Brian Chappatta, Columnist

Low Rates and Low Inflation? Not Always on Main Street

Online installment loans provide a glimpse into parts of the economy beyond Wall Street.

October 30, 2019 at 9:30 AM UTC

Brian Chappatta is managing editor of Bloomberg News' leveraged finance and distressed debt teams. He was previously managing editor and team leader of its wealth group. Before that he was a Bloomberg Opinion markets and finance columnist and a bonds reporter for Bloomberg News.

Mom and pop may still pay triple-digit interest costs. — Mom and pop may still pay triple-digit interest costs.
Photographer: Erika Pontarelli/AFP/Getty Images

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For those in finance and finance-related industries, it’s easy to get lured into sweeping generalizations about the state of the American economy. I can’t begin to estimate how many times I’ve heard some iteration of “the U.S. consumer remains strong,” or “stubbornly low inflation,” or “it’s a great time to be a borrower with rock-bottom interest rates.”

So I give a lot of credit to Bloomberg News’s Christopher Maloney and Adam Tempkin for shattering that boilerplate with an article this week about the boom in online installment loans. Provocatively titled “America’s Middle Class Is Getting Hooked on Debt With 100% Rates,” it undercuts much of Wall Street’s assumptions about life across the country.