Debit Charges

Today Bank of America announced that it will charge, starting in 2012, $5 for any month in which you use your debit card for a purchase. Once again, banks are scrambling to find wqays to re-capture the revenue they lost when Congress declared limits on how much they could charge for overdraft, over the limit credit balances and late fees. They already charge most of us just to use their services, and now they want to add to it. This means that cash customers -- and debit cards ARE SUPPOSED TO BE THE SAME AS CASH -- now will be penalized for not using credit.

What I don't understand is how they can get away with charging us to use our own money. They already hold that money and use it for loans, and charge the loan customers a higher interest rate than they pay us. In addition, these fees will impact most the people whose economic status in America has already been badly shaken -- middle America. Do they care? Do we still bank with them, pay the fees, and smile when we bend over?

Bank of America is the first bank to do this, butthe rest will follow suit. What each of us has to decide is how to respond. Maybe we should all pull out our cash, start dealing locally on a cash and carry basis, and slide back a hundred years to keep these greedy uncaring corporations from raping us yet again.

Oh, gee, I wish I had something cheerful to write about today, but the news is just too overwhelming. If you don't feel like a slave yet, maybe you are staring to feel like an indentured servant. Even your hard earned money has bewcome subject to hidden fees -- and some blatantly open.

Once upon a time Americans believed in integrity. Sadly, integrity has gone the way of common sense, compoany loyalty, competitive products made in the USA, and jobs. And when they figure outr a way to charge for using the ether to voiuce our opinions, I guess I'll shut up, too.