The fight is on to stop payday lending in Pennsylvania, and of course the Republicans are working to protect it. If you live in PA, please sign the petition or make a call TODAY:
The GOP is saying they’ll call for a vote on the bill next week. The only way to stop it is to put constant pressure on the Republican State Reps now, so people should be calling them and spreading the word. People can find out the name and contact information for their State Rep here. Calls are a must.
This is Penn Action’s action page, which lets you send an email and make a call.
Opposition to HB 2191 is broad and deep. You can see a list of organizations opposed to the bill at Stop Pay Day Loans PA. In addition to several other military organizations, the PA Chapter of the Military Officers Association of America are opposing the bill. Iraq war veteran Rep. Tom Murt (R), has filed an amendment that would align HB 2191 with the federal law currently in place for members of the armed forces. Details are below.
The bottom line is that HB 2191 worsens the problems it claims to solve. It legalizes internet and storefront payday lending at rates more than 12 times existing law. It codifies the very toxic terms of the loan product and allows payday lenders to electronically debit 50% of a borrower’s bi-weekly take home pay. Exorbitant fees and interest rates will drain hundreds of millions of dollars out of PA’s economy.
Predatory Pay Day lending doesn’t only hurt the people desperate enough to get them, they hurt most everyone who lives and does business in PA.
Here’s more info on the Murt amendment:
This amendment aligns HB 2191 with the laws currently in place for members of the armed forces. This ensures that Pennsylvanians, such as our veterans, the National Guard, and others are not exploited by the very practices that the U.S. Department of Defense found to threaten our national security. Specifically, this amendment, similar to the law signed by President George Bush, provides that charges on payday loans do not exceed 36 percent annual interest, prohibits holding a post-dated check or electronic access to a borrower’s bank account as a security for the loan, and provides a minimum repayment period of 91 days. In assessing the effectiveness of these types of provisions, the U.S. Department of Defense concluded that “has established a balanced approach in using the regulation to curb products with demonstrated high costs…”
It’s all about liberty and personal rights: the freedom to screw people over and the personal right to cheat as much as necessary to do so. And the money, of course.
Nevermind that payday loans are easy accessible online so that revenue goes to other states
how about the APR calculations for a bounced check, rent late fees, car payment late fees?? Calculated the same way it too is in the 500% range, but I guess that’s ok. Banks bounce checks and charge 35 dollars for a 50 dollar draw… Use your brain and calculate that apr. Ask a bank to loan you a small amount of money with no credit and they will laugh you out of the bank.
Bottom line this should pass for the good of Pennsylvania. Really, stop being stupid.
There was a time when I agreed with you – until I read more about the fallout of these loans, and the fact that the vast majority of the users can’t pay them back on time.
Can’t pay them back on time? Do you even know how a payday loan works? If you write a post-dated or authorize an automatic ach, then the payday loan business will get their money when the person gets deposits to their account. If they don’t have sufficient funds then they will default on their loan and make no attempt to pay it back, then they effectively have stolen the money. Good luck for that person to ever get a payday loan again, however. Not with that business, and most likely that person will be put in a database of people who don’t payback their loans. So for lets say 30 dollars of interest on a 200 dollar loan that person will never get a payday loan again. So 240 dollars that someone borrowed and doesn’t pay back means what exactly to their overall economic outlook?
Please, make sense and research before you post nonsense.
I worked for a man who made millions making payday loans. I know a little something about it. And you, you’re a paid shill. Why else are you posting under two different names?
Because I forgot what I orginally posted under. Sorry, don’t like giving out my email.
Its nice that you know a little something, it certainly beats knowing nothing, however you obviously are not far off from that.
You wrote the article and failed to properly address how payday loans work. But I suppose you don’t need a small loan to cover everyday expenses/emergencies, but those that do… what should they do?
You want to make it a hysteriafest then by all means ago ahead, but its not intellectual nor factual.
Dearest James,
Oh piggy piggy, whatever is the matter? Someone step on your tale?
Sincerely,
Not Anonymous, though may as well be
The greatest of liberal debate tactics, when defeated resort to squealing ad hominems. I leave feeling good.
Dearest James,
I could hardly be called “a liberal,” with my spiritual beliefs, you disgusting fleck of shit.
Sincerely,
Not Anonymous, though may as well be.
(and certainly, no one who knows me well, will ever tag me as a Republican or Libertarian, James, nor a ‘Democrat.’ I’m a human being.)