10 Propositions on debt (and the feckless)

Prepared after a BBC Radio 4 Moral Maze debate on debt
11 July, 2007-07-16

1 Capitalism is freedom in action, and depends on credit, debt and interest.
2 Nobody said freedom - or debt - was easy or nice. They're both challenging.
3 Morality does not consist solely in being prudential. You don't have to be thrifty to be moral.
4 "Neither a borrower nor a lender be" is a very imperfect guide to the exercise - moral or otherwise - of capitalistic freedom.
5 There is something attractive as well as capitalistically useful in wanting to live life fully, including in taking the risks of lending and borrowing beyond the merely prudential.
6 Even morally, there's a lot to be said for that the life "explored" is as important as the life "examined". Extravagance, even impetuosity, is part of that.
7 This is to say that the "Cavalier" has as useful a role - as potentially moral a role - as the "Puritan". The Bible's prodigal son was valued.
8 So there may well be a case for being "feckless", for living in the present with little regard for the future. Indeed, one of the miracles of modern capitalism is the degree to which it allows people to take the level of risk which suits them.
9 But if you take chances - especially careless or selfish ones - you must expect that you may "crash and burn". And all along you ought to have remembered that you had no right to be a "needy" risk-taker. You're on your own if you take untoward chances.
10. Indeed, the feckless may show moral value in the courage with which they face their doom. Their grace in disaster may be a substantial part of the claim we can make that they are moral as well as good fun. And the kindness society shows the feckless may well be a sign of its moral quality as surely as is the kindness shown to the more ordinarily unfortunate.

ends