Fixed: Why Personal Finance is Broken and How to Make it Work for Everyone
by John Y. Campbell and Tarun Ramadorai · 25 Jul 2025
that would be charged on a loan over a period of one year.31 The APR can be compared across bank loans, credit card balances, payday loans, and other forms of short-term credit, and the general principle is to borrow at the lowest available APR. Even a small charge, such as
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501%!32 This startling figure is an indication that payday loans, while simple and convenient, are extraordinarily expensive. People experiencing financial emergencies often pay more attention to the speed of credit access than to its cost
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a consistent fashion across loans with different maturities, so it reveals, for example, that a bank overdraft has a much lower interest rate than a payday loan. However, even the APR, while a good start, falls short of an intelligible cost disclosure in several respects. Many people manage their finances by thinking
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appears to be much greater when short-term loans require a single lump-sum repayment on a given date (such as the pay date in payday loans). On the repayment date, a borrower who is unable to pay off a loan in full may just roll it over, kicking the can down
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branches—which had no other purpose—have become few and far between, as in London, where Tarun Ramadorai lives. 15. Jeannette Bennett, “Fast cash and payday loans,” Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis, April 10, 2019, https://research.stlouisfed.org/publications/page1-econ/2019/04/10/fast-cash-and
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-payday-loans, cites an estimate that in 2017 there were 14,348 payday loan storefronts in the United States, comparable to the number of Starbucks coffee shops and slightly greater than the number of
Gilded Rage: Elon Musk and the Radicalization of Silicon Valley
by Jacob Silverman · 9 Oct 2025 · 312pp · 103,645 words
fallout of the party of consumer protection forsaking its mandate to further legalize an industry that had much more in common with sports gambling or payday loans than finance. When the next bubble popped and voters’ digital fortunes evaporated, it would be on Democrats, too. Most importantly, the crypto industry, angry at
Everybody Loses: The Tumultuous Rise of American Sports Gambling
by Danny Funt · 20 Jan 2026 · 285pp · 100,897 words
away from my wife for a day in Vegas. I spent the rest of that day pressing a button with one hand and applying for payday loans on my phone with the other.” Back home, letters arrived demanding repayments on his debt. He started abusing cocaine and other drugs. In January 2019
No Slack: The Financial Lives of Low-Income Americans
by Michael S. Barr · 20 Mar 2012
-income households use an array of short- and longterm credit products provided by a range of institutions both formal and informal. Alternative credit products include payday loans, tax-refund anticipation 12864-01_CH01_2ndPgs.indd 6 3/23/12 11:54 AM introduction 7 loans, pawnshop loans, rent-to-own products,
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by car titles. Again, for many low-income households these sources of credit are often costly. In addition, short-term credit products, such as payday loans, are structured in a way that makes it easy for households repeatedly to overborrow, and many subprime home mortgages are structured to disguise their true
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alternative credit, depending in part on their available collateral and borrowing needs. Rather than treating each source as a substitute, LMI borrowers appear to use payday loans, pawnshops, refund anticipation loans, and other services as complementary products. Unlike loans from mainstream providers (banks and credit unions), which, when used by LMI
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more standardized disclosure of the financial implications of credit across both the mainstream and alternative financial sectors, including credit-card fees, overdraft policies, and payday loans. Such cross-sector disclosures could improve the ability of consumers to comparison-shop across functionally similar credit products. Tailored disclosures regarding the consequences of certain
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on high-cost AFS providers to conduct much of their financial business— such as cashing checks, buying money orders, paying bills, or taking out payday loans. One might think of these families as “underbanked,” in the sense that formal financial institutions are not offering them the products and services they need
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or not they have a bank account and on their available collateral. Rather than using each alternative service as a substitute, low-income borrowers use payday loans, pawnshops, refund anticipation loans, rent-to-own contracts, and other formal and informal credit services as complementary products. While payday lending services have driven
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Other AFS a Pawnshop Cash advance RAL Rent-to-own Pension cash-out Secured card Credit-card late fee Overdraft By users of payday loans By nonusers of payday loans 40 24 45 20 19 37 43 57 10 7 21 5 6 9 21 19 Source: Detroit Area Household Financial Services study
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; over 10 percent of those who were rejected by mainstream loan providers (banks, savings and loan companies, credit unions, finance and mortgage companies) seek payday loans. Although payday borrowers contribute to savings as frequently as nonborrowers, payday borrowers have lower levels of financial assets and home ownership rates than nonpayday borrowers
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stores, refund anticipation loans, money orders, and layaway. Pawnshop Refund anticipation loans Rent-to-own Layaway Cash advance Overdraft Cash out pension Any AFSa Payday loan Refund anticipation loan Table 2-10. Correlation Matrix of Alternative Financial Services Usage 0.105 0.144 0.021 0.306 Layaway 0.193 0
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meet their expenses, it is possible that their prior spending on nonnecessities crowded out spending on necessities and thus led to high-cost borrowing through payday loans. Future research would need to include data on consumption patterns to better understand these borrowing decisions. Respondents who use payday lenders often use them
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. Family Finances: Evidence from the 1998 and 2001 Survey of Consumer Finances.” Federal Reserve Bulletin 89 (January): 1–32. Bair, Sheila. 2005. Low-Cost Payday Loans: Opportunities and Obstacles. Report prepared for the Annie E. Casey Foundation. Amherst: University of Massachusetts, Isenberg School of Management (www.aecf.org/upload/publicationfiles/fes3622h334
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(AFS) sector in the United States has grown tremendously during the past two decades. Not only have the number of outlets providing check-cashing services, payday loans, and pawnshop loans increased, but also the dollar volume of transactions occurring in the AFS sector has increased (Caskey 1994; Barr 2004; Bair 2005;
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). Using pawnshops and taking credit-card cash advances are other commonly used borrowing methods (11 and 8 percent, respectively). Few survey respondents take out payday loans (3 percent). Because a bank account and proof of employment are required, most respondents may be too disadvantaged to qualify for such loans.10 Overall
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bank overdraft charges, annual credit-card fees, and cash-advance fees. Alternative financial services fees include those from using money orders, check cashers, domestic remittances, payday loans, refund anticipation loans, pawnshops, and title loans. Low- and moderate-income households face a vast array of high-fee services in both the mainstream and
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worked, medical illnesses or emergencies, changes in family composition, or other factors that can unexpectedly change income or needs. References Bair, Sheila. 2005. Low-Cost Payday Loans: Opportunities and Obstacles. Report prepared for the Annie E. Casey Foundation. Amherst: University of Massachusetts, Isenberg School of Management (aecf.org/upload/publicationfiles/fes3622h334.
