Wednesday, March 7, 2007

Government

Scouring the news about India and Micro Banking I found something that could very much affect the lives of millions of people.

http://www.symbiotics.ch/en/latest_news.asp?id=b370

Please read this short article. I am scared the laws will be written in favor of corporations, and not protecting the self help women's groups such as we are going to work with. This law would make a very successful poverty elimination tool a sham and a way to take what little money poor have and give it to those with everything.

In America there are a couple examples of poor use of credit, 'rent to own' stores, 'payday loans' and 'income tax refund loans' all charge very high interest rates and fees. None of these try to improve the lives of people but use their economic position to a personal advantage.

Contrast that with a self help trust loan group, yes money is involved, and an interest rate is involved to keep the value above inflation, and pay the cost of the loaning organization. But the most important aspect is training and education of the borrower, this one aspect, training and education is what sets a successful micro lender from an unsuccessful one. Success meaning that people will be in an economic stable condition and not need to borrow again and again and again.

1 comment:

  1. Its amazing how fast people will work to keep others in poverty and under their control!

    ReplyDelete