The View From Here

DEBT FREE AT AGE 28!!, orig­i­nally uploaded by lemon­jenny. This arti­cle and it’s com­ments are quite sad. Con­sumer debt in Amer­ica is hor­ri­ble! The sto­ries here (some stu­pid, some sad, some amaz­ing, some uplift­ing) speak to a real prob­lem in our soci­ety. What will my gen­er­a­tion do when they retire? We so often hear about the United States as being the wealth­i­est coun­try in the world, how­ever if you pulled the top 5% from that cal­cu­la­tion — how wealthy would we be? I think our pub­lic school sys­tems need to teach per­sonal finance to our chil­dren. As soon as a per­son turns 18, they are assaulted with credit card offers and often times, they accept because they want the lifestyle that MTV and pop­u­lar cul­ture por­trays. There is a gen­eral stu­pid­ity to per­sonal finance in my gen­er­a­tion to be sure (i.e. the num­ber of peo­ple around me who are so very excited by their high tax return as though that is some­thing to be proud of). At any rate, these sto­ries got me think­ing [ ... ]