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In previous three years. d. Any AFS defined as check cashing, money order, cash advance, layaway, pawnshop, tax anticipation, rent-to-own, or payday loan. the exception of payday loans, the unbanked are more likely to use a variety of alternative financial services than the banked.6 Nearly three-quarters of households have a
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moderate-income (LMI) households use short-term credit products provided by firms that operate outside the mainstream banking sector (Barr 2004, 2005). These products include payday loans, pawnshop services, refund anticipation loans (RALs), and rent-to-own. Low- and moderateincome households also access short-term credit through credit cards, as well
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disclosures that permit individuals to assess costs and benefits across differ- 2. Ronald Mann and Jim Hawkins (2007) note that the relatively high probability that payday loans will be rolled over, for example, makes it difficult for consumers, even those who understand the finance charge and APR disclosures, to make an
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alternative credit, depending in part on their available collateral and borrowing needs. Rather than treating each source as a substitute, LMI borrowers appear to use payday loans, pawnshops, refund anticipation loans, and other services as complementary products. Unlike loans from mainstream providers (banks and credit unions), which, when used by LMI
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substantive restrictions on payday lenders in the so-called Talent-Nelson amendment to the 2007 defense authorization bill, which caps the legal APR on payday loans to armed forces members and their families at 36 percent.10 The justification for the law’s limitation to military personnel was that it would
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time of the amendment’s passage, stated that they would voluntarily cease lending to these individuals.12 The extent to which interest-rate caps on payday loans limit overall access to credit is open to dispute. Michael Stegman and Robert Faris (2003), for example, point out that prohibiting payday lending might
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barr, jane k. dokko, and benjamin j. keys were unavailable (CCC 2007). Other research, however, suggests that the typical payday borrower has few alternatives to payday loans and appreciates their convenience (Elliehausen and Lawrence 2001). Until recently, state regulation of payday lending was hampered by partnerships between payday lenders and out-of
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As states had no authority to regulate the lending practices of national or out-of-state banks, they were powerless to prevent lenders from offering payday loans with interest rates far exceeding state limits. Since then, federal bank regulators have effectively shut down these arrangements through their safetyand-soundness supervisory authorities.
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. Financial Institution Letter FIL-81-2010 (www.fdic.gov/news/news/ financial/2010/fil10081.pdf). Feltner, Tom, and Marva Williams. 2004. “New Terms for Payday Loans: High Cost Lenders Change Loan Terms to Evade Illinois Consumer Protections.” Report 25. Chicago: Woodstock Institute (http://woodstockinst.org/document/alert_26.pdf). Flannery, Mark
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). ———. 2011. Handbook for Authorized IRS E-File Providers of Individual Income Tax Returns. Publication 1345. U.S. Department on the Treasury. Johnson, Creola. 2002. “Payday Loans: Shrewd Business or Predatory Lending?” Minnesota Law Review 87:1–152. King, Uriah, and Leslie Parrish. 2007. Springing the Debt Trap: Rate Caps Are Only
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Services Litigation Institute, edited by Alan S. Kaplinsky and others, 41–64. New York: Practicing Law Institute. Skiba, Martin Paige, and Jeremy Tobacman. 2008. “Do Payday Loans Cause Bankruptcy?” Unpublished manuscript (February 19) (www.economics.ox.ac.uk/members/jeremy.tobacman/ papers/rd.pdf). Stegman, Michael A., and Robert Faris. 2003. “
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of statistical precision makes it impossible to tell how the distribution of alternative services use differs between filers and nonfilers, the point estimates suggest that payday loans account for a large part of the difference between filers and nonfilers in the use of alternative financial services. 3. Alternative financial services include
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an illiquid asset is valued by dynamically inconsistent individuals, this welfare improvement should be weighed against the temptation of high-cost borrowing opportunities such as payday loans, credit cards with high interest and fees, and refund anticipation loans.24 Indeed, excessively large amounts of overwithholding may exacerbate dynamically inconsistent individuals’ tendencies
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include a six-month consumer loan with direct deposit and direct debit, using relationship banking and automated payment systems to provide an alternative to costly payday loans. With direct deposit of income and direct debit of interest and principal due, the loan should be relatively costless to service and relatively low-
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should be more manageable for consumers living paycheck to paycheck and would quite likely lead to less repeated borrowing undertaken to stay current on past payday loans. The federal government made some progress toward these objectives over the past couple of years. The Treasury Department launched a pilot program in January
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power element, human behavior, 250–52 Interest rates: broker correlations, 156, 157, 173–75, 266; market-consumer bias conflicts, 252–53; pawnshop regulation, 139–40; payday loan regulation, 137, 138; race-related patterns, 157, 167–72, 173, 265; refund anticipation loans, 140–41, 142 Jackson, Howell, 173 Keys, Benjamin, 181 Knowledge
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Republic Bank & Trust, 141–42 Retirement savings, 5–6, 17, 42, 253 Risk tolerance variable, in portfolio allocation model, 222–23, 225–26, 232 Rollovers, payday loans, 48–49, 137 Rule vs. score changes, behaviorally informed policymaking: overview, 252–57; credit card regulation, 269–70; mortgage regulation, 257–67; savings programs,
The Unbanking of America: How the New Middle Class Survives
by Lisa Servon · 10 Jan 2017 · 279pp · 76,796 words
check cashers, payday lenders, and other alternative financial-services providers. They were curious about how things worked in other places and shocked to learn that payday loans were illegal in the state of New York. In fact, most storefront payday lenders also do everything check cashers do. The primary difference is that
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does it well. But even though Check Center pays her more than minimum wage, it’s not enough to absorb unexpected expenses like car repairs. Payday loans are perhaps the most hotly debated topic in the area of consumer financial services. Consumer advocates vehemently oppose these loans; they object to what they
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the demand part of the story. Real wages have declined, the welfare state has shrunk, and credit markets have contracted, creating a greater demand for payday loans. There are more payday lending stores than there are McDonald’s restaurants and Starbucks shops combined. This statistic is even more impressive when you realize
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a time when banks and other traditional financial institutions failed to provide the small-dollar loans that the displaced people needed. Another study found that payday loans helped borrowers manage their money in the event of a financial setback, such as an unexpected bill for dental care, a reduction in work hours
