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I'm willing to grant you that outlawing payday loans and similar predatory practices without consequently causing all sorts of nasty side effects is hard. But w

I'm willing to grant you that outlawing payday loans and similar predatory practices without consequently causing all sorts of nasty side effects is hard. But what you're saying amounts to "it's hard so let's just not bother at all" which is incredibly defeatist. Using that reasoning, why bother doing anything about anything at all?

gatehouse 13y ago
People can be ungrateful when you interfere, even if it is for their own good, and especially if it doesn't work out.
netcan 13y ago
I don't completely agree. To an extent it's defeatist because I'm saying you can't make things cease to exist with laws. make it. But a lot of things are really like that. We can't legislate things in and out of existence. Personally, I find it quite disturbing that there are hardworking people earning a poverty wage at or near minimum wage. My common sense idea about what a minimum fair wage is about twice what it is. Doubling minimum wage in Europe (like tripling or quadrupling it in The States) will not help the people earning that wage, on average. Many of them will just end up unemployed^ This particular conclusion only applies to outlawing things like drugs, prostitution or payday loans. Products of voluntary exchange. It doesn't apply to things like rape or murder. Outlawing those helps to reduce them (but doesn't eradicate them either. In any case, I do think some things can be done. Charitable lenders or lenders with an explicitly moral charter kept on their toes by discussion like this one can and do make a big difference. Letting normal lenders like banks do business unharassed is preferable to hounding them, for everyone involved. Doing something just to do something even if it's harmful is madness. Control yourselves do-gooders. ^I purposely said double. Most people will agree that a very large increase minimum wage would cause unemployment. Not trying to start an argument about this.
vidarh 13y ago
There's a very big difference between trying to outlaw something the assumed victim does not want to be part of, e.g. murder, theft etc., vs. something the assumed victim is engaging in voluntarily, though we might suspect "forced" by circumstance, or by lack of knowledge etc. As much as there are many things that it is easy to think "should" be illegal, outlawing the latter rarely works, not least because the assumed victim is likely not to want to cooperate with you, and potentially being outright hostile because they see a ban as being what is victimising them, rather than the provider of the banned service. I don't think it's defeatist to accept this - it just means another angle is needed that the presumed victim will actually agree is beneficial to them, such as providing free financial advice, or mandating better information about actual loan costs. This is the approach taken to payday loans in the UK. It doesn't stop the people who has a genuine need for cash even if it is expensive, doesn't drive them into the hand of hardened criminals, but hopefully helps to minimize demand. And improved labelling helps providers that can provide more competitive rates as well - at least one UK pawnbroker explicitly targets payday loan providers with their advertising by pointing to the lower rates they can provide, for example.

gatehouse 13y ago

People can be ungrateful when you interfere, even if it is for their own good, and especially if it doesn't work out.

netcan 13y ago

I don't completely agree. To an extent it's defeatist because I'm saying you can't make things cease to exist with laws. make it. But a lot of things are really like that. We can't legislate things in and out of existence. Personally, I find it quite disturbing that there are hardworking people earning a poverty wage at or near minimum wage. My common sense idea about what a minimum fair wage is about twice what it is. Doubling minimum wage in Europe (like tripling or quadrupling it in The States) will not help the people earning that wage, on average. Many of them will just end up unemployed^ This particular conclusion only applies to outlawing things like drugs, prostitution or payday loans. Products of voluntary exchange. It doesn't apply to things like rape or murder. Outlawing those helps to reduce them (but doesn't eradicate them either. In any case, I do think some things can be done. Charitable lenders or lenders with an explicitly moral charter kept on their toes by discussion like this one can and do make a big difference. Letting normal lenders like banks do business unharassed is preferable to hounding them, for everyone involved. Doing something just to do something even if it's harmful is madness. Control yourselves do-gooders. ^I purposely said double. Most people will agree that a very large increase minimum wage would cause unemployment. Not trying to start an argument about this.

vidarh 13y ago

There's a very big difference between trying to outlaw something the assumed victim does not want to be part of, e.g. murder, theft etc., vs. something the assumed victim is engaging in voluntarily, though we might suspect "forced" by circumstance, or by lack of knowledge etc. As much as there are many things that it is easy to think "should" be illegal, outlawing the latter rarely works, not least because the assumed victim is likely not to want to cooperate with you, and potentially being outright hostile because they see a ban as being what is victimising them, rather than the provider of the banned service. I don't think it's defeatist to accept this - it just means another angle is needed that the presumed victim will actually agree is beneficial to them, such as providing free financial advice, or mandating better information about actual loan costs. This is the approach taken to payday loans in the UK. It doesn't stop the people who has a genuine need for cash even if it is expensive, doesn't drive them into the hand of hardened criminals, but hopefully helps to minimize demand. And improved labelling helps providers that can provide more competitive rates as well - at least one UK pawnbroker explicitly targets payday loan providers with their advertising by pointing to the lower rates they can provide, for example.