Here's what we're reading in April 2018

 A Look at Geographic Distribution of Student Debt

Older people increasingly loaded down with personal debt

America's debt load is reaching a tipping point

Poll: Majority of millennials are in debt, hitting pause on major life events 

Consumer advocates launch campaign against 'predatory' payday lending

Is student loan debt the next financial crisis?

New York Times "Credit" Topic Page

A steady diet of the NYT  articles on bankruptcy and credit. 

NY Times "Personal Bankruptcies" News 

A steady diet of  NYT articles on personal bankruptcy . 

CreditSlips Blog

Active discussion of news of the day by bankruptcy law professors and lawyers. A good source of links to newsworthy events in politics and finance that affect the world of credit and bankruptcy.

BankruptcyProf Blog

Another discussion by law professors. Good source for caselaw and rules developments, as well as legislation.

InsideARM.com

An excellent, well-organized archive of timely articles on economic data affecting the debt and credit industry. The link below is for Credit Card news, but be sure to hover your cursor over the News & Analysis link for a list of other areas you can search: 

Bankrupt: Maxed Out in America

This is a one-hour radio documentary and website about bankruptcy in america from American RadioWorks and Marketplace from American Public Radio

See also: "The boom in going bust" -- a report by Marketplace reporter Chris Farrell on a day in bankruptcy court. 

This American Life: The Giant Pool of Money

This AmericanLife/NPR present one of the clearest explanations of how the housing crisis happened. One hour long.

See also: this update of the original episode.

Media Reports on How the Credit Card Industry Reaps Billions in Profits From Distressed Debtors

Feeling bad about your bankruptcy? 

Don't.

The banking industry has made a calculated science of reaping billions of profits from distressed debtors. By casting a wide net to grant credit to everyone, the real "sweet spot" for banks is the distressed debtor that is caught a never ending cycle of penalties, fees, and exorbitant interest rates (that would have been illegal a generation ago)

NY Times/PBS Frontline: 
The Secret History of the Credit Card

The issues covered in this 2004 documentary are still current, and worth watching. It's an excellent recounting by PBS and The New York Times of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling almost 20 years ago opened the door to abusive lending practices and the rise of the modern credit card industry. After watching this, you'll understand why your credit card company is probably based in South Dakota or Delaware.
PBS: Frontline Video and Articles
NY Times: Articles

Bill Moyers on the social impact of the mortgage meltdown

How unregulated subprime lending destroyed the housing stock of Cleveland

Excellent report on how lack of regulation allowed "usury" to no longer be a crime, and allowed predatory lenders to sell financial snake-oil all without regulation. 

Describes how the inevitable logic of human greed, left unregulated, led banks to make billions by peddling financial snake-oil to naive, cash strapped consumers to sign the equity in their their paid-for houses as collateral for loans they would never be able to pay.... And now whole neighborhoods lie abandoned and falling into ruin, resulting in further loss of wealth base in communities that can ill affford it.

So much for the invisible hand....

A lot has been written lately about whether bankruptcy makes sense for people, in light of the economic downturn, including these articles:

• NPR/Talk of the Nation: Sometimes, Filing For Bankruptcy is Best - (April 20, 2009. Jane Bryant Quinn explains why it makes sense to go bankruptcy to preserve your retirement accounts and other exempt assets. Know your rights!)
• The New York Times: Debt Settlers Offer Promises but Little Help (April 19, 2009)
• The Chicago Tribune: In this economy, bankruptcy may be an answer for many (March 15, 2009)
• The New York Times: Bankruptcy as a Step to Solvency (Jan 23, 2009)
  
• Credit Slips Blog on "Should I File for Bankruptcy" (Jan 23, 2009) ('rules of thumb' about when it's appropriate to file).

Don't like the law? Change it! Vote the rascals out. 

Click here to see how your Senator voted on bankruptcy "reform" (BAPCPA) in 2005, and  how your Representative voted.

Latest on mortgage modification legislation

See National Consumer Law Center, bankruptcy news page.

And here's a BusinessWeek article and blog entry about how credit card disputes that go to arbitration rule for the credit card company 99.9% of the time.

Wall Street Journal reports on problems with debt settlement companies

(October 15, 2008) Read about people who waste lots of money and regret not filing bankruptcy in the first place... more...

Stephen Colbert on Payday Lending Regulation

"The Payday Loan Reform Act drags the payday loan industry out of the darkness and into the anemic firefly flicker of nominal oversight. (04:16)"

Keeping track of the influence of money in Congress

http://www.rootstrikers.org

Started by Stanford Law professor Lawrence Lessig.

http://www.sunlightfoundation.com/

http://www.maplight.org/

Numbers to Watch & Where to Find Them

You can follow the credit bubble as it pops and splatters its way through our financial institutions at http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases, where the Federal Reserve posts monthly reports that track the effects of the credit crisis on America's financial infrastructure.

If the flow of money is the fuel of American capitalism, then these reports are the fuel gauges. The Fed's unglamorous reports give us hard data on how much money is coursing through the American economy.

• Monthly G.19 Reports. These are the reports on consumer borrowing, both traditional loans (such as car loans) and "revolving debt," also known as credit cards. Each month, the Fed lists the total amount Americans have on our credit card bills. The amounts are staggering -- $968 billion in credit card debt, more than 7% higher than just last year -- and show no signs of shrinking. Read more at http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/g19/.
  
  
• The "charge off" rate. This is the percent of loans, including credit card balances, that the lender has written off as uncollectible. The latest figures show that banks are giving up on 5.47% of the credit card amounts owed to them. This figure is the highest since the current bankruptcy law took effect, with the exception of a brief flurry of bankruptcies before the passage of the law. More information here: http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/chargeoff/.
  
  
• The savings rate. This data shows how much Americans are saving each year. It's been hovering between zero and 2% for five years: http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/PSAVERT. For other Fed research data on personal spending, see http://www.bea.gov/national/index.htm#personal.
  
  
• The bankruptcy filing rate. How many people are filing for bankruptcy, and for what kind (Chapter 7 or 13) and where (Statistics by District). This data is kept by the US court system, updated monthly and can be found here: http://www.uscourts.gov/bnkrpctystats/statistics.htm.

You can get other important numbers and information from non-governmental sources, including:

• RealtyTrac, which offers one-stop shopping for the latest foreclosure statistics and news: http://www.realtytrac.com/news-trends/index.html
  
  
• InsideARM.com, which offers an excellent, well-organized archive of timely articles on economic data affecting the debt and credit industry. The link below is for Credit Card news, but be sure to hover your cursor over the News & Analysis link for a list of other areas you can search: http://www.insidearm.com/go/tags/credit%20card.