How a payday lending industry insider tilted academic research in its favor
Source: Washington Post
How a payday lending industry insider tilted academic research in its favor
By Renae Merle February 25 at 2:58 PM
Shortly after the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau began preparing what would become the first significant federal regulations for the multibillion-dollar payday-lending industry, Hilary Miller went to work.
Miller, an attorney who has worked closely with the industry for more than a decade, contacted a Georgia professor with a proposal: Would she like to test one of the chief criticisms of the industry, that its customers are harmed by repeatedly taking out loans?
Over the next year, Miller worked closely with Jennifer Lewis Priestley, a professor of statistics and data science at Kennesaw State University, suggesting research to cite, the type of data to use and even lecturing her on proofreading. “Punctuation and capitalization are somewhat random,” he said in a February 2014 email responding to a draft of the report. “You might want to have your maiden aunt who went to high school before 1960 read this.”
Priestley’s report ultimately concluded that taking out repeated loans didn’t harm borrowers, and, according to the emails, Miller discussed the results with a CFPB economist. It’s unclear how it factored into bureau decisions, but it has been repeatedly touted by payday lending supporters.
Its origins shed new light on the extensive battle payday lenders have waged to influence and undermine federal regulations.
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Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2019/02/25/how-payday-lending-industry-insider-tilted-academic-research-its-favor/
