Trego's Mountain Ear

You know things are bad when the advertisements aren’t ‘Get into credit card debt’ or ‘Quick loans from aggressive, high interest companies’, but are instead ‘borrow against your house’.

Borrow. Against your house.

I heard an advertisement on youtube, recently, that was more or less that. Can’t afford groceries? Credit card bills piling up? Borrow against your house. And it’s phrased as if it’s helping people. As if it’s a solution.

Because the solution to debt is… more debt? Who do they think we are- the government?

Two observations:

• The first is that the shift in advertisements is a marker on the state of the economy, how people are doing, and it’s bad.
• The second, is that sometimes, the best thing you can do is fold your hand.

Recognizing a losing situation is the difference between salvaging something due to an exit strategy, and playing until you have to walk away with nothing.