Surely there is a two tier level of responsibility and accountability here.
The greed of the lenders and the greed and apathy of the consumer must be equally at fault. Credit has been all too easy to sell and all too easy to accept, and lets face it there is a large proportion of our society that simply doesn’t have the common sense, judgment or even basic understanding of personal finances and numeracy to understand the value of their money at all.
I don’t have a great understanding of economics but if, as I regularly read in news articles, there were people who ‘saw all this coming’ then why was there never a whistle blower? An independent watchdog of some sort to regulate the lending and the advertising of loans and credit agreements dangled to daytime TV viewers?
Vicious circle - lenders don’t care, consumers don’t care, government don’t care.
In my opinion, the issues in this country run deeper. A growing lack of social values, disproportionate welfare state, poor education amongst young adults, third or fourth generation of kids growing up with role models who have never worked and a ruthless and cash-hungry media and economy.
Its going to get much worse before it gets better and I think there will be larger scale social unrest in the UK before long, although I really hope I am wrong.
On the plus side my student loan will be fully repaid by the end of the year - kerching!
