Barack Obama has helped me in many ways. The most important being the ability of his administration to directly or indirectly afford me a job. I used to sell cars. When cars got slow he helped with Cash for Clunkers. We sold so many MINI Coopers that month that even the most conservative people at my dealership were singing the government's praises. Then, I lost my luxury car job and got another job selling a domestic brand. This one was with Chrysler in 2010. Thanks again Mr President. If you hadn't bailed them out, I would be without that job as would all the people at my dealership. Now i don't sell cars anymore, but my new industry was recently regulated by the Obama administration making it more reliable and a better industry for consumers.
My new job is in Debt Settlement. In October of 2010, Vice President Joe Biden and the senate passed a law that says that debt settlement companies cannot charge upfront fees for their services. This means that my company must settle a client's debt before we can take a fee from that client. My company, in order to be FTC compliant, has adopted this rule and is now settling millions of dollars in debt every week. We are negotiating the banks down and getting people to give up their credit cards, allow us to negotiate on their behalf and pay off what they owe to the banks at a reduced amount. Without the government oversight and regulation of this industry, people would not be able to trust the companies doing debt settlement because the upfront fees would not force the debt settlement company to actually settle any debt.
I saw the recent diary about OWS debt purchases here:
">http://www.dailykos.com/...
In my opinion, the elimination of debt is the single most important thing we can do to help the middle class. By eliminating peoples debt we are liberating them from slavery to the banks. My company does not take on student loan debt, but we do negotiate down all unsecured debts. I'm impressed with what OWS is doing. I just wanted everyone to know that some of us have been eliminating debt and doing it the right way for a while thanks to President Obama.
It's nice that OWS can give their money and time to buy off this debt, it's even nicer when the government can regulate an industry to protect the consumer. This regulaton did not kill our industry and it did not slow our business. Instead it made our business more reliable and we are now better serving our clients. Government regulation also has made us more successful and we are expanding and hiring more people and making more money than ever. Take that "Job Creators".