Budgeting is really easy. You figure out how much money you need to spend in order to have a reasonable existence. Then, you realize you don't actually have that much money, so you go and buy little plastic model kits of robots instead. Throughout history, people have been attempting to cover this gap between weensie cartoon androids and functional adulthood with a tactical application of debt.
Debt's a simple concept. By getting what the experts are refusing to call un-money, you can cover these little holes in your spending habits. Of course, you can't do this for long, because eventually the lenders will break your knees if you can't pay them back. Unfortunately, it turns out "almost" breaking your knees over and over is very profitable. As a result, a lot of people are forced to get on the un-money treadmill, constantly being offered easy, live-saving debt that they then have to suffer greatly to sorta repay.
Thing is, collecting that debt is costly. People that borrow a bunch of money often don't have any money to pay you back. Chasing them into the courts can take a long time. Hired goons to break their knees? Never been more expensive. And if they simply move houses? That can become a big hassle tracking them down. So, often, lenders will simply sell the debt to some other sucker. Here, it's worth $1000, but you can give me $50 right now, and then you can collect it. A loss, certainly, but less than you'd spend on hired goons (which, you should recall, have never been more expensive.)
Well-intentioned folks have been setting up groups just to buy that debt and throw it out. It makes sense: if it's only $50 to get $1000 worth of debt, then spending $1000 will get you a whole lot of people off the hook. With that new beginning, folks who had a bad couple of months will get a chance to finally stop getting hounded, a bank somewhere loses some money, and everyone gets to feel good about themselves. That's why I've been doing my part, and taking out loans under fictitious names in order to buy little plastic model kits of robots. Screw you, banks! Just try to repossess my Ultra Honeybee Murder-Spree RX-77 Real Grade.
