Down at the corner store they had a small pad with a handwritten list on it; these were the people they could trust; the people who could not pay today, but would tomorrow. The merchants and the people on the list were neighbors who each had families to feed, and they cared about that ability for the other.
Perhaps that was the beginning of the end; perhaps that was a mistake they could not begin to fathom the consequences of, one that would undermine the very existence of the greatest country in the world, and thus the very fiber of every world nation, bar none.
Today, there is a rather ridiculous system that undergirds our economy; it is considered to be quite sophisticated in its evolution no longer is there the little handwritten list, but rather a technological accomplishment of enormous significance such genius that it is adopted worldwide, we call it credit worthiness.
The undermining premise is that there are levels of trustworthiness and these levels should be manifest to whoever has the ability to and chooses to pay for the information; individuals and corporations can access this data which exists for individuals and businesses of all types: corporations, partnerships, sole proprietorships, etc.
In order for this tracking to be possible, there has to be a method of identification such that each entity (person or business) can be distinguished from any other, and this distinction has to be consistent the same identifier must be used at all times, and it must be singular only one identifier per person or business, period.
There are nine digit identifiers, now, perhaps we will have to add a digit as the populations increase medical advances and increased knowledge have provided for healthier and thus longer lives, so people can live to see their great-grandchildren, and sometimes great-greats.
The system has created an entire industry, not only is there the tracking and reporting, but there are companies that provide access to personal worthiness as it is reported. Some of these companies teach how to improve this information, and some companies help consumers when they can no longer substantiate their worthiness as it relates to creditability. Books have been written, too numerous to mention here, and people make a generous living giving seminars on this life impacting facet of our post-modern society.
The problem is that this vast, and, yes, most impressively designed and functioning societal organism’ has grown into a bit of a monstrosity, effectually pulling the veritable rug out from under itself.
Calvin average consumer is encouraged to live the dream: he can have it all, and he can have it now if he will take advantage of the system the message screams at him from television screens, over the internet, on magazine covers, and in the expressions of those already sold on the philosophy of material worthiness. Calvin must utilize the system, or he will not be able to rent or ‘buy’ a nice car or an apartment, he has to establish his creditability by using credit.
It is a good life until the unexpected, undesirable, interjection quietly intrudes: it comes as an unapparent illness requiring multiple tests and hospitalization or a corporate failure that leaves Calvin without income or with less income than before, and worse yet, it is the fatal strike of time itself: age the unacceptable characteristic, the one thing that hampers with a person’s employability but the one thing that is universal in its touch unless of course one is visited first by the sudden reaper.
Interviews go well, but the credit check causes caution, and thus employability dodges away, leaving the extenders of credit further frustrated, so Calvin average consumer’s vision clarifies and he sees beyond the image to the heart of the system that has no heart only insatiable avarice; the desire for more, more, and greater, greater until there is the absence of meaningfulness.
“Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, all is vanity;” a nation that is virtually unchallengeable in wealth, power, and technology is diminished strategically and self-inflicted from within.