Is it moral to spend money you don't have?

[task0778]

Some might say that modern liberalism and authoritarianism (statism) are not that far apart. As I'm sure you know, there is a big difference between what classical liberalism was and what modern liberalism is today, otherwise known as progressivism.

 

[BreezeWood]

Only an absolute ideologue can possibly think the ACA pays for itself.

To suggest raising the debt limit takes care of the debt problem is irrational. All it does is allow more debt to be accumulated.

.

To suggest raising the debt limit takes care of the debt problem is irrational. All it does is allow more debt to be accumulated.

what it allows are the previous legislative appropriations to be funded ...


how can this not be a discussion of ideology, dismantling appropriations not liked by one side or another by surreptitious means. sequester. there is no other ethical answer for "raising" the debt limit than raising the taxes to pay for it ...

just another rightwing scapegoat thread.

 

[Geaux4it]

Is it moral to spend money you don't have?

Meh --- I don't know if it's a "moral" question but it's certainly a risk since you're betting on yourself to be able to pay it back. I agree with the OP's tenet to live within one's means. So I've never been interested in getting a credit card.

One can live within his own means and still use a credit card.

I have a card that pays me 2% of everything I charge and pay off. I use that card for everything and I pay the balance in full every month so I never pay any interest. I also have a card in the business's name that does the same thing and I get a check at the end of the year for 2% of what I charged and paid off every month from both my personal and business expenses.

IMO if a credit co will give me 5 or 6 grand a year for simply using their cards I'm a fool not to use those cards

If you're paying it off before it adds up ---- then you're not living outside your own means either.

I looked into getting a credit card a couple of times actually. I was told I couldn't get one because I didn't already have one. "OK" I said, "if that's the what passes for logic on your planet, I'm outta here". Never looked back. Fuggit.

My brothers good friend was 34 when he bought his first house. He is a nurse and makes big bucks and had no credit history. Paid by cash for everything until wanting a home

The bank denied him a loan.

One would think he could have simply obtained some type of loan at a high interest rate since his had no credit history, then immediately pay it off.

Nope

He needed to show a 'pattern' of making payments all the while paying excessively high interest rate

What a deal

-Geaux

Some people have a credit card and avoid those excessively high interest rates by creating a pattern of paying the balance off every month. And that is not slavery.

You missed my point. Because he dealt in cash, he had to pay excessive interest rates to establish a pattern of paying debt. The latter which is required to obtain lower interest rates. Credit is mandatory and one has to pay up front in the beginning to join the club

-Geaux

 

[Luddly Neddite]

Is it moral to spend money you don't have?

Meh --- I don't know if it's a "moral" question but it's certainly a risk since you're betting on yourself to be able to pay it back. I agree with the OP's tenet to live within one's means. So I've never been interested in getting a credit card.

I have 3 credit cards, each one pays me back for use. I also, only buy things with the credit cards that I would normally buy with cash. At the end of the month I pay off the cards and carry no interest charges. After 1 year, if I spend $10,000 I get $200 back. The rich get richer, by figuring out ways to make extra money. The poor get poorer because they don't use their brains to find ways to make extra money, so become victims to liberalism. Liberalism is all about Equality, where everyone is equally poor and equally miserable, that is called FAIRNESS...

How much do you spend on service fees for those cash-back cards?

Hope you don't mind if I answer - With the Amazon Visa, there are no charges other than interest. Since we pay the entire balance, we never pay anything.


Sent from my iPad using USMessageBoard.com

 

[Luddly Neddite]

Only an absolute ideologue can possibly think the ACA pays for itself.

To suggest raising the debt limit takes care of the debt problem is irrational. All it does is allow more debt to be accumulated.

You are incorrect. Raising the debt limit does not "allow more debt to be accumulated".

It pays the debt that congress already voted to spend.

I don't understand why this confusion continues. Same with not understanding the difference between the debt and deficit.

Apparently, trump also doesn't understand this. Also, he has said he loves debt and would increase US debt. Wait till he finds out that, unlike his own business, the US actually has to pay its bills.

[emoji849]


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[task0778]

Is it moral to spend money you don't have?

Meh --- I don't know if it's a "moral" question but it's certainly a risk since you're betting on yourself to be able to pay it back. I agree with the OP's tenet to live within one's means. So I've never been interested in getting a credit card.

