I'm going to put my super-partisan hat on and say that I love the affordability stuff that the NDP announced.
I fantasize about a world where VISA doesn't get to rip me off. Wish Jack could have been Prime Minister before my student years.
The plan calls for:
- An end to hidden fees with laws requiring full disclosure of charges by banks, cellphone operators, and other companies, including the unfair practice of charging more for cellphone text messages.
- A ban on ATM fees "so you don't have to pay to get your own money," Layton said
- A tough price monitoring agency and a fuel prices ombudsman to "stop gas companies from having the arbitrary power to gouge Canadians."
- A cap on interest rates and fees charged by "fringe banks" on so-called "payday loans."
- A five per cent over prime cap on credit card interest rates
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5 comments:
An end to hidden fees with laws "requiring full disclosure of charges by banks, cellphone operators, and other companies, including the unfair practice of charging more for cellphone text messages."
Disclosure is good and needed but text messaging uses a commodity called bandwith, this bandwith is expensive to create and maintain and any company has the right to recoup expenses. Its not unfair to make a profit on your service and the market will kill those who gouge, the gov should only interfer if there is collusion to set that texting price.
"A ban on ATM fees "so you don't have to pay to get your own money," Layton said"
The companies also don't "have to" supply you 10s of thousands of conviniently placed ATMS, expect to wait in line for the shriking number of machines, or huge lines as they start adding more tellers and scrap the machines. People pay for this convinience and can still go wait in line so why is this an issue? They are not paying to get their money , they are paying to get their money when and where they want it which is a feature not a right of the banking business model
"A tough price monitoring agency and a fuel prices ombudsman to "stop gas companies from having the arbitrary power to gouge Canadians.""
Yes we are getting screwed over at some points in time but unless you nationalize oil, companies currently have the right to sell oil where they can get the best profit, therefore added regulation will lead to shortages as they ship more away, it's not fair but with private oil companies its a reality Jack seems to ignore. You can't make these changes without totaly changing the system. If he intends to change the entire system that's fair but tell us how.
"A cap on interest rates and fees charged by "fringe banks" on so-called "payday loans.""
These are places are criminal and predatory in operation but really the Gov should just open micro banks to cash cheques, offer consolidation loans, no fee savings accounts and MOST importantly credit counseling to get people out of this trap. Crush them with fair competition and needed services not more regulation.
"A five per cent over prime cap on credit card interest rates"
at this time in the U.S. deliquency on credit cards is nearly 5% so even Canadian banks could lose money offering credit in this economic reality at a fixed margin. Also banks are not requied to offer credit and if you set a margin which "they" deem uneconomical, they will simply stop offering credit as is their right. It would not hurt my feelings because I generally don't use credit but many people foolishly rely on it. If banks stop offering it they are screwed.
Some of these are real and valid issues, some are not but the answers are populous babbling not thought out refined answers.
Good for Jack! I like all the plans, but in the meantime here's a tip for your Visa issues:
- make sure you regularly in the BLACK for about 500-1000 dollars on your Visa account (yes, you can do that).
That way you loose out only about $30 max a year (3% of 1000), a lot less than many pay on interest each month!
In general it pays to not spend more money than you have....
In any case, use debit/interac when you pay at small businesses. For businesses there's only a set fee for each transaction when clients use debit (about $0.25 I believe) but Visa charges businesses a percentage of each sale as well; Visa rips businesses off too!
Big businesses have far better deals with Visa so I wouldn't worry to much about them :)
Green Assasin Bullshit:
Disclosure is good and needed but text messaging uses a commodity called bandwith
The bandwidth of a text message compared to say a phone call of 20 seconds is about 0.000000001 percent, and that's an understatement. Charging double for an already outragious rate is pure gauching.
The companies also don't "have to" supply you 10s of thousands of conviniently placed ATMS, expect to wait in line for the shriking number of machines,
Bullshit. In Holland banks can charge a maximum of .25 cents per transaction and the waiting lines are not any longer than in Canada, and they are on every corner.
These essence is that machines that make .25 cents a pop are still making profit; I actually wouldn't mind having one myself :)
These [fringe banks] are criminal and predatory
But Greens don't care about criminals.
at this time in the U.S. deliquency on credit cards is nearly 5% so even Canadian banks could lose money offering credit
Green assassin doens't seem to have been reading any news lately; banks together wit Visa and Mastercard make HUGE profits on their credit card service. A little less wouldn't hurt them.
GREENS are the new NEO-LIBERALS; welcome to the show.
These are my beefs with these policies I did not bother to check our policy, don't blame the party for me.
Bandwith requirements are growing some is massive spam(which I agree no one but the sender should pay for)video, web etc. I see this infrastructure being built daily in the telcos, its what I do, its not cheap.
Even if text is being over charged let the market work, there is no crime here, change providers, cancel the text option, raise hell but why always over regulate?
Why uses a Holland comparison for Canada,? the argument is weak because of the differences in population densities at least use the U.S. or Auz as a baseline, both large and sparce like us not small and dense like holland.
Telephone, rail, atm costs all reflect the amount of infrastructure needed to supply a service,per person per mile, per person per call, per person per transaction. These services can never be as cheap as Holland if a national average is used. Sure the golden horseshoe could probably get that cheap but not all of Canada.
Besides it still does not deal with the fact people choose to use these machines, if you don't like the fees don't use them. Between a minimum balance(I know not every has the min but for most people 1k is not an issue) and refusal to use anything but my bank's machines I never pay a fee.
This week showed what a country of pissed off people can do, if people were really angry about these fees they'd do something. They don't so there is no issue.
"But Greens don't care about criminals."
Nice argument for what was a better proposal to kill payday loan companies (from a nobody like me) than Jack could generate.
Bite me!
Why do people use credit then whine about the cost, don't keep a balance or move it to a credit line at months end? I agree teaser rates and hidden fees are evil and should be disclosed or banned but no one is forcing them to use credit cards and no one has the right to tell a publicly traded company what fair return on investment is. NO only that but it's sure to get an NDP government sued under both NAFTA and WTO rules, and the banks will win. As they will with the attempt to regulate oil prices.
Credit card defaults are nearly at the set margin you are willing to let cards companies charge. Would you loan money at 5% when defaults are 4.86% a .14% margin ? Because I'll take 10K if you're offering.
http://calculatedrisk.blogspot.com/2008/05/fed-delinquency-rates-rose-sharply-in.html
actually I'm a soft libertarian leaning Green who believes in the Gold standard. No political home for me but at least I'm trying to save the planet rather than coddle the dolts who live on it.
GREENS are the new NEO-LIBERALS, and you perfectly fit-in, Green Assassin!
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