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Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?[W:461]

Is there a moral obligation to repay money you borrow?


  • Total voters
    98
Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

Paleocon said:
One is obliged to fulfill any just contracts one has entered into in accordance with the civil law, unless excused by the other party.

It is NOT Morally Wrong to Take Advantage of stipulations in the contract, or in the civil law in force at the time of the contract.
Since when?
I mean that IS REALLY ODD considering Your Own previous String/OP and posts saying Interest IS "morally wrong", In direct denial of the OP premise here.
Now it's OK?
I mean, Interest is Always "in the Loan Contract."

Paleocon OP, 9/23/14
http://www.debatepolitics.com/economics/205321-why-usury-should-against-law.html
Paleocon OP said:
In the practice of usury, one rents money out to others (interest). This is Wrong because, while things like houses and apartments can be rented out, because they can be used without being consumed, Money is more like food, it must be consumed in order to be used, thus it Cannot Licitly be Lent at Interest.

Paleocon post #7 said:
AlabamaPaul said:
"thus it cannot licitly be lent at interest"

Is that not an argument for free money?
No. It's one thing to demand repayment of the loan. It's another to charge over that amount.

Paleocon #13 said:
tres borrachos said:
Are you saying the practice of lending should be banned, or are you talking about usury, which isn't the same as lending with interest.

There are usury laws that are managed on the state levels. Every state has its own usury limits.
The practice of person-recourse Lending At Interest should be Banned.

Paleocon said:
I'm saying that person-recourse interest should be illegal.
....
etc, etc, etc.

Paleocon vs Paleocon
 
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Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

I suspect you would consider contract law to be a lot more of a moral issue if the corporation that employed you decided to renege on your contract and refuse to pay you for work you've done. Hey. They're a corporation and it's a contract so it's not immoral to refuse to pay you what they owe you.

I think you'd consider that plenty immoral even if you don't admit it.

No, that wouldn't be a moral thing either. My employer doesn't pay me because it is moral, it pays me because the consequences for it would be much worse if it didn't pay me. I could sue it and get significantly more than it owed me if it did that.

I dunno man. The bottom line is just that the way you're looking at it isn't how the world works. Companies most definitely do not look at contracts like they impose any kind of moral duty on them. Companies aren't even capable of having morals. If you're going into dealings with companies imposing extra obligations on yourself like that, you're playing a bit of a sucker.

If you think it is irrational to do what you promised if it profits you more not to, then you should look up the "sociopathy" and see if any of the characteristics of it sound familiar.

No, no... Re-read my post and think it through. I described a situation where both party ends up better off. Contract law makes it more or less impossible for the breacher to end up better off while the other party is worse off.
 
Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

Wow. I see why this country is in the sad state of affairs it's in and going downhill quickly. I think I'm going to have to give up reading political discussion forums because hearing what makes people tick these days is making me lose all faith in humanity.

what i see are the observations of someone who is not very financially astute
you took a $30,000 bath you did not need to take, when you failed to short your house in a pledge of the deed in lieu of foreclosure. someone knowledgeable about finance would have taken that route and kept the $30K (plus the requisite tax and penalties) in the 401K. that high horse was costly to feed
i am sure that your corporate lender 'feels' wonderful that you substituted an odd sense of morality for business acumen
you have only proven that PT Barnum was right
 
Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

No, that wouldn't be a moral thing either. My employer doesn't pay me because it is moral, it pays me because the consequences for it would be much worse if it didn't pay me. I could sue it and get significantly more than it owed me if it did that.

I dunno man. The bottom line is just that the way you're looking at it isn't how the world works. Companies most definitely do not look at contracts like they impose any kind of moral duty on them. Companies aren't even capable of having morals. If you're going into dealings with companies imposing extra obligations on yourself like that, you're playing a bit of a sucker.



No, no... Re-read my post and think it through. I described a situation where both party ends up better off. Contract law makes it more or less impossible for the breacher to end up better off while the other party is worse off.

And that breech is immoral and unethical. And contract law doesn't make it possible for you to breech a contract. Lack of ethics makes that possible. Contract law may tell you what's going to happen to you if you breech the contract but a breech is a breech if your contractual agreement, not part of it.
 
Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

Are people who pay back loans suckers?

Seems to be the question, huh? I think we've been given the answer, too.
 
Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

Wow. I see why this country is in the sad state of affairs it's in and going downhill quickly. I think I'm going to have to give up reading political discussion forums because hearing what makes people tick these days is making me lose all faith in humanity.

You have no idea. You need to research into the flow of money, and the relationship between The Fed, The Government, and the banks. There is absolutely no reason why the world should be in its state that it is in today, except for power. We have the resources and wealth to provide the necessities of life of everyone, yet it isn't done. The powerful want people in debt, to force them to work.

So when republicans are mad at spending, what is it, 60 billion dollars to make community colleges free, it's a gimick. Because not only would that create more tax dollars and pay the 60 billion back, not only could we close loopholes in the tax code to pay for it, but we could print it. And it is sustainable, once you learn how it works. That is what is so disgusting. I mean 60 billion dollars (I could have this number wrong) is chump change in the national perspective. Consider that our defense budget is half a trillion dollars.

So why don't they want that?

For one that is less loans, and that is less money for the banks.
Two conservatives hate the idea of using their money to benefit someone else. It has to benefit them directly.
But three the people in true power, want people to be in as much debt as they can be. It forces people to work, and to work hard. That way they don't read, and do other things to really find out what is going on. And so we are like sheep, working 9-5 providing our labor for the majority of our lives, and people get increasingly more rich because money is printed. It stays where it stays, because people are content with their lives. As long as they have their Xbox One, Netflix, cell phone, or any source of product/services/entertainment, we don't complain. And the cycle continues.

There are solutions out there. I've been trying to get people to see some, but they usually regard it as, "socialist," "communist," or "utopian." It's a defense mechanism to keep things the way they are.

The information is out there, you just have to look thru it and step thru the doorway.
 
Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

Are people who pay back loans suckers?

No, definitely not. People absolutely should pay back loans because it is at least nearly always in their self interest.
 
Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

And that breech is immoral and unethical. And contract law doesn't make it possible for you to breech a contract. Lack of ethics makes that possible. Contract law may tell you what's going to happen to you if you breech the contract but a breech is a breech if your contractual agreement, not part of it.

Yes, contract law makes breaching possible. In fact, contract law in lots of situations is kind of structured to encourage "efficient breach"- situations like the example I gave with the widget. For example, if a contract has overly harsh penalties for breaching- penalties that exceed the actual damage you'd suffer from the breach, then courts will refuse to enforce those penalties because they discourage parties from breaching when it would actually be more efficient for them to breach. The reason they do that is because efficient breach is a good thing and you don't want the law to discourage a good thing from happening.

In the world of big corporate contracts that span years, I would say that maybe like 40% of them are ultimately breached. A deal that is good for both parties at the start may no longer good for one of them a few years out. Say, for example, a company has a contract to provide IT services over the course of 6 years and in year 4 they start refocusing their business on hardware and it becomes a hassle to keep providing IT services. in that situation, the vendor will usually terminate or breach their contracts to provide IT services. Nobody in the business world sees that as some kind of unethical thing or something. Assuming the contracts were written well, they have provisions built in to protect the customer. For example, maybe the breaching vendor has to pay $x or to give y months of free transition service or something. Life isn't always predictable and contracts are written with that in mind. The customer would not be any less likely to buy something else from that breaching vendor later, they wouldn't go around badmouthing the vendor, they wouldn't feel like they'd been lied to or something. It's business, not personal.
 
Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

Yes, contract law makes breaching possible. In fact, contract law in lots of situations is kind of structured to encourage "efficient breach"- situations like the example I gave with the widget. For example, if a contract has overly harsh penalties for breaching- penalties that exceed the actual damage you'd suffer from the breach, then courts will refuse to enforce those penalties because they discourage parties from breaching when it would actually be more efficient for them to breach. The reason they do that is because efficient breach is a good thing and you don't want the law to discourage a good thing from happening.

