Getting a loan: The worst thing you can do

by Michael Smith (Veshengro)

Taking out a bank loan is the worst thing anyone can do and the same goes for working with so-called credit cards.

While it is true that some people need to take out a loan at times simply to make ends meet, which in itself is already bad due to the system being designed against them, basically, applying for credit in any shape is a bad idea.

And, I may add here also the buying something on the “never-never”, as it is often called in Britain, that is to say on hire purchase or on catalog credit or whatever. The interest rates, even though presently the bank rates may be at an all time low, are horrendous and the same goes for credit cards.

The best thing to do with the latter is to pay them off, if you have any, and then cut them up into tiny little pieces and dispose off those pieces carefully.

When I was a child I was taught not ever to buy anything that I could not afford to buy in cash and almost everything was still bought in cash then in shops. The use of checks was few and far between and though some people used catalog shopping and the credit that was offered buying on hire purchase, paying off in installments, most saved up and then bought with a wad of cash. And, while paying in cash, especially large amounts can get you into trouble nowadays even, I still today buy only something if I have the money to do so in my bank account. If I think I cannot afford something then that has to wait until I have save the money up top buy it.

But people today do not want to wait. Instant gratification seems the order of the day and they have to have what they want immediately, preferably yesterday. And thus, if they can't afford it, they use credit cards or a bank load, if they can get it. Well, and if that does not work for some then it has to be a criminal act but they have to have what they want there and then immediately. But I digressed a little with the last sentence.

Loans, however, whether from mail order catalogs (with the internet those and the loans are few and far between though nowadays), using credit cards, banks, or whatever, all have a very hefty interest rate attached to them, some as high as 35% and more per year. Far higher than any mortgage. But that is also a loan and is, probably, best avoided.

The best thing to do is to avoid debt in any way, shape or form, because it is going to haunt you and may end up biting you in the proverbial. Learn to be frugal instead and to manage your money and save for things and then save for the best possible version of it; go for quality rather than cheapness, and try to get something that will be repairable.

© 2015

EU just cutting its nose off in-spite its face

by Michael Smith (Veshengro)

The EU has decided to give Cyprus a bank bailout package that will penalize banks' customers via a levy that everyone who has any money in a Cypriot bank is forced to pay and a run has begun on Cypriot banks with people withdrawing their money.

This savings tax, as it is being referred to, is automatically deducted from account holder's accounts without them having any say in the matter. This is the state stealing people's money by order of the European Union.

The fear is now that this could set a precedence for the banks in other countries such as Greece, Italy, Spain and Portugal and it could just happen that investors are going to withdraw deposits from banks in those countries.

Chances are that such actions, should they happen could bring the Euro to its knees and with it, more than likely, the EU altogether.

Banks, apparently, will be closed until the moneys have been withdrawn to prevent people taking their money out of the banks and thus foiling the plot. Initially it was said that this closure of banks would be just until Tuesday, March 19, but this has now been extended until Thursday, March 21.

No wonder the powers-that-be want everyone too no longer use cash and, in the UK, any cash transaction above a certain amount, presently one thousand pound, will immediately be informed to the police. So, if you go into a store to buy an expensive PC or a plasma TV or a car in a car show room and come in with the money in cash the store will immediately call the police who will then come and ask a lot of questions.

© 2013

Banks before people

by Michael Smith (Veshengro)

Our rulers have decided to save the banking system by sacrificing the living standard of the people on the altar of expediency.

It is good to see, I must say, that they have their priorities right and are protecting their (personal) interests. Who are the people anyway but just plebes, riffraff and a nuisance.

At least our rulers' incomes, bonuses, consultancy fees from banking and industry, and living standards are protected. It just would not do and be not proper if we'd allow any of our rulers and leaders to suffer poverty now. Not that there would be much of a chance of them suffering and experiencing poverty first hand anyway whatever.

While ministers vote themselves very hefty pay rises the frontline civil servants and municipal workers, the latter who are on some of the lowest incomes anyways, are forced to accept a pay freeze, at the threat of losing their jobs, for several years and a pay cut in real terms.

Our rulers, whether in Westminster, Washington DC, or elsewhere, sure know how to look after No.1 and after their friends and cronies who keep them well supplied. The people don't count and to them are but serfs to be oppressed and controlled.

They claim to be protecting the economy but aside from the banks they burned out no other businesses, especially none that really did something for the economy by providing goods and services and jobs.

In fact they are not even prepared to help “vital” industries and they are not even protecting local authorities so that the latter be able to provide vital and essential services to the community.

When people, ordinary people, lose jobs or when the threat of job loss is hanging over them they have no confidence to support the economy by spending money on this, that, and the other. Instead they try to make ends meet and hold on to the little that they may be able to “save” for the “just in case” scenario.

The actions of our rulers have absolutely nothing to do with supporting the economy but everything with propping up a corrupt banking system and a broken economic one.

When UK Prime Minister David Cameron in early December 2011 put in his veto, a veto of which no one took the slightest bit of a notice (so much for a veto in the EU), the the EU meeting about the Euro Crisis, his interest was only to protect the City, that is to say the financial institutions in the City of London and the Corporation.

The British people and their wish – in the majority – to get us out of the EU were not his concerns and were not even considered. In fact, David Cameron flatly refused to even entertain the idea of given the people as say as to continued membership of the UK in the European Union.

The banks are put before the people and the reason is as outlined. Time for a change, a serious change, methinks.

© 2011