General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Lending money to someone is an aggressive, dangerous act [View all]The2ndWheel
(7,947 posts)It's not your numbers I was talking about, it was the scenario. If someone randomly comes up to you, gives you $100, and then says you now owe them $500, nobody is taking that $100. If you ask someone for $100, and as a condition of getting that money, they say you owe them $500, that makes more sense as an example.
If you're going to regulate how much the person giving the money can charge in interest, then you have to also regulate how much the person getting the money has to pay by a certain time. Both sides take a risk in the transaction.
As you say, lending money can be dangerous, for all sides. If there's little to no upside for the lender, why are they handing the borrower money? Especially in the impersonal, distant reality that we live in, where we're all nobody to each other.