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and women who find themselves in a financial bind. Defense leaders argue that high interest rates and fees contribute to cyclical borrowing and that marketing payday loans to young, inexperienced service members can have negative implications for their careers. Among navy personnel, financial issues are the cause of 80 percent of security
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a borrower can have, requiring cooling-off periods, and allowing storefront but not online lending. In Florida, for example, borrowers can take out only one payday loan at a time; the loans are tracked through a statewide database. Colorado enacted legislation in 2010 that bans “lump sum” loans—those that must be
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—up to six thousand dollars for returning customers. Like the Build card and KeyBank’s new revolving line of credit, Oportún’s loans compete with payday loans on price, and they prioritize transparency, service, and the kind of relationships that most banks and credit card providers no longer invest in. Two important
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://www.creditcards.com/credit-card-news/interest-rate-report-100114-up-2121.php 5. PAYDAY LOANS: MAKING THE BEST OF POOR OPTIONS 77 Payday loans are illegal: For the number of states where payday loans are illegal, see Pew Charitable Trusts, “State Payday Loan Regulation and Usage Rates” (Washington, DC: Pew, July 11, 2012). http://www.pewtrusts.org
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Lenders: Heroes or Villains?” Journal of Financial Economics, vol. 102, no. 1 (October 2011); Bart Wilson et al., “An Experimental Analysis of the Demand for Payday Loans,” Social Science Research Network, April 28, 2010; Dean Karlan and Jonathan Zinman, “Expanding Credit Access: Using Randomized Supply Decisions to Estimate the Impacts,” Review of
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or Villains?” Eighty-five percent of borrowers: The Center for Financial Services Innovation surveyed payday borrowers and grouped them according to why individuals took out payday loans. The researchers found that about two-thirds of the loans were taken out to fill a single need. The four most common reasons were (1
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that also looked at groupings of borrowers, Clarity Services, a credit reporting agency that focuses on the subprime market, used in-house data to segment payday loans into the following groups: emerging, lower income and credit disinterested, prior prime, and perpetually unstable. See Ranney and Cook, “Changing Patterns and Behaviors of Unsecured
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. The proposal it circulated for comment in March 2015 included a rule designed to prevent consumers who use short- and longer-term credit products like payday loans, auto-title loans, and certain high-cost installment loans from becoming over-indebted by requiring borrowers to determine consumers’ ability to repay before loans are
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to verify borrowers’ income, significant financial obligations, and borrowing history. The rules also aim to protect consumers from some of the costly consequences of using payday loans and related products by restricting lenders’ ability to collect payment from consumers’ bank accounts. Lenders would be required to provide written notice to consumers three
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concerned.” how long their child was taking: Arnett and Schwab, “Clark University Poll.” 110 Seventy percent said they: Isaac Saurez, “Report Shows Millennials Turn to Payday Loans,” Loans.org, June 21, 2013. http://loans.org/payday/news/report-millennials-turn-cash-advance-92906 Half of all millennials: US Chamber of Commerce Foundation
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largest banks: Viacom Media Networks, “Millennial Disruption Index,” Scratch,2014. http://www.millennialdisruptionindex.com Eighty-three percent of millennials: Saurez, “Report Shows Millennials Turn to Payday Loans.” 112 A whopping 94 percent: Jackson Mueller, “Millennials: A New Approach to Handling Money,” Newsweek, February 9, 2015. http://www.newsweek.com/millennials-new-approach
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). http://www.thinkfinance.com/press/news-events/2012-05-17.php a Forbes magazine article: J. Maureen Henderson, “The Surprising and Smart Reason Millennials Love Payday Loans and Prepaid Debit Cards,” Forbes, February 22, 2014. Sixty-three percent of respondents: Think Finance, “Millennials Use Alternative Financial Services Regardless of Their Income Level
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”; Henderson, “The Surprising and Smart Reason Millennials Love Payday Loans and Prepaid Debit Cards.” 7. BORROWING AND SAVING UNDER THE RADAR 126 Ardener described how: Shirley Ardener, “Microcredit, Money Transfers, Women, and the Cameroon Diaspora
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York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2015. El Issa, Erin. “American Household Credit Card Debt Study.” nerdwallet.com, 2015. Elliehausen, Gregory. “An Analysis of Consumers’ Use of Payday Loans.” Financial Services Research Program Monograph, no. 41 (January 2009). Ellis, Blake. “Nine Most Annoying Bank Fees.” CNN Money, June 16, 2011. eMarketer. “Millennials Prefer to
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Reserve Bank of Boston Working Paper No. 14-8. Boston: Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, May 2014. Fusaro, Marc Anthony, and Patricia J. Cirillo. “Do Payday Loans Trap Consumers in a Cycle of Debt?” Social Science Research Network, November 16, 2011. Garcia, Jose. “Borrowing to Make Ends Meet: The Rapid Growth of
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/ Havas Worldwide. “The New Consumer and the Sharing Economy: Prosumer Report.” New York: Havas, 2014. Henderson, J. Maureen. “The Surprising and Smart Reason Millennials Love Payday Loans and Prepaid Debit Cards.” Forbes, February 22, 2014. The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. “Pulling It Together: The Most Popular Provision in the ACA?” Washington
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, Use, and Purpose of the 36 Percent Interest Rate Cap.” Washington, DC: National Consumer Law Center, April 2013. Saurez, Isaac. “Report Shows Millennials Turn to Payday Loans.” Loans.org, June 21, 2013. Schectman, Joel. “The South Bronx Is a Banking Wasteland.” New York Daily News, March 10, 2009. Schumpeter, Joseph Alois. The
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Seigel Bernand, Tara. “Make a Resolution to Budget? Here Are Some Apps to Help.” New York Times, January 3, 2014. Servon, Lisa. “What Good Are Payday Loans?” The New Yorker, February 13, 2014. Shin, Laura. “Why McDonald’s Employee Budget Has Everyone up in Arms.” Forbes, July 18, 2013. Silver-Greenberg, Jessica
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. “Major Banks Aid in Payday Loans Banned by States.” New York Times, February 23, 2013. –––. “Over a Million Denied Bank Accounts for Past Errors. New York Times, July 30, 2013. Silver
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. Silver-Greenberg, Jessica, and Robert Gebeloff. “Arbitration Everywhere, Stacking the Deck of Justice.” New York Times, October 31, 2015. Skiba, Paige, and Jeremy Tobacman. “Do Payday Loans Cause Bankruptcy?” Working paper, February 19, 2008. Sommeiller, Estelle, and Mark Price. “The Increasingly Unequal States of America: Income Inequality by State, 1917 to 2012
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Average Credit Card Debt.” CreditCards.com, 2015. Wilson, Bart, David Findlay, James Meehan, Charissa Welford, and Karl Schurter. “An Experimental Analysis of the Demand for Payday Loans.” Working paper, April 1, 2008. Wolkowitz, Eva. “2013 Financially Underserved Market Size.” Chicago: Center for Financial Services Inclusion, December 10, 2014. Woodruff, Mandi. “How Mint
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., 67–68 determining, 74–75, 150, 212n75 income and, 48–50 innovative models for, 145, 149–52 lack of, 68, 150 medical debt and, 59 payday loans and, 87–88, 93 rebuilding, 115 ROSCAs and, 161 credit unions, 82, 172 creditworthiness, 67–68, 73, 113 criminal prosecution, 95, 98, 99 CRL.
