Philosophy Now Forum

Obvious Leo wrote:

Dalek Prime wrote:Leo, I don't know why financial.planning is not a course in school, because clearly no one taught these adults these simple lessons, which are of great import to everyone's life.

You're just a bleeding-heart neo-Bolshevik softie, Dalek. Schools are there to churn out factory fodder for the dark satanic mills, not to teach people life skills and responsible social behaviour. Next thing you'll be expecting us to teach kids how to think for themselves, which would clearly be the end of civilisation as we know it.

Reading, research skills and reason; yes, it would be the end of the oligarch's world. Always kill the intelligentsia first. Remember that.

Dalek Prime wrote: It's a general rule. Considering the number of bankruptcies that are often due to CC debt, its not a bad general rule. Clearly, if you pay it off every month before interest hits, it's a helpful item. But things happen. People aquire debt and plans go awry.

Your bank hates you for paying your CC on time. You're a lousy customer/consumer. And that's a good thing. But as Leo pointed out, there are debit cards and and PayPal-like systems. So there's less reason to have one.

I don't think the bank hates me for it but see if I care if they do. After all, they're still charging the vendor for every credit transaction. That's the reason why some sellers like dollar stores will not accept CC transactions since they're already working on such a low markup. Aside from all that, CC transactions are much safer as repeatedly mentioned in case of fraud. With a debit card you're mostly out of luck since the attack on your account was direct. No bank will reimburse. In addition, even though I never needed it, you get an extra year's warranty added to the manufacturer's warranty. I also have a debit card but use it sparingly. The way I look at it whatever you buy you have to pay for whether now or later, so why not later if it costs you no more than now!

Hey, you're clearly a responsible consumer, so I have no issues Doob.

What a relief!!

Dubious wrote:What a relief!!

Stop posting from the toilet, Doob!

Dubious wrote:With a debit card you're mostly out of luck since the attack on your account was direct. No bank will reimburse.

I don't know what the consumer protection laws are in your country but in Australia this is not the case. The consumer protection laws here for credit and debit cards are absolutely identical. Although it's never happened to me I deliberately keep my debit card balance low in case of fraud but this is only to save me hassle in the eventuality of it rather than because I'm not protected from it by law. It takes me about 30 seconds online to transfer funds into my debit card account when I need to use it.

Obvious Leo wrote:

Dubious wrote:With a debit card you're mostly out of luck since the attack on your account was direct. No bank will reimburse.

I don't know what the consumer protection laws are in your country but in Australia this is not the case. The consumer protection laws here for credit and debit cards are absolutely identical. Although it's never happened to me I deliberately keep my debit card balance low in case of fraud but this is only to save me hassle in the eventuality of it rather than because I'm not protected from it by law. It takes me about 30 seconds online to transfer funds into my debit card account when I need to use it.

Where I am, B.C., Canada, consumer protection laws are somewhat anemic. Warnings are not uncommon on news programs both radio and TV, about the potential danger of using debit cards vis-a-vis credit cards which are much safer. It's likely you may never encounter a problem using debit cards but if something does happen banks are extremely unlikely to make up for it or it takes so long to resolve you'll likely die of frustration before you get any recompense. There is a definite distinction here in how credit and debit fraud are treated regardless of what the law may state.

Ultimately this is all about consumer protection laws rather than banking regulations but on a more general note I've heard that Aussie banks are more tightly regulated than those in most other countries, much to the chagrin of the "free" market troglodytes, but it was this tighter regulatory control which actually shielded our economy from the worst of the disasters following the global financial crisis of 2008. Our consumer laws are by no means world's best practice but they're better than most and since many of the major corporations are often clamouring to water them down it leads me to conclude that we're mostly on the right track.

I don't know but Alan Watts says that is THE question and I tend to agree.

I just got to say that next to saving the world and producing virtuous people this is the most important question of all of philosophy.