How do credit-constrained communities cope with the financial consequences of environmental crises? Beginning in April 2014, the residents of Flint, Michigan, were exposed to lead-contaminated water resulting from a series of governmental missteps. In this paper, we use the spatial distribution of lead and galvanized pipes in Flint to study the effect of the crisis on households’ financial health, including loan balances, repayment of outstanding debt, and Equifax Risk Scores, as well as on household mobility. We find that relatively more affected households, as measured by exposure to lead pipes, experienced a modest increase in the balance and frequency of past due loans. Equifax Risk Scores declined slightly on average, but more so at the bottom of the Risk Score distribution. In addition, we find that there was no effect on mobility out of the state or county, but that more affected households were more likely to move within the city when the crisis began, away from lead-pipe-dense areas.
{"title":"Credit Access and Mobility during the Flint Water Crisis","authors":"M. Pinkovskiy, Nicole Gorton","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3787685","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3787685","url":null,"abstract":"How do credit-constrained communities cope with the financial consequences of environmental crises? Beginning in April 2014, the residents of Flint, Michigan, were exposed to lead-contaminated water resulting from a series of governmental missteps. In this paper, we use the spatial distribution of lead and galvanized pipes in Flint to study the effect of the crisis on households’ financial health, including loan balances, repayment of outstanding debt, and Equifax Risk Scores, as well as on household mobility. We find that relatively more affected households, as measured by exposure to lead pipes, experienced a modest increase in the balance and frequency of past due loans. Equifax Risk Scores declined slightly on average, but more so at the bottom of the Risk Score distribution. In addition, we find that there was no effect on mobility out of the state or county, but that more affected households were more likely to move within the city when the crisis began, away from lead-pipe-dense areas.","PeriodicalId":196559,"journal":{"name":"LSN: Consumer Credit Issues (Sub-Topic)","volume":"58 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-02-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"125769913","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
American student loans are fixed-rate debt contracts that may be repaid in full by a certain maturity. Alternatively, income-based schemes give borrowers the option to make payments proportional to their income above subsistence for a number of years, after which the remaining balance is forgiven but taxed as ordinary income. The repayment strategy that minimizes the present value of future payments takes two possible forms: For a small loan balance, it is optimal to make maximum payments until the loan is fully repaid, forgoing both income-based schemes and loan forgiveness. For a large balance, enrolling in income-based schemes is optimal either immediately or after a period of maximum payments. Overall, the benefits of income-based schemes are substantial for large loan balances but negligible for small loans.
{"title":"American Student Loans: Repayment and Valuation","authors":"P. Guasoni, Yu‐Jui Huang, S. Khalili","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3707118","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3707118","url":null,"abstract":"American student loans are fixed-rate debt contracts that may be repaid in full by a certain maturity. Alternatively, income-based schemes give borrowers the option to make payments proportional to their income above subsistence for a number of years, after which the remaining balance is forgiven but taxed as ordinary income. The repayment strategy that minimizes the present value of future payments takes two possible forms: For a small loan balance, it is optimal to make maximum payments until the loan is fully repaid, forgoing both income-based schemes and loan forgiveness. For a large balance, enrolling in income-based schemes is optimal either immediately or after a period of maximum payments. Overall, the benefits of income-based schemes are substantial for large loan balances but negligible for small loans.","PeriodicalId":196559,"journal":{"name":"LSN: Consumer Credit Issues (Sub-Topic)","volume":"49 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-10-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"124319619","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The paper evaluates the adequacy of the existing EU legal framework – the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive - and the case law of the Court of Justice of the EU’s in tackling abusive non-judicial debt collection practices. For this purpose, it uses a matrix of analysis consisting of several building blocks required for an efficient regulation of non-judicial debt collection practices. The paper concludes that the current legal framework is insufficient and a harmonized sector-specific regulation is needed at EU level.
