What Counts for Progress

I've got a closer relationship with my credit card companies than I'd like. While trying for years to impose fiscal discipline and live within my means, I somehow manage to periodically amass a scary and impressive credit card balance. Usually it metastasizes onto more than one card.

Recently I sat down to take stock of the big picture, and it was like stepping on a rake. A balance of $11,000 lurked on a Chase card with an interest rate of some 7% and monthly finance charges of $67. A second card with a rate of 13% stood at $4,000. I'd run it up recently in anticipation of redeeming some points for airline tickets - neglecting to check closely the labyrinthine card rules that allowed me to trade some 20,000 "points" for ...nothing. Finance charges there are $61 per month.

But I considered myself prepared! I'd saved all the offers for balance transfers that came in the mail and was ready make the transfer to a lower interest rate and buckle down. My first call was to Chase, which had sent a very nice letter, referencing my exact card number and saying I could transfer my balance for a 1.99 percent interest rate. Trying to feel some brand loyalty, trying to be mindful of my credit rating and not jump wildly from card to card, I called them first. And they balked at transferring their own balance. I could make the transfer but would wind up in the exact same spot when they applied any payment to the highest interest rate first.

Now, of course this is all my own doing. It's hard to defend five-digit credit card balances when you own the stuff (presumably) they bought. But I experienced an hour or so of real bitterness towards this company for their misleading rates and generally outrageous rates that are squeezing little people like me into bankruptcy.

A few days later, I got another offer in the mail, and within 45 minutes had made the transfer to a 0% loan and was mentally wiping my hands of that damn Chase card.

What a sad thing to feel at all victorious about! As my husband points out, any late payment send this 0% to 17%. I am still buckling under the weight of this huge balance. The card has been cut up for months and I'm still struggling to get by. Something always comes up: the furnace needs big repairs. A dental or medical procedure isn't covered by insurance and leaves me with a huge bill. My monthly payments for things like these is approaching $500.

So we soldier on. My husband and I make a game of trying to stay within budget at the grocery store.

I think all of this rises from a structural disconnect between most American's earning power and what it takes to live. Several factors illustrate: Income inequality becomes ever more yawning, with the top 1% showing double-digit increases in wealth while the bottom 40% stagnates. Working families have maintained income over the past several decades only by having wives enter the workforce. What trick will we use now that women are already out there? Greg Palast (www.gregpalast.com) uses an alarming chart in his books that looks like the jaws of an alligator: the bottom line, heading to the right and dropping sharply, represents worker wages, and the top, rising line represents worker productivity.

We are producing more and earning less. The cost of necessities like housing and health care is increasing, leaving less for other necessities and leisure. (Not that vacation-impoverished Americans have much anyway.) We're still bombarded with messages telling us we need flat-screened TVs, constant Home Depot Upgrades, and a big enough grill.

Not sure how to end this post. We do not have a flat screen TV. We do not have a car made after 2000. I vote, volunteer, try to be as active as I can in changing the structural disconnect described, while holding down hearth and home. But often it seems that this soldiering on, being good to the other people in my life and not falling further into the pit, is all we can hope for - and far from being enough.

Postscript:
The above-mentioned husband and I have only been married for a couple of months. Look for other posting on reflections back on Buddhist parent dating....Buddhist thoughts on forming stepfamilies...Merging finances: smart? crazy? ...Helping your children build a home with their new stepfather...Asking your ex to pay for part of extracurriculars...Oh, so much to do! Thoughts, anyone?