This is in my opinion not accurate. Farmers borrowed money then for the same reason they do now: to smooth cashflows. Farming is an inherently lumpy business fr

This is in my opinion not accurate. Farmers borrowed money then for the same reason they do now: to smooth cashflows. Farming is an inherently lumpy business from a cashflow perspective. You plant your seeds and incur a bunch of costs now, and only months later can you harvest and sell them. So yes, it was 'unfair' to farmers to charge interest because it's pretty much required, but also farmers had a vested business interest in getting money lent for low interest rates.