Woozle/2022/09/23

Originally posted to TootCat in slightly shorter form, and then reposted to Nextdoor in Fact-Based Ethical Politics

economic-political philosophical question

Why is it considered acceptable for a lender to claim the property of a debtor in payment when that property was never pledged as part of the loan agreement?

In other words, why should the state exclusively help the *lender* in dealing with their bad decision?

If it's going to help anybody in that kind of situation, why doesn't it help both parties -- why help one at the expense of the other? ...especially since the one they're helping obviously needs it less.

(This is largely a rhetorical question, but I think it helps show some of the unspoken attitudes in our current system, and I don't think I've seen it asked anywhere before.)

(...and yes, I have loaned people money, and gotten it back, more than once. I didn't need the state to intervene for me, either. The one time I did ask the state to intervene, with people who had incrementally borrowed a *lot* of money over many months, it couldn't help -- because the people in question had no money and no apparent assets to seize. Knowing what I know now, I probably wouldn't have done that, and... although I have no love lost for the people in question, they are one more reason there should be universal income.)