Topic: Pure Satire
My earlier proposal that those stuck beneath consumer debts should be provided some assistance in paying them—in the form of government or government-guaranteed low-interest loans with reasonable payment terms—was not very popular. So I’ll present a proposal on the opposite extreme—ABSOLUTE personal responsibility for debts—to see if it is more popular. For purposes of this test of public opinion, I propose the following:
1) Bankruptcy relief, as we know it, should be strictly limited to wealthy individuals and corporations seeking relief primarly from business debts and from obligations to ordinary people.
2) Ordinary people should be held ABSOLUTELY RESPONSIBLE for their consumer, educational and medical debts, and debts arising from the needs of ordinary living, including any interest and late fees their creditors may, in their sole discretion, decide to add to those debts. No bankruptcy discharge of these debts should be permitted.
3) Instead of permitting bankruptcy discharge for ordinary people’s ordinary debts, insolvency preventing payment of ordinary debts should be a federal crime, a crime against the interstate financial system itself, punishable by imprisonment in a federal debtor’s prison for a term proportionate to the size of the debt.
4) Inmates of federal debtor’s prisons should be leased as laborers to private companies, and to public entities in need of labor, at rates competitive with the wages of "cheap foreign labor."
5) The proceeds of a debtor prison inmate’s labor should be paid first to the expenses of maintaining the debtor’s prison program, then to public charges for public relief paid on behalf of the debtor’s children, with any remaining proceeds being used to pay the debtor’s debts to his or her creditors. The debtor should remain imprisoned until his or her full debt is repaid with interest.
6) Any imprisoned debtor who lives long enough to ultimately be released should be placed on a permanent federal Financial Offenders Registry, and employers should be prohibited from hiring any registered offender to perform any "responsible" job.
This Absolute Personal Responsibility Proposal has been posted for voting on the Presidential Transition Team's Citizens' Briefing Book here. All voting closes tomorrow, Sunday, January 19, at 6 p.m. So hurry there to vote!
