“Trapped” in the spiral of easy debt…
Callow said she went to easyhome because it requires no credit. She could also get the furniture the next day. “They’ve got nice furniture but boy, do they charge,” says Callow, who is on disability and lives in subsidized housing in North York. “It’s not fair. I’m on a fixed income.”
The phenomenon of experiencing negative outcomes due to spending beyond one’s means is a new one. Luckily, we have experts to help walk us through the statistics;
The Vanier Institute for the Family released a study last year that examined the assets and debts of Canada’s 15 million households. They found that, based on Statistics Canada figures, the poorest 20 per cent, approximately 2.6 million households, had a net worth of $34 billion but their debts totalled $40 billion.
“This is the only group where the debt is bigger than the (net) value of the assets,” says Roger Sauvé, a consultant who prepared the report.
Oddly enough!
Ah I see. If you can’t argue back, play the race card. Nice one Johnny.
YOU are one of the reasons why racism is still an issue today.
“The Oxleys can’t afford either to rent or go to the movies. But Mary’s line of credit is maxed out at $19,000 because of a used vehicle she bought. To make things easier for Don, at home all day, and to give the family a source of entertainment two years ago, she bought a large-screen plasma TV and made payments on it for two years.”
“You have to have some entertainment for him,” she says.
The $3,800 TV is now paid for. But they still have their monthly cable bill of $176, which includes the Internet, cell and home phone.”
CAN YOU BELIEVE THIS? THEY PAID $3800 for a TELEVISION! Most people in the world do not earn that much in a year!!!
I make nearly a 100,000 a year, but my television cost $500. It is a flat screen. Never in my wildest dreams would I dump 4 grand on a television. And these people consider themselves poor? They’re crazy.
I cannot believe I pay taxes to support low-lifes like this.
“she bought a [$3,800] large-screen plasma TV and made payments on it for two years.”
This probably puts them in the top 0.5% of all Canadians.
That tv cost more than my van.
“then”. I can’t afford correct spelling either.
thee lefties and the OLD moral equivlancy argument
jonny, and business person going bankrupt ain’t nuthin like the fools in the article (which I didn’t read this time, as I’v read it a 100 times before)
the people who posted in here today demonstrate that lefties ENABLING of lossers just ain’t the cure, it’s attitude that matters!!!
“then”. I can’t afford correct spelling either.
Posted by: multirec at April 22, 2008 8:53 PM ”
No,multirec. You had it right the first time 🙂
Daily/Maudlin….if YOU feel so bad about the p&*s poor decisions these folks made,why don’t YOU help them out? OH wait. You’re a leftard. Sorry. My bad.
Thanks Justthinkin, it just didn’t look right.
Kate: I admire your honestly in admitting that you “sneer” at poor people. You sneer at lots of people. As a matter of fact, when you use the word sneer you have gone a long way toward describing the raison d’ etre of your website…
It’s all about making yourself feel better by comparison, isn’t it? You reveal plenty, as well, when you admit you come to your positions by comparing everything with how it is for you. Because clearly Kate, it’s all about you.
Anyway, you have made a rare public appearance at the zoo, so thanks and we’ll see you in the comics again, real soon I hope.
Posted by: Johnny Maudlin at April 22, 2008 12:21 PM
Actually, you’re reading the page back-to-front. It’s the liberals and leftists that insist on pigeonholing people into designated special interest groups and minorities, all the better to entrench victimhood status in them.
You see people of colour, gender orientation, aboriginal backgrounds. We see folks who should all be treated equally, without giving special “victims’ rights” requiring lavish handouts or changes to thousands of years of western culture.
But go ahead, dummkopf, continue to convince yourself it’s those on the right who are the true bigots; however, your projection is showing, Toots.
mhb23re
at gmail d0t calm
Aren’t we a ‘johnny-sock puppet’ short here today? Usually they appear in threes no?
Must be still in line up at the beer, er grocery store, sneering at the over-worked clerk.
