Credit Card companies know the risks when they extend credit, and induce the spendtrift who don't read the fine print to get sucked into the quicksand. BK and a fresh start is not only something I think if fundamentally moral and right, but it also is the only real curb there is on credit card companies just going hog wild, and leading some folks into lifelong peonage as Krugman would put it.
I am a Republican, and if I were in the Senate, I would have been the sole Pubbie to vote no on cloture with respect to this turkey.
I even wrote Krugman to tell him so.
I hope the Republicans are pleased with themselves--they are going to pay a huge political price for this down the line.
I don't think I agree with Krugman on anything much less his take on revolving credit worthiness....you play you pay.
Do you think this will have an effect on housing prices? Maybe people will cut back on the amount they are willing to borrow?
Individuals are responsible for their own actions. NO ONE is forced to use a credit card. I know, because my own brother got into this kind of trouble, and I bailed him out. This is just more of the same from Krugman.
Warren Buffet is again over the top and a little hypocritical, after all he has made billions shorting the dollar while he gloom and dooms the american economy down.
Still severe bankruptcy reform is a very bad idea for Republicans to be promoting; I thought Enron etc taught them something about how all strata of society try to avoid paying their bills when they can.
Also its easy to be in favor of bankruptcy reform if you are a Senator from states like Texas, Florida, and some others now where it is impossible to collect debts anyway.
Not discussed is the fact that TORT issues are largely what made medical care so costly. Sorry you agree with "everything" here.
Second rate drivel from a third rate hack.
As do adults when they sign the contracts .
...and induce the spendthrift who don't read the fine print to get sucked into the quicksand.
They don't cause the spendthrift to get into debt - the spendthrift alone decides that.
If you rent the money, you gotta return it.
They don't read the fine print?
Stupidity has always been a capital crime.
I know it's hard. When I was younger I dug myself in so deeply it took years to dig out, but I owed the money.
So9
I don't know the details of this, but it is probably a very bad idea. I'd remind all my brother and sister freepers that Bankruptcy protection is in the Constitution. I don't know what we are going to do with people who can neither pay nor discharge their debts. But I do know the protection to file bankruptcy was put in the Constitution by our founders because they had seen the useless hell of debtor's prisons in the old country.
Maybe W will break out the veto pen, but I think he is allergic to it.
And isn't it fitting that it should be our national political leaders who sense that the time has come for Americans to understand that we just can't go on spending more than we're bringing in? ;-)
wHY CAN'T CREDIT CARD COMPANIES BE HAPPY WITH 30 CENTS ON THE DOLLAR, JUST LIKE BUYERS OF aRGENTINE bONDS?
I personally think that there is a huge debt problem in this country, but that it is only 50% the fault of the credit card companies. Are their tactics manipulative and underhanded, designed to prey upon the young, stupid and poor? Yes, yes they are. But no one is forced to take on credit card debt. I think the industry needs to be regulated in a fair and just way, but also that the American consumer needs a better education about personal finances and personal responsibility. Why do our schools spend a year teaching algebra to students who will never figure out how to balance a checkbook?
I don't believe you can legally force people into CH 13 because of the prohibition against indentured servitude.
It is remarkably liberating to do without many things including debt.
how interesting.... especially considering it was Republicans who helped to repeal or over-ride old anti-loan sharking bills to help states get into the legal loansharking business via credit card companies. the history of the whole thing is quite interesting, especially considering my own ex-con, ex-gevornor, ex-represenative - William Janklow(R) got the ball rolling right here in SD w/ citabank. why? because SD was the only state (or one of only a very few) who had no loan shark laws.
Debt is incurred voluntarily. Peonage and serfdom were not. Another dumbass Krugman column.
"Borrowing irresponsibly"? Uhh, I'm sorry, did something change when I wasn't looking and make the granting of credit automatic? It still takes two to tango, and the credit card companies - which gleefully pocketed billions of dollars in total late fees after the mail disruptions caused by 9/11 and anthrax - are in no position to complain about "irresponsibility." Pot, meet kettle.