Night Owls, a themed open thread, appears at Daily Kos seven days a week
Paul Kiel and Jeff Ernsthausen at Pro-Publica write—Capital One and Other Debt Collectors Are Still Coming for Millions of Americans:
Federal, state and local officials have all taken some steps to protect Americans from the ravages of the economic crash due to COVID-19. Congress halted a substantial portion of evictions, foreclosures and collection on student loans. And when it sent $300 billion in stimulus checks out to families, many states took steps to make sure that debt collectors didn’t grab the money. But one of the most aggressive and common forms of debt collection has generally been allowed to continue: seizure of wages for old consumer debts.
The main protection Americans have gotten from debt collectors has been inadvertent, a byproduct of state courts being closed to most hearings, including those pushed by debt collectors. But this didn’t help people like Lugo who were the target of actions that began before the closures. Wage garnishments can run indefinitely once begun. As a result, essential workers and others who were lucky enough to keep their jobs have still been at risk of forfeiting a portion of their paychecks.
No one tracks wage garnishments either federally or at the state level, and that’s a key reason they get little public attention. But ProPublica has found that it hits workers earning $40,000 or less the hardest and is particularly common in predominantly black communities. Because garnishments are set at a percentage of income (25% in most states) regardless of whether someone can afford it or not, they often provoke a financial emergency and cause the debtor to let other bills go unpaid. [...]
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At Daily Kos on this date in 2005—GOP takes aim at municipal wi-fi:
There's little more exciting to me than municipal wi-fi—municipalities creating free hot zones for their residents to enjoy.
But forever carrying water for Big Business, the GOP isn't happy with consumers getting free Internet.
A Texas Congressman has introduced a bill that impose a nationwide prohibition on municipally sponsored networks.
Dubbed by the Author, Representative Pet Sessions (R-Texas), the Preserving Innovation in Telecom Act of 2005, the bill prohibits state and local governments from providing any telecommunications or information service that is "substantially similar" to services provided by private companies.
The bill, HR 2726, is similar to a host of state bills pushed by telecommunications companies aimed at fending off municipally-run wireless networks. Some of those bills, most recently one in Texas, have been stalled in state legislatures.
The telecommunications operators say that such networks represent unfair competition while municipalities claim that the services are needed to promote business and close the gap between digital haves and have-nots.
On
today’s Kagro in the Morning show:
Trump’s lies about the bunker and the tear gas collapse before our eyes. Scientists discover still more new ways Trump blew the virus response. Joan McCarter says the recession's official now. The Gop moves on to not caring about other problems.
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