Garden State consumers are defenseless against vulture capitalists

New Jersey is one of eight states whose laws allow creditors and debt collectors to seize nearly everything a debtor owns, even the minimal items necessary for the person to continue working and providing for a family.

Only New Jersey, Georgia, Kentucky, Michigan, Utah, Indiana, Missouri, and Wyoming have earned the worst grades from the National Consumer Law Center.

State exemption laws in most states are a fundamental safeguard for families that protect income and property from seizure by creditors, debt buyers, and the debt collectors these vultures hire.

These laws are designed to protect consumers and their families from poverty and to preserve their ability to be productive members of society and achieve financial rehabilitation.

These protections are critically important as families are reeling from the impact of historically high inflation on their budgets, particularly rent and food.

Yet not one jurisdiction meets five basic standards:

• Preventing creditors from seizing so much of the debtor’s wages that the debtor is pushed below a living wage;
• Allowing the debtor to keep a used car of at least close to average value;
• Preserving the family’s home—at least a median-value home;
• Preserving a basic amount in a bank account so that the debtor’s funds to pay essential costs such as rent, utilities, and commuting expenses are not cleaned out; and
• Preventing seizure and sale of the debtor’s necessary household goods.

“New Jersey is one of eight states whose exemption laws reflect indifference to struggling debtors,” said consumer advocate Lisa McCormick. “The corrupt political establishment here is in league with the corporate oligarchs who are trying to destroy the American Dream.”

While lawmakers fast-tracked legislation that eviscerated the Election Law Enforcement Commission, erased the Open Public Records Act, and made it more difficult for challengers to get on the ballot, a proposal to protect people from predatory financial institutions and vulture capitalists has languishing without attention since 2023.

McCormick said that is because the political establishment is dominated by power brokers who are funded by wealthy donors who comprise the richest one percent of the population.

“Americans must rise up to the responsibility of citizenship, or we should expect more corporate greed that will soak the life out of the United States,” said McCormick.

The state allows creditors—or the vulture  capitalists who prey on working class citizens that fall behind—to seize nearly everything a debtor owns, even the minimal items necessary for the debtor to continue working and providing for a family.

Politicians blame a culture that encourages consumers to spend more than they can afford, but the working class has not shared in the nation’s prosperity while they are clobbered by inflation and their predators enjoy massive unfair tax cuts.