0 So do conserving customers who prioritize their values when making purchases, values like vibrant local communities, healthy foods grown organically and where fair \u201cliving wages\u201d are paid to those to offer the products or services.<\/p>\n

Mindfulness, not abstinence<\/p>\n

I\u2019m first to admit, the use of a credit card is both convenient and, since I pay the balance off every month, a nice way to get a short term \u201cloan.\u201d\u00a0 Using a credit card also allows me to track just about every expense (I don\u2019t even know how to use a cash machine).\u00a0 Talk about budgetary control and understanding.\u00a0 But the most important aspect of my family\u2019s spending is its priority of being a tool for mindfully making the changes we want to see happen in the world.\u00a0 For items we don\u2019t grow ourselves, we support our regional food cooperative (Willy Street) which, in turns, supports local farmers and fair trade relationships, for example.\u00a0 For other purchases, we see our role and responsibility to invest<\/a> in the restoration economy<\/a>, patronizing those companies that care as much about the planet and its citizens as we do.<\/p>\n

There are many who feel living at or below our means will bring about a Depression.\u00a0 My experience, however, as reflected in my books, ECOpreneuring<\/a> and Rural Renaissance, is that the change we\u2019re seeking is exactly the kind of change that such change in our approach to wealth, money and consumption might bring.\u00a0 A caveat, however, is that this kind of a future based on community, collaboration, self-reliance, cooperation, and personal responsibility are the types of values BIG corporations cannot sell, or profit from.<\/p>\n

To be fair to President Obama, he does understand that the change we seek starts with us.\u00a0 Here’s what he said recently at the G20 Summit:\u00a0 “In order for growth to be sustainable, it can’t be based on speculation, it can’t be based on overheated financial markets or overheated housing markets, or U.S. consumers maxing out on their credit cards, or us sustaining nonstop deficit spending as far as the eye can see.”<\/p>\n

I would agree with everything he said except for the part in calling us “consumers<\/a>.”<\/p>\n

Photography: John D. Ivanko\/ecopreneuring.biz<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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