{"title":"Is the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive Fit to Effectively Tackle Abusive Debt Collection? A Critical Evaluation","authors":"C. Stănescu","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3671484","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3671484","url":null,"abstract":"The paper evaluates the adequacy of the existing EU legal framework – the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive - and the case law of the Court of Justice of the EU’s in tackling abusive non-judicial debt collection practices. For this purpose, it uses a matrix of analysis consisting of several building blocks required for an efficient regulation of non-judicial debt collection practices. The paper concludes that the current legal framework is insufficient and a harmonized sector-specific regulation is needed at EU level.","PeriodicalId":196559,"journal":{"name":"LSN: Consumer Credit Issues (Sub-Topic)","volume":"32 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-08-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121344896","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The SBPC found that companies' use of information on credit applicants' education history resulted in ‘educational redlining,’ penalizing borrowers who attended minority-serving institutions. In response to our findings, five United States Senators wrote to a range of companies involved in the collection and use of educational data to demand detailed explanations of this data’s utilization in credit underwriting. These companies' responses only heightened concerns raised in our initial research and revealed additional gaps in fair lending oversight.
{"title":"Fintech Lenders’ Responses to Senate Probe Heighten Fears of Educational Redlining","authors":"Katherine Welbeck, Ben Kaufman","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3757054","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3757054","url":null,"abstract":"The SBPC found that companies' use of information on credit applicants' education history resulted in ‘educational redlining,’ penalizing borrowers who attended minority-serving institutions. In response to our findings, five United States Senators wrote to a range of companies involved in the collection and use of educational data to demand detailed explanations of this data’s utilization in credit underwriting. These companies' responses only heightened concerns raised in our initial research and revealed additional gaps in fair lending oversight.","PeriodicalId":196559,"journal":{"name":"LSN: Consumer Credit Issues (Sub-Topic)","volume":"29 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-07-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"125951414","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
After decades of college costs outpacing inflation, institutions of higher education have become less able to meet the full financial need of students (Clark, 2015) (Walizer, 2018). For families trying to fill this gap, the Federal Direct PLUS for parents (PLUS) has been an increasingly popular, but problematic, financing option. The program enables parents to incur substantially larger amounts of education debt than their college student children even though the parents, unlike their children, receive no direct economic returns on the investment. Eligibility for PLUS entails only a modest check for adverse credit, not a more thorough – and common – check of credit worthiness that reflects ability to repay the debt. Consequently, some parents with low credit scores may borrow more than they could reasonably be expected to repay, but lack some of the programmatic repayment options and protections available to student borrowers. And, because loan counseling is not mandatory for PLUS borrowers, some parents may be less informed than student borrowers. For these reasons, Trellis conducted a study of parent borrower repayment patterns and a qualitative analysis of parent perceptions of the loan process and its effect on other financial experiences. In particular, Trellis examined the experiences of parents whose children borrowed while at either an Historically Black College or University (HBCU) or a Hispanic Serving Institution (HSI) since these schools serve a higher proportion of students from low-income families who might have lower credit scores. Additionally, these minority serving institutions (MSIs) historically have been underfunded and, consequentially, often lack the financial strength to meet the full financial need of its students whose parents, in turn, become more reliant on PLUS loans to gain access to higher education for their children. This study found similarities and differences in borrowing experiences between MSI parents and Non-MSI parents.
