Amex Attack

(Warning, this is a rant)

Just so you're aware...
I've noticed the troubling trend at some of my favorite neighborhood (that's Nolita, NY for those of you keeping track) restaurants not taking MasterCard, or in some instances anything other than Amex.
(Them's fighting words.)

MasterCard happens to be my Washington Mutual debit card. (Read: plastic cash, not plastic-pretend-I-have cash)
Amex and cash-only eateries are posing a threat to my "life without CCard payments" lifestyle. Cash-only places usually have a prominent sign so that we know what we're getting into and if not prepared, have an ATM handy. But when my MasterCard is rejected with a faux sympathetic smile from the waitstaff at the final moments of the meal, it seems easier to just switch cards and lay down the Amex. Ok, yes I should have cash on me and live off a cash budget of what I have in my wallet, but I'm not yet self-actualized enough.

Jeez- I go on a business trip to Manchester, UK and no one, not event the Starbucks equivalent, takes my business Amex and here they're trying to enforce it.

I'm reminded of my (loud, Texan) father's comments after Christmas shopping at Neimann's for what must have been my mother's favorite perfume at the time (either 24, Faubourg by Hermes or Panthere by Cartier). Something to the effect of "They only take check or American Express. This is my money, that I am paying them and they are going to tell ME how to give it to them?"
The man has a point. And usually does, though I often find a way to disagree with it.
His rant was warranted. In his case he wanted to use credit, but who's to say how he can pay for a purchase, when it's clearly a retailer who could physically accept any form of payment?

Surely there's economic motivation for an establishment to be exclusive with one card or inclusive of only some. I don't know what those details are but certainly they have some reason for restricting my payment options.

Is this really the economy where purveyors of luxuries (dinners out, anything sold at Neimann's) should be restricting payment methods? Methinks that would explain why the waitress bent the "No MasterCard" rule quickly after informing me that there was one. I would think that if this state of affairs continues as long as we hear it might, providers of goods and services will be happy to accept payments of any kind.

Moving from what might be the plight of the payment recipients to the plight of the payment givers, in this "credit crisis" (as NPR remindes me daily) should enforcing the use of credit be deemed negligent behavior? Ok, no, probably not but I'll say it's contributing to potentially negligent behavior. As we're seeing, many American citizens and American companies are leveraged out the whazoo, so I don't see it as too harsh to assign some blame and accountability.

It's not called the debit crisis. It's debt, it's credit, debt because of credit; debt because we don't know how to deal with the promise of owning more than we can pay for (coughsubprimemortgagescough).

I'm not even going to beat the subprime lenders further down in this rant but rather shift the spotlight to those card tables set up by credit card companies on college campuses, offering a t-shirt for new applicants. T-shirt? A t-shirt!? Drug dealers are put away for soliciting crappy crack all in the name of getting new users hooked and we're letting otherwise smart humans put themselves into years of debt, starting before their 20th birthday AND THAT'S OK?

Understanding the basic premise of using only what you have isn't rocket science and most of the population should be able to grasp the concept. But for the same reason Communism will never work on a large scale, this doesn't either. We want more. Yes, we're smart humans who should be able to manage our own lives, responsibilities and consequences, but the free will bestowed upon us allows for all sorts of errors. We choose to lie about our age, cheat on our taxes and spend more than we have.

This rambling stream of consciousness brings up an interesting question- is there a moral component to fiscal irresponsibility? Gluttony? I don't think paying off hospital-incurred debt could be considered so, if from an accident (not a face lift, then that's adding Pride to the equation), but living the life of a fund manager when you don't have any funds is (More, more. I want MORE). Paying student debt on a private school when your state school was just as acceptable? Maybe.

It's all perspective based on Background. And at the end of the day we justify our actions as they suit our purposes.