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, 207n65, 208n67, 224n163 credit cards and, 71–72, 210n70, 211n71 history of, 64–65 illegal, 127 informal savings and loans, 132 P2P lending and, 113 payday loans and, 81–82 Internal Revenue Service (IRS), 16, 51, 131, 171 Internet banking, 111–15, 153–54 loans, 97–99 investment banking, 26–27, 106
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–12 fees, 15, 18, 20–21 history of, 12–14 loan sharks and, 134–35 overview of, 4–6 research approach to, 180–83 rollover payday loans, 80–83, 95 Roosevelt, Franklin, 51 rotating savings and credit associations (ROSCAs), 124–34, 138–42, 161 S Santucci, Larry, 212n75 savings, xiv–xv,
How the Other Half Banks: Exclusion, Exploitation, and the Threat to Democracy
by Mehrsa Baradaran · 5 Oct 2015 · 424pp · 121,425 words
after many recent failures and mergers because of the financial crisis.62 In other words, the 40 percent of the population who must rely on payday loans can be saved by fewer than two hundred nonprofit credit unions. However, their financial struggles should not be allowed to diminish the CDCUs’ good work
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$300 in cash. In those states where payday lending is prohibited, title loans take their place. Title loans emerged in the 1990s and are essentially payday loans secured by collateral—the title to the borrower’s car. (The loans are often configured this way in order to avoid prohibitions on payday lending
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a college degree, and is between twenty-five and forty-four years old. Single parents, blacks, Hispanics, and recent immigrants were more likely to use payday loans than other groups. Payday advance customers are also relatively educated, according to one survey (74.4 percent had a high school diploma or some college
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the choice to borrow, as 37 percent of borrowers said they have been in such a difficult financial situation that they have taken out a payday loan on any terms offered. To pay off their loans, many of these borrowers (40 percent) turned to friends or family, sold or pawned personal possessions
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, or took out another type of loan. One in six has used a tax refund to eliminate payday loan debt.59 Nor is the borrowing frivolous. Surveys reveal that loans are used to pay for food or rent, but the budget shortfalls are likely
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and receive a loan from the bank that is using your money to supply others with loans and other functions.” —D. M. from Alliance, OH “Payday loans have helped several times when bills and unexpected circumstances arise. The limits are great, not too high so an individual can keep it under control
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from Birmingham, AL “Although many are predatory and charge way too much, it is the only type of loan I can get right now, so Payday Loans are something I need access to. Regulation to these could prove troublesome.” —Thomas from Dana Point, CA “I am a commission based employee for the
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doesn’t solve the underlying problem, which is often poor money management.”72 Under “7 Brainless Borrowing Behaviors,” Sheyna Steiner lists the first three as payday loans, car title loans, and tax refund anticipation loans.73 This moral outrage about credit, however, is usually only directed at the poor or middle class
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up front. Research has shown that payday borrowers who have “credit card liquidity,” or the ability to borrow on a credit card, still opt for payday loans.92 And yet, despite the informal façade, fringe banks are highly profitable corporations whose rigid practices come into play as soon as debts become due
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is a wide spectrum of state regulation of payday lending. States can regulate interest rates, terms, and various other dimensions of payday loans. Many states have chosen to not regulate payday loans or to set high maximum APRs. In fact, the maximum rates allowed by law have steadily increased over the last decade, with
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food budget and needs to feed her kids? Many community leaders and financial advocates to the poor give presentations to groups about the dangers of payday loans. Inevitably, they are faced with the question: What if I need to borrow money? Where should I go? They have expressed frustration that they usually
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, people are less poor) or fair credit becomes more widely available, variations on high-interest small loans will keep popping up. Because those who need payday loans are already struggling financially, there is some evidence that prohibiting these loans may actually hurt consumers. Paige Skiba found that check bouncing, customer complaints, and
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Chapter 7 bankruptcies all increased significantly in Georgia after payday loans were prohibited in 2004.118 Donald Morgan and Michael Strain also used data from Hawaii and found similar results. Pew found that if individuals were
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faced with a shortfall and payday loans were unavailable, 81 percent of borrowers said they would have to cut back on expenses such as food.119 For years, economists have tried to
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study the effects of payday loans on their borrowers. After a recent review of all the economic research attempting to answer the big question, “Do payday lenders, on net, exacerbate or
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. The more relevant question is whether there are better, less costly, alternatives. LENDING MARKETS AND INTERMEDIATION The question of whether the current high costs of payday loans are justified is another difficult and perhaps unanswerable question. The payday lending industry claims to be serving the needs of the poor and promoting “the
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time, the average finance charge on payday loans … gravitated upwards toward this ceiling.” This pattern, suggest the researchers, is consistent with Nobel Prize winner Thomas Schelling’s theory of implicit collusion around pricing
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the highest caps pay the most. Lenders can charge the maximum allowable because, despite economic theory, market competition has not worked to lower interest rates. Payday loan customers come in desperation. Almost 40 percent of borrowers admit that when they need these loans, they are not “price-sensitive”; they would agree to
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“a case study designed to illustrate how banks can profitably offer affordable small-dollar loans as an alternative to high-cost credit products, such as payday loans and fee-based overdraft protection.”59 Unfortunately, the program ended up illustrating something else entirely. The Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Consumer Credit of the
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the maximum interest and fees allowed: 36 percent APR and 20 percent charges on cashed checks.62 Observers noted that these products were much like payday loans and check cashers. Spelling further doom, several congressmen expressed outrage that mainstream banks should have to take on the risk of lending to the poor
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. When banks are drowning, the government throws them a lifesaver, through cheap credit, so that they can live another day. When the poor are drowning, payday loans are like millstones of crushing debt around their necks. Postal banking could offer to struggling Americans the same type of government credit already given to
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/04/20/magazine/how-payday-lenders-prey-upon-the-poor-and-the-courts-dont-help.html?_r=1. 5. Koran Addo, “Lawmakers Eyeing Limits on Payday Loans,” Advocate, March 30, 2014, accessed March 13, 2015, www.theadvocate.com/home/8685502-125/lawmakers-eyeing-limits-on-payday. 6. According to the CFPB, over
