Great information. Yesterday I paid HOA dues for a FL Vacation plan. I had written checks, but they had not arrived by the due date. I called and had to use a debit card to pay. A $40 fee was attached to the HOA fee per week since I was paying with a card. I was astounded! Who gets this tacked on fee? After reading this, i will increase paying with cash.
Mii~. That $40 fee makes my blood boil. To answer your question of 'Who gets this fee?'—it’s even worse than you think.
Since you used a Debit Card, federal law (the Durbin Amendment) likely caps the bank's cut at pennies. That means the bank didn't get that $40.
The Middleware got it.
That money went to the third-party payment processor (the software portal) and likely the HOA management company itself. They charged you a 'Convenience Fee' that was 99% profit margin simply because they hold the keys to the gate.
They punished you for being efficient.
You are absolutely right to go back to cash or checks. When you write a check, you force them to do the work. When you swipe, you pay them rent.
This has nothing to do with Blue or Red. The “system” doesn’t care about Rep or Dem’s, it’s all the same to them. The 3% is paid by EVERYONE. If you even bothered to read the entire article, you’d see that even the “grandma” who pays cash or single mom with no credit score pays the “convenience fee” of 3%. Stop blaming the parties and look at the big picture.
Most of the current financial system was set up in the 1990s, under Clinton--though the Republicans in Congress were complicit. Biden was the primary sponsor of the 2005 so-called "Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and (this is the joke part) Consumer Protection Act" which made it impossible for consumers to use bankruptcy to escape credit card, student loan, and most healthcare debt.
Can we please stop with the Rep v Dem /red v blue / this v that divisive rhetoric??? Isn’t it crystal clear by now that it’s Us vs THEM whoever the hell is in there?!? They have not been for “We the People” in literally decades! It’s a puppet theatre uniparty that exists merely to distract us with precisely such BS when what we need to do is figure out how to work around or through this rigged system so we can UNfuck ourselves because no one is going to do it for us!
I lost my pink slips on 2 vehicles. In California you can order up new PS online. So I hop online and filled out the paperwork and went to check out. Each vehicle is 149.00$ for a pinks slip. There are all sorts of fee attached. I canceled out and drove to,tye DMV and do it without all the “convenient fees”. 28.00$ per vehicle. Think about that?
You are one of the best to teach all of us. You are talking about computer interaction and emerging technology and future systems field which really have been deployed since 2011 if not 1995! Here is the book recommends by Sabrina Wallace Psinergy , please learn from this book and don't let these transhumanists rule us and hack us like animals! Human Interaction, Emerging Technologies and Future Systems V: Proceedings of the 5th International Virtual Conference on Human Interaction and Emerging Technologies, IHIET 2021, August 27-29, 2021 and the 6th IHIET: Future Systems (IHIET-FS 2021), October 28-30, 2021, France | Springer Nature Link (formerly SpringerLink)
Hi Iain , can you please help me buy this book. Used ones are ok! Thanks
Sorry, pushed wrong key. Well written assessment of the deliberate financial morass we try to navigate every day. If you haven’t had the opportunity, Catherine Austin Fitts is a good read on our financial system and how to separate from it. You can find her on Substack or the Solari Report. Keep up the great work!
You figured all this out early young man! It took me until age 58 to get off the credit bandwagon and return to a cash life. I too have impulse control issues and ADHD traits. I bought my current residence with cash, and when my real estate attorney asked me to list my debts I told him I didn’t have any. He just laughed and then asked me one at a time: mortgage? No Car loan? No Credit cards? No. He couldn’t believe it - said he’d never seen it before. His sage advice? You know you really should get a credit card. I’m your newest subscriber.
Thank you so much for your support!! Of course they want you to get a credit card ... I am facing that right now, as I realize what it means to expand. Loans require good credit. So I am trying to build it back up and I hate every second of it. But, I know I'm focused on the mission. The dopamine comes from building here, not a shopping spree!
What a wealth of information. Everyone needs to read, & think on this & then masticate on it again! I haven’t seen checks in for ever, sometimes difficult to get cash & there are places that refuse to take cash. Wow, easier now to see how the system is rigged against us! I have often wondered & asked this but have never had anyone give me the answer…if you use a Debit Card and chose the option to process as a credit card ( because someone is helping you, you are not comfortable putting in your Pin#, or not sure if you are at an outside gas pump & unauthorized device might be attached) do you by-pass the Durbin Amendment you spoke of?
