Wells Fargo: Bankster Bandits Traveling by Stagecoach

Image by Jerry W. Lewis via Flickr

Disclosure: OK, so I have all but abandoned my previously self-imposed limit of 199 words per post.  Most of my posts will be shorter in the future, but I cannot avoid the occasional long post.  Hopefully you will find the extra time worth it.  Thanks for reading.

I interrupt my blogging hiatus for an incredible, yet true, tale of the Old West, in the spirit of the Wells Fargo stagecoach imagery that has been so carefully nurtured in order to make people think of them in a romantic, Louis L’Amour-like way, not like a corporate behemoth with over $1.2 trillion (with a “T”) in assets.  Yes, my tale was like a lost episode of Gunsmoke that got shelved for fear it wouldn’t make people feel good about the weekly ritual of depositing their funds at the trusty bank.

Like most people, I avoid face-to-face encounters at the bank like the plague, as I have long preferred dealing with ATM’s.  They just give me what I want, and fast.  If I wanted to chit-chat with strangers, I would find a donut shop somewhere.  Anyway, today’s unfortunate visit was required because my ATM card quit working (could have been that magnet I had in my pocket last week).

Before I arrived, I already had a bad attitude.  I pay this joint 25 bucks a year for overdraft protection so that I don’t need to keep lots of cash sitting there to prevent an overdraft.  Suddenly, in the rare event I use the protection, they started hitting me up for $10 PER DISBURSEMENT from the protection.  Now, that fee has gone up to $12.50.  WHAT do I get for the $25/year that I pay?!?  But I digress.

And so, I hitched my horse, patted the dust off my chaps, and walked through the swinging saloon doors to encountered banker #1 wandering around with a clipboard like those survey takers at the mall.  I wanted to avoid her, but I succumbed to the temptation that she might offer assistance.  Nope.  After standing in the line of patrons, I reached banker #2, who was some young kid who hadn’t been trained on my tricky request for a new ATM card.  He said I would have to sit down with banker #3.  But wait, banker #4 stepped in and said that banker #2 could do it from his terminal.  Just then, banker #2 asked me if I had heard the news about my previously FREE CHECKING account.  I knew this could not be good.  When I replied, “NO”, he proceeded to tell me it is now $7/month, unless BLAH BLAH BLAH (or something like that).  Banker #3 said she would be happy to sit down with me and discuss options that could keep my FREE CHECKING FREE.  Great.  Yes, I would prefer not to get bent over by Wells Fargo yet again.  So, I agreed.

Ten minutes into the ordeal with Banker #3, I took the bait when she asked about my kids (she rightly presumed that I have them):

“Yes, 3 of them.  A toddler boy and twin infant girls,” I said.

“Oh, TWINS!” she said.  Shit, I thought.  Why did I mention that?

“Are they identical?” she inquired.

“Yes, identical,” I replied, hoping that would be the end.

“Oh, how cute.  If you know the secret to having identical twins, please tell me,” she said.  WHAT?!?  OK, ten minutes ago I didn’t know her.  Now, she wants reproductive advice.  I smiled on the outside as I recoiled inside.

Then, of course, as she was taught in the Bankster School of Banditry, she proceeded to give me the hard sell on some kind of accounts for my 3 kids.  Honestly, it all sounded like BLAH BLAH BLAH, except the part that went something like, “…and this will help them to think about Wells Fargo as they grow up.”  Wonderful, you need to start them young, I thought.  How about giving them a pack of cigarettes and a shot of whiskey with each deposit, too?  I could have cut her off, but we courteous Midwesterners are all too often proper when it comes to listening.  Me especially.

After probably 15 minutes, she was done selling me and decided to punch the 3 keys required for me to get a new ATM card mailed to my home.  Upon doing so, she told me that banker #5 might be calling me at home to ask how banker #3 did in servicing my needs.  Good Lord!  All I wanted was a new ATM card.  Instead, I become the subject in a marketing experiment to see how much money can be wrung out of a non-revenue transaction.  If there is any solace I take in the ordeal, it is knowing that bankers #1-4 wasted their time on me today.  They only confirmed my previous thoughts of jumping ship to a credit union not obsessed with increasing quarterly profits in the face of a lending downturn, rising bankruptcies, and increased government regulation.

So, as I threw my leg over Sugar Foot and rode off into the sunset, all I could hope is that banker #5 would be identifiable on my caller ID.  If not, I might be faced with more reproductive questions.