John Daly is Oprah, no Doctor Ruth, Joyce Brothers?
You’re lucky to have a psychiatrist of such caliber available to you Kate.
BTW, you seem to sneer a lot, Doctor Daly says so three times in his first two lines of his critique, I’d work on that.
No, Tranio, I’m not on any of those.
Any suggestions would be welcomed.
This is the first time I’ve had this particular pain as it is a branch of the sciatic nerve (so my chiropractor says) and it goes down from the groin. Wicked.
(But my head is held high. I got the sinkful of dishes washed tonight, with no help from the government.)
I used to sling beer at a pub in a small logging town that I moved to because I was in love, it was the only job in town and paid $5.00 an hour due to the recession. One of the drunks was handing out money and buying booze for his friends, which was unusual as he rarely had much money. His wife came in and looked at him, then realized he had spent their grocery money. She started beating the crap out of him right there and then. I took my sweet time calling the Mounties. I love beer, but it’s the first thing off the list if I don’t have money.
John:
We have the right to criticize and “sneer” these self-inflicted “poor” families. Why? Because they continue to make poor and ignorant choices that put them in that situation, and then they have the audacity to cry about it afterwards.
Budgeting your income is one of the responsibilities a person must learn when they reach adulthood. It’s not like anyone is asking these “poor” families to do something unreasonable.
Oh, but we can’t expect them to be held accountable for their own choices can we John? We have to be nice to them and help them out so they can continue to make more poor decisions in the future. God forbid they face any consequences for their choices in life.
Gellen, may I suggest a colon exam, seriously.
I had some wicked pain starting on the one side in the groin area and it went down my leg, turns out I had a rather large polyp that needed to be removed, immediately the pain was gone.
The surgeon stated that it would have turned to cancer eventually AND recommended an exam every five years, (oh yuk, but I will comply.)
Like many other people on this group I was taught not to spend money I didn’t have. I can think of one time that it was a mistake and that was when I had the possibility of going into debt to buy a house in Vancouver in the early 1980’s.
$3800 is more than I paid for my last vehicle. For years the TV’s that we had were retrieved from dumpsters and it never ceased to amaze me that people would throw out a perfectly good TV because just one tube had blown or some other equally simple electronic problem. I think the most I’ve paid for a TV is $200. I also have rabbit ears and no cable. My DVD player is my computer which is also my CD player. My mp3 player is my Palm pilot which I also use for work. I do have a weakness for books and computers and have lost track of how many computers I own but most were purchased used or built out of inexpensive boards. I’ve stopped buying books because I’ve been told by my wife that an existing book has to go out everytime a new one comes in.
When I was in medical school I was suprised at the number of students who would obtain student loans and use them to buy a new vehicle rather than using the money for living expenses. I was lucky that I had part-time consulting work that I did for all except my last year and kept my student loan debts to an absolute minimum.
Patients of mine knew not to ask me for notes for things like a new bed for “medical” reasons. The majority of people who I see on welfare are completely incapable of budgeting and are ready to rant for hours about the unfairness and stinginess of govenment instead of looking at their own behavior. Patients seem to expect that all drugs will be provided to them for free and are unwilling to spend any money for non-covered medications even though they might help them get back to work. They, of course, continue to smoke and can’t cancel their cable TV which would give them the money needed.
I also know doctors who are incapable of budgeting, but for them it’s just a matter of working more hours to pay for their spending excesses. Considering that there is such a shortage of doctors in Canada at this time this is a viable albeit flawed solution to a problem which would be more simply solved just by not buying things when the impulse hits one.
Incidentally, I also pay for everything in cash (except for internet purchases) and I find myself making far more late-night impulsive internet purchases on my credit card than cash purchases.
Being self-employed I know that I have nothing to fall back on when I get sick so one of the first things I did when I started practicing medicine was to ensure I had enough socked away to live on for 1 year if necessary. Over the years this has grown to a 2 year cushion and that is with maxing out RRSP contributions every year.
