I'm not arguing that the credit system doesn't suck. It sucks so much that I haven't had any meaningful contact with it for 20 years. For most of that time, the overwhelming majority of which I spent financially insecure (and a parent, to boot), my disengagement from credit has ended up feeling like a blessing. I genuinely do not understand why people get credit cards.

As for "windfall vs. 9-5", I spent ~20 years in the latter category, a category which I'm not unlikely to end up in again, and I simply don't agree with you.

Maybe another way to put it is this: for all the problems you've had with personal finances, I assert that acquiring revolving credit is a good solution to none of them.

Finally: since litigating this further is inevitably going to involve getting into pretty squicky financial details and debates over personal financial decision-making, I'm going to stop here. Since I think you'll probably disagree with me, I want to be clear that I expect and will read any rebuttal to this that you write, but I'm not going to continue the debate.