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80 percent of payday loans are followed by another payday loan within fourteen days; half are in a sequence of at least ten loans. And loan sizes go up with each subsequent loan, as
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12, 2013, accessed March 17, 2015, www.ncsl.org/research/financial-services-and-commerce/payday-lending-state-statutes.aspx; Consumer Federation of America, “Payday Loan Consumer Information: Legal Status of Payday Loans by State,” accessed September 29, 2014, www.paydayloaninfo.org/state-information. 38. The CFPB sample size was 12 million loans in 2013
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, 2014, accessed March 17, 2015, files.consumerfinance.gov/f/201403_cfpb_report_payday-lending.pdf. 40. Ibid., 12. 41. Center for Responsible Lending, “Fast Facts: Payday Loans,” accessed September 29, 2014, www.responsiblelending.org/payday-lending/tools-resources/fast-facts.html. 42. Pew Charitable Trusts, “Payday Lending in America: Who Borrows, Where
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, accessed March 17, 2015, www.responsiblelending.org/state-of-lending/reports/7-Car-Title-Loans.pdf. 48. Ibid., 16 (explaining the difference between title and payday loans). See also Delvin Davis et al., “Driven to Disaster: Car-Title Lending and Its Impact on Consumers,” Center for Responsible Lending, February 28, 2013, 2
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of Fringe Banking,” Journal of Regional Science 54 (2014): 690. 58. Pew Charitable Trusts, “Payday Lending in America, Report 2: How Borrowers Choose and Repay Payday Loans,” February 2013, 6, accessed March 17, 2015, www.pewtrusts.org/~/media/Assets/2013/02/20/Pew_Choosing_Borrowing_Payday_Feb2013-(1).pdf. 59. Ibid., 7
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-thirds of the matched sample has at least $1000 of credit card liquidity on the day they take their first payday loans, much more than the typical $300 payday loan. For a two-week payday loan with a finance charge of 18 percent, using credit card liquidity first would save these households $300 … if the credit
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card APR is 18 percent.” Sumit Agarwal, Paige M. Skiba, and Jeremy Tobacman, “Payday Loans and Credit Cards: New Liquidity and Credit Scoring Puzzles?,” NBER working paper no. 14659, January 2009, accessed March 17, 2015, www.nber.org/papers/w14659
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Banking Committee, in Consumer Financial Services Litigation,” PLI Corporate Law and Practice (2001), 40. 96. “These results suggest that the effect of restricting access to payday loans on overall short-term, expensive borrowing is muted by the continued availability of overdrafts and late bill payment; i.e., that overdrafts and late bill
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payment are imperfect substitutes for payday loans.” Jonathan Zinman, “Restricting Consumer Credit Access: Household Survey Evidence on Effects around the Oregon Rate Cap,” Journal of Banking and Finance 34 (2010): 546, 551
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. New York State Department of Financial Services, “Press Release: Governor Cuomo Announces Department of Financial Services Notifies Debt Collectors not to Seek Collection on Illegal Payday Loans,” February 22, 2013, accessed March 17, 2015, www.dfs.ny.gov/about/press2013/pr1302221.htm. 100. See, e.g., Benjamin M. Lawsky, “Letter to Governor
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with John Oliver, HBO, August 10, 2014, accessed March 18, 2015, www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDylgzybWAw. 117. Ibid. 118. Paige M. Skiba, “Regulation of Payday Loans: Misguided?,” Washington and Lee Law Review 69 (2012): 1023, 1038. 119. Pew Charitable Trusts, “Payday Lending in America: Who Borrows, Where They Borrow, and Why
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Credit Access: Evidence from the Payday Lending Market,” Quarterly Journal of Economics 126, 1 (2011): 517–555. 122. Paige Marta Skiba and Jeremy Tobacman, “Do Payday Loans Cause Bankruptcy?,” Vanderbilt Law and Economics Research Paper No. 11–13, 1, 4, 14 (2009), accessed September 29, 2014, papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm
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18, 2015, www.fdic.gov/bank/analytical/cfr/2005/wp2005/cfrwp_2005-09_flannery_samolyk.pdf. 132. Ibid., 4. 133. Ibid. 134. Robert B. Avery, “Payday Loans versus Pawnshops: The Effects of Loan Fee Limits on Household Use,” Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, May 13, 2011, accessed March 18
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Research Department, 2010, 1, accessed March 15, 2015, www.kansascityfed.org/PUBLICAT/RESWKPAP/PDF/rwp10-11.pdf. 47. Tom Gallagher, “Microcredit Lending: An Alternative to Payday Loans for the Working Poor,” National Catholic Reporter, August 21, 2009, 27. 48. As late as 2008, this bipartisan support was evident. That year, thirty senators
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Board, 41 Federal Reserve Bank of New York (FRBNY), 54, 60 Federal Savings and Loan Insurance Corporation (FSLIC), 89, 92 Fees: for unbanked, 1; on payday loans, 2; on checking accounts, 141–142; effects of, 143; prohibition of, 145; as source of income, 148; for prepaid cards, 174–175; charged by Wal
The Quiet Coup: Neoliberalism and the Looting of America
by Mehrsa Baradaran · 7 May 2024 · 470pp · 158,007 words
poor. Arbitration clauses are prevalent in employment contracts, especially in nonunionized workplaces and gig-worker arrangements. They are standard in “fringe lending” credit arrangements like payday loans, title loans, installment loans, and subprime loans. More than 90 percent of these debt contracts also include a ban on class action suits. Those most
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, CCRF gave a grant and shared data with the Dartmouth economist Jonathan Zinman, whose research incidentally concluded that states like Oregon that managed to ban payday loans actually harmed consumers.32 Harms included increased bank overdraft fees and late bill payment fees—that is, harms entailed by the condition of not having
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,” Northwestern University Law Review 115, no. 6 (2020): 1505. 32. Stephen J. Dubner, “Are Payday Loans Really as Evil as People Say?” Freakonomics.com, April 6, 2016. 33. Joe Valenti and Eliza Schultz, “How Predatory Debt Traps Threaten Vulnerable Families,” Center
Shortchanged: Life and Debt in the Fringe Economy
by Howard Karger · 9 Sep 2005 · 299pp · 83,854 words
, I asked the clerk how these refunds worked. Through a small hole in the bulletproof glass we chatted about tax refunds, check cashing, and payday loans. After hearing the details I was taken aback. While I understood the economics of higher risk and higher cost, the abuse of unregulated market power
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are increasingly lining the streets of American communities. Chapter 5 explores cash loans. One of the fastest-growing segments of the fringe economy is the payday loan industry. Despite the keen competition among payday lending corporations, the spectacular rise in consumer debt—around $9 trillion in 2004—portends a rosy future
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service. While payday lenders, pawnshops, and check cashers can boast high earnings, the biggest revenues come from housing. Simply put, it would take 500 payday loans of $200 each to equal one $100,000 home mortgage. Not surprisingly, the rapaciousness of the fringe economy is clearly evident in the housing area
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total transactions worth over $8 billion,7 cashed approximately 13.2 million checks with a face value of $5.1 billion, made 1.9 million payday loans and earned $77 million in fees, completed 9.7 million bill-payment transactions, made 2 million wire transfers (worth $581 million) and sold 8
