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University Daily Kansan / Wednesday, April 22, 1992
OPINION
Credit cards are the bane of our daily lives
Credit. Do you have it? Do you use it? And if you do, is it in good standing? Credit cards can be detrimental to the lives of everyone, especially college students.
Do you realize that if you mess up your credit with credit cards in college, you will be unable to obtain a car loan, a housing loan, or any other loan after you graduate? You may need these loans to help you get on your feet before you become established enough to purchase the car or the house without a loan.
It is very easy to get caught up in credit-card mania.
Tiffany
Lasha
Hurt
Staff
columnist
Picture this. You go into a store. You see something you think you cannot live without. But you cannot spend your rent, food, tuition or book money. You are out of cash, and your checking account has $2 in it. So when the cashier asks, "$Cash, check or charge"? you opt to charge, thinking you will pay the $20 off later.
Mistake No.1.
Two weeks later, you do the same thing when you purchase a different item. And you tell yourself that you will pay it off later. You see the pattern? By the time you get the bill, you have $200 to pay off with money that you did not have in the first place. You do not have it now, and you are desperately trying to find out where you are
going to get this money. What started out as a $2 bill has turned into a $20 monthly bill for minimum payments on your credit card.
In addition, in some cases, you are paying the credit card company an annual $20 fee so you can spend your own money. So your bill is not only $20 but actually $220. And if you keep charging as you pay off the bill, you aren't getting anywhere. If your bill is not paid off, the credit card company not only tacks on a $20 annual fee, but also charges you a 19.8 to 21 percent annual interest rate on your purchases. So your $20 bill has escalated into a $20 bill, into a $22 bill, plus 19.8 to 21 percent of your unpaid purchases by the end of the year. Depending on how much money you owe at the end of the year, you could have $20 or more to pay in interest.
Is all this worth sacrificing your car loan, house loan or any other type of loan or assistance that requires you to
have good credit, which you might need in the future?
A word to the wise.
First, if you have charge cards, charge only what you can pay off in a month. This will eliminate the 19 8to21 percent annual interest rate on your unpaid balance.
Second, if you must have a credit card, apply only for those that have no annual fee. Why pay someone else to spend your own money?
If you truly have an extra $20 a month, put that $20 in the bank each month, let it earn interest, and then go out and buy the items you want. You'll remain in good credit standing, and you'll be at least $20 richer because you will have no annual fee or annual interest rate to pay a credit card company.
Instead, you will be able to apply the interest your money makes toward your purchases. And you will not have to make monthly payments on your purchases after you buy them.
Make your money work for you by making your money make money. And then spend it as you wish. Don't make yourself work to spend Visa or Mastercard money.
■ Tiffany Lasha Hurt is an Overland Park sophomore
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
School children not for sale
The captive audience of a public school should not be subjected to advertising
A case currently being heard in California involves the use of a television program produced specifically for the California public schools. The program includes paid advertisements. The 1/2-hour news and current events show on channel one presents ads for Nike and other products along with the news of the day, much like a network news broadcast. The case will decide whether a superintendent can stop the schools in the district from using the program. But even if a district advocates the use of the program, schools should not subscribe to any service that includes advertising.
Schools across the nation, including Kansas, use the service. They argue that the advertisements are a necessary evil. They point out that because the program sells ads, it can provide the schools with free video equipment, equipment that the school could not afford to purchase on its own. They also
note that children watch similar news programs at home and that the program itself is informative and well-done.
There are many counterarguments to these points. For example, children watch too much TV as it is, and teachers should be using class time to teach, rather than let the television babysit the students. But the most fundamental question is this: should our children be for sale? Should children be used, without parental consent, to get better equipment for school?
The answer to the question is no, just as it would be if the students were filling out marketing questionnaires to raise money for textbooks. Children are exposed to enough advertising without the schools forcing them to watch more. The morality of a state using a captive audience for an advertiser is questionable at best; public schools should not involve themselves in this ethical dilemma. Surely, the state of Kansas can provide its children with an education without selling them out.
Stay in school for King day
Mark Coatney for the editorial board
Devoting the holiday to a curriculum about the leader would better serve his memory
Recently, the Blue Valley School District voted against a measure that would allow a school day off to observe the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday. At first glance, this would seem to slight King's memory. However, the goal of the board can only be viewed as consistent with the civil rights leader's message.
The school district plans to celebrate the holiday by keeping the children in school and teaching about King. It would rather see its students in school learning than wasting another day. Officials believe, and with good reason, that a vacation day translates to sleeping in, mall-hopping and hours upon hours of MTV. Almost everyone would agree with that diagnosis.
More days off are not the cure to the ailing state of education in our country. A recent study by the National Assessment of Educational Progress showed that the nation's best elementary and junior high students were disorganized and generally poor writers. As more negative information continues to
come out of our educational system, school districts could do well by taking a hint from Blue Valley.
The next step would be to revoke days off for other federal holidays such as President's Day. The youth of America would be better served by spending these types of holiday's in the classroom. The wisdom of many past presidents and leaders such as King is something that this country and our schools need. Devoting a day to learning about American heroes is better for our children than another day of arcade games and Nirvana videos.
Each classroom should take the opportunity to incorporate the message and ideals of these people into the lesson plan. Schools should bring in special speakers to enhance the celebration of these individuals' achievements. Taking the time to teach these youths about people such as King may help end many of the troubles our society now faces.