The American Way: Ignorant, Complacent, & Incompetent

Image by OmarC via Flickr

NOTE: A second consecutive flagrant violation of my own 199-word limit, this essay was written long before I started the Itty Bitty Witty blog.  Like the previous post on Social Security, this one is as apropos today as it was 2 years ago when I wrote it.  For regular readers, you have noticed my lack of writing over the past month.  I WILL BE BACK, but I am on a hiatus as I focus on other things in my life for a while.  I appreciate your emails inquiring about the blog.

If we Americans have learned anything over the past few years of economic turmoil, it is that lots of people made lots of mistakes that nobody would have thought was possible just a few years ago.  Whether these people were bankers, politicians, CEO’s, or just plain folk who bought homes that were beyond their means, there is enough blame to spread around.  However, a sad reality that has become quite evident is that everybody wants to pin the blame on somebody else.  It is human nature to look for fault in others, and pinning the blame on somebody seems to relieve the rest of us from having to share in the blame.  However, I propose that we consider a more grim reality.  Americans have become ignorant, complacent, and incompetent at virtually everything we do.

Before you throw out my theory as pessimistic rants, consider more deeply your workplace, the places you shop, and the things you see and hear everyday as you go through life.  Evidence of our ignorance, complacency, and incompetence is all around us.  We are so ignorant and complacent, in fact, that most of us do not even realize that we are wallowing in dysfunction.

Sure, the failings of borrowers and lenders are at the heart of the financial collapse that just took place, but a more insidious disease has enveloped society as a whole.  Most of us are too dumb to know what is going on around us, we are too lazy to do much of anything that does not bring instant gratification, and we stink at what we do for a living.  Fortunately, since these qualities are shared by our bosses, peers, friends, and family, we can all get along well enough and avoid feeling like a bunch of bumbling idiots.

This “grim reality,” as I call it, has become evident to me in the 16+ years since I graduated from college.  In that time, I have worked for one of the world’s largest public accounting firms, two of the world’s largest food companies, and one of the world’s largest manufacturers of office products.  In every case, I worked alongside people with college degrees–many from high-priced, reputable universities.  Still, I say without reservation that ignorance, complacency, and incompetence were pervasive in all of these companies.  In addition, I have begun to look for signs of dysfunction outside of the companies where I have worked, and it takes no time at all to find it.  Again, I implore you to open your eyes and look around you.  Ask yourself whether things make sense, and ask yourself whether things will get better or worse over the course of time, based on the trends you see.

Do I consider myself ignorant, complacent, and incompetent?  Surely I do, in certain respects, but I also have a sense of self-awareness about it, which gives me peace of mind and hope that I can overcome my own failings and help others to see theirs, as well.  Humans are imperfect by nature, but ignorance, complacency, and incompetence are not immutable traits.  We all must be accountable for ourselves, and we each must take responsibility for overcoming this scourge so that we and all Americans can once again be proud of ourselves and our ability to make meaningful contributions to the world.  For the time being, we have become basket cases waiting for the government to tell us what they will do next to save us from falling into the abyss.

How did we get here?  We got here by our own successes.  Democracy and free market capitalism gave us a leg up in a world where governments elsewhere were generally more controlling of business and personal freedoms.  These competitive strengths in the U.S. economy delivered a long stretch of growing prosperity that only now seems to have crumbled before us.  Like the only child who gets everything he wants, so did we seem to get whatever we wanted–new homes, new cars, flat screen TV’s, and iPhones.  None of these material possessions brought us happiness, but they did bring us a tremendous amount of debt and a new feeling of being shackled to our jobs for eternity.  We got overconfident in ourselves, we lost our motivation to work as hard as we once did (we were already living like fat cats), and we started to figure out that we could get by without having to truly understand the world around us.  We could just wing it like everybody else.

How do we get out of this mess, and what happens if we don’t get ourselves out of it?  These are simpler questions to answer than one might first think.  First, individuals need to demand more of themselves, voters need to take responsibility for what is happening in government, and businesses need to get back to the business of firing those workers who are not pulling their weight.  In short, each and every one of us needs to feel a greater sense of accountability for ourselves, our government, and our businesses.  We are a society that has gotten used to riding on the coat tails of others, counting on the government to solve our problems, and believing that our success in business would never come under threat from abroad.  Harsh as it may sound, we all need to take our knocks in order to have a wake-up call.  More individuals need to run out of unemployment benefits and go bankrupt.  Local, state, and federal governments need to make more stupid decisions that incite outrage and action by voters, and more businesses need to be allowed to fail.  Failure can be a great motivator for those individuals, politicians, and businesses that suffer the consequences of their own actions.  Unfortunately, we have become a pass-the-buck society that blames its problems on others and casts those who lose out as victims.

