this post was submitted on 14 Jun 2025
136 points (98.6% liked)

News

38864 readers
1715 users here now

Welcome to the News community!

Rules:

1. Be civil


Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.


2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.


Obvious biased sources will be removed at the mods’ discretion. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted separately but not to the post body. Sources may be checked for reliability using Wikipedia, MBFC, AdFontes, GroundNews, etc.


3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.


Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.


4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source. Clickbait titles may be removed.


Posts which titles don’t match the source may be removed. If the site changed their headline, we may ask you to update the post title. Clickbait titles use hyperbolic language and do not accurately describe the article content. When necessary, post titles may be edited, clearly marked with [brackets], but may never be used to editorialize or comment on the content.


5. Only recent news is allowed.


Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.


6. All posts must be news articles.


No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials, videos, press releases, or celebrity gossip will be allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis. Mods may use discretion to pre-approve videos or press releases from highly credible sources that provide unique, newsworthy content not available or possible in another format.


7. No duplicate posts.


If an article has already been posted, it will be removed. Different articles reporting on the same subject are permitted. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.


8. Misinformation is prohibited.


Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.


9. No link shorteners or news aggregators.


All posts must link to original article sources. You may include archival links in the post description. News aggregators such as Yahoo, Google, Hacker News, etc. should be avoided in favor of the original source link. Newswire services such as AP, Reuters, or AFP, are frequently republished and may be shared from other credible sources.


10. Don't copy entire article in your post body


For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.

founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
all 41 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] FartMaster69@lemmy.dbzer0.com 34 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Amazing, people financing dinner might not be able to pay it off.

[–] nickhammes@lemmy.world 11 points 1 year ago

They'd better hire some people who specialize in burrito repossession

[–] HeroHelck@lemm.ee 31 points 1 year ago (3 children)

This shit is wild. You'd figure the capitalists would have a sense of self-preservation and not let things get this bad.

[–] blackluster117@sh.itjust.works 21 points 1 year ago

Why give a shit when you can get bailed out? It's almost like you can be carefree when you're on corporate welfare. What's wild is what you feel like you can try when you have a safety net.

[–] novibe@lemmy.ml 8 points 1 year ago

But they make money even if the people don’t pay. They just package debts and sell them off. And if there’s a big crisis, they still make a lot of money buying the dip.

The capitalist class is infinitely more class conscious and understanding of the system as it really is than the working class.

[–] Spacehooks@reddthat.com 17 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I swear to god this is literally what happened 100 years ago with credit causing the great depression in the 30s. Are we at a 100 year cycle?

[–] thedruid@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago

That's was a part of it. The dust bowl aggravated it further and done other things occurred

Not the same. This is worse. People chose this

[–] khaleer@sopuli.xyz 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] Spacehooks@reddthat.com 2 points 1 year ago

Fudge.

I fear you are right. Maybe we can get a housing crisis?

[–] BigMikeInAustin@lemmy.world 17 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I do keep wondering how these buy now pay later companies see this playing out over a long time.

Klarna was founded in 2005, and Affirm in 2012.

Maybe it's just the same old tech-startup playbook; Live a good life for 10 years of funding until you get acquired, or hired to another good life fin/tech-startup.

[–] fishos@lemmy.world 16 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (3 children)

I mean isn't this one obvious? Fees. There's a ~$4 fee for the basic 4 payments every 2 weeks plan. There are also numerous plans that span various amounts of months. THESE plans have APR up to 30%. Add in your 'I missed a payment, here's a fee" and it's basically just a credit card with more rules that requires ~1/4th payment upfront. They also treat each purchase as a separate loan, so you don't get the benefit of one single monthly payment against the whole balance- each loan must be individually paid - adding up to a lot more than a credit card with a similar balance. And then add in selling marketing data of what customers purchase. It's a simple and solid business structure.

[–] Paddzr@lemmy.world 11 points 1 year ago (2 children)

They also charge the store quite a cut. Because they have such high checkout rate... In some industries it's allegedly 30%. Paypal does 3.9% or something like that.

[–] fishos@lemmy.world -1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

They also typically require a minimum purchase amount, so you have to spend more than you might have planned in order to use them. That $45 purchase suddenly becomes $55 because you needed to add something to go over $50. Those amounts add up over time and result in overspending.

[–] BigMikeInAustin@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I have not seen that so far. I don't click further on this for a payment option, though.

[–] fishos@lemmy.world -3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

So you have no clue what you're talking about about

[–] BigMikeInAustin@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Hello, can your comments please add to the discussion?

[–] fishos@lemmy.world -1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Because you're not actually contributing to the conversation and are just trolling. Or you're dumb. I'm not sure.

[–] BigMikeInAustin@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

Your comments that are solely insults are annoying. Please stop.

[–] OutlierBlue@lemmy.ca 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It’s a simple and solid ~~business~~ exploitation structure.

[–] fishos@lemmy.world -4 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Please explain how a credit card, especially the spam ones that show up in your mailbox unasked for, is any different.

Everyone is ranting on these services like they're something new. They're not.

[–] BigMikeInAustin@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

These are available to a much wider audience. And the placement at the checkout is very manipulative.

[–] OutlierBlue@lemmy.ca 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I never made that claim. Both can be true.

[–] BigMikeInAustin@lemmy.world 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

These are unsecured loans. Your business only works as long as people are paying off their loan. When the economy tanks, when unemployment goes up, when inflation makes food and rent super expensive..., you can only go for so long when enough people stop paying you back.

What did you think I meant?

[–] fishos@lemmy.world -3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I honestly don't know what you mean because if any of that happens all finance gets fucked. This is no different than a payday loan and those have been around forever. Are you just learning today that predatory loan practices exist, and gasp thrive?

Again, you pay more in fees than they give you in loan. They can and will absolutely wreck your credit and sell your debt to collection agencies. And you also realize that the starting credit limit on these things is like $200, right? They're not giving out $5000 credit lines just for signing up. Actual actuaries have done the work to figure out the risks.

Credit cards are unsecured loans too. The average person only gets a secured loan when it's a car payment or a mortgage. Unsecured loans are incredibly common.

You have no clue what you're ranting about, you just want to be mad about something.

[–] BigMikeInAustin@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Why you keep trying to demean and personally attack people in these comments.

[–] fishos@lemmy.world -3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Why are you so dense and think correcting you is attacking you?

[–] BigMikeInAustin@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Why do you continue to demean in your comments?

[–] Cethin@lemmy.zip 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

As the other comment says, they're making their money back in fees. For every dollar they lose because of this, they're making multiple in fees. It really shows you how bad these services are for you financially if they're able to be profitable.

[–] Hobo@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I've never used one of these services. Are they like a credit card in that they have interest/fees only if you don't pay off your balance? Or are there upfront fees to using the service?

[–] Cethin@lemmy.zip 2 points 1 year ago

I haven't used one either, but I'd be surprised if there weren't usage charges, or something similar.

[–] iamunfuckwitable@lemmy.ca 4 points 1 year ago

Who would’ve thought that giving “loans” to financially unstable people might not be the brightest idea…

[–] bradorsomething@ttrpg.network 3 points 1 year ago

I love the theory that if Klarna folds, there will be some small window where you can pay using klarna and get something for free. It will never happen but I love the idea.

[–] cley_faye@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

I have no way of knowing for sure, but I keep hearing people are actually using loans for day to day stuff like groceries.

In what world is that sustainable for longer than like, a month?