By creating more school days, we will be helping the overall state of education. More importantly, by devoting King's holiday to a curriculum about the slain leader we better can serve his memory and our children.
Jim Brown for the editorial board
Cultural opportunity
I'm not writing to emphasize the racial problem at KU. Perhaps it deldom happens on campus what I encountered April 14. When I walked along the sidewalk of Naismith Drive, a young man driving a red truck slowed down and yelled at me, "Go back to China!" I was astonished. It also has happened to some of my friends. Soon after that, TV news said anti-Arian emotions rapidly were growing because of the economic recession in the United States. I hope that this feeling won't last very long and that it won't do any harm to the international peace the whole world has been working on for many years.
I admit that some Chinese, just like some Americans, are not easy to get along with. Unlike Americans, they are usually silent, concerned with their own things and seem to have nothing to do with this campus. I think it's partly because they have a language problem and do not have an outgoing character. As a matter of fact, most of the Chinese desire to make more friends and have a better understanding of a different culture. Analogously, Americans have a good chance to know a lot of cultures
from all over the world
In several ways, Americans turn out to be amiable and friendly. I have some sweet memories of my classmates, host family, club members and friends at the dorm cafeteria. Most of them are building up an international character. In my opinion, that's how they benefit from foreigners and that's why the United States takes the lead in the world. I'm so glad that I'm here to learn a lot from American experiences. Simultaneously, I'm here to be a friend and make known the culture of the place from which I come.
Please say, "Hello!" to some oriental students, and you'll find out that they'll be good friends. KU is such a good place for Americans to get internationally educated by approximately 2,000 foreign students.
Roger Chun-yen Liu Taiwan graduate student
Lettersto the editor
Support the Guard
The Department of Defense recently released the name of the first Battalion 127th Field Artillery as one of the units that would be eliminated by Oct. 1, 1993. As far as I can tell,
this is a proposal by the department to reduce the size of our military forces. It will be up to Congress to establish the exact size of our military. There are several facts that do not support the department's ideas.
Once a soldier is discharged, his skills are lost. Stills that taxpayers paid the individual to acquire. National Guard units provide a place to hold these skills should they be needed.
If we will have additional warning time before a national emergency requires military forces, the natural place for these forces is in the Guard. We can be ready within 60 days of being called.
The Army is only as strong as the nation's support. When the Guard is involved, the nation is involved. The Guard has served in every conflict that our nation has faced.
The Guard provides a capability to the governor to respond to natural and man-made disasters or to civil disturbance. We are playing a vital role in stemming the flood of illegal drugs into our country and state.
Without a doubt, active Army forces are needed to meet immediate threats to our nation's security. But where will the backup forces come from for those committed units?
The Guard and the citizens who serve in it have made the commitment to be there when the nation calls.
The 1st Battalion 127th Field Artillery is committed to the communities in which it serves. If we are to continue to serve, our citizens must let our elected officials in Washington, D.C., know that there is grassroots support for the Army National Guard to play a large part in the defense or our nation.
Ottawaresident
Column is misleading
In the April 15 Kansan, Stephen Martino condemns the "check-off" plan, claiming that inequities would result from allowing students to choose the distribution of their own student fees. His argument was that students are incapable of recognizing whether services such as the bus, the band and KU Legal Services are useful and worthwhile; students must continue to yield their fees to Student Senate for these decisions to be made properly. Regardless of whether one agrees with this reasoning, the article contained misleading statements and
The check-off plan wouldn't require students to assign their entire $25 to one group as implied in the article. Students could allocate their fee to as many or as few groups as they wanted, in whatever proportions they wanted. The projections of the number of students' fees required to keep financing at current levels were incorrect. The article confuses the difference between single-semester fees and full-year budgets. The number of students quoted in the article should be divided in half to make one semester's fees consistent with a half-year budget for an organization.
The estimate of first-year student participation in the check-off plan is 40 percent, not 20 percent. This estimate is based on typical turnout rates in democratic processes and assumes some students will prefer not to have to make decisions about which services they value at KU. The convenience of mail-in ballots and the incentive of controlling one's own money may improve participation — but it makes no sense to oppose the plan because it is convenient and appealing to students.
factual errors that need correction
Matt Conrad
Wichita junior
KANSAN STAFF
TIFFANYHARNESS Editor
VANESSA FUHRMANS Managing editor
TOM EBLEN General manager,news adviser
Editors
Editors
News ... Mike Andrews
Editorial ... Beth Randolph
Planning ... Lara Gold
Campus ... Eric Gorcski/Rochelle Olson
Sports ... Eric Nelson
Photo ... Julie Jackson
Features ... Debbie Myers
Graphics ... Aimee Brainard/J Jeff Meesley
JENNIFER CLAXTON Business manager
JAYSTEINER Retail sales manager
JEANNE HINES Sales and marketing adviser
Business Staff
Campus sales mgr. Billy Elkenwood
Regional sales mgr. Richard Hamburger
National sales mgr. Scott Hanna
Co-ops sales mgr. Anne Johnson
Production mgrs. Kim Wallace
Marketing director Lisa Keeler
Marketing director Kim Clastion
Lead customer Leah Cline
Classified mgr. Kip Chin
Business Staff
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Stick
by David Rosenfield