Maxed Out: A New Documentary on the Credit Industry
17 July 2006This one won’t be available for awhile, as it’s just starting to hit the documentary circuit, but it’s won a number of awards as an expose of some of the darker sides of the credit industry. You can read the synopsis here. The movie is called “Maxed Out,” and it covers a number of the darker credit practices that companies engage in - for example:
“Maxed Out examines an industry that thrives on making people fail, then pursues them relentlessly to death’s door. The film features a shocking interview with Bob and Chris—two idealistic entrepreneurs from Minneapolis whose “People First Recoveries” is buying bad debt all over the country in the hopes of huge profits. They’re going to make “People First” a big success by being shockingly duplicitous. To get psyched up, Chris and Bob imagine themselves as “debt pirates”, wrestlers and professional football players. The personal information at their disposal and the ways in which they are allowed to use it—calling people’s neighbors and relatives to humiliate them into paying, for example—are nothing short of terrifying for us, fun for them.”
It also highlights the attempts by credit card companies to target college students, a target easily seduced by access to more stuff to spruce up the dorm room.
While I think it’s important to shine some light on negative practices in the debt collection industry, what I don’t like is the complete effort to avoid discussing personal responsibility among those who have borrowed themselves into debt. Credit card companies do indeed try to nickel and dime you every way possible - but in the end, no one else forces you to use them. And by the same token, no one else is going to force you to stop. You have to take the initiative to do that yourself, and getting angry or moping about how credit card companies exploit people isn’t going to bring you one bit closer to freeing yourself from credit card debt. By all means watch it and be aware that sharks are swimming in the sea - but the best way to avoid them is to get out of the water.
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One Response to “Maxed Out: A New Documentary on the Credit Industry”
July 24th, 2006 at 11:55 am
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