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, excessive markup in prices, and the socialization of losses among a class of borrowers. Put another way, enough people will make good on their payday loans to compensate for the bad ones—not difficult, given the extremely high industry-wide profit margins. In short, industry claims about the high risks associated
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former recipients into low-wage work, they also allow fringe economy businesses to assume some welfare-state functions, such as providing emergency cash assistance through payday loans, pawns, and other short-term credit. Hence, the fringe economy has taken on the functions of a privatized—and expensive—welfare state by offering
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sales in 2004, with almost $3.2 trillion of that in the United States alone.27 The use of the Internet for mortgages, home refinancing, payday loans, debt-management plans, credit-repair services, and tax refund loans has been exploding. For example in 2003, 9% of all mortgages—$150 billion—were
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a proliferation of online payday lenders with names like Sonic Cash, MyPaydayLoan.com, WeGiveCash.com, PayDay OK, the Cash Station, CheckAdvance.com, and National Payday Loans. Some of these online lenders offer bigger loans than states allow—up to $2,500—and charge interest rates exceeding state usury caps, sometimes in
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65 Anyone who has ever struggled with poverty knows how extremely expensive it is to be poor. –James A. Baldwin 5 Storefront Loans: Pawnshops, Payday Loans, and Tax Refund Lenders All of us need cash at one time or another, and the cost of raising it depends on who’s asking
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the rapid growth of the industry8 The pawnshop industry is evolving from a monoline (single consumer product) to a multiservice industry, one that also provides payday loans and other financial services. The major driving forces in this transformation are the crowded pawnshop market and the pricing pressure exerted by large discount stores
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and no future debt obligation. In comparison, payday advances create a debt trap that allows interest obligations and a borrower’s future indebtedness to grow. Payday Loans Ralph Johnson lives in Bloomington, Indiana, and is employed as an assistant manager for a convenience store chain. He earns $12 an hour, plus occasional
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check in the amount of $217. That is an annual percentage rate in excess of 800%. It’s obvious tremendous returns are possible!1874 HOW PAYDAY LOANS WORK Payday loans are relatively small, and the average is $300—although loans of $500 to $1,000 are becoming more common—with a loan period of
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gives lenders significant leverage, because most borrowers will repay their loan when faced with the threat of criminal prosecution and penalties. Nevertheless, collection tactics for payday loans can be aggressive. If a borrower can’t repay a loan, it may be turned over to a collection agency, which leads to a
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place of employment. Emphasize to them that this U.S. Marshal will first ask for their immediate supervisor!”23 THE SPIRALING CYCLE OF PAYDAY LOAN DEBT The real danger in payday loans doesn’t lie in a single transaction where the borrower is exploited; instead, it lies in creating a spiraling cycle of debt
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customers receive 8-13 loans a year. These chronic borrowers form the backbone of payday-industry profits. For example, borrowers who receive 5 or more payday loans a year account for 91% of payday lenders’ revenues, and 56% of this revenue is generated by customers who take out 13 or more
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loans a year.2777 Payday loans exacerbate credit problems by postponing the inevitable for two weeks at an exorbitant cost. The Southwest Center for Economic Integrity found that 60% of payday
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two-week loan period, and 30% took more than seven weeks to repay it.28 Other studies found that 75% of customers renew their payday loans.29 Some borrowers trapped in the debt cycle get loans from one payday lender to repay another and end up with multiple renewal fees. About
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for those who wrote the 600 million bounced checks in 2003,32 it’s cold comfort for borrowers faced with paying $900 for a $500 payday loan rolled over for two months. CASH LEASING The most expensive loans are those obtained through cash leasing. Lenders use radio and print advertising to
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state and federal regulations. Consumer groups charge that these programs, which include fees as high as $35 for each overdraft, are essentially high-interest payday loans aimed at working-class customers.39 Tax Preparation and Refund Loans Tax time is feeding time for the fringe economy. From December to April, the
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a model that other states should consider. Finally, borrowers should not be prosecuted for using “bad checks” for payday loans. Payday lenders are not duped in accepting bad checks, since they know beforehand that postdated checks have insufficient funds to cover them.55 In that
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they regulate from continuing rent-a-charter relationships with payday lenders. In March 2005 the FDIC adopted restrictive guidelines, requiring banks to ensure that payday loans aren’t given to customers with outstanding loans for more than three of the previous 12 months. It is too early to assess the impact
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to $1,000, the maximum amount that can be cashed every seven days. (I wouldn’t be surprised if Wal-Mart were soon to offer payday loans.) 7-Eleven stores provide check cashing through ATM terminals (generally charging about 2% of a check’s value), plus money orders and transfers. Mainstream
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lot of money. And they do it religiously.95 On the positive side, Janis didn’t take on intractable debt—as she would with payday loans or credit card purchases—and she could voluntarily return the rentals when the payments became unaffordable. Nor did she face a potential lawsuit and hounding
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is to become full-service financial centers. In time, these centers could well offer a complete line of financial products, including pawns, auto title and payday loans, auxiliary financial services, auto and home insurance, tax preparation and RALs, secured credit cards, telecommunication services, and even large-scale subprime lending for vehicles
…
RTO transactions are credit versus lease transactions may be largely academic, since even in fringe economy areas where interest rates are spelled out, such as payday loans, consumers have not been deterred from using the services, nor have those disclosures hampered the growth of the industry. As noted throughout this book,
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can develop consumer lending models that will be adopted by the commercial banking sector. Some credit unions have also developed affordable alternatives to high-cost payday loans. For example, they offer their members up to $300 at an 18% interest rate for up to six months, as long as the members
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lots by advertising second- and third-chance financing. Mainstream banks are offering secured high-interest credit cards to consumers with checkered credit histories and providing payday loans disguised as bounced-check protection or cash advances. Traditional mortgage companies are writing subprime and even predatory loans directly or through their affiliates. Growing numbers