{"title":"PLUS Borrowing in Texas: Repayment Expectations, Experience, and Hindsight by Minority-Serving Institution Status","authors":"Carla Fletcher, J. Webster, Wenhua Di","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3527116","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3527116","url":null,"abstract":"After decades of college costs outpacing inflation, institutions of higher education have become less able to meet the full financial need of students (Clark, 2015) (Walizer, 2018). For families trying to fill this gap, the Federal Direct PLUS for parents (PLUS) has been an increasingly popular, but problematic, financing option. The program enables parents to incur substantially larger amounts of education debt than their college student children even though the parents, unlike their children, receive no direct economic returns on the investment. Eligibility for PLUS entails only a modest check for adverse credit, not a more thorough – and common – check of credit worthiness that reflects ability to repay the debt. Consequently, some parents with low credit scores may borrow more than they could reasonably be expected to repay, but lack some of the programmatic repayment options and protections available to student borrowers. And, because loan counseling is not mandatory for PLUS borrowers, some parents may be less informed than student borrowers. For these reasons, Trellis conducted a study of parent borrower repayment patterns and a qualitative analysis of parent perceptions of the loan process and its effect on other financial experiences. In particular, Trellis examined the experiences of parents whose children borrowed while at either an Historically Black College or University (HBCU) or a Hispanic Serving Institution (HSI) since these schools serve a higher proportion of students from low-income families who might have lower credit scores. Additionally, these minority serving institutions (MSIs) historically have been underfunded and, consequentially, often lack the financial strength to meet the full financial need of its students whose parents, in turn, become more reliant on PLUS loans to gain access to higher education for their children. This study found similarities and differences in borrowing experiences between MSI parents and Non-MSI parents.","PeriodicalId":196559,"journal":{"name":"LSN: Consumer Credit Issues (Sub-Topic)","volume":"11 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"134169689","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This paper uses the universe of mortgage contracts along with a quasi-experimental design to estimate the response of high-interest lenders to borrower protection regulations aimed at simplifying and making loan terms more transparent. We find that lenders substantially reduce interest rates, by an average of 10%, in order to avoid being subject to consumer protection, without reducing amounts lent nor the number of loans originated. This finding implies that high interest lenders prefer the ability to issue obfuscatory mortgage contracts to mortgages with higher interest rates and is consistent with the model of Gabaix & Laibson (2006), which shows that firms may not educate consumers if sufficiently many consumers are inattentive.
{"title":"Playing Hide and Seek: How Lenders Respond to Consumer Protection","authors":"Youssef Benzarti","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3459226","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3459226","url":null,"abstract":"This paper uses the universe of mortgage contracts along with a quasi-experimental design to estimate the response of high-interest lenders to borrower protection regulations aimed at simplifying and making loan terms more transparent. We find that lenders substantially reduce interest rates, by an average of 10%, in order to avoid being subject to consumer protection, without reducing amounts lent nor the number of loans originated. This finding implies that high interest lenders prefer the ability to issue obfuscatory mortgage contracts to mortgages with higher interest rates and is consistent with the model of Gabaix & Laibson (2006), which shows that firms may not educate consumers if sufficiently many consumers are inattentive.","PeriodicalId":196559,"journal":{"name":"LSN: Consumer Credit Issues (Sub-Topic)","volume":"39 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"124809742","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Regulatory bank levies set incentives for banks to reduce leverage. At the same time, corporate income taxation makes funding through debt more attractive. In this paper, we explore how regulatory levies affect bank capital structure, depending on corporate income taxation. Based on bank balance sheet data from 2006 to 2014 for a panel of EU-banks, our analysis yields three main results: The introduction of bank levies leads to lower leverage as liabilities become more expensive. This effect is weaker the more elevated corporate income taxes are. In countries charging very high corporate income taxes, the incentives of bank levies to reduce leverage turn ineffective. Thus, bank levies can counteract the debt bias of taxation only partially.
