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They claim credit scores negatively affect "economic opportunity." This do-gooder idealism will be the basis for extending much more credit than advisable to pe
by lurking15 2y ago
They claim credit scores negatively affect "economic opportunity." This do-gooder idealism will be the basis for extending much more credit than advisable to people who proven themselves to not be credit worthy, and the result will be an utter catastrophe.
- favorited 2y ago> who proven themselves to not be credit worthy I hate when people make terrible financial decisions, like running up cancer treatment bills that they can't afford to pay.
- richbell 2y agoOr having a medical emergency and being rushed to a hospital that happens to be out of network.
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago> like running up cancer treatment bills that they can't afford to pay Looking at this strictly from the perspective of creditworthiness, the question isn't the morality of the debt but whether this influences that person's ability to pay their credit card bill on time. Based on the CFPB's data, if that's the sole delinquency on the report, the answer is a coin flip [1]. [1] https://files.consumerfinance.gov/f/201412_cfpb_reports_consumer-credit-medical-and-non-medical-collections.pdf https://files.consumerfinance.gov/f/201412_cfpb_reports_cons... page 7
- favorited 2y agoIf you can identify a solution to the “I had cancer and lost all of my savings” problem (they do exist!), I’m on board. In the meantime, I don’t care if some lenders are prevented from denying car loans to people with insurmountable medical debt.
- everforward 2y agoI too would prefer an actual solution instead of a veneer. It’s worth remembering that this won’t impact loaners, though; they don’t care as long as everyone has to do it so they aren’t getting undercut on rates. They’ll just raise interest rates to cover the extra delinquencies, making cars/houses/etc less affordable to the poor. Hopefully by a small amount if the CFPB is right.
- burnished 2y agoWhat? How does medical debt relate in any way? Look, medical debt is very different from other kinds of debt in that it is usually incurred suddenly and unwillingly and at ruinous expense. Just using your family medical history would be a better improvement on the model and I've got the feeling that wouldnt strike you as just.
- toomuchtodo 2y agoThey’re only “unworthy” because they live in the US, which has trapped them in a dysfunctional system they can’t escape to obtain reasonable cost healthcare.
- __loam 2y agoMedical debt should not exist. Making the situation slightly less awful isn't do-gooder idealism, it's a tiny step in the direction of a sane healthcare system that nearly every other developed country on the planet somehow is able to have.
- hollerith 2y agoAre you saying that medical debt does not exist in every other developed country on the planet?
- __loam 2y agoIt's far less likely to completely ruin your life than in the US.
- andrewjl 2y agoIt effectively doesn't if the healthcare system is single payer.
- multjoy 2y agoIt does not.
- explodingman 2y agoIt doesn’t exist in Australia
- hollerith 2y agoThanks for the info.
- defrost 2y agoAmerican exceptionalism includes medical debt, not using metric, tipping as a substitute for a living wage, equating social policy with communism, and all manner of other things.
- givemeethekeys 2y agoAs long as they don't ban filing for bankruptcy to wipe medical debt, I think it'll be okay. But, if they instead do to medical debt what they did to student debt - that it can never be bankrupted, then yes - this is how the system creates new slaves.
- nielsbot 2y agoWhat is your basis for saying it will be an utter catastrophe? Not so sure why you're down on doing good--we could use some of that IMO.
- lurking15 2y ago> What is your basis for saying it will be an utter catastrophe? Any of the other times when efforts were made to extend credit to people with bad credit scores, and it ends up with indebted people being in worse debt. > Not so sure why you're down on doing good a do-gooder is someone who has a naive conviction of their own moral superiority and agency I'm saying there's people who, by never doubting their own agency & fallibility, force the unfortunate people they're trying to help into even worse misfortune.