How long would it take to bring them to heel if everybody just didn’t use them at all until the situation changed

oh, i’d say about as long as it’ll take us all to change the anti-gun policies of any major national corporation you care to mention through boycotting them for that. meanwhile i’ll be right over here, breathing in and out quite normally.

which is better, running your own life or letting the lowest common denominator run it for you?

wait, i’m confused — which of those represents joining J. Random Stranger’s boycott in order to change the policies of big business again?

How long would it take to bring them to heel if everybody just didn’t use them at all until the situation changed>

Oh, you say only a few would actually follow through on that, so you would inconvenience yourself by being a holdout? Well, which is better, running your own life or letting the lowest common denominator run it for you? Do you really feel it is imperative to participate in stupidity because it is so popular?

None of the above is intended as snark, those are serious slants on the answers to what may be the more appropriate questions we all should be asking ourselves. Give it whack, I’d be interested in your take on it.

Of course, I also never have an outstanding balance on it.

Sorry that should have read:

“I sure hope none of the people on here who are all for this don’t have marginal credit ratings”

Its that old law of unintended consequences thing. Pass this and the risk/reward equation changes for the issuers. With more risk (e.g. cost of funds might go up but they can’t pass that on to cardholders) and less reward then issuers have to be pickier, charge higher rates, issue cards for shorter periods of time, make contracts terminate and have to be completely renewed from scratch (bye bye all those points you accrued) and many more such things.

So, your credit is only so so and you need to borrow? Enjoy going back to the Pawn shop and Payday lender – and all because Big Government decided to help you.

as it happens, i myself can happily do without, but i’ve already seen folks interject on this thread that it’s not always so simple.

try reading the proposed laws before criticizing them, this time.

First, i don’t know that there’s actually any formal written proposal. Next, I recall that one of the statements was something about protecting rights of people by not allowing interest rate changes on existing debt or some such. That is not a right. Rates don’t change automagically. They are based on something in a contract (prime, libor, whatever). And they’re agreed to upfront.

As I stated in a recent post on Joe’s blog; I don’t need to know the details of your perpetual motion machine idea to know with absolute certainty that it will fail. Same with socialism, which is what we’re discussing here (Fascism, if you want to be more accurate, but I make no real distinction between one form of violent, organized crime and another).

You have to back way up and take a look at the fundamentals. What some of you are doing here, along with Barack Dip Dahdip DiDip Obamna, is tantamount to offering the details of a perpetual motion machine, and demanding that we go through all of them one by one, and allow you to explain them to us, before we can come to a fair conclusion. All I can do is shake my head.

I took your suggestion and read the original story, and the three proposed laws. After doing so, I have to say Uncle has it exactly right. Here’s why:

Obie said:
“ban unilateral changes to credit card agreements”
Uncle said:
“you’re too fucking stupid to read a contract before you sign it.”
If the contract allows them to change the agreement unilaterally, don’t sign it. If you do, you are agreeing that they can change it any time they want, any way they want. You get what you deserve.

Obie said:
“ban rate changes on past debt”
Uncle said:
“you’re too fucking stupid to read a contract before you sign it.”
If the contract allows them to change the rate on past debt, don’t sign it. If you do, you are agreeing that they can change it any time they want, any way they want. You get what you deserve.

Obie said:
“ban interest on transaction fees”
Uncle said:
“you’re too fucking stupid to read a contract before you sign it.”
If the contract allows them to charge transaction fees, don’t sign it. If you do, you are agreeing that they can charge transaction fees. You get what you deserve.

Notice a common trend here? Read the contract! If you don’t like the terms, don’t sign it! If you don’t understand the contract, don’t sign it! If the terms are unfair, or you don’t understand them, and you sign it anyway? Then it’s your own fault when you go bankrupt, and nobody else’s!

The government is not here to protect you from your own stupidity. That is what Uncle is saying.

the laws being proposed do not give anybody a “right” to have a credit card, nor do they hinge on assuming any such right. try again, Uncle; try reading the proposed laws before criticizing them, this time.

But just try living and functioning in today’s world without one.

It’s almost as bad as trying to live and function without a driver’s license.

They also – through those same ever changing terms, constantly whittle away your rights to sue them and force you instead to binding arbitration before a highly biased panel, often times in sioux Falls, SD – which is cool if your going up there for pheasant hunting but sort of out of the way for everyone else (well, except me as I seem to have lots of clients in the area).

And the flyers they send are not nearly secure enough to prevent unauthorized application in your or my name for a credit card.

So we’ve got a potential situation here where someone could have a card in your name, run up the tab on it, run up the interest on it, and you have no reasonable opportunity and/or right to get the comapny to correct the mistake.

The credit card companies are long overdue for a take down. Now, the libertarian in me says NO to government regulation, but with that comes the understanding that there will be no arbitration either (nor limits on class action lawsuits) and if the card companies are wrong, they will be made to pay in court.

So far, they’ve avoided both having to answer to the legal system and any form of regulation (not unlike the insurance industry). So, Bravo to Barak My Name Is Slim Shady Obama for raising the issue, even if I doubt his proposed solutions amount to any actually solutions at all

One thing we should change is the idea that a persons credit rating/score is negatively impacted when they close a credit line. It’s hard to dump a card that you don’t want anymore when doing so would cause your credit to take a hit.