{"title":"Interactions between Regulatory and Corporate Taxes: How Is Bank Leverage Affected?","authors":"F. Bremus, Kirsten Schmidt, Lena Tonzer","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3252433","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3252433","url":null,"abstract":"Regulatory bank levies set incentives for banks to reduce leverage. At the same time, corporate income taxation makes funding through debt more attractive. In this paper, we explore how regulatory levies affect bank capital structure, depending on corporate income taxation. Based on bank balance sheet data from 2006 to 2014 for a panel of EU-banks, our analysis yields three main results: The introduction of bank levies leads to lower leverage as liabilities become more expensive. This effect is weaker the more elevated corporate income taxes are. In countries charging very high corporate income taxes, the incentives of bank levies to reduce leverage turn ineffective. Thus, bank levies can counteract the debt bias of taxation only partially.","PeriodicalId":196559,"journal":{"name":"LSN: Consumer Credit Issues (Sub-Topic)","volume":"37 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"122173535","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Food producers and distributors are the main responsible actors to ensure food safety in the People’s Republic of China. Where food safety is the goal, hygiene is the means to reach that goal. Food businesses must therefore obtain a license that demonstrates compliance with basic hygiene rules before they can enter into business. Also, food businesses must establish and implement food safety management rules to control food safety during the processing phase. This includes the control of incoming products, packaging, storage and transportation, traceability, and the establishment of a recall system. Under the principle of self-regulation, food producers and distributors are required to formulate self-regulatory rules to comply with their obligations. They are guided by the 2015 Food Safety Law, the administrative rules that further implement the Food Safety Law, as well as by various food safety standards that are characteristic to the food safety regulatory system of the People’s Republic of China. This paper covers the chronological steps that food producers and distributors have to take to guarantee food safety. Although this paper mainly focusses on food producers and distributors in the People’s Republic of China, overseas producers of certain high-risk food products that wish to export to the People’s Republic of China may also be subject to process-related requirements by means of facility registration.
{"title":"Process Requirements in Chinese Food Law. Legal Systematic Analysis of Process-Related Requirements for Food Production and Distribution in the People's Republic of China","authors":"J. Buijs, Juanjuan Sun, B. M. van der Meulen","doi":"10.2139/SSRN.3230747","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/SSRN.3230747","url":null,"abstract":"Food producers and distributors are the main responsible actors to ensure food safety in the People’s Republic of China. Where food safety is the goal, hygiene is the means to reach that goal. Food businesses must therefore obtain a license that demonstrates compliance with basic hygiene rules before they can enter into business. Also, food businesses must establish and implement food safety management rules to control food safety during the processing phase. This includes the control of incoming products, packaging, storage and transportation, traceability, and the establishment of a recall system. Under the principle of self-regulation, food producers and distributors are required to formulate self-regulatory rules to comply with their obligations. They are guided by the 2015 Food Safety Law, the administrative rules that further implement the Food Safety Law, as well as by various food safety standards that are characteristic to the food safety regulatory system of the People’s Republic of China. This paper covers the chronological steps that food producers and distributors have to take to guarantee food safety. Although this paper mainly focusses on food producers and distributors in the People’s Republic of China, overseas producers of certain high-risk food products that wish to export to the People’s Republic of China may also be subject to process-related requirements by means of facility registration.","PeriodicalId":196559,"journal":{"name":"LSN: Consumer Credit Issues (Sub-Topic)","volume":"33 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"127661765","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
French Abstract: Tout paiement d’intérêt sur un prêt a toujours été condamné comme de l’usure dans le Christianisme et dans l’Islam. Cette condamnation fut imposée par ces deux religions de par leur autorité, sans justification aucune. Malgré tout, elle a inspiré théologiens et exégètes qui ont cherché à l’interpréter et à l’adapter aux impératifs de l’évolution des sociétés. C’est ainsi que du côté chrétien, les docteurs scholastiques ont développé une doctrine de l’usure considérée comme une des premières avancées de la science économique en occident, alors que du côté de l’islam, on assiste depuis la deuxième moitié du XXème siècle à l’émergence d’un système financier moderne fondé sur la Sharia. Cette étude présente une analyse détaillée de l’évolution de la pensée économique sur ce sujet dans ces deux religions et de son impact sur la vie socio-économique en occident et en orient à travers l’histoire. English Abstract: In both Christian and Islamic religions, the payment of interest on loans has always been considered usurious and condemned as such. This condemnation has been imposed by both religions on their own authority without justification. Nevertheless, it has inspired theologians and exegetes who attempted to explain it and adapt it to the imperatives of time and place. Thus, on the Christian side, the scholastic doctors have developed the usury doctrine considered as one of the first major advances in economic theory in the west. Whereas, on the Islamic side, we witness since the second half of the XXth century, the emergence of a modern financial system based on the Sharia. This paper presents an in-depth analysis of the evolution of economic thought on this topic. It focuses on the financial foundations of the trading measures proposed by the exegetes and highlights their socio-economic impact on eastern and western societies over time.
