31–40 of 46 posts
Debt is just another business. So long as the poor keep paying on the debt, it makes business sense to keep pushing debt to them. It seems the idea is to squeeze the rock just to the point it bleeds, but not kill it.
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That's not really so. If you have a bunch of bad luck in one month, you sometimes need a line of credit to get to the next. Did you have a flat tire? Did the baby need three trips to the doctor because of croup? Banks exist to make our life better when we need extra spending cash. If we ban lending to the poor than it will be one more thing that only the rich will have. I agree that the lending rates are insanely hig…
>you sometimes need a line of credit to get to the next Not in a society that looks after it's people. >Did you have a flat tire? Did the baby need three trips to the doctor because of croup? You shouldn't be paying for healthcare, guaranteed minimum income and social connections should suffice for the other stuff. >If we ban lending to the poor than it will be one more thing that only the rich will have. We shouldn'…
This is the worst opinion I have ever read on HN.
I have a story similar to this. There was a profound moment in my career when I was working as a consultant for a company I wont name, but they were in Canary Wharf, which is the financial center of London, UK. I was in a glass high-rise building, and had been working there for about 4 weeks. The project I was working on was at heart, selling loans and credit to people who couldnt afford it - all hidden by opaque lan…
> he admitted he knew what they were doing, but had an insane burn rate (wife, kids, expensive house and shit) so he couldn't just quit. A core belief I have, and I try to spread it where possible, is that a person owes it to themselves and to those around them to live in such a way that they have personal freedom. This is precisely the way in which debt is pernicious. This man is trapped in a debt cycle - just as th…
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>you sometimes need a line of credit to get to the next Not in a society that looks after it's people. >Did you have a flat tire? Did the baby need three trips to the doctor because of croup? You shouldn't be paying for healthcare, guaranteed minimum income and social connections should suffice for the other stuff. >If we ban lending to the poor than it will be one more thing that only the rich will have. We shouldn'…
> We shouldn't ban lending to the poor, we should ban lending with interest period. This is the worst opinion I have ever read on HN.
I hate to be cynical, but it's a bit rich to keep cashing the checks for five entire years and then having some come-to-Jesus moment. Did the change of heart go alongside some new boss who didn't like the work product? Or perhaps a plan to just move? It's easy to dis something on the way out the door.
I have a story similar to this. There was a profound moment in my career when I was working as a consultant for a company I wont name, but they were in Canary Wharf, which is the financial center of London, UK. I was in a glass high-rise building, and had been working there for about 4 weeks. The project I was working on was at heart, selling loans and credit to people who couldnt afford it - all hidden by opaque lan…
> he admitted he knew what they were doing, but had an insane burn rate (wife, kids, expensive house and shit) so he couldn't just quit. A core belief I have, and I try to spread it where possible, is that a person owes it to themselves and to those around them to live in such a way that they have personal freedom. This is precisely the way in which debt is pernicious. This man is trapped in a debt cycle - just as th…
The whole financial industry seems very much like this. There are all these conspiracy theories that propose that someone -- some group of actual humans -- is on top, but look closely and it seems that in reality the entities themselves are on top and the whole system exists to feed itself as an end in itself.
It's easy to call this kind of lending predatory, but when you leave the problem of poverty to private businesses to solve you end up with high-interest loans and payday loans. If the government banned this kind of lending and didn't provide an alternative, poor people would have no lending options. Regulating this kind of lending (e.g. by tightening the already regulated limits on interest rates) can only go so far…
IIRC poor women's self-run savings groups enable microcredit for poor people, and these loans generally have high repayment rates and relatively low interest. It has been a while since I read about this so it is possible that my info is now out of date.
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> poor people would have no lending options Then they borrow from criminals, which historically provide services the government bans.
> which historically provide services the government bans. Yes... That's why they're called.. criminals?
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Debt forgiveness might be more palatable if it is accompanied by changes to the system that allowed an unsustainable amount of debt to be generated in the first place.
A recurring debt forgiveness schedule would do just that. If all debts expired after 10 years lenders would be much more cautious.
I hate to be cynical, but it's a bit rich to keep cashing the checks for five entire years and then having some come-to-Jesus moment. Did the change of heart go alongside some new boss who didn't like the work product? Or perhaps a plan to just move? It's easy to dis something on the way out the door.
I don't think the cynicism is warranted. In fact, it takes a fair amount of introspection then courage to put your name on an article saying you spent so much time doing something you now find morally repugnant. The easy path is to either (a) not ever recognize you were taking advantage of poor people or (b) sweep it under the rug and go on with your life.