Thank you so much for this post. It is a treasure. God bless you with your endeavors. I will share this info. Not sure that I am doing it correctly, but sure I will share. May God give us eyes to see, ears to hear, wisdom to discern & hearts to love.
This piece cuts through the fog by naming the core lie: credit scores don’t measure responsibility or wealth, they measure obedience to an extraction schedule. Once you see that, the rest of the system lines up fast.
Interchange fees aren’t a convenience cost—they’re a reverse Robin Hood tax, quietly transferring wealth from people who can’t afford credit to those who can, while everyone pays the inflated price. The “rewards” aren’t rewards at all; they’re behavioral pellets designed to keep the loop running.
The dopamine engineering behind swiping is the real crime. This isn’t poor self-control—it’s deliberate neurological decoupling of pleasure from consequence, aimed hardest at the young and impulsive before their defenses are online.
The cash-as-detox insight lands hard. Reintroducing pain into spending isn’t punishment, it’s sovereignty. Agency returns the moment the system loses its anesthetic.
Anyone still defending this as “just how finance works” isn’t defending efficiency—they’re defending a cage they’ve been trained to mistake for normal.
There are some facilities who do not accept cash. They are becoming more popular by accepting only debit or credit cards. After reading this very well written informative narrative it is no wonder they do not accept cash!
“That rep didn’t see a student. They saw a “New-to-Credit” asset with a developing brain and 40 years of extraction potential.”
Smh. Damn. It’s so evil. When you look top down especially. And my card is made of metal and I absolutely fly “for free.” I say it all the time. Uuhghhh wtf!?!?
Great information. Yesterday I paid HOA dues for a FL Vacation plan. I had written checks, but they had not arrived by the due date. I called and had to use a debit card to pay. A $40 fee was attached to the HOA fee per week since I was paying with a card. I was astounded! Who gets this tacked on fee? After reading this, i will increase paying with cash.
Mii~. That $40 fee makes my blood boil. To answer your question of 'Who gets this fee?'—it’s even worse than you think.
Since you used a Debit Card, federal law (the Durbin Amendment) likely caps the bank's cut at pennies. That means the bank didn't get that $40.
The Middleware got it.
That money went to the third-party payment processor (the software portal) and likely the HOA management company itself. They charged you a 'Convenience Fee' that was 99% profit margin simply because they hold the keys to the gate.
They punished you for being efficient.
You are absolutely right to go back to cash or checks. When you write a check, you force them to do the work. When you swipe, you pay them rent.
Starve the beast. Keep writing those checks
Cash is the way to go!
This is what Republicans DO! WTFUP, seriously, they will destroy America, to enrich themselves.
This has nothing to do with Blue or Red. The “system” doesn’t care about Rep or Dem’s, it’s all the same to them. The 3% is paid by EVERYONE. If you even bothered to read the entire article, you’d see that even the “grandma” who pays cash or single mom with no credit score pays the “convenience fee” of 3%. Stop blaming the parties and look at the big picture.
Most of the current financial system was set up in the 1990s, under Clinton--though the Republicans in Congress were complicit. Biden was the primary sponsor of the 2005 so-called "Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and (this is the joke part) Consumer Protection Act" which made it impossible for consumers to use bankruptcy to escape credit card, student loan, and most healthcare debt.
Can we please stop with the Rep v Dem /red v blue / this v that divisive rhetoric??? Isn’t it crystal clear by now that it’s Us vs THEM whoever the hell is in there?!? They have not been for “We the People” in literally decades! It’s a puppet theatre uniparty that exists merely to distract us with precisely such BS when what we need to do is figure out how to work around or through this rigged system so we can UNfuck ourselves because no one is going to do it for us!
+
Yes, Reds forced him into a sharp corner, with a bit of blackmail on the side. Let us focus on the horror we are faced with NOW!
Both Republicans and Democrats are part of the evil cabal. It’s NOT one-sided. Wake up.
I lost my pink slips on 2 vehicles. In California you can order up new PS online. So I hop online and filled out the paperwork and went to check out. Each vehicle is 149.00$ for a pinks slip. There are all sorts of fee attached. I canceled out and drove to,tye DMV and do it without all the “convenient fees”. 28.00$ per vehicle. Think about that?