摘要:在基督教和伊斯兰教中，任何贷款利息的支付都被谴责为高利贷。这种谴责是由这两种宗教的权威强加的，没有任何理由。然而，它激励了神学家和诠释者，他们试图解释它，并使它适应社会发展的要求。就是基督教的一侧,医生经院哲学家们开发了一种磨损理论被视为最早的经济在西方的先进科学技术,而伊斯兰教的一侧,二十世纪下半叶以来,我们看到出现了一个基于伊斯兰教法的现代金融体系。本研究详细分析了这两种宗教在这一主题上的经济思想的演变及其对东西方历史上社会经济生活的影响。英文文摘:In elod both (Christian and Islamic宗教,据贷款支付interest has always been好usurious and as such了埃及。这两种宗教都以自己的权威毫无理由地强加了这种谴责。然而，它启发了神学家和注释者，他们试图解释它，并使它适应时间和地点的命令。Christian Thus, on the side, scholastic医生have developed the usury学说以近少校好as one of the first in economic theory in the west)。在伊斯兰方面，自二十世纪下半叶以来，我们目睹了以伊斯兰教法为基础的现代金融体系的出现。= =地理= =根据美国人口普查，这个县的面积为。它着重于诠释者所提出的贸易措施的财务基础，并强调这些措施对东西方社会的长期社会经济影响。
{"title":"La Condamnation de l’usure dans le christianisme et dans l’islam (The Condemnation of Usury in Christiandom and in Islam)","authors":"Nabil Khoury","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3158773","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3158773","url":null,"abstract":"<b>French Abstract:</b> Tout paiement d’intérêt sur un prêt a toujours été condamné comme de l’usure dans le Christianisme et dans l’Islam. Cette condamnation fut imposée par ces deux religions de par leur autorité, sans justification aucune. Malgré tout, elle a inspiré théologiens et exégètes qui ont cherché à l’interpréter et à l’adapter aux impératifs de l’évolution des sociétés. C’est ainsi que du côté chrétien, les docteurs scholastiques ont développé une doctrine de l’usure considérée comme une des premières avancées de la science économique en occident, alors que du côté de l’islam, on assiste depuis la deuxième moitié du XXème siècle à l’émergence d’un système financier moderne fondé sur la Sharia. Cette étude présente une analyse détaillée de l’évolution de la pensée économique sur ce sujet dans ces deux religions et de son impact sur la vie socio-économique en occident et en orient à travers l’histoire. <b>English Abstract:</b> In both Christian and Islamic religions, the payment of interest on loans has always been considered usurious and condemned as such. This condemnation has been imposed by both religions on their own authority without justification. Nevertheless, it has inspired theologians and exegetes who attempted to explain it and adapt it to the imperatives of time and place. Thus, on the Christian side, the scholastic doctors have developed the usury doctrine considered as one of the first major advances in economic theory in the west. Whereas, on the Islamic side, we witness since the second half of the XXth century, the emergence of a modern financial system based on the Sharia. This paper presents an in-depth analysis of the evolution of economic thought on this topic. It focuses on the financial foundations of the trading measures proposed by the exegetes and highlights their socio-economic impact on eastern and western societies over time.","PeriodicalId":196559,"journal":{"name":"LSN: Consumer Credit Issues (Sub-Topic)","volume":"87 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-04-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"127545410","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
There is a vast literature examining the interactions between law, institutions and economic development, but it only occasionally examines how actual markets in emerging economies have developed and transitioned to relying on legal institutions. This paper addresses that question by examining the puzzling growth of the formal home mortgage market in India from the mid 1990s onwards. Enforcing a mortgage and foreclosing on property in the Indian courts were, until very recently, lengthy affairs with a typical case taking between 15 to 20 years to resolve. These delays, along with other factors, made writing mortgages unattractive for banks and led to a trivial home mortgage market until the mid 1990s. However, from about 1994 to 2003, and before any mortgage law related changes took effect, the home mortgage market in India grew quite impressively. This paper examines what led to this growth and finds that, amongst other things, banks in India relied on “dysfunctions” in the criminal justice system to help overcome dysfunctions in the civil justice system for enforcing mortgages. Quite simply two “wrongs” might make a “right”. In particular, in house departments at banks relied on a provision that criminalized “bounced” checks along with the predictability and regularity of extortion by the police to enhance their ability to obtain payments for mortgages and other kinds of debts (e.g., car loans, student