In 1980, Seymour Durst began sending holiday cards to senators and representatives reading "Happy New Year. Your share of the national debt is $35,000." A bit of an exaggeration at the time, but his point was well made. In 1989 Artkraft Strauss took this idea a step further and erected the National Debt Clock on the Avenue of the Americas in New York. At the time, the national debt was a mere $2.7 trillion dollars.

The clock was actually disabled for a couple of years starting in 2000, as the national debt was shrinking and the clock was unable to run backwards. Sadly, it was plugged back in July of 2002 as the debt once again began to climb. Now, reminiscent of the 2000 debacle created because programmers couldn't imagine the next millennium, the clock has required an upgrade. To add a digit.

Yes, we've now exceeded the $10 trillion mark in public debt. Over $33,333 for every man, woman and child in the country. The digits are flying by faster than those on the gas pump gauge.

But wait, there's more. According to a recent article in the Economist, when we add in the present-day value of foreseeable Social Security and Medicare shortfalls, our national debt is more like $70 trillion. Perhaps they should have added a couple of more digits, just in case.

According to some estimates, the average American household carries nearly $10,000 in credit card debt alone. If you're only able to make the minimum payments each month, you'll have a hard time keeping up with accumulating interest, and you may never make a real dent in that balance.

One of the easiest things you can do to alleviate your personal credit crisis is to simply call your credit card company and ask for a lower rate.

Sometimes you'll get lucky, spend two minutes on the phone, and the customer service agent will gladly slash your interest rates right then and there. Others play hardball and say that they can't do it. That's when you ask for a supervisor, and explain to the supervisor that if they can't reduce your rates, you'll be forced to transfer your balance to another credit card. If they want to keep your business (and they do), they'll help you out. A US PIRG study found that 56% of consumers who called their credit card company were granted lower rates within five minutes. On average, those rates dropped by 5.5 percentage points.

While you're on the phone, it can't hurt to fish for other bargains as well. True story -- when a friend called his credit card company to activate a new card, he finished the activation process and the customer service agent asked "Is there anything else I can do for you today?" He replied, "I don't know -- is there?" To his surprise and delight, she answered, "Well, I can give you a $25 credit on your account." Hey, you never know unless you ask!

While we read the dismal news on the state of marriage in the US, a new survey from Parade Magazine reports that more couples are happily married than previously thought. According to the findings of a new national poll, about 88% said they were happy or reasonably content in their marriages. Only 12% ranked their marriages at the bottom of the scale.

Respondents also offered positive explanations for why they've stayed married, with 71% choosing "deep love" as a reason and 73% citing "companionship." On the negative side, close to 30% of the respondents admitted that they remain married either because of financial reasons or because "it's too much trouble to get out."

No matter why people stay in a marriage, it is good for the pocketbook. The longer people stay married, the greater their wealth accumulations. At retirement, a typical married couple has accumulated about $410,000 compared to about $167,000 for never married, about $145,000 for divorced and just under $96,000 for the separated.

It is simply cheaper living together. There are economies of scale and access to insurance, annuities, pensions, and social security. Even in-laws have value as they often leave assets to their offspring. Especially if you are older, it may be better to stay married even if you are no longer feeling "deep love." Better yet, work a bit and rekindle the feelings that brought you together in the first place.

Barbara Bartlein is the People Pro. To sign up for her webinar to improve your relationship, visit: Webinar

You've probably seen the headlines or news, especially if you watch CNN.

CNN recently released a poll, in which it surveyed 1,000 Americans. About 60% of respondents believe that it's very likely, or at least somewhat likely, that the nation will have another depression.

I'm sure it's a good survey, and I don't quibble with CNN polling people to see what their attitudes are toward the economy. That's a hallmark of journalism, checking with the mindset of the public.

Here's a sign of the times: a contest you can win that will offer you not a trip to Disney World, or a bunch of money, but instead, something we really need: free legal help to assist people in rebuilding their credit.

(OK, most sane people would choose the trip to Disney World and a bunch of money, as I'm sure the guy offering this contest would... still, it is something a lot of us can use.)

