by Jake Halpern
First published 2014
Jake Halpern takes readers into the shadowy world of debt collection, where a former banking executive and a former armed robber form an unlikely partnership. Their target is "paper" - uncollected consumer debts that banks sell for cents on the dollar. Halpern reveals how this unregulated industry operates through deception and intimidation. Collectors misrepresent debtor situations, make illegal threats, and sometimes pursue debts they have no right to collect. The author follows these operators as they use weapons to intimidate rivals, run high-pressure call centers, and devise new schemes to profit from American debt. Halpern traces the evolution of collection agencies while exposing the human toll of a system that traps ordinary Americans in cycles of debt they cannot escape through reasonable means.
Genres: business, crime, economics, non-fiction, 21st-century, current-affairs
Vibes: intimate, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: unlikely-partnership
Audio CD · Dreamscape Media Llc