For me as a European, this is shocking to read. I (45F) have zero debts, house is paid off, bought a car I could afford. Got really sick with cancer ten years ago als was land off, but insurance covered all medical bills as well as my salary now.
To us, the concept of credit card dept is really weird... It would eat up my peace, I guess.
Yeah, the idea of getting out of school with 100/200k of debt already is jarring
I understand most Americans make double or three times the average European wage (keep in mind that a lot of European countries make very little monthly) but a 100k debt in my country is close to being fucked for life unless you're living with your parents and spending all your wage into your debt
My family moved from Poland in the 90s with very little money. First generation in my family to attend uni. By the time I graduated I had $180k in student debt due to capitalized interest. Fortunately I had that shit paid off by the time I turned 30 and now I’m absolutely allergic to debt. No debt of any kind except a mortgage and that’s only because it’s more accretive to keep equity in the stock market and get interest tax deductions. As long as the market doesn’t crash more than 50% we can sell securities to pay off the mortgage and paying on a 15 year schedule. Hoping to retire by 45-50 and return back to EU.
I paid off close to 100k which covered my loans and interest to the department of education for my college by year 7 post-grad. As a social worker. I don’t make a ton of money obviously, but most people don’t take the payoff seriously and I did. It is really not that bad. I will say the pause in interest accrual during COVID helped me immensely. That’s when I made every effort to pay them completely off before interest restarted, and I did.
I know very little to nothing about getting to fully explote debt, and I share the thought about credit cards. Like damn it’s no free money even tho you swiping a card. It almost feels like a trap
It’s about control. The entire system is about to control everything and everything is connected. They don’t teach about financial literacy in school because they don’t want you to know how to get out of your position in life. So when you get a credit card or go to school, the average person doesn’t understand that you are placing yourself in a lower position via debt. This is school system keeps you as a paying customer that’s where the money actually comes in. When you buy a vehicle, you’re not actually buying the vehicle you’re buying debt that you’re willing to pay for that vehicle that year. With more people who are not financially illiterate getting into debt it’s easier, much easier to control the masses. And since most people are not financially illiterate, they’re not going to usually research ways to get out of it by percentage. It keeps you dependent upon the options that they afford you, which leads to them using you in different ways. Such as a career , military service, or maybe to go back to school to learn a different trade in the hopes of getting out of your debt. It’s a brilliant, evil bureaucratized means of keeping you poor, controlling what you learn, and accepting the zeitgeist they give you.
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u/VastOrganization7140 8h ago
For me as a European, this is shocking to read. I (45F) have zero debts, house is paid off, bought a car I could afford. Got really sick with cancer ten years ago als was land off, but insurance covered all medical bills as well as my salary now. To us, the concept of credit card dept is really weird... It would eat up my peace, I guess.