> When poorer folk take the "same" risk, they can be ruined for decades.
In the vast majority of circumstances that's an extreme exaggeration.
Speaking from past personal experience with poverty (ie being "poorer folk"), you can default on every possible type of debt - wait about seven years (can vary slightly by state, but it's typically around that), and you're free from it. My credit rating went from 800, to 480, back to 760 in that process over eight years, without requiring any special effort. I defaulted on numerous credit cards, I defaulted on medical debt; it all vanished, one after another as time ticked by, and my credit rating jumped as each item fell off. Every negative mark falls off your credit report after N years.
It's very unpleasant to have your credit rating wrecked for years. To say that it will ruin you for decades, that's reaching into the land of absurdity. I'm sure it happens, some people get stuck in a vicious cycle for ... decades, however it's not rocket science to properly utilize the negative mark credit cycling to your advantage and reboot. It doesn't take more than an hour or two of reading to self-educate at zero cost about how the system works.
In the vast majority of circumstances that's an extreme exaggeration.
Speaking from past personal experience with poverty (ie being "poorer folk"), you can default on every possible type of debt - wait about seven years (can vary slightly by state, but it's typically around that), and you're free from it. My credit rating went from 800, to 480, back to 760 in that process over eight years, without requiring any special effort. I defaulted on numerous credit cards, I defaulted on medical debt; it all vanished, one after another as time ticked by, and my credit rating jumped as each item fell off. Every negative mark falls off your credit report after N years.
It's very unpleasant to have your credit rating wrecked for years. To say that it will ruin you for decades, that's reaching into the land of absurdity. I'm sure it happens, some people get stuck in a vicious cycle for ... decades, however it's not rocket science to properly utilize the negative mark credit cycling to your advantage and reboot. It doesn't take more than an hour or two of reading to self-educate at zero cost about how the system works.