Friday, December 4th, 2009...10:15 am
La Cervecera Gets Slapped Around on Payday Loans
I read this piece by Howard Fischer this morning. Tell me something: what does it say that the likes of Vernon Parker and John Munger, neither of whom are exactly vessels of proletarian outrage, get to call you out for being an industry stooge and selling out the working poor? Heck, even Joe Arpaio got into the act.
(For those not keeping score: this means that Jan Brewer has given the Mayor of Paradise Valley and a millionaire real estate lawyer room to talk as if they are the second coming of William Jennings Bryan and “Sockless Jerry” Simpson.)
Oh, wait, I’m sorry. Brewer, despite that it seems the top tier of her campaign is feeding at the payday loan trough, doesn’t know what she thinks about the issue, and she can’t even remember how she voted on the initiative last year. There’s a comforting thought.
7 Comments
December 4th, 2009 at 6:09 pm
That is pretty spineless. I mean, 41% of the voters did vote against it last year, if she’s one of them why not say so? Heck, I voted for it, and now I’ve actually changed my mind to where I’m actually against running them out of town at least until the recession is over.
December 4th, 2009 at 10:19 pm
More people voted against this prop than voted for McCain in last November’s election.
December 6th, 2009 at 3:26 pm
Ted, sorry but my knowledge of Spanish is weakening. What does “La Cervecera” mean when you refer to the Gov.?
And Brewer is definitely losing votes on her defense of the pay day loan industry.
December 6th, 2009 at 8:41 pm
Carol:
‘Beer’ is ‘cerveza.’ You figure it out.
December 6th, 2009 at 8:50 pm
One other thing to consider regarding payday loans:
When I lived in Texas, my bank (and every other bank in Corpus Christi) charged like $8 a month just to maintain a checking account if people didn’t keep a balance of at least $250 in it. A lot of poor people don’t have $250 they can just drop into a bank account and not touch it, so if they don’t the bank maintenance fees can also get pretty outrageous. And if you post-date a check to someone and they forget and deposit it and your account gets overdrawn (and then maybe a couple of smaller checks hit after that) you can get hit with hundreds of dollars in overdraft charges literally within a few minutes.
So don’t assume that usury is limited to payday lenders. One logical reason someone might go to one is because the bank fees can often end up being even higher.
December 7th, 2009 at 9:05 am
Carol-
It’s a Spanish play on Jan’s last name.
December 7th, 2009 at 4:32 pm
Thanks, got it, I think.