That trend is evident in the home of 40-year-old Scott Boedy, a neighborhood service representative for a cable company.
Mr. Boedy said he and his wife now pay $200 a month for cellphone service, up by about $50 from early last year, even as they have managed to cut spending on groceries by shopping at discount chain Aldi and on “fun stuff” by going out to dinner and movies less often.
Looking over the family budget on Sunday night, Mr. Boedy said, his wife marveled at how much of it was going to the phone company.
“It stinks,” Mr. Boedy said. “I guess it’s the cost of modern-day America now.”
No Scott, it isn’t. It’s the consequence of your choices. But as long as one has the ability to do what every other borderline insolvent entity in the world does, namely to “charge it”, sweep it under the rug.
Dispatches From The Front 