One can live within his own means and still use a credit card.

I have a card that pays me 2% of everything I charge and pay off. I use that card for everything and I pay the balance in full every month so I never pay any interest. I also have a card in the business's name that does the same thing and I get a check at the end of the year for 2% of what I charged and paid off every month from both my personal and business expenses.

IMO if a credit co will give me 5 or 6 grand a year for simply using their cards I'm a fool not to use those cards

If you're paying it off before it adds up ---- then you're not living outside your own means either.

I looked into getting a credit card a couple of times actually. I was told I couldn't get one because I didn't already have one. "OK" I said, "if that's the what passes for logic on your planet, I'm outta here". Never looked back. Fuggit.

My brothers good friend was 34 when he bought his first house. He is a nurse and makes big bucks and had no credit history. Paid by cash for everything until wanting a home

The bank denied him a loan.

One would think he could have simply obtained some type of loan at a high interest rate since his had no credit history, then immediately pay it off.

Nope

He needed to show a 'pattern' of making payments all the while paying excessively high interest rate

What a deal

-Geaux

Some people have a credit card and avoid those excessively high interest rates by creating a pattern of paying the balance off every month. And that is not slavery.

You missed my point. Because he dealt in cash, he had to pay excessive interest rates to establish a pattern of paying debt. The latter which is required to obtain lower interest rates. Credit is mandatory and one has to pay up front in the beginning to join the club

-Geaux

Not true. Most of us start out without credit, you don't have to pay any interest at all if you pay off the balance due every month. That's how you you establish that pattern of paying debt, but you've gotta make sure your spending doesn't exceed the money in your pocket or bank account. There are numerous merchants who will allow you to purchase something on their credit card, and as long as you pay it off in a certain number of months it's the same as cash, no interest due. It may take some time, but no one has to pay excessively high interest rates. To do so is an unnecessary choice, and choices are sure as hell not slavery.

 

[task0778]

Only an absolute ideologue can possibly think the ACA pays for itself.

To suggest raising the debt limit takes care of the debt problem is irrational. All it does is allow more debt to be accumulated.

.

To suggest raising the debt limit takes care of the debt problem is irrational. All it does is allow more debt to be accumulated.

what it allows are the previous legislative appropriations to be funded ...


how can this not be a discussion of ideology, dismantling appropriations not liked by one side or another by surreptitious means. sequester. there is no other ethical answer for "raising" the debt limit than raising the taxes to pay for it ...

just another rightwing scapegoat thread.

First, I have never said it's all the fault of the Left, cuz it isn't, so you can cut the crap on this rightwing scapegoat nonsense.

Second, funding or spending by previous legislatures can be changed.

Third, you don't see cutting spending as a possible ethical answer to not raising the debt limit? Why is it raising taxes is always your answer? If that's your ideology then it's a piss poor one and IMHO immoral as hell. And BTW, the real problem isn't raising the debt limit, it's appropriations spending that exceeds revenue. Which these days is a big problem with both parties, nobody has the balls to tell the voters we gotta cut this and this and this cuz we ain't got the money to pay for it.

 

[Pogo]

Some might say that modern liberalism and authoritarianism (statism) are not that far apart. As I'm sure you know, there is a big difference between what classical liberalism was and what modern liberalism is today, otherwise known as progressivism.

Again, you can't use a term to mean its own opposite. I don't know what's hard to understand about that. Cannot be done.

Why is this even trotted out as a "thing"? Here's why:

>> One of the major problems in American political consciousness today comes from a misrepresentation of the political spectrum. This is partly the result of a deliberate effort to put all of America's enemies (fascists and communists) into the same basket after World War II, and a deliberate effort by the American "Right" to classify everything that they oppose as "Leftist".

After World War II the Republican Party was struggling for survival and was in the process of reinventing itself. Part of the political strategy of some Republicans was to portray the Democratic Party of Truman and Franklin D. Roosevelt as "Red," thereby associating "Liberalism" with "Socialism". It was a common tactic during the 1950s to accuse Democrats of being "Communists" or "Communist sympathizers", a tactic that worked well during the McCarthy era and has had a lasting impact on how Americans view politics. << -- Redefining the Political Spectrum​

That's where it starts --- the "Red Scare" daze of McCarthyism, speaking of dishonest. At the time the Democratic Party had held the White House for five straight elections and desperate times called for desperate measures. "Left" and "Liberal" were conflated into psuedo-synonyms which they absolutely are not.