John Amorison is an attorney based in Woodbridge, NJ, who, to quote his blog, Legal Speak with John, "runs a full-service law firm -- divorce, litigation and business contracts, credit repair, debt consolidation and negotiation."

My mom is in the eighty plus group, lives alone, and manages her own finances. She has been retired for more than twenty-six years, living off of pensions, Social Security and savings. While she is concerned about rising costs, especially gas and energy, the economic meltdown does not really affect her financial status.

Like many of her friends and others in her age group, she learned a long time ago how to stretch dollars. She grew up in the depression and "frugal" could be her middle name. She saves foil wrap and baggies, pays off all of her credit cards in full each month, and combines trips with her car to save gas. Her occasional splurges are trips to the casino where she spends no more than $20 and usually gets a free meal.

Mom does not have a large stock portfolio. As she says, "What more do I need to save for?" Her house and car are paid in full and she retired with no debt. In spite of relatively modest income, she is able to put money away each month for unexpected expenses.

While she does not see dramatic changes in finances for herself, she worries about her children and grandchildren. College, rent and homeownership is so much more expensive than years ago. After all, her first home cost less than $3000 in the 1950's. The same home is now around $350,000. Yet, wages have not increased proportionally.

I emulate and admire my mom's approach to money. With simple needs, she has the extra money for trips to Europe or cruises in the Mediterranean. Spending less than you earn is a simple formula for success.

Barbara Bartlein is the People Pro. For her FREE e-mail newsletter, please visit The People Pro.

There are some things that it really pays to spend extra money on; houses, beds, and bicycles. But there are some things that we buy that are simply money drains. Here are five purchases where it pays to be cheap.

1. Car. A depreciating asset, you lose money the minute you drive it off the lot. And then they continue to depreciate. I buy cheap, used cars with about 30,000 miles on them. I try to pay no more than $12,000 or so and I still think that is too much. My next car will be a hybrid of some sort with gas mileage 50 MPG or more. If I need a van for a trip, I will rent it.


2. Higher education. Unless you are going to Harvard or one of the big name schools, it really doesn't matter. Most of us can get a great education at our local state schools for a whole lot less money. Especially for a general liberal arts degree, it doesn't make sense to be $100,000 or more in debt to get that bachelors. Save your money for the masters or professional school.


3. Household products. Save a fortune every year by buying all household products in bulk. Cleaning supplies, detergents, bathroom products, paper goods and kitchen staples can be bought cheaply at one of the large stores. Stock up for 1-3 months at a time to save money and gas.


4. Children's clothes. Kids grow so fast, especially when they are little. Take hand me downs, shop thrift shops and buy at cheaper stores like Target and Kohls. You will find high quality at reasonable prices. As they get older and want nicer clothes, have them earn a part of the cost so they appreciate the value.


5. Hotel rooms. I travel all over the country for speaking engagements and all the hotel rooms look the same. Unless it is a five-star hotel at over $500 per night, I rarely notice a difference between expensive and cheap rooms. When traveling on your own dime, look for the cheap rooms and spend the extra money on a nice dinner out.

Barbara Bartlein is the People Pro. Join her for her new webinar on relationships. For info see: Webinar

It seems that many of our congresscritters took advantage of the public outcry for a quick passage to pack a bunch of pork into the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008. It seems ridiculous, but members of Congress took advantage of a bill meant to save the economy to fund questionable programs in their home states. While many contend that the pork was needed to get enough votes for the bill to pass, you'd think the threat of martial law would have given senators enough reason to pass the bill without the added fat.

Taxpayers for Common Sense compiled a list of the Top 10 pieces of pork stuck into the bailout bill, the most ludicrous listed below.

1. Tax break for manufacturers of wooden arrows used by children -- Cost $2 million
2. 7 year tax extension for Race car Tracks -- Cost $100 million
3. Tax incentives for film and TV production companies -- Cost $478 million

These are just a few of the crazier examples of pork attached to the bailout bill, the rest of the list encompassing billions of dollars in expenditures is sure to turn your stomach.

Not all pork has to be bad, there are many other extras added into the bailout bill which in my opinion fall under the bacon category, as in pork that tastes good!

Despite my Ivy League MBA and my role as a founder of a personal finance web site, I haven't done much in the way of planning my financial situation. All of my financial milestones in the past decade or so have been accidental, serendipitous, or just a gut response to a disaster.

