Another Senate Charade -- RollingStone.com
In Washington, of course, it's another story. Finance/Credit companies spent well over $30 million in lobbying in each of the last two years. If you take a look at contributions to Banking Committee members, you always find Finance and Credit companies at or near the top of the list. The credit card companies' dominance of congress was never more apparent than in the Bankruptcy Bill back in 2005, which essentially made it impossible for people with credit card debt to file for bankruptcy to keep their houses.
Do not underestimate the importance of the Bankruptcy Bill. In essence, the credit card companies convinced Congress to alter a private contract between you and them. The contract used to be that the 20% rate they charged was acceptable because when you went bankrupt, they got nothing. Now, they changed it. Now you can't. Loans like this pay a much different rate in a free market, more like 4%. But, because you wanted to give lots of power to do "good" things, they have just enslaved a whole boatload of poor people to debt enslavement for decades.
No comments:
Post a Comment