Has the New Bankruptcy Law Gone Into Effect?
Everyone kept talking about the “new bankruptcy law” that was shadowing anyone who was in financial trouble. I remember this talk starting a couple years ago, and then not hearing about it for a while, probably the law got held up in congress. And for good reason. The new bankruptcy law was known for one thing primarily : It would make it much harder for people to just “write off” their debts to their creditors by filing for bankruptcy. And how so?
Well, the new law is in effect officially, as far as I know, and it is called the “Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act of 2005″, which is pretty much a self described law, but I’ll get into a little bit of explanation of why it was put into effect and even proposed for consideration in the first place. The law’s purpose is to make it more difficult for some people to just completely erase debts by simply filing for bankruptcy.
In the past, before this law was passed, many financial companies, lenders, banks and other financial services companies felt that too many people with gambling problems, and unruly spending habits were able to just get off scott free by filing bankruptcy and not being responsible for repaying any of these debts to their lenders, who were left holding the bag.
Some people do oppose the law though, claiming that it may hit the people who need it the most the hardest, such as lower income families and single moms. As with anything else, this law seems to be fair from one perspective but also tends to deprive others who really deserve it of their rights to financial freedom.
Entitlement? For some yes, for others it really might be a necessity. It’s a shame this isn’t a law that sees more grey than black and white. But that’s the problem with law, isn’t it?
