Credit card loan sharks
Toolbox
Published: January 12, 2009
At one point the state of Vermont had enforceable laws against usury — unconscionably high interest rates on loans. But credit card-issuing banks have gotten around that by surrendering their Vermont charters for federal charters. Apparently, the banks were better able to strong-arm the feds to allow them to charge interest rates that would make even criminal based-loan sharks blush. What gets me is that despite the Vermont laws that banks have chosen to thwart, they still come into state court to enforce their otherwise illegally high rates of interest on loans.
I would like to see at least one Vermont judge with enough integrity to throw these banks out on their usurious keisters.
DAVID SEARLES
Rutland Town
33