George H.W Bush (and his dishonest manager Atwater revived the same lie in 1988, sneering "Liberal" at his opponent Dukakis as if it were a dirty word. It isn't, and never has been. That's completely dishonest.

"Progressivism" refers to a period usually framed as about 1890 to 1920. Again, someone's trying to recycle a term that already has its own definition. Whether it's a similar case of trying to mean its own opposite cannot be determined, since nobody has ever come up with a contemporary definition. I've been asking for one for years. Still have yet to get one.

Terms have to have definitions with a bit more substance than the emotional "bad! boogyman!". And they have to be rationally and mathematically defined. Otherwise they have no meaning and no legitimate use.

(/offtopic)

 

[Pogo]

One can live within his own means and still use a credit card.

I have a card that pays me 2% of everything I charge and pay off. I use that card for everything and I pay the balance in full every month so I never pay any interest. I also have a card in the business's name that does the same thing and I get a check at the end of the year for 2% of what I charged and paid off every month from both my personal and business expenses.

IMO if a credit co will give me 5 or 6 grand a year for simply using their cards I'm a fool not to use those cards

If you're paying it off before it adds up ---- then you're not living outside your own means either.

I looked into getting a credit card a couple of times actually. I was told I couldn't get one because I didn't already have one. "OK" I said, "if that's the what passes for logic on your planet, I'm outta here". Never looked back. Fuggit.

My brothers good friend was 34 when he bought his first house. He is a nurse and makes big bucks and had no credit history. Paid by cash for everything until wanting a home

The bank denied him a loan.

One would think he could have simply obtained some type of loan at a high interest rate since his had no credit history, then immediately pay it off.

Nope

He needed to show a 'pattern' of making payments all the while paying excessively high interest rate

What a deal

-Geaux

Some people have a credit card and avoid those excessively high interest rates by creating a pattern of paying the balance off every month. And that is not slavery.

You missed my point. Because he dealt in cash, he had to pay excessive interest rates to establish a pattern of paying debt. The latter which is required to obtain lower interest rates. Credit is mandatory and one has to pay up front in the beginning to join the club

-Geaux

Not true. Most of us start out without credit, you don't have to pay any interest at all if you pay off the balance due every month. That's how you you establish that pattern of paying debt, but you've gotta make sure your spending doesn't exceed the money in your pocket or bank account. There are numerous merchants who will allow you to purchase something on their credit card, and as long as you pay it off in a certain number of months it's the same as cash, no interest due. It may take some time, but no one has to pay excessively high interest rates. To do so is an unnecessary choice, and choices are sure as hell not slavery.

Then how come my perfect record of paying utility bills -- which are automatically bank-drafted without interruption --- gives me no credit "score"?

That's a revealing term -- "Score" -- as if you're supposed to be "winning" some kind of "game" that you're given no choice of whether you even want to play..... implying if you have no "score" you're a "zero". Ah yes there's definitely a psychology if not a 'slavery', which can be just as effective if not more.

 

[task0778]

I'm pretty sure progressivism is alive and doing very well today. Are you suggesting that modern liberalism is unchanged from what meant 230 years ago?

 

[task0778]

If you're paying it off before it adds up ---- then you're not living outside your own means either.

I looked into getting a credit card a couple of times actually. I was told I couldn't get one because I didn't already have one. "OK" I said, "if that's the what passes for logic on your planet, I'm outta here". Never looked back. Fuggit.

My brothers good friend was 34 when he bought his first house. He is a nurse and makes big bucks and had no credit history. Paid by cash for everything until wanting a home

The bank denied him a loan.

One would think he could have simply obtained some type of loan at a high interest rate since his had no credit history, then immediately pay it off.

Nope

He needed to show a 'pattern' of making payments all the while paying excessively high interest rate

What a deal

-Geaux

Some people have a credit card and avoid those excessively high interest rates by creating a pattern of paying the balance off every month. And that is not slavery.