I was pregnant pretty much the moment after I was engaged, at 28. Through the birth of three boys (all of which came along a little sooner than I expected), I worked in a unusual career that I made up out of whole cloth, starting out in dotcom operations management, finance and product development and ending as a professional blog producer. While it paid fairly well, it did not pay nearly as well as the jobs of my business school peers; and it became very difficult to make extra room in my budget to pay my huge student loan payments. Instead of paying down my student loans, I've only compounded them.

One thing I did brilliantly was to buy a house in an up-and-coming neighborhood immediately upon getting pregnant with my first child, and never refinancing it. Buying it was a gut reaction to the nesting hormones, but it turned out wonderfully. Four years later a Starbucks went in two blocks away, and my home's value doubled. Early on, I took out a home equity loan to (hiding my head in shame) pay for our wedding; I'm thankful I never refinanced the house, keeping my ARM that was garnered at the peak of my credit score. While I was seriously guilty of living outside of my means as a young bride and mama, after I became pregnant with my second son I buttoned down the hatches, canceling all my credit cards and vowing to live on what I made.

That one really good decision -- never to refinance my mortgage -- has paid off with a low-ish monthly payment and a fast-reducing principal balance. And with my new philosophy of "no debt no way never," I know at least I won't be facing a tough credit review at my local bank.

Mortgage backed derivatives. Credit default swaps. LIBOR. Leverage. The credit crisis now unfolding in sickening shades of desperation is complex, and difficult for even adults to understand (politicians in particular, apparently). But what do kids think? I asked my 11-year-old daughter Anna what she thought of the current situation.

Do you understand what's going on in the financial markets today?
No, but it sounds really scary. Ms. Harper, my teacher, says the banks crashed or something. And the prices of houses got too high and now nobody's buying anything.

Does it worry you?
Mom says we're going to be hurt down the road, so I'm kind of scared.

Why?
I'm scared what the effect is. I'm scared Mom might lose her job. And I'm scared because America is getting really bad. It's in debt and we're in a war. It's like the world is getting really bad.

What's the worst that could happen to you?
We wouldn't really have enough money for stuff. Food, stuff, clothes, and we'd have to get all our money from Daddy, and then he'd lose his job. And then we'd live on the streets or something. And I'm not just saying that to sound immature.

What do you think they should do about it?
Not spend so much money on this war in Iraq. Spend more money on hospitals and stuff. Maybe lower the prices of houses. And food. Mom's all like, "$4.50 for a bag of chips!?"

Do you think all of this will affect you when you're a grown up?
If it passes, I'll just say to my kids, when I was young, there was like another Great Depression, but then we got over it. But it colleges are too expensive then I'll have to go to a cheaper college or do something else. I'd learn a trade.

You've seen your cousin struggle with her son, Jerry. Lots of potential, always hot on the trail of a great job that will set him up for life, and only needs enough money to buy a good suit or get his car fixed or his teeth whitened.
You know him because he shows up at his parents' house, hand out, with the regularity of the tide. And because he's flesh and blood, they give in. But this is the last time, right, they say. He's just finding himself, they tell you.

They are in denial, the first of five stages parents goes through dealing with a deadbeat child. You're familiar with the stages, the same that one goes through at the passing of a loved one.

• Denial- "I'm sure he'll make it on his own this time."
• Anger- "Dammit, Helen, I almost hate to see my own son coming up the walk."
• Bargaining- "We're going to keep a running record of our loans, son, and set up a repayment plan for you."
• Depression- "He's hopeless. We're hopeless. What did we do to deserve this burden?"
• Acceptance- "We love him too much to deny him, so we might as well quit worrying about it and enjoy his company."

How can one break out of this pattern? You could try to change your child first. You could also try to stop the wind from blowing, with about as much of a chance of success.

What you can change is yourself, your cognitive frame.

First, stop equating money with love. What if you had no money to give? Would your love for your child be any less? If you give him $100 instead of $50, will he love you twice as much? Then he's an unworthy child, imho.

