Thursday, December 09, 2004
Even worse than credit cards!
300-700+% interest on payday loans. The New York Times has more.
From Bloomberg:
Payday lending is rooted in a practice that spread through impoverished neighborhoods in American cities such as Boston, New York and Philadelphia at the end of the 19th century, Peterson says.
In those days, ``salary lenders’’ advanced workers portions of their weekly earnings.
After state legislatures cracked down on usury in the early 20th century, organized crime syndicates moved in, and salary lenders earned a new moniker—loan sharks. They typically charged 250 percent annual interest.
``Payday lenders actually charge more than mafia loan sharks,’’ says Peterson, author of ``Taming the Sharks: Towards a Cure for the High-Cost Credit Market’’ (University of Akron Press, 2004).
Guess which ‘family-values’ party the payday loan industry mafia supports, by a margin of 2 to 1…