If we do not change our ways, then the downward spiral in America will continue.  It is no wonder that foreign competition is ravaging American industries.  People in developing countries around the world are working harder than Americans, both in school and at work, and they do not feel the sense of entitlement that we feel.  We can hide from this truth for only so long.  Government can pump money into the economy to goose the economic indicators and make it look like things are back on track, but such shenanigans miss the point.  Americans need to learn some lessons the hard way.  We don’t need a bankrupt government to reach out to us with more money it borrowed from delusional investors.

Social Security–The Ultimate Ponzi Scheme

If Only This Message Were Still True!

NOTE: The post that follows is a flagrant violation of my own 199-word limit, per the slogan of the Itty Bitty Witty blog.  However, I previously wrote this piece for another blog two years ago.  Unfortunately, NOTHING HAS HAPPENED in the past two years to shore up Social Security.  If anything, the situation has gotten worse, as we now know just how dysfunctional Congress has become, as evidenced by the debt ceiling brinksmanship and pathetic, short-term resolution.  The outlook for Social Security is bleak, but never hopeless.  This is America.

Since “Ponzi Scheme” has been repeated a billion times of late in the media, ever since Bernie Madoff made off (pun intended) with billions of dollars of investors’ money, I felt this was the perfect time to talk about the Ultimate Ponzi Scheme–Social Security.  What makes it the Ultimate?  Three factors make it untoppable, even by the biggest cons ever to walk the earth: millions of beneficiaries, government mandated contributions by all workers, and an endless source of funds to keep the scheme alive for now.

First, for those of you with an ounce of doubt regarding whether Social Security could truly be considered a Ponzi scheme, let’s review a few facts.  My favorite online dictionary (www.thefreedictionary.com) defines a Ponzi scheme as follows:

Ponzi scheme: A fraud disguised as an investment opportunity, in which initial investors and the perpetrators of the fraud are paid out of funds raised from later investors, and the later investors lose all funds invested.

Social Security is, in fact, disguised as an investment opportunity.  Put your money in each week while you are working, and the government will send you checks after that until the day you die.  Not a bad deal, for those who collect the checks.  That leads to the next part of the definition.  Those who collect on Social Security are funded by contributions made from later workers.  Everybody knows by now that there is no pot of money in the Social Security trust fund.  On the contrary, the checks are going out as fast as the government can bring the money in from current workers making their contributions.  This leads to the last part of the definition–later participants lose all funds invested.  There has been plenty of talk about when Social Security will go bust–start paying out more in benefits than it is taking in by way of contributions.  The question is not whether Social Security will run out of money but when it will run out.  Whether it is my generation or my baby boy’s generation, Social Security will go bust, and there will be lots of contributors who do not see a nickel of their money ever again.  So, there you have it.  Social Security fits the definition of a Ponzi scheme very well.  Now, let’s get back to talking about why it is the Ultimate Ponzi Scheme.

Let’s start with the beneficiaries.  If you are like most Americans, you have family members who wait for the check to show up each week from the good ol’ Social Security Administration.  Since Americans are notoriously poor savers, far too many Americans live off this money and could not make ends meet without it.  Then, there are the other seniors collecting their checks and heading to the casinos or far away places for nice vacations.  I have read statistics supporting that senior citizens today have a higher standard of living than in past generations.  This is all well and good.  Who doesn’t think that Grandma, Grandpa, or your parents should have a nice retirement?  However, all of these goodhearted people are pawns in the government’s Ponzi scheme.  Why?  Because they are voters, and because they believe they are entitled to their government check, no matter how insolvent the system might be.  This means that any attempt to fix the problem will be political suicide, if it means reducing payments to beneficiaries, unless the politicians behind it are shrewd enough to put the biggest burden on the smallest number of constituents.  Surely, that is where the solution will come someday (but not now, for heaven’s sake).