You missed my point. Because he dealt in cash, he had to pay excessive interest rates to establish a pattern of paying debt. The latter which is required to obtain lower interest rates. Credit is mandatory and one has to pay up front in the beginning to join the club

-Geaux

Not true. Most of us start out without credit, you don't have to pay any interest at all if you pay off the balance due every month. That's how you you establish that pattern of paying debt, but you've gotta make sure your spending doesn't exceed the money in your pocket or bank account. There are numerous merchants who will allow you to purchase something on their credit card, and as long as you pay it off in a certain number of months it's the same as cash, no interest due. It may take some time, but no one has to pay excessively high interest rates. To do so is an unnecessary choice, and choices are sure as hell not slavery.

Then how come my perfect record of paying utility bills -- which are automatically bank-drafted without interruption --- gives me no credit "score"?

That's a revealing term -- "Score" -- as if you're supposed to be "winning" some kind of "game" that you're given no choice of whether you even want to play..... implying if you have no "score" you're a "zero". Ah yes there's definitely a psychology if not a 'slavery', which can be just as effective if not more.

It ain't rocket science; get a credit card and put your bills on it and pay it off every month. You'll get a score soon enough. Find a store like Walmart or Best Buy that will give you a credit card for their products and use it to buy what you need and pay it off. I can't say this enough: you don't have to pay exorbitant interest rates to get a good credit score.

 

[Pogo]

My brothers good friend was 34 when he bought his first house. He is a nurse and makes big bucks and had no credit history. Paid by cash for everything until wanting a home

The bank denied him a loan.

One would think he could have simply obtained some type of loan at a high interest rate since his had no credit history, then immediately pay it off.

Nope

He needed to show a 'pattern' of making payments all the while paying excessively high interest rate

What a deal

-Geaux

Some people have a credit card and avoid those excessively high interest rates by creating a pattern of paying the balance off every month. And that is not slavery.

You missed my point. Because he dealt in cash, he had to pay excessive interest rates to establish a pattern of paying debt. The latter which is required to obtain lower interest rates. Credit is mandatory and one has to pay up front in the beginning to join the club

-Geaux

Not true. Most of us start out without credit, you don't have to pay any interest at all if you pay off the balance due every month. That's how you you establish that pattern of paying debt, but you've gotta make sure your spending doesn't exceed the money in your pocket or bank account. There are numerous merchants who will allow you to purchase something on their credit card, and as long as you pay it off in a certain number of months it's the same as cash, no interest due. It may take some time, but no one has to pay excessively high interest rates. To do so is an unnecessary choice, and choices are sure as hell not slavery.

Then how come my perfect record of paying utility bills -- which are automatically bank-drafted without interruption --- gives me no credit "score"?

That's a revealing term -- "Score" -- as if you're supposed to be "winning" some kind of "game" that you're given no choice of whether you even want to play..... implying if you have no "score" you're a "zero". Ah yes there's definitely a psychology if not a 'slavery', which can be just as effective if not more.

It ain't rocket science; get a credit card and put your bills on it and pay it off every month. You'll get a score soon enough. Find a store like Walmart or Best Buy that will give you a credit card for their products and use it to buy what you need and pay it off. I can't say this enough: you don't have to pay exorbitant interest rates to get a good credit score.

Once again --- you can't just waltz into a Big Box, ask for a CC and expect to get one. Right back to where I started, this is old advice and it doesn't work. This is where they feed you the old line, "you can't have one because you don't already have one".

I know full well that makes no sense, but that's the line.

 

[Geaux4it]

My brothers good friend was 34 when he bought his first house. He is a nurse and makes big bucks and had no credit history. Paid by cash for everything until wanting a home

The bank denied him a loan.

One would think he could have simply obtained some type of loan at a high interest rate since his had no credit history, then immediately pay it off.

Nope

He needed to show a 'pattern' of making payments all the while paying excessively high interest rate

What a deal

-Geaux

Some people have a credit card and avoid those excessively high interest rates by creating a pattern of paying the balance off every month. And that is not slavery.

You missed my point. Because he dealt in cash, he had to pay excessive interest rates to establish a pattern of paying debt. The latter which is required to obtain lower interest rates. Credit is mandatory and one has to pay up front in the beginning to join the club

-Geaux

Not true. Most of us start out without credit, you don't have to pay any interest at all if you pay off the balance due every month. That's how you you establish that pattern of paying debt, but you've gotta make sure your spending doesn't exceed the money in your pocket or bank account. There are numerous merchants who will allow you to purchase something on their credit card, and as long as you pay it off in a certain number of months it's the same as cash, no interest due. It may take some time, but no one has to pay excessively high interest rates. To do so is an unnecessary choice, and choices are sure as hell not slavery.

