TDV is proud to introduce a new monthly column today called Dear Slavey. We receive a lot of email from people who live in the US and who don't want or can't leave but who want advice on how to survive the ever expanding state. Dear Slavey has lived in the US nanny state of California for decades and has learned how to navigate the muddy waters and game the system in order to survive through the collapse of the US dollar. His ideas and insights are enlightening, creative and enjoyable reading. We hope you enjoy it! – Redmond Weissenberger, Managing Editor
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Dear Slavey,
I’m a middle class guy and my income used to be enough to pay for a fairly comfortable life for my family. Not anymore. Like most Americans, I’m buried in debt, my wife and I are both working two jobs (for far less pay than 10 years ago) and the majority of our income after food and rent goes to paying credit card interest and old health insurance co-pays. I don’t have the money to ‘escape’ to another country, or even to another city and I’m tired of feeling trapped. What can I do?
Roger in Los Angeles
Dear Roger,
I get it. I used to be in a similar situation until I learned the key to surviving with a middle class income in the United States in the 2010’s. STOP BEING AFRAID. There are tons of little tricks you can use to improve your situation. It’s all about learning strategies for survival that work within the system and around the system: peaceful, personal anarchy. Very much like an ant crawling over the boot of the now typical American police officer outfitted in para-miltary gear supplied by Homeland Security. That ant breaks through the wall only because he’s stealth and too small to be noticed. I’ll be here to answer questions from fellow middle class Americans to show them how to take back their dignity little by little working around the police state and the power big corporations think they have over our lives. It’s actually pretty easy, if you just stop being afraid of what will happen when you act a little differently than you're expected to act in the U.S. in 2012, but not so differently that you get arrested.
All the best,
Slavey
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Dear Slavey,
I owe so much to the credit card companies that I can’t even cover my minimum payments. My balance is about $30,000 and increasing all the time with interest, but I only make $28,000 a year. Do I have to declare bankruptcy or is there another way?
Dennis in Plano, TX
Dear Dennis,
You’re in luck! It’s mid-2012, and the entire world is in so much debt that big credit card companies couldn’t care less about your little chunk. There are six states where you can’t do what I’m going to suggest (Arkansas, Arizona, Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota, and Washington) but since you don’t live in one of those, here’s how you can free yourself from being a slave to the credit card companies: Just. Don’t. Pay. Credit card bills are the number one way corporate America enslaves us, if we let them. Check out this chart:
WASCUR is employee compensation (wage & salary) and this chart shows it compared to GDP. No wonder you can’t pay your bills! It’s falling off a cliff!
Just stop sending in ALL credit card payments – even the ones you think you can pay. They will call you, so use your call display and don’t answer any number you don’t recognize. They will write to you, so throw the letters in the garbage. You’ll get letters from lawyers threatening to sue you, so throw those in the garbage, too.
The only time you need to worry is if you receive a court document, (served by a process server) with a real case number you can verify, suing you for monies owed. But guess what? If you have no money in your bank account to pay, they’ll know, and I can pretty much guarantee they’re going to write off your debt and you’ll never get that summons. Find the statute of limitations for credit card debt online for your state here.
In about the same amount of time a bankruptcy would have appeared on your credit report, there will be no legal way for them to collect the debt and the letters will stop. Your credit rating will be ruined, but seriously, unless you’re buying a house (and you won’t be with your income), that means nothing.
Enjoy the extra money, you can now afford to eat and take your girl to the movies again! One less slave in America. Yeah!
All the best,
Slavey
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Dear Slavey,
About six months ago I spent a day in the hospital in St. Louis for tests which turned out to be very expensive. I have great insurance, but the copay and deductible were almost $2,500. There’s no way I can afford to pay that. They charged nearly $20,000 for the tests, and most of that was reimbursed by the insurance company (after the insurance ‘discount’ whatever that is), but they still want more. I feel like such a slave.
Marcia in Missouri
Dear Marcia,
I feel your (financial) pain. Here’s my take on it: have you ever asked for the full bill and looked at the fine print? Medical bills in the US are more or less extortion. They ‘fix’ you (or don’t), and slap an outrageous and completely arbitrary price on the service they provide, and then just expect you to pay. It’s like asking $40 for a carton of milk. I took a look at some typical hospital charges: $150 for the little plastic thing that they plug the IV into, $450 for a 1cc sedative injection. OMFG. Don’t buy into the scam!
If your insurance has already paid that much they KNOW they’ve made a fortune from you already. It’s a multiple of what’s reasonable, so guess what? Unless you live in one of the six US states where you can be jailed for outstanding medical bills (Arkansas, Arizona, Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota, and Washington) – don’t pay it. And when they start calling and writing, NEVER speak to anyone on the phone from the hospital (use your call display) and ignore all the letters. I guarantee after about six months they’ll write off the copay and leave you alone. Sure, your credit rating may be affected, but you should stop giving credit rating agencies power over your life, too. We’ll cover that one another day.
All the best,
Slavey
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Have a question or feedback for Dear Slavey? Just email us at tdv@dollarvigilante.com.
