When I was a youngster of seven or eight years of age, our neighborhood grocery store was owned by a Mr. Strout. He knew our family well. One day when I was in the store I saw a customer walk up to the counter with an armful of groceries and say, "Charge it, Mr. Strout." No money was exchanged. He just said "charge it" and walked out. I was amazed by this mysterious transaction. I said to myself, "How foolish I have been, believing that money was required for needed items, when all I had to do was to say those magic words, 'Charge it."' So I began using those magic words regularly, and they worked. I began bringing my friends to the store, inviting them to get whatever they wanted. I felt like a politician in Washington. I had a license to spend.

But one day I heard my father call out the…