In the world of big corporate contracts that span years, I would say that maybe like 40% of them are ultimately breached. A deal that is good for both parties at the start may no longer good for one of them a few years out. Say, for example, a company has a contract to provide IT services over the course of 6 years and in year 4 they start refocusing their business on hardware and it becomes a hassle to keep providing IT services. in that situation, the vendor will usually terminate or breach their contracts to provide IT services. Nobody in the business world sees that as some kind of unethical thing or something. Assuming the contracts were written well, they have provisions built in to protect the customer. For example, maybe the breaching vendor has to pay $x or to give y months of free transition service or something. Life isn't always predictable and contracts are written with that in mind. The customer would not be any less likely to buy something else from that breaching vendor later, they wouldn't go around badmouthing the vendor, they wouldn't feel like they'd been lied to or something. It's business, not personal.

A mortgage only gives you one option: REPAY. The fact that the bank has options if you default is THEIR option. Yours is: REPAY, not repay or give them the house. Your only option in a mortgage contract is repayment.
 
Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

Yes... unless the borrower makes it too difficult to repay... then screw them.
 
Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

A mortgage only gives you one option: REPAY. The fact that the bank has options if you default is THEIR option. Yours is: REPAY, not repay or give them the house. Your only option in a mortgage contract is repayment.

Depending on your state, losing the house may not get you technically out of the woods. In theory, they can foreclose on the hose and come after you for a deficiency if any on the auction, though that usually does not happen. Some states allow lenders to let you keep the house and come after you directly full the full balance. It just varies.
 
Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

A mortgage only gives you one option: REPAY. The fact that the bank has options if you default is THEIR option. Yours is: REPAY, not repay or give them the house. Your only option in a mortgage contract is repayment.

Anyways, live your life however you want. But just be aware, business people treat contractual relationships more like a game with rules, like basketball, than they view it like an emotional human sort of relationship. They play the game however advantages them the most within those legal rules. What you're saying is sort of like saying that a basketball player faking like they're going to go left when they're actually going to go right is "lying" and you refuse to do it on moral grounds. That kind of thing doesn't actually make the world a better place. It just means you'll lose more games than they will. That isn't "moral" so much as handicapping yourself because you're bringing in etiquette rules from interpersonal relationships that aren't appropriate in the business/basketball context.

Like, here, let me put it like this. If you actually were to figure out a way that you could end up better off by breaching contracts with banks, you should do it, then you should do it over and over and over again as fast as you can for as long as you can until they fix whatever flaw in their contract you've caught on to. Nobody would hate you or think you're unethical, people would see you as a really clever businessperson- the kind of guy you want on your side when you're in a complex negotiation. The banks you were beating wouldn't be offended by your actions, they'd be wining and dining you to try to get you to work for them. Just like the opposing basketball team's coach would respond if you were really good at faking his players into thinking that you were going one way when you went the other way.

Now, one can certainly make an argument, and I would agree, that we should bring real morality to business. We should only buy from companies that are socially responsible, avoid companies that pollute, give portions of our profits to charities, extend opportunities to disadvantaged people, and so forth. Those things all do make the world a better place, and there isn't nearly enough of that in business.
 
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Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

Anyways, live your life however you want. But just be aware, business people treat contractual relationships more like a game with rules, like basketball, than they view it like an emotional human sort of relationship. They play the game however advantages them the most within those legal rules. What you're saying is sort of like saying that a basketball player faking like they're going to go left when they're actually going to go right is "lying" and you refuse to do it on moral grounds. That kind of thing doesn't actually make the world a better place. It just means you'll lose more games than they will. That isn't "moral" so much as misplaced etiquette.

Now, one can certainly make an argument, and I would agree, that we should bring real morality to business. We should only buy from companies that are socially responsible, avoid companies that pollute, give portions of our profits to charities, extend opportunities to disadvantaged people, and so forth. Those things all do make the world a better place, and there isn't nearly enough of that in business.

Figuring out which those companies actually are requires too much effort for consumers.
 
Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

Figuring out which those companies actually are requires too much effort for consumers.

Yeah, I agree. That's probably the main hurdle to it. That said, with the Internet it actually is getting quite a bit easier. There are mobile apps, for example, where you can just type in any company name- or scan any barcode in a store- and they'll tell you what the company's record is on those kinds of things. But even so, yeah, I agree that even that much hassle is probably more than very many people will do. Still though, I think that is a good thing when people do do it. Trying to be "nice" to banks, not so much.
 
Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

Yeah, I agree. That's probably the main hurdle to it. That said, with the Internet it actually is getting quite a bit easier. There are mobile apps, for example, where you can just type in any company name- or scan any barcode in a store- and they'll tell you what the company's record is on those kinds of things. But even so, yeah, I agree that even that much hassle is probably more than very many people will do. Still though, I think that is a good thing when people do do it. Trying to be "nice" to banks, not so much.


I have a hard time trusting a lot of that info. Everyone has a profit motive. Even ratings agencies. Remember, those bad loans that crashed our market in 08'? They were given top ratings...
 
Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

Actually it is a matter of intelligence I'm afraid. Anyone too stupid to see that they were duped into buying a bad loan by a bank and feel sorry for them and pay the whole thing off for "moral reasons" deserves to be a right winger. I guess lefties don't like being patsies as much as the Right.

Nice way to rationalize stealing.. " I was duped" riiight
 
Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

Here we go, let the games begin. Just say you will lie when it suits you and be done with it.

So if you were in posession of extensive US military secrets and a Russian official asked you for them, you would tell them? If a child rapist broke into your house and asked you where your children were, you would tell them? How about if the mob is after your best friend, would you tell them where he is? Do you tell your wife that her new dress makes her butt look ****ing massive?

I'm tired of the "more holy than thou" types. Morality is not a one size fits all kind of thing. Context matters. Lying can be bad, but it can also be necessary and even good. Even killing is not wrong in all situations. So get off your damn high horse and stop seeing the world in 2d.
 
Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

So if you were in posession of extensive US military secrets and a Russian official asked you for them, you would tell them? If a child rapist broke into your house and asked you where your children were, you would tell them? How about if the mob is after your best friend, would you tell them where he is? Do you tell your wife that her new dress makes her butt look ****ing massive?

I'm tired of the "more holy than thou" types. Morality is not a one size fits all kind of thing. Context matters. Lying can be bad, but it can also be necessary and even good. Even killing is not wrong in all situations. So get off your damn high horse and stop seeing the world in 2d.

What in the hell does that have to do with repaying a loan???
Who's being holier then thou?? Great Strawman though!..meow
 
Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

What in the hell does that have to do with repaying a loan???
Who's being holier then thou?? Great Strawman though!..meow

You want to pretend like morality is clear as spring water. Well, it's not. Take any college-level ethics class and you will quickly learn that the world is not as simple as you would naively like to think it is. You had a problem with my statement that morality is not so black & white that dishonesty is always a bad thing. So I attempted (that being the key word here) to make you see that such moral issues are complex and rely entirely on context.
 
Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

Yes... unless the borrower makes it too difficult to repay... then screw them.
Difficult to pay? You mean like the lender picks up and moves in the middle of the night with no forwarding address?
 
Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

Yes, you are obligated to pay at least the principal. Taking money and not repaying it is morally theft.
 
Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

I wonder how many that think repaying loans is "optional" think that giving you back the money you deposit is also optional? You can take legal action against them so they have no obligation to return your funds if they decide they would rather not. Right?

I get a kick out of watching Judge Judy at lunch time. Most of her cases involved one party loaning another party a sum of money, but the other party considers that loan a gift or lies about it. What I find equally funny is the number of people, who have no clue the difference between borrowing money and loaning money, and they use the words interchangeably to mean the same thing, to which Judge Judy immediately corrects them.
 
Re: Are you morally obligated to repay a loan that you take?

Greetings, AlbqOwl. :2wave:

Other than banks, but on a more personal basis, money borrowed from friends or family doesn't necessarily have to be repaid in money if you are broke. It can always be paid in doing jobs done such as lawn or garden work, babysitting or something the lender wants or needs. That is the basis for the huge barter system in this country, and it works. A doctor could agree to have an out-of-work carpenter build storage units for an office or his home, as an example. The loan could be repaid that way, and both parties would be satisfied. Just a thought....

It all depends on what the agreement was in the first place. If I agreed to repay a loan from mom or a sibling or whomever in the family, IMO I am morally obligated to repay the loan in cash unless the agreement is renegotiated. If the money was given no strings attached, then I feel obligated to repay the kindness somehow though it doesn't necessarily have to be in money.
 
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