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of America, Quick Facts about FiSCA. 9 ACE Cash Express, 2004 Annual Report. Although this number may be inflated, since many check cashers also offer payday loans, it doesn’t include rent-to-own stores, fringe economy used-car lots, tax refund lenders, auto title pawns, and pawnshops. Adding those sectors
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Lucy Lazarony, “Credit Card Companies Sidestep Usury Laws,” Bankrate, March 20, 2002. 42 Consumer Action, Annual Credit Card Survey, 2003. CHAPTER 5: STOREFRONT LOANS: PAWNSHOPS, PAYDAY LOANS, AND TAX REFUND LENDERS 1 John Caskey, Fringe Banking (New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 1994), 5-9. 2 Ibid. 3 Fannie Mae Foundation, Low-Income
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,” March 24, 2003. CHAPTER 6: ALTERNATIVE SERVICES: CHECK CASHERS, THE RENT-TO-OWN INDUSTRY, AND TELECOMMUNICATIONS 1 While most large check cashers also offer payday loans, the two have been separated here because of their different functions—check cashing is not a loan service. 2 Anne Kim, “The Unbanked and the
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carriers), 100, 101 Clinton, Bill, 22, 206 CNW Marketing Research, 150–151 Coalition for Responsible Credit Practices, 191 collateral-based cash loans, 66 collection tactics, payday loans, 75 college students, 54–56 Colston, Hal, 170–171 Community Advantage home-loan secondary market program, 211 Community Financial Services Association of America (CFSAA), 77
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, 58–59, 61 debt settlement, 187–188 Get-A-Fone, 100–101 inequality of, 106–107 mortgage, 115–116, 119, 123 pawnbrokers, 67–68 payday loans, 73–74 post-paid cell phone service, 102–103 refinancing/home equity, 120 regulating, 142 FICO (Fair Isaac Company) score, 46–48, 115 file segregation
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168 pawnshops, 8, 11, 66–72 Payday Alternative Loan (PAL), 210 payday lenders, 7–8, 53 average customers of, 19 customers, 24 online, 26–27 payday loans, 6, 72–79, 208 risk management, 11 penalty rates (credit cards), 51 personal bankruptcy, 180 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA), 23 Pew
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bank accounts, 19 borrowers using NFCC agencies, 179 consumer debt, 31–32 credit card use, 44–45 federal debt, 31 minimum wage earners, 21–22 payday loans, 77 personal savings, 32 poverty-level Americans, 21 rent-to-own customers, 103 subprime mortgages, 113–114 two-income family earnings, 33 uninsured motorists,
Scarcity: The True Cost of Not Having Enough
by Sendhil Mullainathan · 3 Sep 2014 · 305pp · 89,103 words
out a loan to pay back the first lender. She kept getting in deeper. Within six months, Sandra was paying rollover fees on six different payday loans. In June 2003, Sandra and her husband were close to being evicted from the apartment they had lived in for six years. Sandra wrote, “Basically
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(12,000) and Starbucks (almost 9,000) locations combined. Sandra’s practice of rolling over and accumulating fees is also common. Three-quarters of all payday loan volume comes from rollovers, ultimately accounting for $3.5 billion in fees each year. Why do those strapped for cash take on such extreme loans
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businesses prey on low-income individuals; they fuel discussions about the myopia of the poor and the need for financial education. Consumer advocates bemoan the payday loan industry as predatory and push to ban these loans. Others point out that when you’re in real need, a loan, however expensive, can be
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this debate. We raise it because it provides an important window on scarcity. The problem is more than just with payday loans. The cash-strapped borrow in many ways, not just through payday loans. They “borrow” by paying their bills late. About one of every six families in the lowest income quintile (the bottom
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all the worthy goals that do not matter when you’re speeding to the hospital, the long-term economics of the payday loan do not matter at that moment. This is why payday loans are so attractive—people turn to them when they are tunneling on putting out a fire. And their best feature
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and effectively. Their worst feature—that the fire will return in the future, possibly enlarged—is obscured. Of course, none of this is unique to payday loans or to money. Think about putting off answering an e-mail. When we take on this time debt, we focus on the benefits: “Right now
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to the next one—the poor earned 60 percent more points; the rich were unaffected. In another version of the experiment, we re-created a payday loan trap akin to Sandra’s experience. The Family Feud poor rolled over the loans just like payday borrowers. Their debt would start getting repaid on
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us shortsighted. We ignore the (future) health cost of eating out when we are busy. We do not think about the implications of paying back payday loans (in the future) when we are tight on cash. We do not consider the (future) benefits of keeping our offices clean when working on a
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this very basic impulse creates more scarcity. This is not just the story of the vendors; it is also the story of Sandra and her payday loans from chapter 5. Though this mechanism is powerful, the psychology of scarcity makes it hard to get out of the trap for other reasons as
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we often fail to appreciate this when presenting information. This was illustrated in a study of payday loans conducted by economists Marianne Bertrand and Adair Morse. The researchers divided customers who were about to take a payday loan into two groups. One group was shown a table that listed the annual effective interest rate
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need to take out of your pocket. What Bertrand and Morse found was that far fewer customers took the payday loan when they were shown the cost in dollars. Those who come for payday loans are accustomed to seeing, thinking about, and needing dollars. Interest rates, by contrast, are exotic financial instruments that few
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a stark example. Many workers, as we saw in chapter 5, resort to payday loans. Yet it’s worth observing that a payday loan is often simply a loan against work that has already been done. The worker who takes a payday loan halfway through the pay cycle has already earned half her paycheck. The need
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S. Benartzi, “Save More Tomorrow™: Using Behavioral Economics to Increase Employee Saving,” Journal of Political Economy 112, no. S1 (2004): S164–87. a study of payday loans: M. Bertrand and A. Morse, “Information Disclosure, Cognitive Biases, and Payday Borrowing,” The Journal of Finance 66, no. 6 (2011): 1865–93. God’s gift
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beer bees behavioral economics Benihana restaurants Berra, Yogi Bertrand, Marianne bills automatic payment late payment of Bjorkegren, Dan Bohn, Roger Bolivia borrowing Family Feud and payday loans traps tunneling and See also borrowing; debt Boston bottom-up processing Bowen, Bruce brain development lateralization perception See also mind bridges Bryan, Chris buffer stock
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, Stephen creativity credit cards crop insurance crop yields culture customer service dating, online daycare deadlines benefits of focus dividend and debt in India leveraged buyout payday loans rolled-over traps tunneling and See also borrowing; loans decisions, linking and the timing of declarative memory Dempsey, Christy diabetes dichotic listening task Dickinson, Charlie
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, Walter Missouri mistakes pilot slack and MIT money behavioral economics and borrowing and myopia college financial and expertise and financial literacy education harvest and mistakes payday loans perception and savings, see savings scarcity scarcity traps slack in trade-off thinking and 2008 recession Morse, Adair mortgage low-cost forms MSN mud multitasking
