Best way to help the poor is to take away their rights

This huffington post/ New York times article makes this case. The article bashes the credit settlement industry for "taking advantage of the most vulnerable in their time of need." Of course, this is not what the majority do. The majority get the debtor (the customer) to settle their debt with the credit agencies and take a portion of that settlement as fees. The vast majority of the people in the industry are honest people trying to help people out when they need it.

The worst part of this article is not the villification of the people working in a customer service industry, it is the fixes they are proposing. In order to protect the poor, we need to interfere with their right to contract in certain cases. This is absurd. The rich and powerful (Arianna Huffington and New York Times editor board) always return to this old cliche that the poor are just too stupid to make contracts for themselves that they feel is beneficial. No rational individual would enter into a contract, which this is, if they did not think it was their best bargain. When we begin to understand that, the NYT opinion becomes appallingly clear. They simply do not believe that poor people (or even middle class people who took on too much debt) are irrational to the extent we should remove some of their rights. I dare disagree.

I disagree not only because I think that these companies can sometimes help people, and they can. I disagree because the government should not ever interfere with my rights to improve myself. As long as I am not hurting anyone, who the heck is the government to tell me that I do not have the right to benfit myself, even if they view the facts differently. Do I wish that certain people acted differently? Sure but nothing gives me the right to force my will upon them and nothing (certainly not the constitution) allows the government to force their will upon me.

I just wait for articles like this to cease and the poor to finally get the respect they deserve.