Next, let’s talk about government mandated contributions.  While some people feel sorry for the unsuspecting victims of Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme, one thing is for certain.  Nobody made those investors put their money with Madoff.  It was by their own doing that they chose Madoff and believed in his big lie.  Social Security, on the other hand, has one-upped all other Ponzi schemes by making it federal law that everybody must contribute, whether they want into the scheme or not.  I am 37 years old as of this writing, and I am here to tell you that I would waive my future Social Security benefits in exchange for the choice to stop contributing immediately.  Why?  Because I do not believe in the Ponzi scheme.  Unfortunately, if I did find a way out of my Social Security obligation in each paycheck, I would likely end up in prison for tax evasion.  What a deal for the federal government!  Cook up a scheme that steals money from those who keep the lie going, and toss them in jail if they somehow stop making their payments.  The SEC requires that mutual funds and  publicly traded companies provide a wealth of information regarding the risks of putting money into their mutual fund or stock.  However, it is OK for the federal government to knowingly collect regular contributions from millions of young workers when there is no disputing that Social Security will become insolvent before some of those workers can collect anything.  If that doesn’t qualify as fraud, then I don’t know what does.

Lastly, let’s talk about the endless source of funds to keep the scheme alive for now.  It is no secret that the U.S. government has no qualms about spending more than it takes in.  This is how we get to a budget deficit projected in 2009 alone of about $1.8 trillion.  Our total national debt is estimated to be $11.8 trillion right now, and the government estimates that the next 5 years will add about $9 trillion more to this figure.  What this means is that the U.S. government, unlike you, me, or anybody else managing a budget, can solve its budget problems by simply borrowing more money.  How does it do this?  It does it by selling government bonds to investors, domestic and abroad, who still believe that U.S. government bonds are a risk-free investment.  As long as the rest of the world stays just a bit more corrupt, a bit more socialist, and/or a  bit less supportive of individual liberties and the pursuit of happiness, people will lend money to the U.S..  Whereas Bernie Madoff’s house of cards would surely have collapsed on its own if he had not fessed up, the U.S. government can keep the music playing, so to speak, for as long as it wishes.  All it needs to do is keep borrowing to meet its obligations, and it will not have to admit to the whole fraud.  If this seems too good to be true for the U.S. government, that is because it is too good to be true.  There will be a day when U.S. government bonds will not be perceived as “risk free.”  Investors will demand higher rates of interest on government bonds, and the government will be facing the same bleak situation as all those gullible ex-homeowners whose mortgages suddenly reset in accordance with the terms of their variable rate mortgages.  The government can tinker with just about every element of the free markets (and it has), but it cannot ultimately outwit the worldwide markets for debt, which presently make it possible for the U.S. to borrow at rates of interest that are not indicative of the true risk involved.

So, as you can see, there can be only one Ultimate Ponzi Scheme, and Social Security wins the award.  What should be done about it, you ask?  The President and Congress need to share the facts with Americans, and they need do what is most equitable.  Without question, the government will have to break its promises to many Americans, but bad news is not like wine–it doesn’t get better with age.  In the name of equity, even current beneficiaries should take a hit.  Actuaries need to help figure out what will be required to shore up Social Security, and Congress should take a long and hard look at Social Security before deciding whether to save it.  The private sector has long since gone away from pension programs (defined benefit, like Social Security) in favor of 401k plans (defined contribution).  Maybe it is time for Social Security to bite the dust also.  If each American could see an actual account balance and have some say in how that money is invested, then personal accountability could start to make its way back into society.  Guaranteed checks from the government sound good, but there is no such thing as a free lunch, as the expression goes.  I, for one, do not like being made a pawn in a Ponzi scheme.  In my lifetime, I have contributed $60,000 to Social Security, and my wife has contributed $48,000.  Still, I would rather that Social Security be exposed for what it is–the Ultimate Ponzi Scheme–than have to continue contributing to the scheme until the day I retire.  What is lost is lost, but what money I still have I can put to productive use in my own retirement planning.

Proof That Watching Cartoons Can Be Harmful

Few things make me LOL.  Fewer still make me LMAO, and I am not quite sure what that would entail.  Working your AO makes sense, since there is work involved.  There is a show called “Dance Your AO” (http://dyao.oxygen.com/about-dyao), which also seems plausible (and the work of marketing genius, I might add, by combining dance and weight loss competition in one show).  But laughing to burn off calories?  I am skeptical.  BUT I DIGRESS!  Today’s post is about a story and video that truly made me LOL.  Most of us know The Flintstones cartoon well.

