British banks write off £6.8 billion in personal debt in one year
From The Daily Telegraph (UK)
Lenders from around the country wrote off some £6.8bn in individual debts last year, statistics from the Bank of England reveal. It is the biggest annual total since records began in 1993, more than doubling in the past five years.
That's more or less £100 ($200US) for every man, woman and child in the island, the cost of which is (of course) passed on to the depositors and secured debtors and rarely if ever to the shareholders.
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They've been aggressively pursuing the most irresonsible lending for the best part of 15 years now. Absolutely appalling.In the UK you had people already 30 grand in debt still being bombarded with offers for credit cards and loans. WHat the hell are they moaning about? Anyway, they're still making a mint each year in profits!
hagley road to ladywood - http://www.mymarilyn.blogspot.com
is being "written off?"
In other words, almost half the debt that banks "wrote off" were debts owed by corporations - most likely their own pets.
And of the "consumer debts" [read working class slaves] the vast majority of what they "wrote off" most probably could not be salvaged by any means whatsoever.
In contrast, the debts for which they are secured (i.e., mortgages) represent "only a small fraction" of the whole.
Ta-da! Banks cut their losses, and get a tax break for it at everyone else's expense.
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"Money" has no value - people do.
The UK does have exceptionally high levels of personal indebtedness. I can remember back in the late 1980's (when I was living in London) being given a Platinum card by my bank with a £40,000 limit when my annual salary was just a fraction above £30,000. That card taught me about the dangers of debt, a painful but valuable lesson that has served me well since.
Up to very recently, this is still happening to people all over the UK. UK banks, and one or two of the bigger players in particular, have been grossly irresponsible when it comes to their lending. They got what was coming to them. The sooner a stop is put to their usury and fraud, the better.
I've had the luck to live in 3 different European countries and -aside from Britain - nowhere else there are such aggressive marketing campaigns to actively get people into debt.
I remember working as a part-time barman, age 19, while at University. Walked into my bank for some enquiry and they got me to sit down, cup of tea, trying to ram a loan and a Visa down my throat. Remember those were the pre-minimum wage days, so I was probably making £200 a month at best. The credit card they were offering had a £2,000 limit.
Luckily I had the sense to say no. But most of my mates my age have worrying levels of personal debt. When I lived in Italy and told people that any ejit in England walks around with a credit card in their pocket, people couldn't believe it. Apparently only high earners with a stable income can apply for credit in Italy.
These people are criminals who take advantage of other people's plight.
hagley road to ladywood - http://www.mymarilyn.blogspot.com
That's not true any more. Levels of personal debt in Italy have been rising, and there is a worrying trend towards treating the family home like a cash machine through so-called 'equity release' plans.
Of all the countries in which I have lived, the one with the least troubling levels of personal debt is Russia, Italy would rank slightly ahead, France and Spain would be worse still. Only the UK and Ireland are way ahead of their European counterparts when it comes to personal indebtedness.
If only people would wake up and realise that making use a high credit limit is not a sign of success, but rather the opposite.