When Pigs Fly
It’s an oft repeated story, government’s abuse of power discriminated against a group. In this case the United States Department of Agriculture (“USDA”) denied loans to black farmers based on race. A group of black farmers (I wonder why they are “black” farmers and not “African-American” farmers) sued and after a while the USDA admitted to the discrimination. The USDA settled the Pigford vs Glickman case and agreed to pay affected black farmers $50,000 per claim. Here is my first hiccup. The USDA, while a bloated bureacracy, is made up of people some of whom discriminated against black farmers. None of the article that I read mentioned anything about people being fired, going to jail, or being fined because of the offenses. Yet another case of government screwing up and costing us money.
Personal Finances: My wife and I have amassed some decent credit card debt by spending more money than we had available, or deficit spending. Since we are blessed with a good credit rating, the banks are always willing to raise our credit limit. They are just so nice about that. Rather than take advantage of those nice folks’ offer, we are in the process of reducing that debt through a number of means. We are going to have to spend less, sell some investments, and restructure some debt, but should have it eliminated within the next three months. Although it will be hard, but we feel that there is a need to eliminate this debt. 