Kidding ourselves about high price of debt

Gene Lyons

Posted on Wednesday, July 30, 2008

Credit cards, as most people theoretically understand, can turn into the 21 st century equivalent of sharecropping. First, you borrow from The Man to get your cotton planted (or maybe to buy that new flat-screen HDTV ). Comes picking time (or the warranty runs out ) and you’re likely to discover, in the words of an old country song, that you “owe your soul to the company store.” Not to mention late fees and a big jump in the interest rate. Meanwhile, you’re getting letters daily offering you a new card at temptingly low rates for the first six months. Why not double down ? Hey, your 15-year-old’s being offered a platinum card with the logo of his high school’s mascot. Shoot, I’ve got a Charolais calf named Layla who’s probably eligible for EZ-Credit today. Basically, anybody who can walk and chew cud at the same time can end up owing a half-dozen company stores.