Image by andertoons via Flickr

Who could forget Fred’s car–the one he started and stopped with his feet?  Environmentally conscious as his solution might have been, he was ahead of his time by a few thousand years.  Moreover, the cartoon was FICTION.  That is, it was fiction until a guy in Michigan decided that faulty brakes were no reason to leave his truck parked.  He could stop it WITH HIS FEET!  Reportedly (http://n.pr/oceVzy), he traveled at speeds up to 40 MPH, a speed that would have made Fred Flintstone envious.  Best of all, police captured video of the guy trying to stop his truck unsuccessfully (see above).  Nobody was hurt, but several cars were damaged.  A small price to pay for LOL.

Mindless Marketing Monikers: Limited & Unlimited

Jeep Wrangler Sahara UNLIMITED (honest, but stupid)

Perhaps I am not your average consumer, having spent most of my career as a marketing professional, but certain product names elicit a wry smirk from me.  The words “Limited” and “Unlimited” are two such examples.  I was reminded of this recently when I parked my car, looked out the window, and saw a Jeep Wrangler Sahara Unlimited parked beside me (see photo).  As an aside, I believe there is a point where the name of the product gets way too long.  Here, we have Make/Model/Version followed by the aforementioned senseless “Unlimited”.  While “Limited” and “Unlimited” are both hollow and meaningless names, “Unlimited” is clearly the dumber of the two.  If you buy something that is “Limited” and you are naive enough to believe that companies will not make as many as they can possibly sell, you might feel that you are one of the chosen few who get to experience the pleasure of owning one.  Exclusivity is coveted by many consumers.  However, if you buy something with “Unlimited” emblazoned on its visible brand signature, you are basically saying that your product is so commonplace and easy to attain that any dolt can get one.  Implicit, as well, is that you are one of those dolts.  Congratulations.

Not Your Average Jog in the Park

Somehow, the duct tape came off my broken blister during the run. See exposed skin near the little piggy--the one that went "wee wee wee" all the way home.

Call me adventurous.  Or wacky.  Or lacking of good judgment, if you ask my wife.  In any event, I am intrigued by novel approaches, newfangled solutions, and interesting diversions from the sometimes mundane aspects of life.  I learned to ride a unicycle a few years ago and have endured join-the-circus jokes ever since.  I once bought a book about powered parachutes (like an ultralight aircraft, except replace the wings with a parachute), convinced I would fly like a bird.  My latest recreation has been barefoot jogging.  Fast approaching the critical mass required for fad status, this activity is as simple as it sounds.  Ditch the shoes and hit the pavement just as you were born, except with shorts and a shirt (let’s not take this bare thing too far).  Having run a marathon in shoes, I am now convinced that running without them is like watching a movie in 7.1 channel surround sound on a 60-inch HDTV.  With shoes, it was like watching on one of those 13-inch, black-and-white boob tubes your grandma used to have on the kitchen counter.  Sure, I have suffered one minor injury, a blister that tore open, but I did what any reasonable person would do.  I put a piece of duct tape over the tender skin and ran another three miles this morning.

Cell Phones Advance Faster Than Common Sense

We Love Our Phones! Yes We Do! (Image by Anirudh Koul via Flickr)

With technological advances come new dilemmas for mankind to consider.  Few examples of this phenomenon are as clear as the cell phone.  Once a novelty, the latest statistics suggest that 80-90% of all Americans (not just adults) use cell phones, and an increasing share of them are so-called “smartphones”, capable of accessing the Internet.  Aside from the known hazards of driving, walking, or doing just about anything else while using a cell phone, there is the fundamental question of what RIGHTS a person has to use his or her cell phone.  A Constitutional expert I am not, but most arguments in favor of unrestrained cell phone usage seem to hinge on the First Amendment right to free speech.  Difficult as it may be in a litigious society, it seems like common sense ought to solve most of these dilemmas.  Unfortunately, it has not.  Instead, our prisons are constantly on the lookout, not for drugs or weapons, but for cell phones used to orchestrate crimes from behind bars over airwaves that cannot legally be blocked.  Restaurant and theater owners who install signal blockers are found to be criminals.  Law abiding citizens using public transportation have found their cell phone service intentionally blocked.  When does the madness end?