Ball State

» Payday Advance and Location

By China at 1:05 PM

Where I grew up and went to high school, I have never seen a payday advance business anywhere in town. I really didn't even know what it was until junior year of high school when we talked about it in consumer education for about 5 minutes. But when I came to Muncie, Indiana for college, well for orientation, I saw a ton of payday advance businesses all over the town. How come we don't have more back home? Do less people in my suburb outside of Chicago need a payday advance than the people who reside in Muncie? I'm not sure, but when my dad and I were driving up and down the main road in Muncie, I saw about 10 to 15 signs advertising payday loans and businesses that I had never seen before at home.

Is it true then, that some places have more payday advance businesses and have a better need for them? Or is it just that they don't have them around home because people didn't think to open one in my town and that there are the same amount of people who need that service, but they have to go elsewhere to find it? I seriously have no idea, but it would be interesting to find out.

It makes me sad though that people, especially families with children have to get by that way. The only thing that I have heard about payday advances is that they are expensive and you have to pay back a lot more than you are given in the first place, and the loan really isn't over a long period of time, usually just until you get your next paycheck or money comes in, but the interest rates are insane. Right now though with prices of our everyday needs skyrocketing, it doesn't surprise me that more and more families have to resort to this option to get money for food or rent. It is extremely sad that is has come to this (although I am sure payday advances have been happening for much longer than this) and our economy may be facing a depression. It is weird to hear older people who have lived through the depression compare what they are seeing now, to what happened then. It really does make you scared to see what will happen in our near future, especially since I will be graduating college soon and entering the real world.