You are one of the best to teach all of us. You are talking about computer interaction and emerging technology and future systems field which really have been deployed since 2011 if not 1995! Here is the book recommends by Sabrina Wallace Psinergy , please learn from this book and don't let these transhumanists rule us and hack us like animals! Human Interaction, Emerging Technologies and Future Systems V: Proceedings of the 5th International Virtual Conference on Human Interaction and Emerging Technologies, IHIET 2021, August 27-29, 2021 and the 6th IHIET: Future Systems (IHIET-FS 2021), October 28-30, 2021, France | Springer Nature Link (formerly SpringerLink)
Hi Iain , can you please help me buy this book. Used ones are ok! Thanks
This article is so informative! It's so well-done and explained! It's factual and very, wait... VERY on-point and eye opening. Thank you.
Sorry, pushed wrong key. Well written assessment of the deliberate financial morass we try to navigate every day. If you haven’t had the opportunity, Catherine Austin Fitts is a good read on our financial system and how to separate from it. You can find her on Substack or the Solari Report. Keep up the great work!
I will take a look!
You figured all this out early young man! It took me until age 58 to get off the credit bandwagon and return to a cash life. I too have impulse control issues and ADHD traits. I bought my current residence with cash, and when my real estate attorney asked me to list my debts I told him I didn’t have any. He just laughed and then asked me one at a time: mortgage? No Car loan? No Credit cards? No. He couldn’t believe it - said he’d never seen it before. His sage advice? You know you really should get a credit card. I’m your newest subscriber.
Thank you so much for your support!! Of course they want you to get a credit card ... I am facing that right now, as I realize what it means to expand. Loans require good credit. So I am trying to build it back up and I hate every second of it. But, I know I'm focused on the mission. The dopamine comes from building here, not a shopping spree!
What a wealth of information. Everyone needs to read, & think on this & then masticate on it again! I haven’t seen checks in for ever, sometimes difficult to get cash & there are places that refuse to take cash. Wow, easier now to see how the system is rigged against us! I have often wondered & asked this but have never had anyone give me the answer…if you use a Debit Card and chose the option to process as a credit card ( because someone is helping you, you are not comfortable putting in your Pin#, or not sure if you are at an outside gas pump & unauthorized device might be attached) do you by-pass the Durbin Amendment you spoke of?
Thank you so much for this post. It is a treasure. God bless you with your endeavors. I will share this info. Not sure that I am doing it correctly, but sure I will share. May God give us eyes to see, ears to hear, wisdom to discern & hearts to love.
🇺🇸🙏❤️
Thank you for your attention!
This piece cuts through the fog by naming the core lie: credit scores don’t measure responsibility or wealth, they measure obedience to an extraction schedule. Once you see that, the rest of the system lines up fast.
Interchange fees aren’t a convenience cost—they’re a reverse Robin Hood tax, quietly transferring wealth from people who can’t afford credit to those who can, while everyone pays the inflated price. The “rewards” aren’t rewards at all; they’re behavioral pellets designed to keep the loop running.
The dopamine engineering behind swiping is the real crime. This isn’t poor self-control—it’s deliberate neurological decoupling of pleasure from consequence, aimed hardest at the young and impulsive before their defenses are online.
The cash-as-detox insight lands hard. Reintroducing pain into spending isn’t punishment, it’s sovereignty. Agency returns the moment the system loses its anesthetic.
Anyone still defending this as “just how finance works” isn’t defending efficiency—they’re defending a cage they’ve been trained to mistake for normal.
Exactly •••🤨
Right on young man; laid down their plans very methodically!
Appreciation and blessings from Sydney Australia.
Well said!
The treasure trove 🔝 of FACTS. Please SHARE! EVERYWHERE We the People want Our Country back!
Really well written
There are some facilities who do not accept cash. They are becoming more popular by accepting only debit or credit cards. After reading this very well written informative narrative it is no wonder they do not accept cash!
If you haven’t already made the connection
“That rep didn’t see a student. They saw a “New-to-Credit” asset with a developing brain and 40 years of extraction potential.”
Smh. Damn. It’s so evil. When you look top down especially. And my card is made of metal and I absolutely fly “for free.” I say it all the time. Uuhghhh wtf!?!?
Wow!
Tell me about the in app. Payment? Is Substack moving to digital and facial ID?