Here's a death calculator site that will give you a rough idea of when you're checking out. When you enter your basic information, you will also be given a bit of code to proudly display your expected date of death.
Cool. Now that I know when I'm going to die, I can plan the remainder of my life. In my case, though, 20 years doesn't sound to be much time remaining.
A group called Grass Roots Organizing (GRO) held a rally in front of the Bank of America Building in downtown St. Louis, announcing that big banks are quietly financing the biggest payday lending companies. The announcement was based on a report issued by National People's Action out of Chicago.
I videotaped portions of the rally, which was led by an energized woman named Robin Acree, Executive Director of GRO. When you understand how payday lenders operate (and subvert the political process), you'll also understand why it takes some spunk to stand up to the lenders and to expose these shady dealings. [Note: Acree's microphone had malfunctioned just prior to this segment--she was still carrying it, but it wasn't working].
After seeing a bit of Acree's presentation, you'll see a two-minute confession by Graham McCaulley, who formerly worked at a payday lender and offers a laundry list of the unscrupulous practices he saw first hand.
Consider that these two presentations constitute a formidable indictment of big banks. Here's an excerpt from the NPA document handed out at the St. Louis Rally:
Major payday loan companies receive their funding from the largest national banks . . . Major banks provide over $1.5 Billion in credit available to fund major payday lending companies . . . The major banks funding payday lending include Wells Fargo, Bank of America, U.S. Bank, JP Morgan Bank, and National City (PNC Financial Services Group) . . . Our analysis find that the major banks indirectly fund approximately 450,000 payday loans per year totaling $16.4 Billion in short-term payday loans . . . Major banks access credit from the Federal Reserve discount window at 0.5% or less, these banks extend an estimated $1.5 Billion annually to eight major payday lending companies, who in turn use this credit to issue millions of payday loans to consumers every year at average rates of 400% APR.
For a lot more information about 400% payday loans and why they should be outlawed, see this earlier post, which includes a powerful video of St. Louis attorney John Campbell (John and I work together as consumer lawyers at the Simon Law Firm). And isn't it incredible that it is almost impossible to convince state legislators to cap consumer loans at the substantial rate of 36%? Sad but true.In the special "Origins" issue of Discover Magazine, evolutionary anthropologist Michael Tomasello discusses some of his findings based upon his most recent book, Why We Cooperate. The article is not yet available online. The author of this article (Carlin Flora) opens her interview with Tomasello by pointing out that the vast majority of projects done in today's world are done in collaboration with others. What makes humans such collaborative beings? Actually, willingness to collaborate is a quality that clearly separates us from the other great apes, says Tomasello. He argues that the reason we cooperate so well with each other is our deep desire to help others and work with them toward shared goals. He was startled to find the degree of the "natural tendency" of young children (aged 1 to 3 years old) to cooperate with each other, but also to demand that newcomers to a group follow the rules of their games. Tomasello sketches out what he thinks is the origin of cooperative behavior
I think cooperative behavior started with obligate collaborative foraging, which is just a fancy way of saying that we need one another's help to get food. If we have to work as a team to get food, all of a sudden you're really important to me, and I am motivated to make sure you get your fair share so the you will want to team up again. Were interdependent.Tomasello argues that the "second booster rocket of our evolution of cooperation" was the development of social norms-agreements about how to act.
Humans have conformity norms. In our studies we will show a kid how a game works, and then we'll have a puppet come in who plays the game wrong. The children will say "no, no, no! This is not how you do it! You do it like this!" But conventions apply only to "us" in the group; it is "we" who prepare our food in this way and dress in this way. It's part of our identity that we do it like this. In contrast to those people on the other side of the river; they talk funny, they dress funny, the discussing things and we don't care whether they behave in this way are not.How powerful is the human instinct toward cooperation? "We conduct our wars with armies that are highly cooperative." The big question for Tomasello is whether we can scale up our willingness to cooperate, which evolved in small groups. We haven't completely ruined the world yet, and "we are still here."
While riding my bicycle past a housing project in the city of St. Louis yesterday, six teenaged boys ran up to me. I suspected trouble. One of the teenagers ran alongside me. I was concerned that he was going to push me off my bicycle, so I hopped off. He looked nervous, and we all froze for a couple seconds, with the other five teenagers standing about 20 feet away. The teenager closest to me suddenly reached back and took a swing at me, punching me on my right shoulder. I wasn’t hurt much, even though this kid was trying to hurt me. Though I had previously been in only one other fight in my entire life (a minor scuffle when I was about 10), I assumed that I could handle two or three of these teenagers (assuming that they didn’t have weapons), but not six of them. Instead of lunging for the attacker, I yelled, “Cut it out!” He immediately backed off, then all six young men scampered about 150 feet away, taunting me as they went. I crossed the road toward a restaurant and they stayed away. This all happened along a well-traveled road.
We buried my best friend yesterday. I had known Joe since first grade. He was a believer. I am not. We've had many lively debates over the years and our differences of opinion never affected our friendship. Joe died from neglect. He neglected his own health in favor of taking care of his family which consisted of an aging father, a somewhat schizophrenic brother and his ten year old niece who he had adopted after his sister died of cancer while the child's father was in prison. Six years ago I warned Joe, who was overweight, that in order to take care of his family he must first take care of himself. He needed to start to eat right and exercise. I did this for selfish reasons, I told him. I didn't want to lose my best friend. Selfless as he was, he didn't take my advice. A few years later he developed diabetes and eventually lost a leg. This was his wake-up call, he told me. Everything is going to change, he said, for the sake of the people that were in his care, especially the little girl with no mother. [More . . . ]