Fighting the Credit Card Plague

It has been estimated that cigarettes kill 1200 people per day. What this actually means is that 1200 people die from smoking related illnesses like lung cancer or emphysema. But smoking is not the only habit that causes disease.

In the US there are an estimated 1.5 million bankruptcies per year. Many more people are deeply in debt and are on the verge of bankruptcy. In our politically correct world, the media quickly points out how dangerous cigarettes are. But what about financial problems? Many studies have shown that our physical health closely parallels our state of well being. Our state of well being depends a lot on our financial health. Cancer, heart disease, and mental illness can thus be related to our finances.

Bad financial habits are directly the result of campaigns initiated by the Credit Card Industry. As a result people wind up deeply in dept and getting cancer, heart disease, or worse yet, committing suicide. The Credit Card Industry is pretty much like the tobacco industry, they are responsible for the deaths of millions.

Our politicians in the US like to pass laws protecting us, whether we like it or not. In particular, they feel that we're not smart enough to figure out what's good for us, so they order the placing of warning labels on items like cigarettes to make it clear that they're bad for our well being.

Under the circumstances, we should write, call, or email our legislators and ask that they do the following:

• Ban all credit card advertising on radio and television. Get those CapitalOne Pillagers off the air!
• Ban all mail and phone offers of credit cards.
• Put warning labels on credit cards. Here's an example of how one should read:
  • Surgeon General's Warning: Indiscriminate Credit Causes Cancer, Heart Disease, Suicide And May Complicate Pregnancy.
• Repeal the new bankruptcy law. The old one was better for the working man.
• Allow a maximum interest of 10% on all credit cards.
• Collection agencies should be required to send all their field personnel to sensitivity training.
• Congress should hold a hearing on the subject. They should subpoena the heads of major banks issuing credit cards like Chase, CapitalOne, WaMu, Citibank, and others. The lawmakers should charge these executives with addicting the nation to credit cards, knowing full well how habit-forming credit cards actually are.
• Credit card companies should be prohibited from issuing credit cards to anyone under twenty one years of age.
• Law suits against credit card banks regarding individual illness, death or financial ruin, should not only be allowed, but encouraged. Class action suits should be considered a possibility.

We need to bring the middle and lower classes of the world back to economic health. One way this can be done is to limit their dependence on credit cards.