Then how come my perfect record of paying utility bills -- which are automatically bank-drafted without interruption --- gives me no credit "score"?

That's a revealing term -- "Score" -- as if you're supposed to be "winning" some kind of "game" that you're given no choice of whether you even want to play..... implying if you have no "score" you're a "zero". Ah yes there's definitely a psychology if not a 'slavery', which can be just as effective if not more.

It ain't rocket science; get a credit card and put your bills on it and pay it off every month. You'll get a score soon enough. Find a store like Walmart or Best Buy that will give you a credit card for their products and use it to buy what you need and pay it off. I can't say this enough: you don't have to pay exorbitant interest rates to get a good credit score.

But your initial interest rate is excessive. Whether you pay if off in the recurring cycle or not. Majority of Americans, especially the young ones who are caught in this loop, can't control their spending. And the CC companies know that. Regardless, the consumer does sign the dotted line and its all on them to keep things in control

-Geaux

 

[Mudda]

As a gov't, isn't it immoral to spend more money than the revenue coming in, i.e., incur debt? Might be some higher moral imperatives that come into play, such as national security or a natural catastrophe that must be addressed. I'm talking about emergencies here, rather than usual expenditures. I think it is highly immoral to create a huge national debt and pass it on to future generations to pay interest on, let alone the principal. And yet here we are, spending more money than we've got without a thought about the consequences.

Tell you the truth, I'm embarrassed about it. I grew up being taught to live within your means and don't spend more than you've got; make do or find ways to earn more money but you don't spend future earnings that you ain't got yet. I see no reason why the gov't should be any different, cuz sooner or later there will be a reckoning and we won't be the ones to have to deal with it. Don't know when the crap will hit the fan, but it is inevitable IMHO.

I put this here in this forum on Ethics cuz it's basically an ethics question. I suspect a certain amount of politics will get injected though, if the thread gets any traction. These days both parties seem to have lost the imperative to reign in spending over the past 16 years or so. Hopefully we don't get into another finger-pointing exercise over who is worse.

Nobody would be able to buy a house if you had to save up all the money first.

Numbskull.

First of all, I was talking about the gov't as opposed to an individual. Second, most people would understand that buying a house or a car is a little bit different than blowing your budget every month on shit you don't need. So you budget in the payments for the house and/or car and make sure you can still make ends meet. In so doing, in the minds of many you are not really spending more money than you've got. And finally, name calling does nothing to bolster your argument and actually makes you look like an immature asshole. So cut the crap and make your point or shut the fuck up.

So do you look like an immature asshole for calling me an immature asshole. Me thinks YES!

If the governments weren't able to borrow money the world economy would come to a grinding halt. Try to think before you post next time.

 

[Pogo]

I'm pretty sure progressivism is alive and doing very well today. Are you suggesting that modern liberalism is unchanged from what meant 230 years ago?

Yes. Just as the word "modern" still means what it meant 230 years ago. Because there's no reason it should now mean its own opposite, "ancient".

On the other thing -- The Progressive Era (1890-1920). And a more detailed page on the same topic is here.
Whether those descriptions synch with, or are in conflict with, the modern misuse is, again, impossible to say if no one will offer a definition of the contemporary use. But obviously they're the same term. English has some 50,000 words; it's not like we don't have enough to cover our bases. Unless of course our aim in assigning double-duty is to deliberately cloud the waters.

This is the point where such intentional clouding becomes surreal. Shall we ask for a "dog kennel" when we mean "mattress"?

​

This was another poster's errant tangent anyway. No reason to beat it to death.

 

[BreezeWood]

Only an absolute ideologue can possibly think the ACA pays for itself.

To suggest raising the debt limit takes care of the debt problem is irrational. All it does is allow more debt to be accumulated.

.

To suggest raising the debt limit takes care of the debt problem is irrational. All it does is allow more debt to be accumulated.

what it allows are the previous legislative appropriations to be funded ...


how can this not be a discussion of ideology, dismantling appropriations not liked by one side or another by surreptitious means. sequester. there is no other ethical answer for "raising" the debt limit than raising the taxes to pay for it ...

just another rightwing scapegoat thread.

