this post was submitted on 23 Oct 2023
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Regardless of the clear predation of the reverse mortgage industry, you realize they have to get the equity out of their house or they'll starve to death, right?
The problem is the system itself, not elderly people who need to make ends meet.
You realize that predatory crutches become systemic necessities precisely because they band aid such systemic issues from being addressed properly right?
Social security exists because seniors were dying in the streets.
Predatory reverse mortgages shouldn't exist to exploit desperate people who would otherwise die, anymore than payday loan traps shouldn't exist getting people trapped in impossible interest traps over a one time shortfall.
Instead of going through the pain and having society respond through governmental policy change, you now have predators making things far worse long term installing themselves as the "free market solution" that needs to be protected by government while bleeding already struggling populations to new depths.
A pay day loan /reverse mortgage may save a person here or there, but their existence at large hurts so many more. I will say it point blank: it was worth a lot of people dying to get social security enacted, because it was a real solution to a real problem, not yet another level of con game drawing out the pain.
And no, social security would not have been enacted when it was without those deaths. It would have been a far worse outcome for society if some predatory workhouse industry moved in and "saved" them in some cruel for profit scheme and declaring the problem "solved."
I literally said the system is predatory, it's just weird to victim-blame random broke seniors for it, but okay.
You also claimed its worth continuing to exist so some seniors don't starve and are instead exploited.
I firmly, strongly disagree. It just prolongs that exploitation in perpetuity.
No, that's what the strawman in your head said.
Oh ok, so you agree those seniors shouldn't have eaten because reverse mortgage scams shouldn't exist and your initial reply had no point, got it. How Seinfeldian.
No, you idiot, I'm saying it's fucked up of you to blame the elderly for having to take loans against their houses for food and medical care.