Spending money I haven’t got

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By Wolfie | July 27, 2007

We live in a world that thrives on credit; we almost force our children to get into debt before they’ve even had a chance to go out and earn any money; people get into dire straits with their finances and end up losing their homes; families are wrecked forever because people can’t deal with money anymore. But at the same time, we seem to be hellbent on consuming everything in sight - “Greed is good” as someone once said! - and if you haven’t got the latest trainers, or MP3 player, or flash car then you’re a nobody. So we borrow.

As a past employee of one of the four big UK banks, I’ve seen how financial institutions play both sides of the equation - offering you as much money as you want one day, and then getting all legal on you when you can’t afford to pay it back the next day.

I’ve also experienced it myself; when I stopped working for that bank the overdraft that I had, and a loan that my partner at the time had, all got a lot more expensive. I went into a commission-only job that I wasn’t ready for and over the next few months ran up huge debts. When I did finally get a job that paid a weekly wage it took over six years to get back to a point where I was actually solvent. Then another six years to get to the point where I had a healthy credit rating.

Which is all the long way of saying that I had made a vow to myself a few years ago that I wasn’t going to get to the point where I was borrowing money anymore. Until I saw this and just had to have one:

So now I’m up to my ears in debt again and I’m wondering if I’ve done the right thing. But sitting here, typing this on a huge 24in screen I’m realising that I should have got one ages ago - my knackered old PC laptop has needed replacing for some time. So what if I’ve got to go without food for a couple of years? At least I’ll lose weight!

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