loans). Although this aided the growth of the home mortgage market, it also resulted in substantial negative collateral effects by enhancing corruption and worsening adjudicative delays in India. Indeed, the “bounced” check strategy came to represent one of the largest areas of litigation in India. However, once the mortgage market started growing the banks pushed for law changes around 2003 that facilitated the continued expansion of the market, but reduced the need to rely on the “bounced” check strategy, which was becoming costly for banks. This account of the development of the home mortgage market in India not only tracks the incentives faced by the players and highlights the improvisational aspects of this market’s growth, but also has implications for a number of areas of research. This includes insights on the interactions between law, institutions and economic development, the role of private ordering, and key players like in-house lawyers, in market development, and how sustained change and legal reform might be effectuated in some contexts. These insights in turn facilitate the emergence of a richer and more textured approach for exploring the interactions between law, institutions and economic development.
{"title":"Law, Institutions and Economic Development: Examining the Development of the Home Mortgage Market in India - Can Two Wrongs Make a Right?","authors":"Vikramaditya S. Khanna","doi":"10.2139/SSRN.3032632","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/SSRN.3032632","url":null,"abstract":"There is a vast literature examining the interactions between law, institutions and economic development, but it only occasionally examines how actual markets in emerging economies have developed and transitioned to relying on legal institutions. This paper addresses that question by examining the puzzling growth of the formal home mortgage market in India from the mid 1990s onwards. Enforcing a mortgage and foreclosing on property in the Indian courts were, until very recently, lengthy affairs with a typical case taking between 15 to 20 years to resolve. These delays, along with other factors, made writing mortgages unattractive for banks and led to a trivial home mortgage market until the mid 1990s. However, from about 1994 to 2003, and before any mortgage law related changes took effect, the home mortgage market in India grew quite impressively. This paper examines what led to this growth and finds that, amongst other things, banks in India relied on “dysfunctions” in the criminal justice system to help overcome dysfunctions in the civil justice system for enforcing mortgages. Quite simply two “wrongs” might make a “right”. In particular, in house departments at banks relied on a provision that criminalized “bounced” checks along with the predictability and regularity of extortion by the police to enhance their ability to obtain payments for mortgages and other kinds of debts (e.g., car loans, student loans). Although this aided the growth of the home mortgage market, it also resulted in substantial negative collateral effects by enhancing corruption and worsening adjudicative delays in India. Indeed, the “bounced” check strategy came to represent one of the largest areas of litigation in India. However, once the mortgage market started growing the banks pushed for law changes around 2003 that facilitated the continued expansion of the market, but reduced the need to rely on the “bounced” check strategy, which was becoming costly for banks. This account of the development of the home mortgage market in India not only tracks the incentives faced by the players and highlights the improvisational aspects of this market’s growth, but also has implications for a number of areas of research. This includes insights on the interactions between law, institutions and economic development, the role of private ordering, and key players like in-house lawyers, in market development, and how sustained change and legal reform might be effectuated in some contexts. These insights in turn facilitate the emergence of a richer and more textured approach for exploring the interactions between law, institutions and economic development.","PeriodicalId":196559,"journal":{"name":"LSN: Consumer Credit Issues (Sub-Topic)","volume":"144 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-09-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"122377588","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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