The Secularist's Philosophy - Debt

I started what I thought would be a pretty easy series of posts deriving the modern, secular, progressive philosophy with this post on children. Roughly 3 months later, I'm getting around to post number 2. Here's the point of the series.

I've decided to take a look at my own formulations for what I've been calling the progressive, post-modern, secular world. In this, I'll use secular as a short hand for that formulation to make it more readable...My definition of the term is the dominant culture in America and Western Europe...

I've been wrong to say that secularists have discarded objective morality. If they had, then the Confederate flag would still be flying in South Carolina and Brendan Eich would still be the CEO of Mozilla. They most certainly do have objective morality, but it's not one that I can find accurately described anywhere. In a series of posts, I'll try to define the characteristics of secular philosophy and morality through observation.

Debt

You'd think that with all of my wild-eyed ranting about debt, this would have been an easy post to write, but it's been a bear. I went round and round in my head trying to come up with a generalization about the $20T Federal debt we're leaving to the Millenials and their generational neighbors.  Last week, I had the breakthrough. Dig this.

My wife and I were chatting about how happy we were that none of our kids took out loans to get through college. Graduated and working in their respective fields. they have no debt and we don't, either. We sent them to schools we could afford and demanded they get degrees that would lead to careers. It was a business decision, made with the future in mind.

We both know people of all ages caught underneath that red line. Young people who took out student loans and parents who borrowed to pay for their kids' college educations. Once the degree is complete, they realize what they've done to themselves. They will be spending years paying off these loans. For example, I know a young lady who is moonlighting as a waitress after getting off her full-time day job so she can make her loan payments.

Now dig this.

Federal debt over the same time period. Click on the image for the full, horrible picture.

The graphs are practically the same. The bend starts a bit later in the Federal debt, but it's there nonetheless. At some point in time, we stopped worrying about debt, both personal and public. Why?

Saving money is planning for the future. Borrowing money is spending the future. Those are crude definitions, but on the whole, I think they're right. Savings represent decisions you can make down the road. Loans are decisions taken away from the future. Our kids can choose to vacation in Ireland if they want. They've got the money. Our friends with student loans can't.

Connecting Points 1 And 2

In the first post, we discussed how the secular world has stopped having children. In this one, we see how the secular world is spending future earnings today. They're two sides of the same coin. We're living for today.

See what it gets you? If you borrow too much and don't have any children, you end up wearing dreadful clothes and unable to sync your lips with your words. How ghastly.