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scarce resource marketing non-profit restaurants scarcity managed in slack and small businesses overconfidence oxygen packing parenting consistency in poverty and single vigilance patching patience payday loans perception performance, and arousal personality Peru pharmacology Philippines physical resources, shortage of pilot error planning fallacy plumbing politics poor behavior Portfolios of the Poor poverty
Weapons of Math Destruction: How Big Data Increases Inequality and Threatens Democracy
by Cathy O'Neil · 5 Sep 2016 · 252pp · 72,473 words
loops. But there’s one important distinction between a school district’s value-added model and, say, a WMD that scouts out prospects for extortionate payday loans. They have different payoffs. For the school district, the payoff is a kind of political currency, a sense that problems are being fixed. But for
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, predatory advertisers will promise them Viagra or Cialis, or even penis extensions. If they are short of money, offers will pour in for high-interest payday loans. If their computer is acting sludgy, it might be a virus inserted by a predatory advertiser, who will then offer to fix it. And as
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. They’re more likely to be targeting people in the poorest zip codes, with special attention to those who have clicked on an ad for payday loans or seem to be concerned with post-traumatic stress. (Combat veterans are highly recruited, in part because it’s easier to get financing for them
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available credit and higher interest rates for those who are already struggling. Much of the predatory advertising we’ve been discussing, including the ads for payday loans and for-profit colleges, is generated through such e-scores. They’re stand-ins for credit scores. But since companies are legally prohibited from using
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was Douglas Merrill’s idea. A former chief operating officer at Google, Merrill believed that he could use Big Data to calculate risk and offer payday loans at a discount. In 2009, he founded a start-up called ZestFinance. On the company web page, Merrill proclaims that “all data is credit data
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to reap the rewards. For most of them, in fact, WMDs appear to be highly effective. Entire business models, such as for-profit universities and payday loans, are built upon them. And when a software program successfully targets people desperate enough to pay 18 percent a month, those raking in the profits
…
Triple-Digit Interest Rate Payday Loads,” PBS Newshour, January 6, 2016, www.pbs.+org/+newshour/+bb/+fighting-+the-+debt-+trap-+of-+triple-+digit-+interest-+rate-+payday-+loans/. In 2015, the Federal Trade Commission: Lindsay Wise, “Feds Charge Data Broker with Selling Consumer Info to Scammers,” McClatchyDC, August 12, 2015, www.mcclatchydc.+com
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/credit-and-debit-cards/31money.html. Douglas Merrill’s idea: Steve Lohr, “Big Data Underwriting for Payday Loans,” New York Times, January 19, 2015, http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/01/19/big-data-underwriting-for-payday-loans/. On the company web page: Website ZestFinance.com, accessed January 9, 2016, www.zestfinance.com/. A
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Platform Revolution: How Networked Markets Are Transforming the Economy--And How to Make Them Work for You
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If You See Them
by Vicki Sokolik · 23 Nov 2023 · 332pp · 104,544 words
Abolish Silicon Valley: How to Liberate Technology From Capitalism
by Wendy Liu · 22 Mar 2020 · 223pp · 71,414 words
The Simple Path to Wealth: Your Road Map to Financial Independence and a Rich, Free Life
by J L Collins · 17 Jun 2016 · 194pp · 59,336 words
Future Politics: Living Together in a World Transformed by Tech
by Jamie Susskind · 3 Sep 2018 · 533pp
The Simple Path to Wealth (Revised & Expanded 2025 Edition): Your Road Map to Financial Independence and a Rich, Free Life
by JL Collins · 191pp · 66,998 words
Gigged: The End of the Job and the Future of Work
by Sarah Kessler · 11 Jun 2018 · 246pp · 68,392 words
The New Class Conflict
by Joel Kotkin · 31 Aug 2014 · 362pp · 83,464 words
Janesville: An American Story
by Amy Goldstein · 17 Apr 2017 · 364pp · 108,237 words
The Nation City: Why Mayors Are Now Running the World
by Rahm Emanuel · 25 Feb 2020 · 212pp · 69,846 words
The Capitalist Manifesto
by Johan Norberg · 14 Jun 2023 · 295pp · 87,204 words
All Day Long: A Portrait of Britain at Work
by Joanna Biggs · 8 Apr 2015 · 255pp · 92,719 words
Data and Goliath: The Hidden Battles to Collect Your Data and Control Your World
by Bruce Schneier · 2 Mar 2015 · 598pp · 134,339 words
Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value (And How to Take Advantage of It)
by William Poundstone · 1 Jan 2010 · 519pp · 104,396 words
Cities: The First 6,000 Years
by Monica L. Smith · 31 Mar 2019 · 304pp · 85,291 words
Thinking About It Only Makes It Worse: And Other Lessons From Modern Life
by David Mitchell · 4 Nov 2014 · 354pp · 99,690 words
Artificial Unintelligence: How Computers Misunderstand the World
by Meredith Broussard · 19 Apr 2018 · 245pp · 83,272 words
Automating Inequality
by Virginia Eubanks · 294pp · 77,356 words
We Are All Fast-Food Workers Now: The Global Uprising Against Poverty Wages
by Annelise Orleck · 27 Feb 2018 · 382pp · 107,150 words
Upstream: The Quest to Solve Problems Before They Happen
by Dan Heath · 3 Mar 2020
On the Run: Fugitive Life in an American City
by Alice Goffman · 30 Apr 2014 · 371pp · 110,641 words
Cogs and Monsters: What Economics Is, and What It Should Be
by Diane Coyle · 11 Oct 2021 · 305pp · 75,697 words
The Second Machine Age: Work, Progress, and Prosperity in a Time of Brilliant Technologies
by Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee · 20 Jan 2014 · 339pp · 88,732 words
Big Capital: Who Is London For?
by Anna Minton · 31 May 2017 · 169pp · 52,744 words
Meet the Frugalwoods: Achieving Financial Independence Through Simple Living
by Elizabeth Willard Thames · 6 Mar 2018 · 179pp · 59,704 words
The Costs of Connection: How Data Is Colonizing Human Life and Appropriating It for Capitalism
by Nick Couldry and Ulises A. Mejias · 19 Aug 2019 · 458pp · 116,832 words
Fair Shot: Rethinking Inequality and How We Earn
by Chris Hughes · 20 Feb 2018 · 173pp · 53,564 words
It's Not TV: The Spectacular Rise, Revolution, and Future of HBO
by Felix Gillette and John Koblin · 1 Nov 2022 · 575pp · 140,384 words
A Bit of a Stretch: The Diaries of a Prisoner
by Chris Atkins · 6 Feb 2020 · 335pp · 98,847 words
Where We Are: The State of Britain Now
by Roger Scruton · 16 Nov 2017 · 190pp · 56,531 words
The People vs Tech: How the Internet Is Killing Democracy (And How We Save It)
by Jamie Bartlett · 4 Apr 2018 · 170pp · 49,193 words
Hiding in Plain Sight: The Invention of Donald Trump and the Erosion of America
by Sarah Kendzior · 6 Apr 2020
The Lean Startup: How Today’s Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses
by Eric Ries · 13 Sep 2011 · 278pp · 83,468 words
Frugal Innovation: How to Do Better With Less
by Jaideep Prabhu Navi Radjou · 15 Feb 2015 · 400pp · 88,647 words
Gray Lady Down: What the Decline and Fall of the New York Times Means for America
by William McGowan · 16 Nov 2010 · 316pp · 91,969 words
Drama Queen: One Autistic Woman and a Life of Unhelpful Labels
by Sara Gibbs · 23 Jun 2021 · 263pp · 89,341 words
We Need New Stories: Challenging the Toxic Myths Behind Our Age of Discontent
by Nesrine Malik · 4 Sep 2019
Colorado
by Lonely Planet
Spam Nation: The Inside Story of Organized Cybercrime-From Global Epidemic to Your Front Door
by Brian Krebs · 18 Nov 2014 · 252pp · 75,349 words
The Big Fix: How Companies Capture Markets and Harm Canadians
by Denise Hearn and Vass Bednar · 14 Oct 2024 · 175pp · 46,192 words