The Trump presidency is eroding the international US standing at a pace that leave me speechless. He is shooting in the foot all the US historical allies and enemies alike. Even Europe is slowly distancing itself from US, that was unfathomable a decade ago.
You write about (a quite shitty) reality, but the picture is somewhat of a dream, everyone is projecting their own wishes all around it. Running water, electricity, in the vicinity of supermarket/restaurant/pharmacy… it’s all there, in magic country land.
I am also a city person. I love disconnecting for holidays, but then I am back with similar minded friends, in a city with all city commodities and I don’t think I would switch.
They check if you can afford it “right now”, but the situation could change: a kid, an emergency, inflation, loosing your job, inflation… have i talked about inflation? Or the loan rates could change too
That assumes your means are constant and your spending isn’t, but this situation is the opposite: long term spending items (mortgage, car debt, significant inflation…) and means that dropped by losing jobs or pay raises that do not match inflation.
It seems to me that a lot of US people use credit cards to smoothen over larger purchases, so if you buy say a guitar for your hobby it doesn’t come all for this month’s budget but you plan to pay it off over multiple months. Often, credit card companies also encourage this behavior, giving short term low interest loans. But the overall market in the US is way more volatile than in Europe, so in the months you are paying off (your guitar, that fancy holiday, the tickets to a show…) you could lose your job, or the interests on your house mortgage could change significantly. And you are screwed.
Overall, Europeans tend to dislike credit unless it’s in the format of a mortgage, while it is a much more widespread form of payment in the US (and many other places). So, to most of your questions the answer is: most people have some credit card debt at all times.
I’m okay breaking the rules if that’s how the language is usually spoken, but It’s still interested in learning the rule
I think the whole premise of Duolingo that learning a language means translating to and from it is bonkers. I know multiple languages at various levels, and every time to speak I create my sentences in the target language directly. Translating is a totally different skill set
There are some limitations though: often native speakers don’t have a deep understanding of the grammar rules they use, because they use them intuitively. So sometimes learning this way makes it a bit foggy. I often use this technique when I’m already familiar with the target language, At a basic level.
Scale it considering that a president is appointed for 4 years, a monarch for life. Overall, I don’t find it weird that people need time to mourn when their political system gets a good shake…
But Queen Elizabeth was not “former” queen. What would happen if a President would die (of natural causes) on the job?
Being the governing body means having responsibilities towards the population. They want to erase the population, obviously they don’t want to be in control when that happens!