Stephen L. Carter, Columnist

Restrictions on Payday Loans Hurt the Poor

Everyone hates these lenders, right? Well, ask the 10 million people who use them.

June 9, 2016 at 6:13 PM UTC

Stephen L. Carter is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist, a professor of law at Yale University and author of “Invisible: The Story of the Black Woman Lawyer Who Took Down America’s Most Powerful Mobster.”

Access to cash.
Photographer: Dan Kitwood/Getty Images

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Everybody hates payday loans. Interest rates are high. Borrowers can lose property they pledge as collateral, or wind up in a debt spiral as they roll the loans over.

Yet those sometimes called the “less numerate” have trouble calculating these and other risks. Google recently set off a debate by banning ads for payday loan firms from its site. Prosecutors are on the hunt for indictments.