Today’s Seth Godin was particularly noteworthy for lots of reasons.  When Mr. Godin speaks about this issue, unlike Suzie “The Harpie” Orman, he has a different way of saying it that makes it more relevant.  Nicely done, Seth.  BTW, Seth Godin’s guest post Don’t Even Try to Get a Job! done for WWDS is still one of the more popular posts.  ’magine that.  Here’s the first few paragraphs, but make the jump.

Here’s a simple MBA lesson: borrow money to buy things that go up in value. Borrow money if it improves your productivity and makes you more money. Leverage multiplies the power of your business because with leverage, every dollar you make in profit is multiplied.

That’s very different from the consumer version of this lesson: borrow money to buy things that go down in value. This is wrongheaded, short-term and irrational.

A few decades ago, mass marketers had a problem: American consumers had bought all they could buy. It was hard to grow because dispensable income was spoken for. The only way to grow was to steal market share, and that’s difficult. Enter consumer debt.

Why fight for a bigger piece of pie when you can make the whole pie bigger, the marketers think. Charge it, they say. Put it on your card. Pay now, why not, it’s like it’s free, because you don’t have to repay it until later. Why buy a Honda for cash when you can buy a Lexus with credit?

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Ed. Note: Ok, I need to explain this.  Remembering what one our employees said to me after seeing one of these Gruzzles…”we just want to figure out how your feeble mind works…” I thought I had better explain this.  Just so you ‘member, my blog persona is definitely a-political and middle of the road, although I do admit to a bias toward business.  But I did think it was of questionable priority, when the three most famous O’s in America-=Pres and Mrs. O. and Oprah– all three went to Sweden to sell Chicago to the Olympic committee.  It was similar, focus-wise, to the beer summit with Sgt Crowley and Professor Gates several months back, and then this week, the WH taking on Fox and the Chamber of Commerce, seemed well, er, unseemly.  So those three things…beer summit, the Chicago mis trip, and the beginnings of a Nixonian enemies list, I thought was humorous commentary.  The question was what was the connection, the x?  I thought about saying “Shades of Pres. Carter” but THAT would really age me.  Plus, not one in twenty people would remember that the main rap on President Jimmy “the true nuclear scientist” Carter was that he knew too much, and got involved in too many arcane details.  Sound familiar?  So “what else?” I thought, what issue might be next.  The OBVIOUS choice for me was the BCS, the bowl championship series of college football.  Now, there is something the Prez can fix.

The headline wrote itself.  ~GLH