I have no sympathy for anyone who gets themselves into debt through poor planning. Unfortunately, that is the reason that for >90% of the people in Canada who are “poor”.
What I forgot to mention is that one of the first things I do in patients who overspend is to give them the mood disorders questionaire (MDQ) to screen for bipolar disorder. I’ll also go over the MDQ results with their spouse to see if they would agree about the severity of their problems. People, when hypomanic, tend to make impulse purchases which might be way beyond their means. Bipolar2 occurs in about 5% of people and is easily treated with mood stabilizers. I also start looking for Bipolar Disorder in people who have gambling problems.
I’ve had a hard time accepting the so-called “poverty line” since about 1994. At the time, between my wife and I, our combined income put us well below the poverty line for a family of five, yet we bought a $130,000 house with just under 25% down from the equity in the old house, plus were able to finance a new minivan- $19000- with 0 down, and still made our payments. Sure it was lean, but it still makes me doubt the alleged poverty numbers. Right now, we have a lot of un-necessities, but they can all go by the wayside if they have to.
‘Late to this thread, but I’ve been out making a living to pay the bills–which do get paid every month: no credit card debt.
Like many others on this thread, it often means cutting back and living simply–you know, a DVD and bottle of wine at home instead of dinner out and going to a movie; heck, that’s often “a holiday” at our house.
Because we live more or less frugally and have almost put two children through university (with their help; they both have paying jobs), it’s hard not to be pi**ed off by the huge numbers of entitled laggards in Canada who genuinely feel that the rest of us “owe” them a living, smokes, beer, big colour TV, cable, and all.
If that puts me in the sneerers’ corner, tough. Here, have a hankie, John Daly. ‘Wouldn’t want your dainty sensibilities to be offended. And there we go again: someone’s offended. Well, too bad. ‘Get a life.
If anybody’s interested,all you have to do is re-read the sockpuppets line of “reasoning” and you have the answer to most of the problems with debt. But then these commies-in-waiting can’t successfully implement their world order without making people,especially the stupid people,dependent on government. To them,the whole idea of personal responsibility is repugnent.
Just one question for them. When everybody is happily living of the welfare system,who is going to pay for that system?
Idd, thanks for mentioning this to me. I already have to have regular colonoscopies because cancer was found in the neck of a polyp years ago. I’m due for another next yr.
I’ve managed to get a doctor’s appt for tomorrow and will mention it to him.
Gellen, 🙂
My best wishes that’s it’s just a pinched nerve.
“When everybody is happily living of the welfare system,who is going to pay for that system?”
The evil American multinational corporations! Like, duh?!
There’s two kinds of poverty – a temporary condition due to outward circumstances (like being displaced from your property by war and having to start over with only the shirt on your back in a country where you do not even speak the language) and a permanent reliance on other people’s money in the form of Welfare. The first is an external obstacle that is overcome by hard work and thriftiness.
The second form of poverty is caused by a chain of bad decisions and an attitude of entitlement to be saved from the worst consequences of those bad decisions.
There’s a simple anti-poverty formula that works for any class or race that follows it:
Get as much education as you can.
Do not have children until you’re married.
Try to stay married.
Work steadily, at any job.
Stay away from criminals and criminal activity.
John and his fellow liberals follow and teach this formula to their own children but when it comes to “the poor”, suddenly it’s inhumane to have the same expectations of them???
What’s inhumane is forcing people who have worked hard all their lives and made sacrifices (like no plasma TV’s) to support others who refuse to work hard or do without comforts. Where’s the equality crowd when it comes to divying up the work and responsibility pie?
There should be no welfare except for the truly incapacitated. It should all be workfare; if nothing else, then cleaning roads and parks or the homes of the taxpayers funding you. And no work is demeaning as the assbackwards libs have termed it. Being a permanent parasite is what’s demeaning. Self-respect comes from the fruits of one’s own effort, not scamming someone else’s labor long term. That’s no better than stealing.