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by secstate 3200 days ago
It would be an awful lot like the end of Fight Club. Destroy credit records, or reduce them to meaningless, either way the economy would collapse.

People can complain all they want about credit, but the reality is that it exists as a financial service because loaning things with interest is probably older than agriculture in human society. We've just gotten very good at risk assessment, and this going public would ruin our ability to assess risk for years.

Honestly, the credit industry ought to be the ones raging against Equifax's fuck up. If only all the other credit bureaus weren't on eggshells hoping they're not next.
4 comments
ProblemFactory 3200 days ago
Credit and existing credit records would still be easily available.

The only change would be that you need to present photo ID in person to open new credit lines... which doesn't seem that unreasonable really.

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mattmanser 3200 days ago
How have we got very good at assessing risk?

So far, I have had three phones signed up in my name (essentially stolen from the suppliers), can't easily get a mortgage because I own my own company, somehow making me riskier than people who earn half my income, and in the past had my credit card limit extended to £10,000 without asking when I was almost broke.

To me that doesn't sound like they're good at assessing risk at all, they're just blindly following extremely simple algos instead of knowing their customers.

The records wouldn't be rendered meaningless any way, the fundamental of a credit report is how much debt you already have and if you ever miss payments or have judgements against you. Then a lender compares that to your income.

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howard941 3200 days ago
> It would be an awful lot like the end of Fight Club

The film ended that way. The novel had a different, more Palahniuk-ish ending. Spoil it for yourself if you must at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fight_Club_(novel)

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mattrices 3200 days ago
> interest is probably older than agriculture

Offtopic I know, but quantitavie economics and bureaucracies were both borne out of agriculture; before that value was subjective.

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