...why isn't it hip or cool to save up the money to get things done instead of financing every last little wish on your list?
Josh and I want to buy a home, we save 20% down. We want to put me through school, we put that money aside and don't touch it. We want to upgrade our water heater and a/c unit, we save for it now - can't use the school money, it's already been spent. Won't use the salesman's "6 months same as cash" selling tactic - we don't know what's going to happen to us financially in the next six months, so it would be stupid to spend money we haven't yet earned.
To me, it's simple (and there might be only 2% of the population that actually functions this way), so why does the United States of America, the very country that was founded on freedoms of every kind, choose to spend money it's not yet earned? What has this country been teaching its citizens? Why would our country choose the burden of indebtedness?
Debt does not feel good. I have gone into debt three times in my life - I financed $9k of my car in 2003 after I finished paying off $6k in student loans. I paid as much as I could every month because I hated the feeling of not being in control of my own finances (my 4-year car loan was paid in full after two years had passed). Josh and I now owe a bank about 78% of the purchase price of the home we live in. I hate that feeling, too, but it's pretty hard to save up enough money to purchase a home outright, at least the first time around.
Deficit spending baffles me. Very little of it may be necessary once in a very great while, but at some point in time Big Daddy USA is going to have to man up and realize it can't give everyone everything they want.
Now, as long as Josh and I keep our health, we'll be good to go. Like most others, we're just one debilitating disease away from bankruptcy. I can't believe a country as great as ours can allow its citizens to lose everything and then some because of the cost of treating a disease. It just doesn't make sense. We shouldn't have to deficit spend to ensure people get the life-sustaining treatments and medications they need. Maybe our country is spending its money on the wrong things? Certainly there's a better way for everyone involved. Anyone know what it is?