Second, consider this; 'No' is a crucial lesson we all must learn. No, you can't wish away the flu. No, you can't get an 'A' by schmoozing your teacher. No, you can't have a raise you haven't earned simply because you need more money. No, you can't avoid death. Perhaps the best lesson you can pass along to this child is the meaning of 'no.'

It's a credit crunch. A meltdown. A financial crisis! A banking collapse! While we're all panicking, what should we do? While Tracy Coenen points out that the credit crunch is overstated, I have to agree with Julie Tilsner, who suggests banning credit cards. But my plan goes even further: I don't want to borrow any money for anything. Not a major appliance "buy now pay in 2010!" plan. Not a new car. Not a home equity loan, a refinance with cash out, or anything.

Having made all (or, well, many) of the financial mistakes a woman can make, I've vowed to only buy the stuff I can afford. If my dishwasher bites the dust (it did), I'll wash dishes by hand until I can find a good used machine for my budget or until my sister's erstwhile boyfriend installs the extra one he promised us. If my glass-top stove breaks (yep), I'll cook with the two burners whose glass wasn't totally shattered until I find the gas stove of my dreams on craigslist (anyone want to barter for homemade fig pear lavender jam?). If we need to get around town, we'll ride our bikes or the city bus. Need to go on a vacation? Need a new TV? No one needs these things. New school clothes? Goodwill. New roof? Guess I'd better start saving now.

I've learned that borrowing money when you're broke is only going to make you more broke in the future. The stuff I earnestly told myself was an "investment" has turned out to be just stuff, much of which wouldn't even move for a few dollars at our family's yard sale.

If only the nation's banks could learn that lesson. But they just borrowed money from their rich Uncle Sam. And you and I both know what happens when you borrow money from family...

As the vice-presidential candidates talked about the financial crisis gripping this country and the House and Senate sparred over the $700 rescue bill, the crisis got a little darker for at least one family as CNN reported that a 90-year-old woman shot herself in the wake of an eviction attempt. The woman, from Akron, OH, survived, and has become a flash point for the debate -- she was mentioned on the floor of the House on Friday.

Foreclosures have all sorts of victims and we've been reporting on them since the beginning of the crisis, but the stories of real people may have gotten a little lost over the past few weeks as the banking crisis has spiraled out of control. How do you process the plight of one woman losing her home against the backdrop of a $700 billion rescue plan? Both are impossible to fathom. And this woman has not been the only one to come to national attention for attempting suicide -- there was a case back in July of a Massachusetts woman who committed suicide as she faced eviction.

Perhaps as Congress considers the big picture of the financial crisis, it's important that they are reminded of the very real human costs of our economic condition.

AOL Money & Finance writer and editor Zac Bissonnette is a sophomore at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and an expert on getting a great education without going broke. Got a college question? Leave a comment and he'll get back to you!

JPMorgan Chase is dedicated to helping you pay for your child's college education, while making its shareholders billions in profits in the process. Sadly, one of the techniques that Chase suggests for financing education can be hazardous to your wealth. From the website:

A Chase Home Equity Loan or Chase Premier^SM Home Equity Line of Credit can provide a simple, flexible solution to the challenge of financing a higher education. With great rates and an easy online application, you'll receive a response to your college financing request in minutes.

I know: you want to help your kid pay for the education of his dreams, and you'd sell your blood to the Red Cross if you could. But the reality is that, if taking out a home equity loan is the best option you have for college financing, it is one that you can't afford. Your home is your nest egg and if you don't have any assets to tap outside of that and retirement funds, you simply cannot afford to help your kids pay for college. If you are financially secure enough to use your home equity that way, you also have other funds you can use.

It's great to help your kids pay for college but remember: they have lifetimes of work ahead of them, and you absolutely must put your own retirement needs ahead of your kids.

Well why not?

What if they outlawed credit cards? Would the world end? Would it be financial Armageddon? Would we shuffle from food line to water queue in our now-tattered $250 blue jeans?

It's never gonna happen, we know. So play along with me here. I'm not talking about business credit. That's an altogether different animal (currently in hibernation). I'm talking consumer debt. This idea that we can have the McMansion AND the boat AND the trips AND the kitchen remodel because we could, up until just a bit ago, borrow all that money to do so.

And look where we are today.