Training needed before applying for credit cards

I tell young people that obtaining their first credit card, in their name, is just like buying a gun.

This comparison always brings a puzzled look. They can't make the connection!

No one should own or even handle a pistol or long gun such as a shotgun or rifle without safety training.

No one should carry a credit card without training in how to use credit, but more importantly how to pay what's owed on that credit card account.

These little plastic cards are part of growing up. A man or woman today has to possess a major credit card to spend the night in a hotel and to rent a car at an airport. I still remember hearing of a North Texas rancher who was well-to-do, but never got around to applying for a credit card.

He lived in a fairly large rural town where he simply wrote a check for big items and paid cash otherwise. This didn't work in a Denver airport when he had to rent a car. He could have written a check and bought the car he was wanting to rent, but that didn't get him the car keys.

So today's lifestyle requires a credit card, but most folks have half dozen or more with debt on them all.

It is so easy to use a credit today but so hard to pay off the debt. Would you permit your son or daughter to own a semiautomatic pistol before having any training in safety or the dangers involved? You can't shoot a friend in the stomach and then just say, "Gosh ... I'm sorry!"

Sears & Roebuck used to be the place my family bought all our major appliances, because before credit cards it was about the only business where we could buy a refrigerator or washing machine on credit.

Now with plastic cards, any store in town welcomes buyers and their credit doesn't have to be checked out.

Why do we need credit rather than paying cash? We don't have the cash. An Associated Press story this week pointed out a family of four with two children is living at poverty level with an income of less than $20,444. If you and your spouse together make anything less than that your children are growing up in what the federal government considers poverty.

And sadly, those in this lower income bracket are part of the 15.8 percent of Americans who don't have any health insurance. This just adds to their financial problems.

The poverty level is the official measure of who is eligible for federal health, housing. nutrition and child care benefits.

Do politicians really care about these needy families? It doesn't appear so. Poverty has not been a big issue in anyone's campaign.

"The poor are politically mute," said Larry Jacobs in an AP story Tuesday. He is a political scientist at the University of Minnesota. He added, "What rational politician would listen to the poor? They don't vote; they don't write checks; why care?"

How long ago has it been since Lyndon Johnson was president? He was the last president to launch a major initiative aimed at eradicating poverty.

How did I get from credit cards to poverty figures? Mainly because it is many times harder for families living in poverty to pay off credit card debt. But how do you tell people simply not to use credit? Repayment of credit is the key. But how can this be taught? - From Times Record News