First, I have never said it's all the fault of the Left, cuz it isn't, so you can cut the crap on this rightwing scapegoat nonsense.

Second, funding or spending by previous legislatures can be changed.

Third, you don't see cutting spending as a possible ethical answer to not raising the debt limit? Why is it raising taxes is always your answer? If that's your ideology then it's a piss poor one and IMHO immoral as hell. And BTW, the real problem isn't raising the debt limit, it's appropriations spending that exceeds revenue. Which these days is a big problem with both parties, nobody has the balls to tell the voters we gotta cut this and this and this cuz we ain't got the money to pay for it.

.

Only an absolute ideologue can possibly think the ACA pays for itself.

the funding is built into the legislation. what shortfall are you alluding to ...

Only an absolute ideologue can possibly think an F-35 jet fighter pays for itself.

correct, no funding whatsoever, 100% tax based expenditure.

Second, funding or spending by previous legislatures can be changed.

by the executive branch, no - raise the debt limit, rewrite the laws appropriation post existing contractual obligations or file bankruptcy. or voodoo economics by the criminally insane.

Why is it raising taxes is always your answer? If that's your ideology then it's a piss poor one and IMHO immoral as hell.

... and IMHO immoral as hell.

so says the U S Air Force - Retired.

your right, the military industrial complex in this country is the absolute most immoral institution this country has ever produced, why do you not pay for it some other way than taxing (stealing) from hard working American people.

 

[task0778]

Why is it raising taxes is always your answer? If that's your ideology then it's a piss poor one and IMHO immoral as hell.

... and IMHO immoral as hell.

so says the U S Air Force - Retired.

your right, the military industrial complex in this country is the absolute most immoral institution this country has ever produced, why do you not pay for it some other way than taxing (stealing) from hard working American people.

Listen up dipweed, I never said anything about the military industrial complex, but I do take offense at your implication that it is the absolute most immoral institution this country has ever produced, nor the implication that as a USAF retiree I am in any way agreeing with that assessment. The US Air Force has nothing whatsoever to do with determining how money they get each year to spend and in most cases they are also told what to spend it on. They don't get to pick and choose which weapon systems to buy or which bases to close, and they sure as hell have nothing to do with how the money they spend is raised.

The military industrial complex lobbies Congress for as much as it can get, but no different than any other group looking for gov't funding. Big AG, Big Oil, Big Banking, etc., it ain't like the military is any better or worse than the rest of them. And how the blue blazes fuck do you think any of those groups should get their money if not from taxes?

 

[task0778]

.

Only an absolute ideologue can possibly think the ACA pays for itself.

the funding is built into the legislation. what shortfall are you alluding to ...

How can anybody not know the extra money the gov't is spending vis-a-vis the ACA, way above what we were told? You truly have lost touch with reality.

 

[BreezeWood]

.

Only an absolute ideologue can possibly think the ACA pays for itself.

the funding is built into the legislation. what shortfall are you alluding to ...

How can anybody not know the extra money the gov't is spending vis-a-vis the ACA, way above what we were told? You truly have lost touch with reality.

,

How can anybody not know the extra money the gov't is spending vis-a-vis the ACA, way above what we were told? You truly have lost touch with reality.

what shortfall are you alluding to ...


I guess the question for specifics alluded your observation and also its funding is not derived from general revenue as the pentagon budget but specific funding through its passage by reconciliation, the same leaver the republicans are attempting to use for its demise, surreptitiously.

but I do take offense at your implication that it is the absolute most immoral institution this country has ever produced, nor the implication that as a USAF retiree I am in any way agreeing with that assessment.

but you find fault with a self funded program for individual health insurance for millions of Americans and the required coverage without conditions and supplemental insurance for the working poor -


the republican reconciliation to remove all such coverage and near complete reversal for the working poor. is your example of moral turpitude ... your song and dance in favor of the industrial military complex is just that and the same for the ACA "way above what we were told".

 

[task0778]

Anybody who says the ACA is self-funded is way out of touch with reality. And I am no more in favor of the military industrial complex than any other complex, and with that we are done. You really are a waste of time. Good day sir.