LTTE in Green Bay paper attacks Sen. Hansen for going after payday loans.

[TheMightyFavog]

http://www.greenbaypressgazette.com/news/archive/opinion_22391917.shtml

Payday lenders are not the predators

GREEN BAY — Sen. Dave Hansen’s letter about payday loan centers shows a lack of knowledge. He calls payday loan centers predators and parasites — an interesting choice of words, considering most people use those words to describe politicians.

The average payday advance center charges a fee of $22 per $100 advanced. Usually the annual percentage rate is 500 percent for a 14-day advance. Most banks, however, charge an NSF fee of $25 to $32 per bounced check. Imagine the annual percentage rate on those fees.

If Hansen wanted to stop these “predators,” he’d focus on high-pressure, high-fee mortgage and insurance companies that solicit customers via the telephone. When was the last time you were solicited to take a payday advance? Most likely never. The customer must go into the center to take the advance.

Hansen’s ignorance about banking-industry fees may be because of the lobbyists who controlled his campaign.

Ask payday loan consumers who else would have helped them when they were in a financial jam. Not banks, credit unions or even finance companies, and certainly not a politician.

Hansen should focus on issues that directly affect Wisconsin families, such as the parasitic taxes Hansen has no problem increasing.

Elton Schenk

Four more days.... then I'm back to a much saner part of the state... Four more days.

EDIT: Read the last LTTE of the bunch. We could have soooo much fun with that one.

[ThoughtCriminal]

1. Want to guess what Mr Schenk does? - nt

[hobbit709]

2. Do I get 3 guesses?

[ewagner]

3. Sounds like

he manages one of those places....

or, generally hates Sen Hansen... :shrug:

[sybylla]

4. His logic is hosed.

I've thought banking fees were ridiculous for 20 years (thank you Ronnie Raygun) and this is coming from a former bank teller. But in all my years of banking, I never met anyone who planned on overdrawing their account in a way that would cost them overdraft charges.

So if you don't plan on overdrafts, isn't it kind of hard to go to a payday center to get a loan to prevent those fees. :shrug: I suppose you could use it to stanch the flow of subsequent checks bouncing after the bank gobbled up all the funds in your account to pay for fees. But $20 per $100. Sorry. That's simply evil.

[mrbscott19]

5. It's not evil....

As someone who has used the payday loans quite a few times, I can say it's not as bad as it looks. Yeah, they get you $22 per $100 IF you wait an entire month to pay them back. The way I did it was borrow money until I actually got paid(usually a week later), and paid it back in full. Do you know the cost to borrow $100 for 7 days? $7. Which is well worth it to me.

If you're too stupid to pay the loan off before the due date, then you deserve it. Even borrowing $100 for a month and getting charged $22 is not bad, IMO. It's a Small price to pay for not having to ask a relative to borrow money.

[sybylla]

6. Why not ask a bank?

Even at 18% a bank loan is only 5 cents a day plus a small loan fee.

People shout vile things at credit card companies, yet at 30%, $100 would only cost you 8.5 cents per day after your advance fee (mine's 2.50 each) and that's rounding up.

And you tell me $7 for 7 days is not evil.

How this doesn't violate usury laws is beyond me. I suppose if they call it a fee, it's not governed by usury. Conducting business in this manner used to garner the respect generally reserved for pawn shops and loan sharks. Now, apparently, it's become an acceptable, everyday course of business. Maybe armageddon is just around the corner after all.