Watch John Oliver Explain How Payday Loans Are Awful


Payday lenders are awful, horrible scum who prey on the desperation of the working class. Payday loans are awful, horrible deals wherein a borrower gets a small amount of cash at an exceedingly high interest rate and agrees to pay it back in a short amount of time, typically two weeks. If a borrower can’t pay it back then they’re hit with an avalanche of fees and end up having to borrow more and then its a vicious cycle all the way down. According to the Center for Responsible Lending, the average borrower ends up paying $1,105 to borrow just $305.

On Sunday’s Last Week Tonight, John Oliver made these points and more in a way that will make you eventually run your head into a brick wall because you have no more tears left to shed.

Watch:

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Mother Jones was founded to do journalism differently. We stand for justice and democracy. We reject false equivalence. We go after stories others don’t. We’re a nonprofit newsroom, because the kind of truth-telling investigations we do doesn’t happen under corporate ownership.

And we need your support like never before, to fight back against the existential threats American democracy faces. Fundraising for nonprofit media is always a challenge, and we need all hands on deck right now. We have no cushion; we leave it all on the field.

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