What began for many as a way to pay for concert tickets and vacations is becoming an ordinary tool that Gen Z and millennial shoppers use for food, contact lenses and trash bags.
think about how these financing options are smoothing out paychecks for young people and low income folks
What actually happens, every time, is that prices go up until financing is the only way to afford anything. Debt detaches prices from reality. It breaks unaffordability as a mechanism to keep prices down. Student loans are how college tuition got so high, you require student loans. Mortgages are how housing prices got so high, you require a mortgage. Some of it is increased competition from people who were simply too poor to be in the market - some of it is plain old greed.
Low-income families are hit hardest, because they get roped into this shit for things other people can still afford. Rent-to-own furniture winds up costing them multiple times what anyone else is paying, due to long-ass lease terms. It becomes a loan with triple-digit interest.
Depending on how hoity-toity your taste in literature might be, see either David Graeber’s “Debt: The First 5000 Years,” or Sam Vime’s boots theory from Discworld.
What actually happens, every time, is that prices go up until financing is the only way to afford anything. Debt detaches prices from reality. It breaks unaffordability as a mechanism to keep prices down. Student loans are how college tuition got so high, you require student loans. Mortgages are how housing prices got so high, you require a mortgage. Some of it is increased competition from people who were simply too poor to be in the market - some of it is plain old greed.
Low-income families are hit hardest, because they get roped into this shit for things other people can still afford. Rent-to-own furniture winds up costing them multiple times what anyone else is paying, due to long-ass lease terms. It becomes a loan with triple-digit interest.
Depending on how hoity-toity your taste in literature might be, see either David Graeber’s “Debt: The First 5000 Years,” or Sam Vime’s boots theory from Discworld.